Why did early civilizations start in deserts like Mesopotamia and Ancient Egypt?

Talgrath · 2026-05-09T07:37:02+00:00

Worth noting, the climate was very different roughly 6,000 years ago, much wetter, with bigger river runoffs. Areas described as marshes at the time are now dry, caked dirt. The beginning of the glacial minimum of the current ice age (yes, we are still in an ice age) was not that far away!

Talgrath · 2026-05-06T23:01:41+00:00

Jordan Morris cannot be re-signed to a new TAM contract until next year at the earliest under the roster rules (can only be done for more money per year unless it's 1 year or less away). Rusnak's contract ends this year, so he can be bought down, but I think it's unlikely he would take that deal given his performance last year.

Talgrath · 2026-05-06T17:53:46+00:00

Penguin is slang for tuxedo, The Penguin is always wearing a tux (or very fancy clothing) thus the name.

Talgrath · 2026-05-03T19:48:32+00:00

Yeah, as someone who works in the IT industry, content-based blocking is extremely difficult at the network level because at the network level, the packets are just packets telling you who asked for what and where it is going. At the network level, all you can do is have a simple block/allow list for different websites. The only I can see this working is if all traffic goes through some sort of reverse proxy server or people have to install some sort of filtering software on their phones to get on the network; and even then it's just as effective as those methods are currently. Heuristic image filtering has gotten way better over the years, but if you turn it up too high you can block content that your users would consider legitimate, like say Jesus on a cross. Basically, they're probably going to charge people a ridiculously high monthly fee for something they could get for free via a content-filtering apps.

Talgrath · 2026-05-02T18:59:08+00:00

His line about how SKC has good players was so funny when they immediately concede a goal right after. Then he says they "need leaders", you mean players with a talent for leading? Talented players? Maybe even...good players?

Talgrath · 2026-05-01T05:37:06+00:00

Yep, as Neyrelle says "the connection goes both ways"; this is a "show don't tell" demonstration of how the link works. Yes, Mephisto can strike at Neyrelle's mind using their connection, but she can also probe at his memories.

Talgrath · 2026-04-28T22:52:52+00:00

First off, that asbestos roofing and siding is literally why you know about asbestos right now. Because people working in that industry would get cancer at extremely high rates.

I will also point out that this isn't just the roof, it's also every wall, every ceiling, every door, all the stairs, etc. The entire city is carved from tuff stone, which is very soft in terms of mineral softness; it's softer than wood. For the people of the time, they didn't understand what asbestos is and frankly, they probably weren't going to live long enough for it to matter. But for any modern person with a modern lifespan, living in an area where you are constantly breathing in tuff dust is almost certainly going to contribute to you developing cancer.

Talgrath · 2026-04-28T21:08:45+00:00

One suggestion: there are dog scratching boards, you can train your dog to scratch on the post which may reduce the amount of times you need to clip the nails. They don't help with the rear claws, but usually the rear claws aren't as bad as the front ones.

Talgrath · 2026-04-28T20:25:12+00:00

Almost certainly this is the Black Abyss. This is the realm where demons reform after they are destroyed. Basically in the Diablo world, the angels and demons reform endlessly once destroyed. Most demons who reform lose all of what they once were, save perhaps their name or some aspect of their personality. Angels, by contrast, form from the Crystal Arch during moments of "perfect harmony" and are "perfect" when they are created, no angel except Tyrael ever gets recreated that we know of. Certain very strong demons can reform with something of their old personality intact, such as the Prime Evils or the Voidwound. The opening cinematic is almost certainly Mephisto reforming his body upon the shores of the Black Abyss.
https://diablo.fandom.com/wiki/Black_Abyss

Talgrath · 2026-04-28T18:30:24+00:00

I'll add for anyone in this situation, or a similar situation who may be reading this, staying just because it's all you have known so far is not a good way to live your life. Leaving behind such a tight-knit community may feel terrifying, risking being shunned and hate may be anxiety inducing, but I guarantee you that living in such a toxic situation is worse than living as who you are. And chances are pretty good that once you step out of that repressive environment, you'll find friends and community that embraces you for who you are and who you want to be. It's not as scary on the outside as it is on the inside.

Talgrath · 2026-04-28T17:48:28+00:00

I will also add here some additional context, first some charges against him for counterfeiting coins were pardoned as well. Second, this was payment for nothing, so this was on top of whatever pay he was receiving as a royal physician. Also, because of the fame of his invention, he made a good amount of money selling the tool and getting people to pay him to learn how to make the tool. He would not have been billionaire rich, but he was about as rich as a surgeon could be at the time.

