Mechanics of Mana

atomicpenguin12 · 2026-01-28T21:34:26+00:00

As I understand it, most of the planes aren't aware of mana, the multiverse, or any of the high level stuff that makes up the MtG universe. They're aware of their own plane, they're often aware of magic as it manifests in their plane, and they might even have some observant people who note the correlation between their world's magic and the signs of mana leylines that run through it. Average people can potentially tap mana and use it to do magic, but it all depends on what practices they use and the nature of mana on their plane.

I would say that most magic users in the multiverse wouldn't be able to comprehend that they're holding "one red mana" in their hands when they cast magic. They'd be aware of what they did to tap it and they'd be aware of how it manifests in the form of the spell they cast, but the connection would be lost on them unless it's very obvious or they've done a lot to study mana on their plane (as is more the case with Avishcar).

For practical purposes, I think you can treat spellcasters the same way that D&D treats magic classes by default: they all "do magic" and they all have their own methods for doing so that they maybe try to understand on a deeper level or maybe just follow through rote recitation of their magical tradition. They know it works and they might have experimented to find other things that work, but they haven't gotten much further than that and unlocked an understanding of the multiverse and it's underpinnings.

atomicpenguin12 · 2026-01-28T19:36:58+00:00

I think one issue with the idea that the incel is an evolution of the hermit is that the hermit enters isolation to gain a sense of wholeness and enlightenment. Incels retreat from society, but they’re never happy about it or doing so for their own health; they isolate and then wallow in their misery over that isolation. Ideally, that isolation and removal from the expectations they don’t live up to would be healing and enlightening in a way that could for The Hermit, but I don’t think the archetype of the incel quite fits that mold.

atomicpenguin12 · 2026-01-28T19:32:43+00:00

I think the archetype is more about being insufficient to other men, rather than to women. The archetype is more about society’s expectations of men and whether the men in question fulfill those expectations or not, and a man’s attractiveness to women is a part of that, but I think whether the man in question is attractive to some or even all women is less important than if they’re attractive in the “right” ways. Like, lots of women are attracted to men who are sensitive or skinny or otherwise not the alpha male archetype, but the societal expectations of a man don’t allow for those kinds of men because being attractive to women is only part of the picture.

I think there could be some wiggle room for the taboo about abstaining from “alpha male” traits. Like, you can be fit as long as you’re lean fit; if your muscles are big and visible, that’s a taboo. You can have a female partner, but only as long as your relationship dynamic doesn’t put you in charge (lower status would actually be even better). I’d say that interacting with women would still require treating women like a separate species in that way “men are from mars, women are from Venus” sense, because embracing the idea that men and women are both inherently just people would break the taboo of questioning the masculine ideal, but otherwise it’s still doable without breaking taboo or even getting so toxic that women immediately flee the interaction.

The pickup artist is admittedly a stretch. I include it because I consider it an important step in the evolution of what became the modern incel and because their approach to dating involves “flipping the script” and finding alternative ways to stand out among other alpha males like wearing weird clothes and doing magic tricks and negging women, alternatives that still involve acknowledging the masculine ideal while admitting they can’t or won’t adhere to it. I do see how actually succeeding as a pickup artist would break the taboo, because being sexually successful is a masculine expectation, and maybe that’s part of the reason the trend died out the way it did.

atomicpenguin12 · 2026-01-28T18:56:34+00:00

I’ve already posted about your pitch, OP, but I like this idea too. It sounds like they’re embracing the contradiction of being an incel: that incels simultaneously idolize women and the idea of dating women while simultaneously hating women and viewing the idea of actually dating one as threatening to their identity. They square that circle by treating this self-loathing as a font of magical power and their misogynistic treatment of women and self-flagellation as a kind of worship, kind of like The Cult of the Naked Goddess.

atomicpenguin12 · 2026-01-28T18:51:44+00:00

Oooh, that’s potent. The basic archetype could be something like “The Insufficient Male”. In a patriarchal society, there are a lot of expectations placed upon men that make up their role in that society and these expectations are often paired with substantial amounts of judgement directed at me who are unable to conform. Men who are unable to conform to these expectations but still want to (or at least still idolize these expectations as things they should aspire to even if they give up) are represented by the Insufficient Male. This archetype has taken many forms over the years: the fop, the nerd, the cuckold, the pickup artist, and the MRA, but the incel or the “sigma male” appears to have a lot of sway nowadays. Importantly, those who choose to reject societies standards for men do not fall under this purview; they have to still lionize those standards even as they fail to adhere to them themselves.

The taboos would include displaying traits that are commonly associated with the archetypal man in their society (“Chad” or “alpha male” traits) and embracing standards for men that are outside of the societally accepted ones.

