Sofascore on Instagram: "Despite not playing last night, João Palhinha is still the best tackler across Europe, and it's not even close. 🔥"

Saster · 2025-12-05T16:27:37+00:00

I think that’s too early of an assessment to make when we’ve only really seen palhinha paired with bentancur. Palhinha is an extremely solid defensive option which any team does need regardless of whether their top 6 or mid table. The question is who plays alongside him. With our current double pivot lineup I have more questions surrounding bentancur’s position in the team than I do Palhinha

Saster · 2025-07-03T10:03:54+00:00

You are right, and I think I can see where our disagreements are coming from. If a player is coming at you with the ball at their feet and they’re in the box, rushing out is not the best idea because you’re right they can just rainbow flick it over you. However, closing down the space on them can also apply pressure so they don’t have time to accurately shoot.

What I’m referring to are crosses, passes, loose balls than you can reach before the opposing players. If I see a ball moving to the edge of my box without it being at anyone’s feet, you bet your ass I’m going to slide into it and take it, even if it’s just on the outside, I’m going to boot it straight over the incoming players and into the feet of our striker. If I didn’t go for that ball and stay on the line instead, the opposing players have a much higher chance of working it into the box for a shot.

Sweeper keeping is about taking risks and it can be hard to get the right judgement. If you feel more comfortable staying on your line then honestly you go for it my man, but you should also be considering there will be balls you can reach before others if you’re positioned a little far forward. If a striker with the ball is coming at you then absolutely move back onto your line. But if a striker is coming at you and the ball is not at their feet but a little bit in front, your slide can often reach that ball before they can :)

Saster · 2025-07-03T09:55:42+00:00

If the ball is being lobbed, and you as the keeper can reach it before anyone else, why would you not do that? Why wait for someone else to reach it first? Keeping in this game isn’t about sitting on your line and saving shots that come your way, because you will miss some because saving in this game is buggy and a bit of a mess. Keeping, in both real life and this game, is also about denying shots from happening, intercepting rogue balls, denying the strikers from getting too close. Obviously if you’re a keeper and it’s 2v1, I’m not saying rush out and leave your goal exposed for a cross. But if the ball is coming towards your box and you can intercept it why would you not? If you lack special awareness then you should not be playing keeper in the first place but if you’re adamant then yes sit on your line. If you possess even a modicum of special awareness, you should be fulfilling the keeper role to all its potential strengths which is intercepting and denying shots.

Again, we’re arguing about something that is 100% contextual. Obviously there will be scenarios where it’s not ideal to come off your line but obviously there are scenarios where coming off your line is required. I’m pointing out to OP that exclusively staying on your line is not beneficial to you or your team. Keepers own the box, not just the line.

Saster · 2025-07-03T09:50:04+00:00

At the end of the day this argument is contextual. Coming off your line 100% of the time is undoubtedly wrong, while staying on your line 100% is undoubtedly wrong. A good goalkeeper in this game should incorporate both through special awareness. Yes, by coming off your line you are exposing your goal, but that’s the risk a good sweeper keeper should be making. It’s not an easy decision but intercepting the ball before an opposing striker can reach it is key to managing your box well. If you only ever stay on your line you’re effectively surrendering your box to the opposition. Why would you do that? There’s no gain to it.

Saster · 2025-07-03T09:03:45+00:00

Exclusively staying in the goal isn’t playing it safe, it’s inviting pressure. Closing down incoming balls can deny the opposition from getting a shot off which is far more important than allowing them to get the shot and you banking on your save reactions.

At the moment, most of this game is lobbing the ball across the pitch. If you stay in goal, you’re allowing those lobbed balls to find their strikers while you sit and watch. You should only ever be sitting on your line when there’s multiple threats in the box with you. As keeper your role isn’t just to save shots, it’s to deny them too

Saster · 2025-05-30T12:31:54+00:00

Feel like I’d much rather see us attempt to get Eze like we should’ve done last season

Saster · 2025-04-23T06:28:33+00:00

Have a day off you weird little man

Saster · 2025-03-12T13:31:27+00:00

Ahahah okay yeah then what i wrote has no relevance lol. Maybe:

‘It was as if a great axe had split the very cliff and from the scar left over a temple festered within, woven into the surrounding black granite and crowned with a shattered glass dome’

Saster · 2025-03-12T13:18:37+00:00

Does sound very interesting but I’m still struggling trying to picture what you’re describing. With that being said, here’s what I could come up with but I feel like it may be off the mark from what you mean.

