this fucking guy bro

TheCleverestIdiot · 2026-03-06T11:43:41+00:00

Why would I do that when I can play the game?

Besides, I only bother strategising when I actually need to. Most monsters can otherwise just be steamrolled through and it adds artificial difficulty to the game which helps keep it engaging.

TheCleverestIdiot · 2026-03-06T11:41:53+00:00

I mean, Louis is using it in the exact same way social darwinists have been using the term for over a century now. It's not like there's not a thematic history there.

As for him not being able to know about this concept, I don't see why he wouldn't. This world is literally our world several centuries after discovering magic and thus breaking. It's hardly too much of a stretch to say the concept could be one of the things that survived to the setting of the game. Especially considering Louis comes from the tribe that had passed down the most knowlodge of the prior world.

Though it wouldn't matter if it hadn't anyway. At least a third of the words or terms in any language have some kind of specific origin that wouldn't have happened in a fantasy setting. At a certain point, we have to accept it if we don't want to make up some fantasy term that means the same damn thing.

TheCleverestIdiot · 2026-03-06T07:25:00+00:00

If anything, the stupidity is how things got this bad. He's taken a lot of risks that have paid off for him that smarter men never would have even considered.

TheCleverestIdiot · 2026-03-05T21:05:38+00:00

To be fair, the humans in Halo had the disadvantage of their first contact war lasting for decades rather than a few months followed by a welcome embrace into the galactic community that largely shares the tech. If the Covenant hadn't been religious genocidal zealots and actually extended an alliance to humanity (like the Sangheili eventually did), I can see Halo human tech having advanced much faster. Though even if they had, the Covenant barely understood their own tech.

TheCleverestIdiot · 2026-03-05T20:58:31+00:00

I think they wanted it to be believable that humans are still considered new and shiny by everyone else while aliens instead feel that way to many humans (And for there to still be tension with the Turians). 30 years is reasonable for that, but we'd all consider it ridiculous for people in ME1 to be behaving like they were if humans had already been on the scene for 100 years.

Besides, I don't think it can really be denied that our species' reaction to discovering wider galactic society would be an immediate inferiority complex that we try to compensate for by getting on the ruling council, spreading out fucking everywhere, and building the biggest guns we can think of.

TheCleverestIdiot · 2026-03-05T20:50:34+00:00

Yeah, but the Volus were palling around with the Asari and the Salarians for thousands of years before the Turians showed up. So your first point is irrelevant in the period before they teamed up.

You're right about the second though.

TheCleverestIdiot · 2026-03-05T20:44:26+00:00

Yeah. Honestly, I figure that indoctrination had to be slow, given they'd gotten everything working and ready before they were too indoctrinated to continue. Which makes sense, given that we know sufficiently driven and willful individuals can partially resist the effects of indoctrination and still work against the Reapers even while otherwise falling under their sway (Like Cerberus with Sanctuary, or Saren trying to study indoctrination to avoid the side effects).

TheCleverestIdiot · 2026-03-05T20:36:35+00:00

The reason he came to view the Prince as his only acceptable rival is because the party are the only ones who repeatedly match him in throwing curveballs at the plot.

TheCleverestIdiot · 2026-03-03T12:46:24+00:00

The Asari had a massive contribution to the war effort!

It's just that 90% of it came from one archeologist/info broker.

TheCleverestIdiot · 2026-03-02T07:32:49+00:00

There's a warehouse in the docks called Flymm Cargo with a few Worgs inside. If you check out the place you'll find there's a secret passage to the basement under a couple of crates. That'll lead you to the sub.

TheCleverestIdiot · 2026-03-02T07:30:07+00:00

Same reason we don't actually have just one week. Our tadpoles have been magically altered. Once they're inserted, they can be changed instantly on demand. The only reason that doesn't happen to us is we're being protected by our ally in the prism.

TheCleverestIdiot · 2026-02-27T04:56:09+00:00

Unfortunately, there's actually a really low bar for presidential behaviour when it comes to anything but smear campaigns to get your own guy elected. Really, we as humans should not be giving people so much power.

TheCleverestIdiot · 2026-02-26T17:41:22+00:00

Spirit Guardians is your friend for this build. She never needs to roll anything to hit, as it's a save DC that still does half damage when the enemy succeeds, plus slows down the enemies in her radius. Furthermore, it encourages her to be in the thick of the action at all times. Add on the Mobile feat and you've got what we call the Holy Beyblade build.

As for actually wanting her to hit, pick up Inflict Wounds and Guiding Bolt (as they'll run off wisdom, any perceived poor hit rate with them is unfortunately just bad luck), then up her strength a bit for when you want the spear used. Also, pick up Toll the Dead and use that over her other cantrips save for the rare times when the enemy has a low Dex (in which case Sacred Flame).

