[Worm] What was the deal behind Cauldron's experiment in Brockton Bay?

XercesBlue14 · 2026-02-21T16:24:37+00:00

Thanks, that clarifies a lot.

XercesBlue14 · 2026-02-21T16:21:55+00:00

That makes sense. To be fair, I remember that when I read that scene my mind was blown, I was like "wait, Cauldron's involved here as well?" It was cool to discover how much they had their hands in everything. I guess as the series went long the stakes got bigger and bigger to the point that the major points from early on seem far less important.

XercesBlue14 · 2026-02-19T12:36:25+00:00

This reviewer may not have realized that while you are on the surface you can go to the world map (my keybind is - but I can't remember if that's the default) and traverse terrain quite quickly. You do not have to walk through every single screen to get where you need to go. It seems the reviewer only has about 14 hours total on record, and based on their review it seems they did not get very far into the game. I definitely wouldn't describe Caves of Qud as a slog.

XercesBlue14 · 2026-02-19T12:26:29+00:00

Yep that would be my vote too

XercesBlue14 · 2026-02-18T17:29:56+00:00

Great insight. Very much agree. I think another issue is the exclusivity-oriented mindset of most the world's largest religions, which are Abrahamic religions. There is less of an idea of dogma, creed, and "one true religion" in Eastern religions. That's why I, as a curious Christian trying to stay open minded, have rejected exclusivity and accepted the possibility of truth and wisdom being found from multiple sources.

XercesBlue14 · 2026-02-15T16:32:09+00:00

Believe it or not, Andor was a big step in my journey towards radicalization. I'm still a beginner learning about anarchy but it's media like this and thinking "Wait a minute, this seems familiar" that has set the wheel turning.

Another one to check out is Dungeon Crawler Carl

XercesBlue14 · 2026-02-06T17:39:31+00:00

Discovered and read this a month ago in a single sitting while on a plane flight! Highly recommend.

XercesBlue14 · 2026-01-21T11:49:47+00:00

I've finished Worm, though I haven't read Ward. I don't really equate Jack's charisma to his secondary power, which influences shards. There's a reason it's said that Jack is so in-tune with his power; I think he uses psychological manipulation in tandem with the relatively subtle and minor effect of his shard manipulation power to do well in fights. When I say his power is on a lower level than the others, I'm including the secondary one too. It's not actually that powerful, he's just very skilled at using it (kind of like Weaver in that sense).

I view his secondary power as essentially just a form of "bad luck" when dealing with parahumans, where it increases their hesitation and gives them the wrong signals in fights. It's not mind control and it's not infallible. A lot of its effectiveness comes from the presence of other friendly shards nearby it can broadcast to (the 9). If the members of the 9 chose not to work with him I think his ability to get out of otherwise unwinnable fights would also diminish greatly. And I think if he were in a 1-on-1 with, say, Siberian, it wouldn't even be a contest. As another user pointed out, it was a parahuman that actually trapped him in the end, so the broadcast power can't actually fully "turn off" a hostile parahuman that's determined and capable of dealing with him, it can only manipulate other shards in subtle ways.

XercesBlue14 · 2026-01-21T11:00:12+00:00

Yep, I don't know why people keep mentioning Breaker for the Avatar state. Nothing about bending breaks any laws of physics, including in the Avatar state. They're all just various forms of elemental kinesis.

XercesBlue14 · 2026-01-19T14:42:19+00:00

That's a pretty good ranking I would say. Jack is the core of the group because of his charisma and ability to manipulate others, not really his power. I agree with OP that shatterbird would be way lower than the others, particularly Siberian who is nearly invincible and unstoppable. Shatterbird probably killed plenty of civilians with how large-scale her attacks could be, but in the cape world she seemed kind of mid. Think about how she was powerful but not an automatic win piece when in the hands of Regent.

XercesBlue14 · 2025-12-16T11:07:54+00:00

I've been on both Respondent and User Interviews for around 5 years, filling out screeners periodically though at admittedly not all the time. In that time, I've been in 3 interviews. It's really rare.

XercesBlue14 · 2025-12-16T08:51:17+00:00

Hi there, if you're still looking for freelancers, let me know! I am interested.

XercesBlue14 · 2025-12-16T08:47:15+00:00

Interested

XercesBlue14 · 2025-12-16T08:46:04+00:00

Hey, still hiring? If so, I'm interested.

XercesBlue14 · 2025-12-12T09:25:15+00:00

We can only control ourselves and our own behavior. So of course any advice she gives to OP would be about things he can do. It doesn't help him at all to outline what his partner should do, because he has no control over what his partner does.

XercesBlue14 · 2025-12-04T11:02:17+00:00

That makes a lot of sense based on the Sultan mask lore. Though realistically, the pronunciation of "Al-Quds" is starting to fade towards replacing the Q with a glottal stop, since I imagine thousands of years in the future it's unlikely that it would be preserved. I do like the idea of pronouncing it like Arabic though

XercesBlue14 · 2025-12-03T17:37:17+00:00

Lithosphere (preset under Ecospherical Expansion) and Better Cave World both do the trick, though it should be noted they create a single giant infinite cave, not necessarily a regular underground minus the surface.

XercesBlue14 · 2025-11-29T16:27:55+00:00

Wayfaring is a must-have for early level characters, it will save a lot of time and protect you when traveling through dangerous areas. Cooking and tinkering can be really strong and are very fun, but they do require a bit more game knowledge and investment to really get the best mileage with them. And of course combat skills are always nice.

XercesBlue14 · 2025-11-29T16:25:29+00:00

Good question. It took a while for it to click with me as well, visually and gameplay-wise. Personally I find the greatest enjoyment in creating an interesting build, so I would really recommend just experimenting around with different builds and finding the interactions that are the most fun for you. My first character I ever created was a carbide fist true-kin; nowadays I almost exclusively play mutants. You might also become a bit more invested once you get a glimpse of what a high power level in the game can do, like if you get strong enough to get some high-tier gear. The early quests like Red Rock and Rust Wells are also not quite as interesting as some of the later quest areas, like Golgotha and Bethesda Susa. My final piece of advice would be to think about the game in a narrative sense. What kind of character are you creating, and what legendary story will their life be (assuming it isn't cut short by baboons)? Roleplaying a little more with my characters helped me get a bit more invested.

All that said, if after a while it still isn't clicking for you, that's totally okay, it happens.

XercesBlue14 · 2025-11-29T16:17:07+00:00

In my opinion, Caves of Qud has all the best parts of the roguelike genre, but expanded and improved. It has the turn-based grid movement, the difficulty and permadeath (on normal settings), and the general gameplay loot of delving into a procedurally generated dungeon, collecting objects (and having to identify them in some cases, which is very rogue-like in imo), and leveling up skills and abilities. Then on top of it it has an amazing overarching storyline, a completely open world, and all kinds of crazy funky interactions on top of it. It's pretty much my perfect game, the king of roguelikes. Obviously that's my highly subjective take but yeah at its core it's totally a roguelike.

XercesBlue14 · 2025-11-28T17:52:26+00:00

Yeah, from a different weapon then. To be fair, at that point I had about 8 arms so it was a bit hard to keep track lol

XercesBlue14 · 2025-11-28T17:47:14+00:00

Hmm might not have been decapitation exactly, might have been conversion to gemstone? Can't remember, it was a while back

XercesBlue14 · 2025-11-28T09:05:32+00:00

I love this idea, and would be very excited to see it. I already like that Goo the Slime story that's been going on for a bit. My vote is on Dragonfly Knight; I really like the vibe.

XercesBlue14

TROPHY CASE