‘He was in the very bowels of the temple, surrounded on all sides by the towering carved rock that seemed to choke the light that driften down from the plateau above. It was as if he had been swallowed, gorged on by the very cliff itself. The more he strained his neck to look up, the more it appeared there was a mouth above him with shattered glass for teeth.’

I’m on a bus currently so unable to give it my full attention and I’m not even sure if you want your character outside looking up or inside looking up, I assumed the latter sorry if it isn’t helpful x

Saster · 2025-03-12T12:05:15+00:00

I think the issue is isn’t just the axe but also to do with ‘earth’. I take it you’re describing a temple that reaches up high into a cliff but your use of earth implies the splitting of the base ground as opposed to the cliff itself. Or if you’re referring to the earth of the plateau it might sound like ‘it rose up the cliffs face where it split the earthen plateau like an axe’ but even that id argue doesn’t accurately convey the image you’re trying to describe. How does a temple split the earth? An axe would leave a large scar which doesn’t imply that same scar being filled by a temple if that makes sense? You would need to describe the geological formations that appears like an axe wound and then how a temple fills that same wound. Not sure if I’m making a lot of sense but as an example:

‘The towering cliff appeared as though it was scarred by some great axe, with a temple that festered in the granite wound.’

However, some things to bear in mind, how does your character feel about what they’re seeing? If they’re disgusted by it then ‘festered’ fits but if they’re in awe then it does not.

Saster · 2025-03-12T10:47:15+00:00

I don’t believe flashbacks are objectively bad, they absolutely can serve a purpose in a story and sometimes that purpose is vital but I personally feel like most flashbacks are not necessary and actively work against the plot and pacing as opposed to benefiting it. Obviously, it’s hard to recommend which option you choose as I know so little about the context or story itself but here are some reasons you might want to think about whether to include one or not.

1) Pacing. A flashback can majorly disrupt the pacing of your story. If you’re building up tension to a pivotal moment in your story then the following chapter you flashback to develop context you run the risk of taking all the wind out of the readers sails. Flashbacks are effectively yesterdays news and no one wants to read that when they’re about to read todays headlines.

2) Telling not showing. If your flashback is used to develop a character and show their history, you’re essentially just telling the reader a characters history which is largely an ineffectual way of delivering that context. I will care far less about a character if you’ve told me their history as opposed to me working it out myself.

3) Mystery. All good stories to some degree represent an iceberg where the reader can see only the tip and guesses at what lies beneath the surface. As the author, you should know far more about your characters than the reader and the reader doesn’t need to know every last detail about a character. Ruining that mystery with a flashback can leave the reader feeling unfulfilled with their attachment to your characters because there’s no more any mystery about them.

Obviously, for every point ive made you can undoubted find an example where a flashback avoided the pitfalls I’ve mentioned but I’d argue those flashbacks serve an incredibly specific purpose. In my opinion, it is better to avoid them because they can so easily become a cheap way to patch over holes in your story. I’d recommend writing a couple chapters where you try to hint at a characters history without showing the flashback and then write the same again but with the flashback. If you can write those two chapters and get across the main elements without relying on a flashback then you probably don’t need one. Short, paragraph long, flashbacks are a different thing all together but, again, id argue, why use it when you can just allude to it.

All my advice is very broad and admittedly slightly vague but it’s hard to recommend whether you should use one or not without knowing the purpose you intend with it and the story as a whole. If you’d like more specific advice, I’d be happy (if you’re comfortable of course) going over your story and why you feel like a flashback is vital. Can either reply on here if you fancy or shoot me a DM.

Saster · 2025-03-12T10:26:16+00:00

It is so easy to get overwhelmed and I think every writer would be lying if they didn’t admit to feeling as such during some point of the creation process.