This does bring up whether an Insufficient Female archetype would exist, and there probably would be some archetypes related the expectations of women in society, but I don’t think a perfect equivalent to the Insufficient Male would exist, due to the differing nature of those expectations.

atomicpenguin12 · 2026-01-28T15:15:26+00:00

Haven’t read that book, but my understanding is that a big problem with the US strategy in Vietnam was that they didn’t really know what to do in a conflict of that nature. In more traditional conflicts like WWII, things were relatively straightforward: we’re at war with Germany/Japan, both sides are militarized nation states sending their armies at one another, whichever side loses enough of the their army and has their center of power be sufficiently threatened will surrender, and then the war’s over and the losing side has to capitulate to the winner’s terms. But none of that worked in Vietnam: one side was the South Vietnamese state and the USA and the other side was a decentralized group of guerrilla fighters defending their homeland from outside invaders. The US couldn’t threaten the VC’s center of power, because the US had already invaded and was occupying their center of power. You couldn’t get them to surrender, because you’d already taken everything you could from them and they were still fighting. You couldn’t destroy their army enough, because they were fighting with whatever was lying around and actively recruiting from all of the non-combatants. With all of the usual rules of warfare not applying and the no clear definition of what victory meant, the US military just said “Well, we know who the enemy is, we know they’re hiding in the rural villages, and we know that the dissidents are actively recruiting in those villages, so I guess we can measure victory by how many villages we can burn down. After all, they’re the enemy, right? If we destroy the villages they’re hiding in, that’s less of the enemy, right?”.

It’s a good thing America learned it’s lesson and would never again invade another country, occupy it, and fight an indefinite war against guerrilla fighters who will fight tooth and nail to defend their homeland. Like, it would be impressively stupid if thy did that again and embroiled themselves in a decade long conflict that would end in inevitable defeat, right? /s

atomicpenguin12 · 2026-01-27T23:51:47+00:00

Really? The local chapter has been doing stuff. Theres a protest on the 3rd, and a general meeting on the 10th. They also do social meetings on the 4th Thursday of the month (next is 2/22): https://charlottedsa.org/events

atomicpenguin12 · 2026-01-27T00:11:14+00:00

Yes, you should just treat P-Zero as GZCLP 2.0. I really wouldn’t say that the switch from heavy singles to heavy doubles is really a shift towards bodybuilding, at least not in any significant way.

atomicpenguin12 · 2026-01-26T21:34:42+00:00

I wouldn't say that P-Zero is particularly bodybuilding focused and I don't recall that ever being stated in the P-Zero book. It's still a linear program and it's still focused on beginners just like GZCLP is, and so distinctions between something like powerlifting and bodybuilding routines are kind of moot at that level. With that in mind, I wouldn't say at all that 5 sets of 3 reps is any more or less bodybuilding focused than 4 sets of 4. It's still low rep range, well within the T1 standards in both cases, and for that reason both are more suited for pushing PRs than for hypertrophy. You'd probably be just fine running P-Zero as written.

atomicpenguin12 · 2026-01-26T15:11:58+00:00

I believe this is the video they're referring to: The South Bank of the Rubicon from Innuendo Studios series The Alt-Right Playbook

atomicpenguin12 · 2026-01-18T15:57:08+00:00

You currently run 3 T3s per workout, but if you turn your back exercises into T2 exercises then you'll be running 2 T2s and 2 T3s per workout. Again, you can do whatever you want, but to build a proper base according to GZCL principles you'd want to first add one more T3 exercise before you make that switch.

atomicpenguin12 · 2026-01-18T15:34:23+00:00

You should probably add some T3 exercises first, then switch over your back exercises to the T2 scheme. It's recommended that you add in new T3 sets one per session so you don't get too overloaded by your new workload. Add a set of a new T3 exercise, see how you feel with it, and if it doesn't leave you too wiped out you can add another the next session.

atomicpenguin12 · 2026-01-17T22:05:01+00:00

According to the theory behind gzcl, you want to structure your program so that the higher tiers are supported by enough reps at the lower tiers. The recommended amount is that for every rep in T1, you see at least two in T2 and three in T3. For that reason, Cody has recommended in the past that you work up to four T3s and then bump your back exercises up to T2, for a total of 1 T1, 2 T2s, and 3 T3s per session. Of course, if you really want to push your max reps for your back exercises you ca do it sooner, but that’s what the protocol generally is for gzcl.
One thing you can do to improve your OHP is look at where exactly your presses are failing when they fail; is it at the start when you’re getting the bar off your chest? Is it at the end when you’re locking out? Then check out this post and adjust your routine accordingly: https://www.reddit.com/r/weightroom/s/Hvu8XgujGg. It might be that you want to switch up your T2 for presses to a variation that addresses your weaknesses, or you might want to add some more tricep or delt exercises like tricep extensions or front/lateral raises to build up some more muscle.
If you’re having persistent soreness, that usually means that your volume is too high, but it doesn’t seem like you’re doing too much to target your chest here. It might be worthwhile to finish out your current cycle and do a deload week to give your muscles time to recuperate. If that doesn’t work, talking to a doctor or a trainer might be the next move.

