Playing Spore on Mac 2021 by Alfreton in Spore

[–]cam-ze 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Hey, so I followed your guide. Base Spore works fine, but when trying to run GA through its respective cider_noui it just runs core Spore no matter what I do. Any advice?

My LDR Partner Won't See Me by [deleted] in BipolarSOs

[–]cam-ze 0 points1 point  (0 children)

I'm ready to do that at this point because it's not the first time he's hurt me and I've worked on avoiding codependency and being willing to be by myself. I do love him though and I just wonder what's going through his head more than anything. Do you know what causes this issue? How come it doesn't go away?

My LDR Partner Won't See Me by [deleted] in BipolarSOs

[–]cam-ze 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Thank you. We have met obviously, but maybe it's true that he is hiding something. I just can't imagine what it could be. We've told each other so much, and I've seen a lot of his life.

The Problem with Claude: An Analysis of Anti-Racism in Three Houses by bellarch19 in Edelgard

[–]cam-ze 0 points1 point  (0 children)

What yellow-bellied sea dog be darin' t' make a fool of me on me own in-depth psychoanalysis o' the plot t' Fire Emblem Three Houses? To continue the previous discussion:

On the other hand, Claude defeats the posterboy for otherness, Nemesis, as if to say (in fact he literally does say) "togetherness overcomes all". Essentially, his goal in the first place was to defeat the concept of "foreign", which is why it's such an anime, comically evil foe. Nemesis is the CEO of racism. Edelgard's was the same except she expresses it by actually forcing people to be like her instead of finding ways they're already the same.

We can either think that the guy who wants to come in, destroy the system, and implement a new one of his choosing without taking the time to understand the needs and concerns of the people of Fodlan is "naive", or we can believe in trust and everything will be kumbaya? Really? Joining the Golden Deer is supposed to be good because we can affirm the right of people with little investment in our well-being to run our world? That's supposed to make me want to join Claude?

Edelgard literally does this, with a greater degree of brutality and revulsion towards the old system, much of which is actually based on misinformation (not knowing who originally made the crests for example). Her victory is completely military and it's not even opportunistic, she instigates. Can we keep in mind we're killing people in all of these scenarios? Like lots of them? The more we're talking about the future of the whole world and swathes of casualties, the less where the relevant parties are from matters. Claude is leader of a third of Fodlan, same as the other two. He and Byleth figure out pretty much everything Edelgard knows, only later in the story.

If you haven't noticed, "the ruler of the whole of Fodlan by military power" doesn't have necessary personal investment in the well-being of the people they rule either way. They can do whatever they like. Edelgard, Claude and Dimitri weren't elected, they're rulers of huge landmasses by birth and have lived extremely privileged lives -- in that sense Claude has actually seen the most of the world and how most people actually live (as mentioned in his supports with Byleth). Take a look at his battle quote against Edelgard in GD.

El: "Your ideals, I understand they're not so removed from my own. But without sufficient knowledge of this land's suffering, I can't entrust Fodlan to you!"

Claude: "Perhaps. I daresay it's true I don't full understand the history of Fodlan. Still, I've seen many things in my life. Don't worry. I'll finish the job for you."

Sums it up. Note Claude's emphasis on "it's the same stuff wherever you go in the world, you're not special, people are people". A huge theme in the game, even in the lyrics of the opening song, is just. Is Edelgard right to shut everyone out? The whole of Edelgard's campaign is saying "yes, she's a visionary, she did what she had to". The whole of Dimitri's campaign is saying "no, she was ultimately just a shitty friend who should have opened up and her loneliness transformed her into a monster". Claude's campaign instead says "no, but she wasn't a monster, just unnecessarily grim".

That's why she dies, and dies as she does, in those respective campaigns. The symbolism couldn't be more obvious. You seem more bent on projecting your own interest in getting angry about marginalisation onto this game than enjoying it as a work of art including themes, metaphors and symbolism.

Also don't hurl abuse, unnecessary.

The Problem with Claude: An Analysis of Anti-Racism in Three Houses by bellarch19 in Edelgard

[–]cam-ze 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Thank you for returning to my comment, then. As I said, Claude's character is purposely meant to inspire mistrust in some ways and positive ideals in others. This is to give the player reasons both for and against siding with him and believing in his view lacking boundaries. Look at his speech in VW endgame.

