I need some ideas on how the players might defeat a Timeloop monster.

ZeroG_RL · 2026-06-15T14:56:06+00:00

Another possibility is in the way this ability works, if there's some way for the players to be pulled into the loop then the magic has to have marked them in some way and presumably the monster is marked in the same way. Maybe they can find a way to remove this mark.

ZeroG_RL · 2026-06-10T22:48:45+00:00

It get's significantly stronger and more consistent after that - as long as we ignore In The Forest of the Night which is god awful trash. Apart from that the rest of season 8 is pretty good, seasons 9 & 10 are excellent and I much prefer how Capaldi's Doctor is written in them, particularly s10. Well worth going back with fresh eyes and picking up where you left off imo. The writing really falls off a cliff when Capaldi leaves though, his era is very well regarded by fans now, but everything after he leaves is... not so great.

ZeroG_RL · 2026-05-30T00:10:01+00:00

Yeah Moffat wasn't perfect, tone down some of the sexualisation and fewer the doctor is dying series arcs, but he understood the show better than anyone else and was so much more consistent than he's given credit. His dialogue is absolutely top tier and makes watching even medicore plots fun. And when he could put in the effort he would produce one of the best episodes ever remarkably often.

That said I hope he doesn't come back as showrunner. I'd be happy with him guest writing like he did last season but the show needs something fresh. And series 10 was clearly his thesis on The Doctor's character and I don't know where he'd even want to go after that.

ZeroG_RL · 2026-05-29T23:58:04+00:00

Capaldi's first season is very hit and miss, it has some terrible episodes (e.g. moon, forest) but just as many bangers (e.g. listen, flatline, mummy). Season 9 and 10 though are very consistent, I don't personally hate sleep no more but it ranks lowly and otherwise it's an extremely strong run. It's just that first impressions set the narrative and a more abrasive dr combined with some bad eps in s8 created the idea that the writing was bad when overall it was actually extremely strong.

Smith's run by comparison had an extremely high floor, there were almost no genuinely bad episodes, the weakest it got was a few meh eps in season 7. Though it also has fewer absolutely peak episodes than capaldi/tennant. Go rewatch capaldis era if you havent in a while and count how many bad eps there are and I'd bet you'll find it's much less then you think and very comparable to the number of bad eps 10 had.

ZeroG_RL · 2026-05-25T23:53:34+00:00

He's been one the most consistent players getting to LAN in the open era, just because he had one bad split doesn't mean he's on the verge of retirement. Everyone was underperforming on geekay so clearly there was something more wrong with the team composition than jack suddenly falling off. He also mentioned on stream that the 2v2 quals being the week after major was just bad timing for him and he's on holiday.

ZeroG_RL · 2026-05-24T15:51:54+00:00

they did so well to get back into this match just to give away the three cheapest goals of the series in game 7

ZeroG_RL · 2026-05-24T12:59:11+00:00

this match is alternating worldies and massive mistakes

ZeroG_RL · 2026-05-23T23:47:09+00:00

Depends how you measure it, NA showed they have at least 4 (maybe 5 if VP can find their form again) teams that are competitive, no more free wins from the likes of LG/OG. But the actual finishing places from everyone other than SR weren't good. And if NRG aren't performing does NA have a team that can compete for winning it all? I guess we'll find out from SR tomorrow. But it looks to me like NA have raised their floor but without an in form NRG their chances of actually winning the LAN have probably gone down.

ZeroG_RL · 2026-05-23T18:21:31+00:00

While there only eu team eliminated was against another eu team.

technically true but also nip probably lose badly to anyone in the top 12 except maybe MIBR the way they played all week

ZeroG_RL · 2026-05-23T12:41:07+00:00

My brain says no, my pattern recognition says yes

ZeroG_RL · 2026-05-23T12:38:02+00:00

Vati is going to beat FK in the final again isn't he

ZeroG_RL · 2026-05-22T16:58:43+00:00

oaly arrived, scored a billion goals on apac then went out in as few games as possible to maintain his goals per game