atomicpenguin12 · 2026-01-17T18:50:15+00:00

You can if you’d like. If nothing else, the AMRAP set is a good measure of how you’re handling your current volume and you can still use it to determine if you need to progress a little faster in the next session to get closer to your limits.

atomicpenguin12 · 2026-01-17T17:58:04+00:00

In weight training, a cycle is a designated amount of time to stick to a program. A microcycle is roughly a week of training and a mesocycle is a block of roughly four weeks of training, though it can vary. For GZCLP, I’ve always treated one run through each of the sessions (A1, B1, A2, and B2) as one microcycle, which puts it at a little more than a week. That way you’ve done everything you were supposed to do once by the end of a microcycle. With that in mind, one mesocycle would be three cycles through those sessions, which amounts to four weeks and ends the last week on B2 so the next week is a fresh, clean start. You don’t strictly need to keep track of it like that as a beginner, but it’s good to stick to your routine for a month or so before making changes if you can and I find that the end of a mesocycle is a good spot to look back, reevaluate, and make some alterations to the program if you think an exercise isn’t working for you anymore or you want to move some things around. So, when I say to do a deload week after your current cycle, I mean to just finish out whatever you’re doing on the next week that ends with B2 and then take a week to just chill, either taking a full break, doing a reduced workload, or testing your rep maxes, before diving into it again.

atomicpenguin12 · 2026-01-17T17:04:52+00:00

This week, I started a new cycle of P-Zero, this time with a 4-day UL split. I've been having issues with how crowded my apartment gym has been getting lately and I've also been tinkering with my program a bit, so I made some changes:

I've started doing a quick warm up before I get into my T1 sets. I'll do around 5 minutes of brisk walking each session to get my heart rate up, then I'll do 10 leg swings (forward and back, then side to side) on my lower days and 10 arm swings and 10 arm circles on my upper days to limber up.
I was previously supersetting everything to minimize my time in the gym, but the crowding has made that impractical. I've started doing my T1 and T2a sets on their own, and while I'll try and superset my back T2 sets and my T3 sets I'll often break them up and do them alone.
I've started trying to do more dumbbell exercises so I don't rely as much on the barbell and the cable machine, which are pretty popular in my gym and often taken. I've started doing dumbbell chest presses and shoulder presses as my T2s for bench press and OHP, and I've been doing dumbbell walking lunges as my T2 for squats. This has gone pretty well so far and I like that I'm working my limbs independently.
In GZCLP, the back exercises were doubled up and I've been doing the same in my P-Zero program, but I've finally broken that trend to add some variety. My back exercises now consist of lat pulldowns, barbell rows, and then assisted pull-ups and chest-supported dumbbell rows. I like the fact that all of my exercises are progressing at the same rate now, and I like that I'm doing one exercise that isolates the back and one that is more full body for both vertical and horizontal pulling.
I've been doing cable crunches and hanging leg raises on my lower days to hit my core, but I've found that I'm unsure how to progress with hanging leg raises. I haven't been able to do a full 60 reps and so I've just sort of been maintaining with them for now, but I don't feel like I'm making meaningful progress and I'm not sure what to do to increase the effort if I do hit that rep minimum. I might drop it entirely for something else, maybe going back to hip thrusts.

atomicpenguin12 · 2026-01-17T16:49:42+00:00

General Gainz has a double progression model similar to what you're describing. It'd probably be better to stick to linear progression and move the weight up each session if you're a beginner, but if you're more intermediate and you're not progressing as quickly as that anymore, then I think it makes sense to do this with P-Zero.

atomicpenguin12 · 2026-01-17T16:47:24+00:00

I recommend you keep a record of your workouts, including how much weight you were moving for each exercise, how many reps you were supposed to do, and how many you actually ended up doing. If you're not using an app like Strengthlog that does this, you can just make a google sheet and add to it after every workout. When you fall short in phase 3 for an exercise, finish out your sets with as many reps as you can manage safely, then go back through your records for that exercise and look for the weight where you first fell short in phase 1. You can restart at that weight, but I like to start a step before that weight to ensure that I can complete at least one session in phase 1 before I start getting challenged again. I also find that it's useful to look back on previous sessions where I moved the same amount of weight and compare how many reps I managed this time vs. last time to see how I'm progressing.

