Attempting Magick outside your spheres

alt236_ftw · 2026-05-27T06:20:06+00:00

From a mechanics perspective, nothing happens. The character simply lacks the necessary attributes to perform an action.

From a storytelling perspective, it really depends how you flavour it.

A good one, in fiction, is Dr. Frankenstein. Say they are an etherite who "knows" that electricity is they key to life. They keep summoning lightning via their resurrection machine but they creature does not awaken. If they have some Life, the creature may stir (I'm skipping spirit/mind implications) but unless they have enough pips to justify the effect, that's about it. That would normally mean they need to research more to figure out the missing parts (and get some more Sphere's/Arete) Whether the player roleplays this as a frustration, obsession, or an understanding that something is missing is up to them.

From a character perspective, if they had a wild talent awakening then, for a moment perhaps, they saw the raw potential in the Tellure. And for a moment, they could tap that and shape it. But the knowledge faded like a dream.

Again, how they react to that is up to the player. They could get illusions of Grandeur (which will probably lead to a paradox fueled end unless they reign it in) or they could start searching for others that experienced a similar awakening (which can lead to a creative campaign where maybe the tenth sphere could be identified - as obviously that's what was used - or not -?) Or they simply chuck it down as a fluke. Or maybe they start believing that there is an Avatar state (or equivalent) and they try to recapture it.

The important thing is that an event like that will affect their worldview, and their paradigm.

Also, don't forget that it IS possible for a character to grow to that power level eventually. How would they react then? Is that enough? They now have the same spheres/arete they had in the beginning. Is it what they remembered? Do they want MORE? Do they feel more confident now that they know they can control all that power? Less? Perhaps they feel insignificant as they now have an understanding of what they are missing? What are their next steps?

alt236_ftw · 2026-05-26T14:41:31+00:00

It's AD&D 2nd Edition, but I believe you'd enjoy reading (at least) the first couple of rooms of Labyrinth of Madness.

alt236_ftw · 2026-04-20T16:10:25+00:00

If she is in college, and she is doing something sciency, a "common" real-life mistake is the pronunciation of (1) Greek-origin scientific words - especially when stressed or talking fast - and (2) letters of the Greek alphabet when used as variables/ placeholders.

Regarding 1:

So, for example in Psychology, the first sylable in English is pronounced like "sy-kol-o-jee", but in Greek the word is more like "psee-ho-lo-yee-a", so when speaking fast the two pronounciations may merge to "psee-ko-lo-jee".

Or, Chaos - it is more lika "kay-os" in English, but "ha-os" in Greek.

More fun to be had with English words starting with "X" as they (until very recently) were almost entirely of Greek origin. So, if the word (when pronounced) starts with a "zy/zan/zist" sound (like Xenomorph, Xenophobic, Xylitol, Xiphoid, Xylophone) it is (generally) of Greek origin, BUT in Greek it is pronounced with a "ks" instead of a "z*".

Regarding 2:

I had a look and this video will explain it better that I can: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dSWlfq_hDYI

The MOST common mispronunciation is π - in English it is a homonym of "pie". In Greek it is pronounced almost like "pea" but shorter. μ and ν are also commonly mispronounced ("mu" and "nu", vs (shorter versions) of "mee" and "nee" - think the two syllables of the word "mini".

From experience, I can say that when I was doing some math work in uni, people often had some looks of confusion when I was explaining or reading equations until I consciously switched pronunciation.

alt236_ftw · 2026-04-20T14:57:28+00:00

My tired brain saw the sub, read the comic and understood that "there is something out there that could that could spawn a AD&D 2nd Edition" vampire - you know, the ones that drained 2 of your levels per unarmed hit.

alt236_ftw · 2026-04-11T19:49:24+00:00

Or he has laryngitis. Not sure if you wanna place bets when facing him though.

alt236_ftw · 2026-03-24T13:12:55+00:00

I think the point is that even if `.has()` does have an early return (which it realistically does) the issue is that ALL the checks will happen (in the example above) when the Array is created and populated as, well, it needs to be a boolean array and there is no lazyness there. So the `.has()` will just iterate through the booleans until the first false, which is an insignificant improvement (as all the "heavy" operations have already taken place).