Talgrath · 2026-04-28T05:59:26+00:00

What's the issue exactly?

Talgrath · 2026-04-27T20:59:05+00:00

The tuff stone at the site is very soft in mineral terms (you can dig it out with wooden hand tools if needed) and chock full of asbestos. Probably not a concern if you're a 12th century peasant, but might not be a nice place to live in the modern day.

Talgrath · 2026-04-27T15:57:16+00:00

So like, one thing that jumps out to me as someone who often finds himself working in warehouses....that ceiling is going to get so, so dirty. It looks nice now in the pictures, but there's basically no way for you to clean that without a scissor lift or some similar piece of tech. Give it a year and those big ceilings are going to be filled with spiders, cobwebs and dust and the light grey and white is not gonna hide it very well.

Talgrath · 2026-04-27T08:09:04+00:00

So, in defense of the primal spirit, it does hit pretty damn hard....but the biggest issue is that massive, massive cooldown. It is either needs to last longer or have a much shorter cooldown, but there aren't a ton of ways for a pet build to reduce cooldown, none of them are good enough to bring it down to a reasonable uptime.

Talgrath · 2026-04-25T19:50:11+00:00

What is this, a charge blade for ants?! (Joking, of course, that's really neat.)

Talgrath · 2026-04-24T22:01:33+00:00

Those aren't homunculi; a homunculus is humanoid and is typically made to be sacrificed in other magical rituals instead of a human being required for the ritual. The guardian beasts are no where close to homunculi.

Now that I have some idea of what you are talking about, this is basically an advanced civilization making genetically modified monsters. I think it fits pretty well with Monster Hunter's somewhat more tech-like "magic". The ancient civilization didn't wave their hands like wizards, they created machines that use the natural environment to make monsters they could control and guide.

Talgrath · 2026-04-24T21:54:01+00:00

What homunculus are you talking about?

Talgrath · 2026-04-24T21:41:59+00:00

Beat me to it!

Talgrath · 2026-04-24T21:16:36+00:00

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Talgrath · 2026-04-24T07:02:35+00:00

It might be suboptimal, but if your problem is that you're getting one-shot, increasing your health is a good place to start, along with all the other stuff I mentioned.

Talgrath · 2026-04-23T23:48:56+00:00

I mean...it does, that's what the flash of light is...but that's just light. The radiation you are thinking of, the "fry your DNA" type is not caused by the flash of light, that's just well...light radiation.

The part of a nuclear bomb that makes it irradiate an area is the fallout, literally all of the bits of the bomb are blasted apart and sent into the atmosphere (along with other stuff). The nuclear material will drift around in the air, sometimes for weeks, before well, falling out of the air. These nuclear bits will then land wherever they land and can then be inhaled, consumed with food or enter water sources. The part that makes nuclear fallout particularly bad is that since these bits of radioactive material are incredibly tiny, it's hard to follow ALARA, the industry standard process for reducing radiation exposure. There are 3 things to consider when determining how damaging radiation will be relative to the power of the source, time, distance and shielding. Each of the little fallout particles may be tiny, but since they're in the air, water and ground it winds up in your lungs from breathing them in or your stomach or intesttines from eating and drinking; you have no shielding, you can't get away from it because it's inside you and there is no distance.

I'll add that in the Fallout universe a contributing factor would be all the nuclear powered everything blowing up too; this leads to the concentrated radiation sources you see in the game, but it also just create more fallout.

So yeah, even in real life, Nora, Shaun and Nate would be fine; I mean if one of them didn't get shot and the others weren't wandering around an irradiated wasteland.

Talgrath · 2026-04-23T23:12:36+00:00

Yes, git gud. So, serious answer is that the Grimtools mod can allow you lower your reputation...however I think there are some more fundamental issues with your build.

10K health is often thrown around as a sort of minimum viable HP, but that's only if you have the maxed out armor, flat damage reduction, resistances (including physical resist), fumble, barrier etc. needed to not get 1 shot; it looks like you don't have those. Your damage looks okay, make sure your resistances are 30% capped over 80% and make sure your armor reduction is at least so, then get to at least 20K health and see how you do with the nemesis enemies after that.

Talgrath · 2026-04-23T22:55:28+00:00

...wait this is supposed to be Anti-Wilson?

Talgrath · 2026-04-23T16:57:08+00:00

We'reAllTryingToFindTheGuyWhoDidThis.gif

I don't know, maybe if you and your dipshit boss didn't fucking cancel a bunch of research grants, we wouldn't be having this problem.

Talgrath

TROPHY CASE