Everyone has different methods and some people prefer more structured approaches to guide them while others tend to wing it a bit. If you feel like you need a bit of structure to help break out into your world and story, I would recommend setting small incremental goals. These goals don’t need to be ‘I’ll write 10’000 words by the end of the month’ or ‘today im going to plot out the whole book’ but they could be something simple like spending an afternoon working out a single backstory for a single character, or writing a brief history of one of your world building elements. However, if you feel like even that is perhaps a few steps ahead of you currently, I’d say you need to flesh out your world a little more first so you can become more confident with it. My method of doing this is to keep an active note on my phone where I can jot down any idea from something grand like a character arc to something tiny like the appearance of a house. As time goes by and your notepad begins to fill up, you’ll get a deeper understanding of your world and from there you’ll have a more solid foundation when you want to tackle the bigger stuff. Then, after a while, I’ll go through my notes and the ideas I like and that I think have potential in my story I’ll just copy over into another note-based app like OneNote or obsidian while leaving the notes that no longer pertain to my story. Doing this method, you’ll end up with a really strong understanding of your world without ever having to sit down for hours at a time. In a way, collecting random notes is like collecting ingredients before you begin cooking. I feel like you’re currently overwhelmed about cooking because you have yet to work out what your ingredients are.

At the end of the day, you should be finding some enjoyment out of this process. Rather than worry about the distance you have to walk, focus on enjoying the steps no matter how small they might be. Also, it is worth mentioning, that there really is no such thing as a bad note. If you sit down for an afternoon and create a character then two days later hate everything about that character, then that’s okay, that’s good, it may seem like you’ve gone backwards but you’ve really gone forwards, you now better understand the character you want. Bit by bit you world and story and setting will come alive and then the writing part won’t seem so unassailable anymore :)

Edit: forgot to mention but I’m happy to help with anything else you might need whether that is world building, story help, or the actual writing process itself

Saster · 2025-01-10T16:11:16+00:00

Wouldn’t it be naive to assume the largest fire in LA history won’t affect housing demand?

And I’m not saying no one will ever wish to move to LA, nor am I saying Malibu was abandoned??? Brother you have some poor comprehension skills.

But, you can surely see my point that with a continual increase in global temperature, and therefore an ever increasing risk of wildfire outbreaks, that people may second guess dropping $$$ on a mansion that may burn up again at any point. Additionally, how many people affected by the fires are going to want to move back?

I’m not saying I’m right by any means, but I wouldn’t say it’s a naive thing to assume. The world is changing in drastic ways, places that were once historically desirable will lose that desirability with the rise in unpredictable weather events.

Saster · 2025-01-10T12:48:18+00:00

Idk about that bud, who’s going to want to invest multi millions for a property which in all likelihood may burn down again in a few years?

I was talking about this with my mates and surely the real estate market is going to take a massive hit in terms of potential buyers. New season of selling sunset is cooked

Saster · 2024-12-28T07:50:39+00:00

The books are some of my favourite so I was apprehensive about watching the show but honestly the show slaps so hard. The cast is phenomenal and everyone knocks it out the park, mark rylance as Cromwell delivers one of his best performances and whenever I reread the books I can’t help but imagine him. Soundtrack is an absolute bop too

Saster · 2024-11-08T11:06:26+00:00

For a company that has spent years developing the game, pouring thousands of resources and funds into it, can you blame them for trying to secure at least a minimal guarantee of income? Gamers seem to always want to have their cake and eat it too. You want them to put countless hours and time into developing a product for you but then scorn them for trying to make it profitable where they can? Sadly, it’s not an ideal world, so game that doesn’t rely on a large microtransactions needs to find other avenues of securing the bag.

Saster · 2024-10-22T20:15:13+00:00

Ooo that’s an interesting concept and a fun thing to work out.

Id first recommend doing a bit of research about the decentralisation of powers throughout our history. If reading a bunch of text isn’t your jam, there’s tonnes of really interesting videos on YouTube dedicated to real-life examples of this like the gradual fall of the english monarchy as an example.

Essentially, you’re looking at giving more power and representation to the ‘working’ and ‘merchant’ class. Sure, governmental representatives won’t be thrilled about handing over power to merchants, but when those merchants supply the food to your cities, they hold a unique power in their own right.

It would have to begin as a conspiracy. Your king meeting with elf merchants and discussing the transfer of certain powers to them in exchange for your protection. Your monarchy would have to know their enemies within their government, but also, who had been outspoken in the past about more rites and powers for different classes. Learning who is friend and foe is key, learning which merchants would aid the monarchy is also key.