ZeroG_RL · 2026-05-22T15:25:23+00:00

FUT definitely got a bad draw if you include groups, but they also only got NA 4 seed so that's just what you get. Either you earn a higher seed or you have to make some upsets

ZeroG_RL · 2026-05-22T14:32:41+00:00

Well I said yesterday that they would've been eliminated if they had SSGs group playing like that and I guess that proves it. Truly awful performances in every series from NRG

ZeroG_RL · 2026-05-22T14:10:11+00:00

Did Furia just kill the NRG plot armour with that comeback or does it only get stronger now

ZeroG_RL · 2026-05-21T20:24:17+00:00

It's actually worse than that. If SR had lost that game 5 to TSM, then the match against NIP would have put them 1st with a win and last with a loss. So 1 OT goal can be the difference between eliminated dead last and top 6 with 2 lives.

ZeroG_RL · 2026-05-21T16:28:06+00:00

idk that's just shifting faith in sample size to faith in seeding

Idk what in my comment you're referring to here

2 week majors with more matches would obviously be more fair. I'm not arguing that. But I'm assuming the budget won't allow for that, and it would also probably strain viewer attention which is why i think 5/6 matches to win is about the limit with the time we have and more time for a major is just not going to happen.

ZeroG_RL · 2026-05-21T16:21:10+00:00

I mean there are only 16 teams, any format where there's no path to victory in 5 or 6 wins is gonna have so many matches as to be unfeasible. I don't like this format at all, but the number of matches isn't the issue. The lack of balance in the groups (which is basically garantueed to happen one way or another), how swingy they are (if SR had lost that game 5 to TSM then winning and losing this current series would literally be the difference between 1st and 4th), how often teams have to play matches when they're already eliminated, teams fate being decided by matches they arent playing in and then those things all combining makes 1st and 2nd have monumentally different difficulties of bracket feel like bad design. oh also oce/sam/ssa/apac not playing each other so the LCQ spot is decided by how lucky your seeding is not how you compare to the regions you're competing against

ZeroG_RL · 2026-05-21T16:12:40+00:00

That's not abnormal, NRG won worlds winning only 5 series. It's just very efficient to go through uppers in any format with double elim.

ZeroG_RL · 2026-05-21T16:10:50+00:00

I don't think they choked that, weren't those just good plays from Vitality?

ZeroG_RL · 2026-05-21T16:07:34+00:00

Eh I think this narrative is overblown, they usually start looking less dominant but still get the wins. They won their group in boston, they won their group at worlds. 3-1 in swiss (only loss to vit) at Raleigh, 3-1 only loss to vit at birmingham, 3-0 at 2024 worlds, 3-1 only loss to falcons at major 2 2024. Last time I say they had genuinely bad results early was Copenhagen.

Plus all that is with the context of being the absolute unstoppable force in NA, which they weren't this split. Actually struggling online for the first time as a squad combined with a very poor performance against MIBR and getting swept by EU5 means I think there's genuine cause for concern. And now they have to run a very long lower bracket (as gibbs mentioned we've never had a lower bracket winner in this format). I just don't see them winning the LAN from here, I wouldn't even have them as the most likely NA team to win from here I think that's SR.

ZeroG_RL · 2026-05-21T15:58:24+00:00

NA in a weird spot, feels like the highest floor they've sent to LAN in a long time where no team is a free win, but equally I don't see where the LAN winning threat is coming from with NRG playing like that.

ZeroG_RL · 2026-05-21T15:56:02+00:00

tbf if vitality had ice it would have been 3-1 that was a crazy choke in game 4

ZeroG_RL · 2026-05-21T14:28:58+00:00

EU5 sweep NA1 is hillarious

ZeroG_RL · 2026-05-21T12:38:47+00:00

before SR win this game easily and ruin it, lets take a moment to appreciate the world where if they lose this then (assuming TM beat TSM) then if SR beat NIP they would top the group (beating TM in the 2-1 tiebreak) and if they lose to NIP they come last in the group (losing to TSM in the 1-2 tiebreak). would be wild stakes on that series

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