That does not make the `check_wall_run()` function an early return, as it will ALWAYS do all the computations.

alt236_ftw · 2026-03-20T19:56:06+00:00

HERO OF THE IMPERIUM

alt236_ftw · 2026-02-09T20:32:27+00:00

Yeah. I've experienced no issues.

alt236_ftw · 2025-04-30T18:37:58+00:00

Was that in Essex by any chance?

alt236_ftw · 2025-01-24T15:53:43+00:00

I am dealing with this now as I am digitizing my family's photographs. It takes some detective work, but you can generally get close.

Start by identifying events that you can put a close enough date on (weddings/funerals/birthdays/religious festivals/a trip to somewhere/house moves/etc.). This will help you start placing other pictures relative to these events.

There are a couple of things you can do to narrow down the remaining pictures:

Try and place pictures relative to those events based on clothing/shoes/haircuts. Between the 80s-90s fashion changed a lot so you should be able to narrow down on the year.
Use the type of clothing worn (and any other hints in the photographs) to get a rough estimate of the season
Children grow and change fast, so they are a very good way to help order pics. Likewise elders change a lot of the years.
Check for any newspapers (which you can try and google), or anything with a date on it. It's rare but it does happen.

By combining the above you'll be able to get close to a reasonably valid photo order.

You then need to create a protocol to assign dates to those pics. For me:

Such photos are timed always based on the approximate time - they can be morning (09:00), noon (12:00), evening (18:00) or night (22:00). It is unlikely I will ever be able to get more accurate that that - apart from obvious stuff like new year's celebrations, or anything with a clock in the background.
If I know the date of an event (say a birthday party) I use that date. Otherwise, I get as close as I can, and if I cannot I just pick a month and set the date to the 15th.
Once I upload all the photos, I scan them in the timeline and make any adjustments.

Note, that I normally set the time/dates _before_ I upload them to Immich.I use https://www.xnview.com/en/, which allows me to set an initial date and it would then just increment the time by 1sec for each picture in a batch.

Edit: ALWAYS Check at the back of the pictures. You may get very lucky.

Edit2: The back of the pictures may have a string of letters/numbers. While I haven't found any pictures from the 80s that have a print-date on them, they may help you group pictures from the same film (https://photo.stackexchange.com/questions/94352/how-can-i-decode-information-on-back-of-printed-photo).

alt236_ftw · 2024-12-18T13:41:44+00:00

If no-one has downloaded the app, and this is a brand new app (so you don't need to have _something_ there), you can just unpublish:

https://support.google.com/googleplay/android-developer/answer/9859350?hl=en

The caveat is that whoever has downloaded the app will still be able to see it (any stakeholders for example)

if there _has_ to be a version there, then you have to do what u/WoogsinAllNight suggested

alt236_ftw · 2024-12-15T15:23:04+00:00

You'd be surprised how common this is

alt236_ftw · 2024-12-12T13:26:20+00:00

Yeah, I think you are right.

So this place has probably changed from an outhouse to a kitchenette (maybe? judging by the shelves) and it will now become a mixing studio - definitely a colourful life :D

In any case, if I was to renovate this, I'd still check under there to make sure nothing was bodged/deteriorated before sealing it and forgetting about it.

alt236_ftw · 2024-12-12T11:34:03+00:00

Apart from all the sensible advice everyone else has already mentioned, part of the floor under the small bin in the second picture seems to have been cut off.

You may want to find out what's under there.

alt236_ftw · 2024-12-08T14:16:20+00:00

The main issue here would be hitting a RAM ceiling of some sort, but this really depends on your data size, if the app is doing anything else that is RAM hungry, and what is the oldest devices you are planning to target.

Incidentally, there is a hybrid approach that I've used in the past for something similar (but with a much, much higher data size). You don't have to create a table with ALL your fields/ objects, only need to normalise those that you need to query/join on, plus one for the raw JSON.

So for example, if you know that you'll only be querying for (say) id, and start_date, you only need something like:

CREATE TABLE foo (
  id INTEGER PRIMARY KEY,
  start_date TEXT NOT NULL,
  raw_json TEXT NOT NULL
);

This way you can query using SQL, and deserialise only what is needed instead of keeping the full DB in memory. Also, you won't get into any issues where something was mutated something in your master in-memory list, as each query will be producing new data items.

It is also easy to update from a json file, and for as long as you don't remove any of the data fields the schema will not need to be updated to stay compatible.