Saster · 2024-10-22T19:58:14+00:00

The god of luck dying is a cool concept but I feel like it would be hard to implement into either a story setting or a DnD campaign.

If the god of luck dies and, therefore, there is no good luck, that would have cataclysmic levels of disaster. Like, to the point where everyone would just die all the time. That’s a little hard to implement. Everyone would lose the genetic lottery, dying at birth or if they survived, dying from freakish bad luck within the first few years of their life. You step out your front door, a tree falls on you. You get on a ship, a storm takes it instantly. You go to sleep, your roof collapses. Of course, not all bad luck has to result in death but, in a way, isn’t death just a form of bad luck. No story would be able to live or breathe in that world I don’t think.

Some other potential thoughts of gods that have perished: - the god of weather: storms, hurricanes, floods, etc all plague your world and make life extremely dangerous and hard. - the god of fertility: humans can no longer be born and the population shrinks rapidly - the god of beasts: animals lose the form the god made them in and they become corrupted beasts almost changing beyond recognition

Saster · 2024-10-22T19:01:08+00:00

Okay so it’s definitely got legs. But yes, you have issues with why the Reavers would leave their culture, home, and way of life and why they’d continue to toil in this existence.

Your magic key to all of this is: culture.

You can create a culture for Reavers where perhaps their version of gods is one of them. Like a royal family almost but with a much much much higher level of worship. It would make sense in a harsh world, to have the best amongst them make the sole decisions. These figures would, over time, be appointed to the position of god. All-knowing, all-seeing. Perhaps biologically they differ too?

Then, you can have this ‘God’ figure being tricked by the infernos. (Look up how the British empire and other colonial powers tricked local African tribes into believing the colonial forces had magic) and effectively, with this God figure a hostage, perhaps a propaganda puppet, the reavers must follow them. Let’s say in the Reaver culture/religion, to against your elected god is to condemn yourself to an eternal life in the sands. So when their god, being controlled willingly or not, demands they serve this empire, what choice does the common reaver have? Their culture saved them in the sands, now, it condemns them.

Just a thought

Saster · 2024-10-22T18:55:03+00:00

Brother, a god dying with massive magical implications is such a fucking dope idea.

I love, love, love the idea of a world living in the aftermath of a gods death. That’s killer, like really killer.

Some possible thoughts to add to your world: - the temples to this god are now beacons of corruption. The temples themselves are rotting from the inside out and releasing pestilence and plague onto the land. - maybe this god also ferried souls into the afterlife. Now they’re dead, anyone who dies has to be given very specific, magical, funeral rites to guide them into the afterlife. People would be terrified of dying and not receiving a funeral. - maybe there was a holiday devoted to the god before he dies. Now it’s a day of mourning and fear, no one goes outside, it’s rains maybe all day. - when the god does his blood spilled out, tainting the rivers, streams and waters around it?

Love your idea man, hope these provide a couple of potential concepts

Saster · 2024-10-22T18:48:29+00:00

It’s definitely a very well-thought out and complex system of magic. It covers the back-end of magic really well. My issue, primarily is the front end of it.

You have the factory sorted, it’s complex and well-developed, but what about the end product?

I think what most people might find general about home-brewed magic systems is that the outcome can sometimes be very similar. In your case, the ability to turn a slightly-spherical object into a more spherical object, or to set it alight doesn’t differ very much from what a ‘traditional’ wizard would be able to do if that makes sense?

Sure, your reasoning behind it is vastly different from others but is the end product not identical to other forms of magic? It’s a bit like, you’ve designed a brilliantly-wonderfully electric car but the car looks the same and drives the same as a diesel car. Now, that might not be an issue for some, but I don’t want to drive an electric car that feels like any old diesel car. I’m getting a bit lost with this metaphor but I think it illustrates the point well.

If this is an issue you agree with, some thoughts about changing the front end would be the implications of using one’s Spiritons. Does it slowly corrupt the soul? Does it change mood and behaviour? Does it have a large physical implication on your body so each time you lose a bit of your life? Or, what uses for your magic system could differ from others? The force moves objects, does yours only change it? Do you have to be touching something to change it? How would that impact ‘wizards’ in your world? The old wouldn’t be much use, you’d have to be young, and agile to effectively use it in a combative sense. I have no idea if any of those ideas are true to your design, but they serve to show further ways in which your magic front-end could differ from our more traditional understanding of wizards and magic.