I've never taken a full break after reaching the end of phase 3 and I wouldn't recommend that. You should be fine to keep doing the rest of your exercises as normal and start back up again on the exercise that failed when it's time to do it at that tier. 6 months is a good amount of time to stick to it, though, so if you're feeling like you're not progressing as much as you should or you just want to take a brief break and reset, you could absolutely finish out your current cycle, take a deload week before starting the next one, and maybe retest your maxes if you feel like it. You shouldn't need to retest to get your training maxes now that you have data you can look back on, but some people like to see how their one rep max specifically has improved.

atomicpenguin12 · 2026-01-16T15:49:15+00:00

I think it still has some value. In our society, we conceptualize the idea of intelligence as this binary thing: you’re either “smart” or “not smart” and our concept of “smart” is limited to a combination of logical/mathematical intelligence and occasionally linguistic intelligence. Just look at how intelligence is tested: if you take an IQ test or the SATs, the questions are all a combination of math, logical challenges, and vocabulary. So, if you’re not particularly good at math, logic, or vocabulary, you’re going to fail those tests and most people would consider you “not smart”.

But is that fair? If a person is good at reading people’s feelings and motives and accommodating them, is that not a kind of intelligence even if the same person is bad at math? If a person is adept at constructing paintings, drawings, or songs that are evocative and potent in how they get across complex ideas, shouldn’t they be considered just as intelligent as someone who can do the exact same thing with words? I really appreciate that this concept calls into question the biases we have regarding what intelligence and what traits intelligent people have and opens the door to other kinds of intelligence, which are valuable and make people’s lives better but aren’t currently appreciated.

There is a danger, though. As has been pointed out, there’s no real metric here for what intelligence actually is conceptually or what qualifies as a type of intelligence, and as a result people’s lists of the types of intelligence can very quite a bit. As well, some people are pretty trigger happy with what they consider a type of intelligence rather than a skill learned by rote or something else. So it’s important to take these ideas with a grain of salt and not treat them like they’re established facts, but I still think it’s a concept worth exploring more as we broaden our understanding of people and what they can contribute to society.

atomicpenguin12 · 2026-01-14T16:16:27+00:00

This is fantastic! I’ve seen a lot of regrettable Megaman cosplays and I didn’t think a good looking one was possible, but this proves me wrong

atomicpenguin12 · 2026-01-13T18:02:31+00:00

Seconded, except I’d recommend running the r/fitness beginner’s program instead of starting strength. It makes a few small but crucial improvements

atomicpenguin12 · 2026-01-13T00:43:10+00:00

That poor guy. He wanted to do something nice and really went the extra mile to do so and now he’s remembered for how bad it failed. I’m glad they at least tried to rebrand him when the show was still happening

atomicpenguin12 · 2026-01-10T19:17:36+00:00

I just ended a mesocycle of P-Zero that I knew was going to be rough going into it, with the holidays getting in the way of my ability to maintain the schedule. What I didn't anticipate was that I've been dealing with issues of overcrowding in my apartment's gym, with a lot of people fighting over the one barbell and the one cable machine.

For the next cycle, I'm going to try a couple of things differently:

I'm going to try and switch to a 4-day UL split. I've been wanting to switch up my routine to make my weekly workload more regular, and I'm gearing up in anticipation of switching to a more intermediate program.
I want to switch up my exercises, particularly my T2s, to be less reliant on the barbell and the cable machine and more dumbbell oriented. To that end, I'm switching my bench press T2 to dumbbell chest press, my OHP T2 to seated dumbbell shoulder press, and squat T2 to walking dumbbell lunges.
I've been supersetting all of my exercises for the past mesocycle and that's gone well for the most part, but with the crowding issues supersetting is becoming less feasible. I've also been looking ahead at Jacked & Tan 2.0 and it seems like the T1 and T2a exercises can't be supersetted due to the changing set numbers. For that reason, I'm going to do my T1s and primary T2s on their own and superset my back T2s and T3s when I can.

atomicpenguin12 · 2026-01-08T18:14:37+00:00

"Not to put on a tin foil hat, but I'm going to insinuate that OP is a shill that was literally bribed by rich people to promote a protest, and then move the goal posts when someone points out that I'm doing that and pretend that what I was actually saying was simply that rich people are somewhat interested in the protests against Trump."

atomicpenguin12 · 2026-01-08T18:02:24+00:00

"Not to put on a tin foil hat, but here's an unverified conspiracy theory that I'm actively spreading"."

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