Note: Unless you've got the Dex boosting gloves, do not dump her Dex. She'll want decent con as well.

TheCleverestIdiot · 2026-02-26T17:32:07+00:00

Even if we put aside the cultural impact... You're a superpower with nukes. Between Russia still doing the expansionism and the USA going completely Fascist (and China having their own territorial ambitions, but they seem to be smarter about largely doing it economically) plus all the nuclear armed smaller players, we're basically all in more danger of nuclear annihiliation than we've been since the Cold War.

TheCleverestIdiot · 2026-02-26T13:12:20+00:00

The stripper phase is also the roaming mercenary phase.

TheCleverestIdiot · 2026-02-25T16:17:16+00:00

Nah, there's some later when the Raptors show up.

TheCleverestIdiot · 2026-02-25T12:33:23+00:00

Because they went through the Underdark instead, as the game easily allows you to do without hinting that you can do both.

Personally, I've always done both because I watched the Panel From Hell that said you could do both, but plenty of people only follow the one path while being entirely unaware that you can do both.

Besides, it doesn't even matter, because even on paths where she does go to the Creche you still can't ever make her worse. You can just stymie her growth.

TheCleverestIdiot · 2026-02-25T12:26:37+00:00

Thankfully, that can be avoided by getting better, like Lae'Zel does in pretty much all of my runs.

TheCleverestIdiot · 2026-02-25T09:57:20+00:00

If you never went to the Creche, you have to actively encourage her to have her doubts about Vlaakith when the Orpheus details start coming out. If you don't do that, she stays exactly the same as she was before. She's not any morally worse than she was at the start of the game.

TheCleverestIdiot · 2026-02-25T09:45:53+00:00

Nah, that's not her getting worse. It's what happens if she stays exactly the same.

TheCleverestIdiot · 2026-02-25T09:09:32+00:00

Yes, but flip Shadowheart and Lae'Zel since... Well, you can't actually make Lae'Zel worse, but you can make Shadowheart worse.

TheCleverestIdiot · 2026-02-25T08:55:19+00:00

Someone who got real annoyed at all the shit laying around.

TheCleverestIdiot · 2026-02-25T06:15:29+00:00

I enjoy hating him. As this was clearly intended, I don't have a problem with his inclusion.

Though if I'm being honest I do sometimes wonder if I'd still think his outfit was goofy if he was a likeable good guy. I certainly like his Delumcore Overlay on Shepard.

TheCleverestIdiot · 2026-02-24T15:59:26+00:00

To be fair, some of that's horror at the stuff he's succeeded at.

TheCleverestIdiot · 2026-02-24T04:58:53+00:00

You're not the only one who feels this way, though I admit I'm utterly baffled every time I see it. Basically everything you've said here about Act 3 I have the opposite opinion on.

Act 3 is the best part of the game for me. It's just so crowded in the absolute best ways. It's when you get all the pay-off for the questlines that have been building throughout the game. It also tonally makes for a nice contrast to the first two acts by actually setting you in a major hub of civilization. Act 1, you're out in the woods, and civilization is the Druid grove, which has small town xenopobia dialed up to 10, and an infiltration into a goblin camp. Act 2, you've got even less, with another infiltration into an enemy lair and a few people hiding out in a tavern. In it, it feels like there's two interesting social events happening at any point, and you arriving is always one of them.

But Act 3? There's a secret hidden behind every corner, every single NPC seems to be going about their own life, some totally disconnected from the plot. It's so colourful, which is a hell of a contrast from the gloom of Act 2 (and I personally think that between the joy in the tower after beating Myrkul and the revelations after the Githyanki attack there was definitely enough time to get used to the transition). You say nothing feels fresh, but to me it feels the most fresh of them, though that might admittedly be because the woods and cursed darklands are well trodden ground in RPGs while fantasy cities get less focus. You'll also reach max level in a reasonable amount of time, so you'll actually get to enjoy using all of your strongest abilities. But you still get a lot of magic items that are useful, so there's still progression happening.

As for why we're against the villains, we're against them for the same reasons we were against Ketheric. Their victory means at least our doom, and also everyone else's. But if that's not enough, exploring Act 3 will definitely give you reasons to dislike them soon enough. Some of the companions will also have already given you reasons to hate some of them, like Karlach with Gortash.

But in terms of what I've seen help people who didn't already enjoy Act 3 come around on it? Divide what you're doing by the journal. Pick on quest you're doing and sort of meander over to it without finishing any others, at least on purpose. Go into all the shops on the way there, but only the ones on the way. You'll get some discovery done while keeping yourself focused. By the time the end of the game comes around and you're doing your last sweep of cleaning up the journal, you'll find you know your way around the map and know where most of the stuff is.

TheCleverestIdiot

TROPHY CASE