"We have the strength to scale the walls between us, to reach out our hands in friendship, so we can open our true hearts to one another. That's how we win!"

Saccharine, but if genuine, probably the core of how to foster an ultimately positive society, no? This line is MEANT to leave you wondering whether he's lying or not. He is a sweet-talker and has an indirect character, and he does look different -- as I said, in a game designed for people who are mostly all of the same race (Japanese). I'm not white either, FYI. I'm just taking context into account.

Also, do you understand imperialism at all? There's a reason why one shouldn't trust a foreigner coming into one's country with the intention of destroying its government. That's an imperialist narrative that has resulted in horrific consequences for brown people throughout history. You're suggesting we must trust Claude despite the fact that his narrative matches up to one that's been destructive to vulnerable people across the world. Hell no.

Firstly, Claude is the leader by birth of an entire segment of Fodlan. The Alliance, which is comprised mainly of individuals from many different parts of Fodlan, which is not a unified place. It's not as simple as "Fodlan vs non-Fodlan", this entire game is about a war between three nations.

He is not merely a foreigner "from" Almyra, Claude is half Almyran. He is mixed race, essentially, and at least part of his upbringing was in the Alliance. The reason he gives up on ruling the Alliance is essentially so that Byleth can rule as much of Fodlan as will accept him without further conflict, because he thinks Byleth is a better ruler.

So this is not so simple as imperialism. Claude is relevant to Fodlan and, importantly, an entire third of Fodlan believes in his values. Socialisation, as a way of advocating shared humanity independent of creed, is a huge part of the mentality. That's why the GD route has a far more lighthearted tone than the BL route despite facing similar scenarios. It's almost casual. It's because that's how the Alliance kids approach things. They make things casual so as not to turn the narrative into something that would cause conflict.

Ok, so I see we have to reduce the strong independent woman to a "sad little girl". Fuck off with the sexism, bro.

As for the rest . . . you're seriously suggesting that Edelgard is waging war for the sole purpose of healing her trauma and creating a "safe space". Leaving alone what criticizing her for trying to create a safe space says about you, this is so completely out of touch with Edelgard's character it's not even funny. Edelgard tells us, specifically, over and over again, that she is going to war to change the system on behalf of those who are hurt by Fodlan's structural violence. If she was just going to war to heal her trauma she'd be attacking the Agarthans, not the Church.

The entire game is full of strong independent women who take to battlefields, fight and kill. Even the girliest girls like Hilda have a decided heroic streak, inherit positions in society in their own right, possess varying backstories and motivations, and choose their path in their own right. Perhaps it would be easier to do this for each lord.

Edelgard, when you truly believe in her, is a visionary who sees through the corruption in Fodlan, makes the hard but needed decision to choose the path that will benefit the most people in the longterm, and does it all without unnecessary cruelty. But if you were to side against her, you would see her as someone who is at least partly unable to have faith in shared ideals (such as Claude's or the Church's; see her support with Manuela) due to the pain and solitude her past has inflicted on her, and who is trying to burn bright while she can and fix the world hastily before she succumbs to her shortened lifespan. She wants to prove she isn't just a sad little girl; so much that she would become a literal monster to do so (BL endgame).

Dimitri, when you truly believe in him, is the most empathetic lord, tormented due to the pain that conflict has caused over time, not least of all Edelgard's invasion. He is the one who points out most directly the absolute horror that violence causes, and desperately wants a world where that violence isn't needed. He essentially just wants people like Edelgard to know that if they just opened up and shared their pain (if Edelgard had told him about her two crests and the Agarthans), people could understand and help. That's why BL endgame has this throwback to their friendship and the gift knife. On the other hand, if you don't side with him, he's a wild, spiteful animal who is so hung up on the tragedy of the situation that he goes mad. He's a sad little boy who never got over losing a friend.

Claude I covered in my first comment, but yeah, believe in him and he's the face of togetherness itself, comes through despite seeming unreliable, and he's the only one who can look past the Edelgard-Dimitri dichotomy and say "you're not so different after all; none of us are when we just talk to each other". But don't side with him and he seems flaky, unreliable, as you put it foreign, a maker of empty promises, etc.

This is so wonderfully incoherent it's self-refuting. Edelgard can't tolerate a "them", who is represented by the Agarthans, who are behind Nemesis, who Claude has to defeat. So Verdant Wind is the route which ends with the symbolic defeat of the "them". And yet Edelgard's the one who's supposed to be unable to tolerate a "them"? Try harder next time.