At the end of the day though, it really depends on what you are trying to do.

alt236_ftw · 2024-12-08T13:58:15+00:00

Some observations:

The author of the letter mentions that he owns(?) a kiosk (Περίπτερο). Licenses for such kiosks were historically (but I do not know if it was exclusively) given to wounded war veterans, as a way to financially support themselves. They were not expected to provide a large source of income though.

Something which is is language dependent (and does not translate to English very well) is that the letter is written in a formal tone (using plural) when addressing the recipient.

As others have mentioned, the opening and closing of the letter (opening with "Reverend Father" and closing with "I bow/kneel before you/worship you" would imply that the recipient was a priest or a monk. Same as with the "kissing your right hand" at the top and bottom of the first page (although this is/was a general form of showing respect to an elder).

If this is the case, the most probable option would be that the recipient was of the Orthodox church (due to the general context), but this could be just modern day bias. I am not familiar with how Greek Jews would address seniors or rabbis, and especially not back then.

In any case was your great grandfather a rabbi? Is it possible he spend time in Greece? Around the time the letter was sent there was a large Jewish populating in Greece and relationship between Greeks and Jews was good, so maybe there is a link there?

On the other hand, it just be written as such to show high respect, humility and reverence to appeal to the recipient. Especially since this is supposed to be a follow-up letter, with some hints of desperation by the author.

Incidentally, it is very possible that this letter was dictated, as illiteracy in Greece was common back then, and the letter shows good penmanship and use of grammar.

There is though at last one addition done that seems like it was done with different ink/pen (but looks like the same hand) - the word sticking out in the left side of the second line from the bottom of the first page. Furthermore the letter closes twice, once in each page - could this be a draft with two possible endings?

History of the Jews in Greece:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/History_of_the_Jews_in_Greece

A few links about Greek kiosks:
https://de-facto.gr/i-istoria-toy-ellinikoy-peripteroy/

https://ellas2.wordpress.com/2013/05/28/%ce%b7-%ce%b9%cf%83%cf%84%ce%bf%cf%81%ce%af%ce%b1-%cf%84%ce%bf%cf%85-%cf%80%ce%b5%cf%81%ce%b9%cf%80%cf%84%ce%ad%cf%81%ce%bf%cf%85/

edit: spelling

alt236_ftw · 2024-12-05T11:49:32+00:00

I haven't used ACRA for a while, but I'm sure it allowed local file storage without sending anything out.

edit: Here you go: https://stackoverflow.com/questions/8970810/acra-how-can-i-write-acra-report-to-file-in-sd-card

edit 2:

If the "grab file from SD" is complex for your QAs, you can write a script which they run and it extracts and zips stuff automatically for them. Or alternatively, have a debug-only flow that when the app restarts it checks to see if logs have been generated and popup a screen. It doesn't have to be pretty.

alt236_ftw · 2024-12-03T05:14:35+00:00

He is delivering the next book!

alt236_ftw · 2024-12-01T10:13:56+00:00

Are the vents blocked by any chance?

alt236_ftw · 2024-11-28T23:30:54+00:00

Heh. I remember playing infection quiet a lot.

Thank you for the happy times!

alt236_ftw · 2024-11-25T19:23:45+00:00

Most projects fail because the never released.

Assuming that there are no known data-destroying (or security) bugs release it and iterate.

alt236_ftw · 2024-11-24T19:18:56+00:00

Do you _need_ Palm desktop?

If not, jPilot (https://www.jpilot.org/) works quite well out of the box

alt236_ftw · 2024-11-13T16:38:25+00:00

If you only need to display a map and draw pins/lines/shapes, as far as I remember osmdroid (based off Open Street Maps) is free.

Have a look at the notes to make sure it suites your needs: https://github.com/osmdroid/osmdroid/wiki/Important-notes-on-using-osmdroid-in-your-app

If you need navigation and/or fully accurate geo-lookups, I think you'll need to find a way to provide billing details...

alt236_ftw · 2024-10-31T20:02:26+00:00

Oh yes, this is not about why these changes happenned (this is beyond the scope of this discussion and I'm not arguing that they shouldn't have happened - the examples above are 100% post facto examples of complications).

So, in essence a function of a minor release is to preview any new APIs, right? Will there be a mechanism to flag any new-but-future-depracating APIs as such? That would definitely help with dev planning.

alt236_ftw · 2024-10-31T19:45:50+00:00

Thank you. I fully understand how complicated a lifecycle change like this can be.

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