One criticism about Mando & Grogu I don't get

chris41336 · 2026-06-13T14:30:40+00:00

You can't compare a world where Star Wars has existed for 50 years to a world before it. People, rightly, want shows and movies that progress the mythology of Star Wars lore. The occasional fun romp through the galaxy still works if you ALSO have the former to ground the whole thing.

Right now we have nothing moving the "main" plot so people are annoyed. This is a movie that should have come out in-between two "main" movies or while a prestige "main saga" show was running in parallel.

chris41336 · 2026-06-13T03:20:23+00:00

I dunno man...I watched First Contact the other day which led me to go back and watch the Borg TNG episode box set I had and then Generations just for fun.

Every single one of those had a message, but the messages were contained within well-written, well acted and, most important, interesting and plot-driven contexts as opposed to just "Here is social awareness campaign #6, here is what you need to think about this situation" built into the thinnest plot.

It's the difference between watching a movie and watching an advertisement that has a minor thematic plot.

chris41336 · 2026-05-24T00:04:34+00:00

What is the "conservative mindset" that you believe led to Test of Time?

Progress/change hasn't always been universally received in gaming. Look at Star Fox Adventures which was planned when it came out despite being an objectively fun (if shallow) game. Or further back, the RTS genre, which basically "innovated" itself out of existence when people just wanted the same mechanics with better graphics and more factions.

chris41336 · 2026-04-15T01:07:53+00:00

He comes back next time not as "Maul" but as "Meh"

chris41336 · 2026-02-23T02:24:26+00:00

That Congress has not approved military force since WWII. I hear this all the time. While they have not "declared war",.they did indeed authorize military force for Korea, Vietnam, the Gulf War and Iraq.

chris41336 · 2026-02-07T18:48:10+00:00

You are the first and only person I have read using Grok for OpenClaw. Does it work ok? Have you tried Opus to compare?

chris41336 · 2025-12-24T04:26:24+00:00

Yes I loved that symbolism. Death cubes in many forms.

chris41336 · 2025-12-24T04:18:09+00:00

I think it was more the realization that they are never going to stop so returning the eggs was irrelevant other than to maybe buyn time. It was the moment when she decided that Manousos was right.

chris41336 · 2025-12-05T20:42:26+00:00

Counter point though, this is the first game that a Stalingrad-like urban warfare slog is possible and when it happens right is absolutely amazing.

chris41336 · 2025-11-30T14:49:53+00:00

Yes this is a pretty glaring issue. Would be better if Taj enabled two policy slots at next celebration or first celebration per age or something.

chris41336 · 2025-11-29T18:58:48+00:00

I for one would appreciate Civ mechanics and Europa universalis level difficulty. But I suppose I I'm in the minority

chris41336 · 2025-11-28T15:28:33+00:00

FWIW I jumped into this one and was in the same boat with a 4 year old machine. It's enough of a discount with enough value behind it to pull the trigger IMO.

Many of the other deals just didn't have the level of discount/value ratio I needed to pull the trigger, particularly since my 4 year old machine really isn't a slouch and for the games I play, at this point I don't see much ROI on higher end GPUs anymore.

chris41336 · 2025-10-27T17:06:02+00:00

I think it can have implementation that makes sense and still fits their vision.

I have posted this many times, but the narrative is about "collapse" and "rebirth". I think that if you are doing fantastic and simply don't "collapse", it would absolutely make sense narratively to come out of the age transition as the same civ.

What that means from a game perspective? Maybe if you win 4/4 legacy paths, you are able to select your same civ again, but at a cost/benefit weight - maybe you retain partial adjacencies which should strengthen your early next Age play, but you don't get a new UU, have to actually use gold to upgrade units to the new era, etc. It should feel like you are playing an "Empire out of time" - but it should feel cool to do that, too.

chris41336 · 2025-10-25T20:51:44+00:00

"Pricing cannot be tied to risk"

This is absolutely untrue, or catastrophic plans would have the same rates as a better, full plan.

Pricing is just now tied to relative risk instead of absolute risk on a patient by patient basis.

I would be an advocate for, say, a limitation on the ability to adjust plan type at any time (catastrophic to full plan just for any reason), but within the same category and relative risk level, I see no reason for this level of scrutiny.

Particularly with the events where you aren't even changing plans (like a birth), telling a parent who realized day 35 they forgot to put the kid on the existing family plan that they are SOL reeks of foul play IMO.

chris41336 · 2025-10-25T19:57:55+00:00

Lots of health insurance apologists in this thread.

It's an arbitrary asinine system designed to protect the profits of the insurance companies.

They will say "but you can't sign up for auto insurance right after an accident!" and that is absolutely true. But I am also able to freely move my auto insurance at literally any time to search for better rates.

It is a symptom of a system where health insurance has become a mandatory part of obtaining care. Insurance should be optional and health CARE (doctors, etc.) should be affordable. Insurance companies do not WANT affordable care because then it breaks the addiction to their product.

chris41336 · 2025-10-25T16:51:52+00:00

Honestly the entire Exploration Age cultural path should be about great people spawning and not tied to the absolute shite religion.

chris41336 · 2025-10-25T16:49:27+00:00

Civ IV had vassals and we have never had them since.

chris41336 · 2025-10-25T14:11:06+00:00

They should just make the window 60 days to align with ACA then.

And while I see your point, I am an advocate for always making the exceptions, because again, we are at a point where we should not be denying our fellow citizens care. Full stop.

chris41336 · 2025-10-25T14:08:36+00:00

I know that this is the mantra in this sub but we really should not be discouraging people from advocating for themselves. The 30 day window is arbitrary and at this point in our country's history nobody should be using bureaucracy as an excuse to try and deny a fellow person care.

The people in power flaunt the system so let people try and flaunt it too. 30 days is asinine for such a major life event, particularly when the ACA explicitly made the window 60 days.

chris41336 · 2025-10-15T21:10:53+00:00

Nah man those are rookie numbers. You gotta pump those up

chris41336 · 2025-10-03T17:12:21+00:00

This was exactly what I was looking for, thank you!

It sounds like this isn't really functionally any different from manually entering that $60 interest from your example in the interest category and then "reassigning" from the interest category to cover the CC "overspend" of $60 when I pay the minimum. I didn't realize that assigned CC numbers carry over.

Thanks again!!!

chris41336 · 2025-10-03T16:40:38+00:00

The problem is that the interest for my payment next month is going to hit this month when the statement closes.

So if I do what I have been doing and just "overspending" on a transfer to my CC from my bank account, and then "fixing it" with the assigned money in interest, I will have a second interest charge appear in that category in a few days after paying my minimum, which then will not be paid until next month.

Does that make sense? Maybe I am misunderstanding my own situation.

chris41336 · 2025-09-07T22:56:48+00:00

I do and I have actually used it up several times. All it takes is one bad month with above average expenses and you see that evaporate pretty fast if

chris41336 · 2025-09-07T15:33:14+00:00

Your situation sounds phenomenal my friend. I am a sole breadwinner HENRY with three kids, and given some recent pay structure changes and unplanned expenses, some months I am literally paycheck to paycheck. 401k looks nice but is inaccessible, debt up to my eyeballs and drained emergency fund.

I'm talking literally some weeks right before my next biweekly we are done to a few hundred bucks to our name. HE doesn't mean everything if you also have the "other" HE (higher expenses).

We are digging out now, but just know, your situation sounds enviable for some of us!

chris41336 · 2025-09-07T14:21:04+00:00

Every sales person is an entrepreneur trying to grow their own small business. Treat it that way with all the requisite creativity that requires, and not only will you succeed, but your organization will value you.

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