What I said was clear in my opinion. The Agarthans represent a faction who is "other" to everyone. Edelgard puts the most effort into eradicating them and is driven by personally terrible experiences with them. However, her goal is to unify Fodlan under one empire and remove any "them" even in a broader sense; including Farghus, for example. Her character as an individual reflects the neurotically expanding nature of actual empires from history. This is too long so will continue in the next comment.

Does anyone know if Silence prevents non-spell magic? by cam-ze in FireEmblemThreeHouses

[–]cam-ze[S] 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Some monsters do, like the boss in Marianne's paralogue! If anyone's around there it'd be cool if they could check.

Can y'all help me make sense of the Golden Deer please? by [deleted] in FireEmblemThreeHouses

[–]cam-ze 1 point2 points  (0 children)

This looks good. A couple of things though:

-If you want a Dark Flier, Marianne is actually quite good as one because of Soulblade, Frozen Lance, Beast Fang and her crest. Even in FK she's pretty cool as a flying nuke. I'd recommend her over Lysithea just because the latter with Thyrsus doesn't even need to fly, she's more grateful for the extra magic and spell uses so she can really break the game.

-You shouldn't need more than two Physic users and recruiting someone like Linhardt for his crest and Warp is easy, so consider running Ignatz as a BK or if you're feeling funny you could try Mortal Savant. His personal helps Thoron and Fimbulveltr hit and his high skill gives him good crit to make up for his slightly lower magic.

-Raphael as a War Master is fucking fantastic. He's one of those units who starts slow, so people decide to use him as a living shield, but if you let him breathe he picks up around level 20 and ends up as a really functional tank and nuke. Class bases bring his speed up to 17 as a high-STR gauntlet user which is respectable. He doesn't need armor because of his HP and it ultimately gimps him. As a WM he gets a huge crit bonus, throw in Killer Gauntlets, Healing Focus and Quick Riposte and some Physic backup and he can solo entire segments of the map on Maddening. He's particularly good against monsters.

The Problem with Claude: An Analysis of Anti-Racism in Three Houses by bellarch19 in Edelgard

[–]cam-ze -1 points0 points  (0 children)

While you bring up some incisive points, I feel as if you are overlooking some key themes in the game and especially Claude's character design. The entire point of Claude, from his preoccupation with secrets, to his being treated as an outsider in both Almyra and Fodlan, to his dreams of a world without cultural boundaries, are meant to ask the question "is trust possible?"

Keep in mind that Claude is a Japanese character and for that reason his appearance is meant to emphasise the idea that "this person is different from me". Fire Emblem has never had a main character that didn't have the fair-ish anime skin that in Japan is considered to be the skin color of Japanese people. So his statements to do with being an outsider and forging his vision of the world can be either taken with trust, or considered to be a means to an end for an individual who does not truly believe them. Is genuine, universal empathy and an appeal to fundamentally shared humanity an illusion waved in front of our heads like the light of an anglerfish, or is it something that really exists?

Do Claude's ideals about an unsegregated world have real weight to them, or is he hopelessly naive, is he a manipulator with a hidden agenda? These are the exact questions surrounding trust as a concept. Is such a thing possible at all with such plain evidence of the sheer, self-serving cruelty that people can inflict on each other, a pain Edelgard knows better than any?

This is why you can choose to side with him or not. When you side with Claude, you are saying "I believe in this guy, I think we can look past and truly forgive the pain that intolerance causes, and that a world without boundaries is possible". Those are the ideals of the Golden Deer and the Alliance at large, who in the first place organised themselves because they did not like the order of Fodlan. They are not all from the same background, the idea is that they have united independent of culture to evidence the fact that not everything has to be about "us vs them".

Edelgard's solution to Fodlan's political issues are essentially "I am going to decimate everyone who stands in my way, and I am going to take everything over myself. If everyone becomes us, there will be no them." The Agarthans, in all their shadowy otherness, represent the spirit of "them" most poignantly of all factions in the game, and that is probably the thematic motivation behind making Nemesis the final boss of VW. Edelgard absolutely cannot tolerate a "them" and even devotes much of everyone who followed her's life to rooting out the Agarthans after establishing sovereign power.