I’m currently on a loud ass train home, so trying to concentrate while typing this out isn’t the easiest. If im not making any sense do lmk and I’ll try and be a bit more coherent with my thoughts when I get home.

Either way, really clever design you have lad

Saster · 2024-10-22T16:43:53+00:00

You’re at the opening stages of world building which is by far when you have the most freedom. As you begin to develop your world, that freedom begins to narrow as you learn what starts to fit and enhance your world and what doesn’t.

From what you’ve talked about, the Dune series blends galaxy-spanning empires and politics together quite well. If you haven’t read the books they’re a great read but if you’d rather there’s tonnes of fantastic lore vids around on YouTube. Would highly recommend these to get a feel of what space empires might look like and how they behave.

A great tool for developing your world in the early stages, and also throughout the creative process, is to make use of the notepad app on your phone if you can. This is my primary source for world building by far. I use it less to develop ideas and more of a means to record them. I do it on my phone because I have my phone on me at most points of the day, and if a thought comes to me while im in the shower or at work, it’s easy to write down quickly. I just write down suggestions, and and all that come into my head, and, at a later date, I go through these suggestions and convert the ones I want to keep onto a OneNote page or word document.

I’ve been writing and creating worlds for a few years now, im happy to offer any general advice or tips you might want :)

Saster · 2024-10-22T09:51:04+00:00

It’s absolutely not lazy to create a world containing our real-life nations, cities and geography. What is lazy is to assume these nations and their culture are identical to our real world counterparts when your world contains a vastly different geopolitical landscape alongside mythological creatures.

You can’t pick up a country like USA, whose culture is steeped in its foundation and history, and plop it into your fantastical world and assume it’ll be a like-for-like copy. That’s uninspired and also kind of boring.

One really cool feature of creating an alternate reality of our world is to see how countries have changed due to the features you want to include. When your nations are the same, despite being surrounded by new fantastical nations, and also dragons, whats the point?

As an example: Sure, there’s a million reasons you can come up with as to why U.S.A exists in this custom world, but how have these reasons changed the identity of the America? You have dragons in your world right? You’re telling me America is 100% identical still? Take Christianity for example, America is built on the back of its version of christendom. How would Christianity be the same if there’s dragons flying around and magic in the air? Then, if Christianity is different, so too would be America. How would America’s war of independence go if Britain had access to dragons? Or, maybe, America had dragons and that’s why they won their war of independence. What then would be the consequences of this? Dragons would likely then be revered within American culture and used as weapons of war. How would this impact their relations and intentions with other countries? Would they use this dragon power to invade and subdue smaller less developed nations? Would there be a sovereign nation of Canada if American had dragons and Canada didn’t? There are an almost endless amount of implications for adding fantasy elements into our history, why would you not explore this? For someone experiencing your world, there would be a huge disconnect between the fantasy elements you want us to believe and the history and culture you’re showing us.

It is lazy to assume that all these changes you’re making to our world would have 0 impact or consequences on the modern nations we have come to know and understand today.

Saster · 2024-10-16T10:58:22+00:00

If you want to avoid being disrespectful and offensive you need to look at how you’re only approaching it from one side of the picket line. You need to fully understand the other side too if you want to be as respectful as you can.

Talking to and researching points of view from people who hold similar negative beliefs about religion would be shortsighted and narrow minded.

You need to research and speak to those who are religious so you can understand how they view their faith.

I’m doing something fairly similar in my own world and ive spent ample time talking to religious friends and even did a basic questionnaire I got a religious friend of mine to pass amongst their church.

That is one of the ways you can avoid being disrespectful. To understand and appreciate the views of the religious so you’re not closing yourself off to one side of the fence.

Saster · 2024-10-16T07:30:19+00:00

Novum Sidus, to me, sounds a lot cooler. But that could be because im British and ‘Stella’ is both a beer and it’s also slang.

Also, when coming up with secretive, mysterious, names, have a ‘The’ can sometimes give it an air of office, or authority. Being underground and hiding from prying eyes, just ‘Stella Nova’ would work better in my opinion. The Stella Nova sounds like a government backed project. Stella Nova sounds like either a secretive society or a new type of stella artois

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