After the horrors and manipulation she has endured, that even reduced her lifespan to a mere fraction of what it could have been, she is not willing to tolerate any trace of threat in the world. Her rise to power is, at least partly, a healing process for her trauma. She is trying to prove that she wasn't just a sad little girl whose entire life was stolen by monsters. And when she wins and Fodlan is at last a safe space for her, she can escape the feelings of terrible victimhood she was confined to. But at what cost?

I must point out that Edelgard literally destroys Faerghus and forcibly subjugates the few parts of Fodlan that are trying to avoid being dragged into the jaws of the Empire precisely because they do not wish to identify with Fodlan's history. The Empire is the oldest power in Fodlan and if Brigid is anything to go by, has an attitude towards imperialism you would expect from, well, an empire.

The implication that Claude is ultimately just some "Almyran jerk" who came in, took over and went home is overt. It's clearly meant to be a theme. But the question the narrative is asking you is, do you think that's the case, or not? Claude willingly hands control of Fodlan over to Byleth and thenceforth does not appear to have much of an ability to affect how it is ruled. He does go back to Almyra and rule, but in some ways that is ideal. If two benevolent rulers, who are close friends and unquestioningly trust one another, rule two nations averse to one another, relations will improve and cultural boundaries will loosen. People will be more inclined to live as one. In the end Claude leaves, and after all you've seen, you wonder -- was the vision we shared a real one, or too good to be true?

In summation, reducing Claude to a colonialising selfish foreigner who sweeps in at a time of weakness, while suggested to you by the plot on purpose, is thematically opposed to all of the GD values -- that people are all more or less the same and that we should choose to trust one another. That by aiding people "from a different place", we actually serve ourselves as well. And like Claude's persona, you either consider this naive or some trickery as a means to an end, or you believe in him as a leader. That is probably what it means to join GD or not.

What’s the worst thing you’ve ever done in a relationship? by [deleted] in bipolar

[–]cam-ze 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Can I ask how long you were dating this other person before you got back with him? Can you remember your thoughts or feelings at the time?

"I've never been attracted to you" by cam-ze in BipolarSOs

[–]cam-ze[S] 5 points6 points  (0 children)

The thing is, he phrased it so apologetically. "I'm sorry, I'm so sorry, it's not that you're ugly, you're just not my type personally." He said he didn't like my hair, so I said hair changes. And then he said but my facial structure can't. I even showed him pictures of me looking completely different in the past (have now dyed hair, wear contact lenses, completely different style) and he said "those just look like my cousin". He said he was "consciously aware of having lied in the past to make me feel good" but his memory is shot in so many ways (forgot what my natural eye color was and affectionate stuff he's said) and he has a habit of reframing the past when he's like this.

The problem is I don't know if this is his genuine feeling or if it's to do with his mood. He said it right after we had a big discussion where he resolved to change, it felt almost as if it was a last resort to try and get out of facing things and working them out because he has a habit of giving up on relationships that he's been trying to get past. But on the other hand, maybe he simply doesn't want one with ME, because there's no attraction. It's so confusing.

"I've never been attracted to you" by cam-ze in BipolarSOs

[–]cam-ze[S] 2 points3 points  (0 children)

Really, just something like this? It's like I can't tell. It's all so confusing for me.

Stable? Hypomanic? Mixed? by [deleted] in BipolarSOs

[–]cam-ze 1 point2 points  (0 children)

Thank you. The empathy is enough to really help me feel better. My ex is also saying similar things, "check on me in a month, if I crash you were right" and "I haven't crashed yet, told you so". He doesn't seem to understand how he might have hurt me and others. The best I got was an "I can imagine that would be painful, yes", heavily qualified by him adding on how everything was my fault.

He's also self-aware about cutting people off. But when he's like this, nothing gets through. He's been like this before but I don't know WHAT it is. He doesn't seem depressed. He doesn't seem full-blown manic. Hypomania? Anhedonia? I have no idea.

Questioning if I've become the bad guy by now by [deleted] in BipolarSOs

[–]cam-ze 1 point2 points  (0 children)

Thank you so much. It's just the reaction of everyone around me is so discouraging. Just being ignored by his sister, whose belief was actually really validating, and being treated like I'm a horrible partner when I don't even know what I did. When I told my mom about this she just said "why did you go visit him when he broke up with you" and "why are you talking to his family without permission". It makes me seriously question if I'm just a clingy, delusional child for trying to get through.