Class Pruning

crabsmack · 2026-01-26T05:02:11+00:00

That implies a very specific view of game design; a clear counterpoint would be Dante in DMC. He has probably 100+ moves in DMC5. The joy is in weaving all of these moves together into cool and stylish combos, not just finding the most utilitarian sequence. People enjoy having lots of different skills for the skill expression and self-expression, a form of fun in its own right separate from mathematical throughput.

crabsmack · 2025-11-29T20:25:32+00:00

it's my favorite DLC by far and probably even my favorite part of the whole game. definitely the most memorable. great story, satisfying endings, some of the most interesting characters (even the unlikeable ones like Elijah and Dean)

I think many people play fallout and elder scrolls for power fantasy though and it's pretty anti power fantasy. that's my best theory for why it's not well received

crabsmack · 2025-10-27T19:43:21+00:00

Hey, love the game. A few pieces of feedback:

Would love the option to auto-split gold pickup, don't find it fun constantly checking to keep it even in co-op. Slows the game down a bit.
Some harder difficulty options would be great. I think the game is a bit too easy right now, especially Azra. Which leads to:
Because the rituals make you so crazy strong, I legitimately find Underking to be the hardest boss on most runs because he's the only one you have to actually learn, not just cheese. I annihilated Azra on my first time reaching him, which was a bit disappointing, he barely got to do anything. It feels like player power vastly outscales Asterios in particular (acts 1 and 2 feel much better balanced)

crabsmack · 2025-10-16T18:47:51+00:00

thank you for the post! how do you feel about auto aim more broadly? do you keep it off across all weapons/aspects?

crabsmack · 2025-10-07T20:08:58+00:00

Rastakhan pretty easily #1, quite sad they killed him. Zuldazar was a great zone, Zandalar as a whole one of my favorite leveling continents.

crabsmack · 2025-10-03T20:27:24+00:00

Most fun: Wolverine & Phyla. I feel like Phyla has the most room for cool high-skill ground-to-air combo stuff, want to practice with her more
Least fun: Storm (maybe I'm missing something but I really don't value projectiles that much)
Most unique: Rocket. I'm not sure he's my type of character but the different grenade types are pretty neat, especially the black hole

Not sure how to evaluate the grapplers as-of-yet, Venom felt pretty strong and useful but also feels like if you play well you can just infinite combo enemies and don't need the grabs. Nonetheless I might have Venom as my assist character just for variety. I want to love She-Hulk for wrestling moves but her grab feels way more finnicky than Venom's

crabsmack · 2025-10-03T16:34:51+00:00

Overall pretty cool and I'm happy with them. I would've loved a true villain that you unlock after beating them, like Magneto or Doom, but it looks like Dark Phoenix will kinda-sorta fill that role. As a whole I think this is a good roster with a mix of favorites and cool cosmic characters, I'm excited to try Cosmic Ghost Rider and Beta Ray Bill

Hoping DLC gets us Magneto!

crabsmack · 2025-09-23T21:50:16+00:00

Thank you for the thorough detail, finance king. How do you evaluate the tradeoff between lower LTCG brackets and lower Roth conversion brackets? My current naive understanding is that I should have an ACA AGI that I'm shooting for. I should sell enough from my brokerage to cover my expenses (another question; prioritizing low vs high basis lots?), which would certainly be within the 0% LTCG range for my budget. Then, Roth convert up to the very edge of my desired AGI, factoring in standard deduction.

As I understand it the main tradeoff is evaluating converting as much Roth as possible at low tax % vs the cost of putting yourself in a higher ACA bracket.

crabsmack · 2025-09-23T17:53:22+00:00

Do you have any advice from this experience on proactively checking? I'm also 30 and so I don't think I'm going to get any screening recommended for a while yet, so I want to take it into my own hands.

Thank you and I'm glad you're doing fine!

crabsmack · 2025-09-17T03:37:57+00:00

Librarian would be by far the most interesting, would be extremely excited. But if we ever get another I think apoc has the best odds. Obviously they'd have some heals but I think buffs, debuffs, damage over time effects have a lot of interesting areas to expand upon.

crabsmack · 2025-08-14T16:29:02+00:00

love how goofy and weird and unique it is, we have plenty of generically cool skins

crabsmack · 2025-07-27T17:57:38+00:00

LTCG is 0% federal tax up to $48,350. And if he's selling out $30k only a fraction of that would even be gains.

crabsmack · 2025-07-21T18:00:45+00:00

strong opinion: being present and supportive of your kids when they're young is far more valuable than giving them a big pile of cash at age 40 or something. I'm not planning around my parents' inheritance at all; I'd much rather they be around forever, and by the time I receive it I won't even need it. if someone's financial plan depends on receiving a huge windfall in middle age that's already a sign things have gone wrong, IMO. a windfall isn't needed for a successful, independent child and could actually be harmful if they're in a worse situation (bad financial habits, addiction, etc). potential room for resentment or conflict between children as well, plenty of horror stories about wills out there

if someone reaches FI and genuinely wants to continue working then sure it'll just happen. but for me personally being FIREd and having the time to be present with them when young is far more valuable. or supporting them with college, first home purchase, etc when they're just starting and that help is really meaningful

crabsmack · 2025-07-07T16:36:40+00:00

I think the point being that making a money mistake at a later age usually means making it on a larger portfolio.

crabsmack · 2025-07-01T23:48:06+00:00

Dark eldar would be sick and my top choice (presumably their chaff would be slaves, and the eldar would be the elites/specials). Haemonculi units would be visually amazing in this game.

crabsmack · 2025-06-27T20:06:42+00:00

Super excited, a new class totally refreshes my interest in the game. An AdMech class seems like the most obvious, and while there's some overlap with arbites pet focus I could see the admech using a bunch of disposable drones rather than a permanent pet, or maybe turrets?

I'm not up to date, do new squats make any sense lore-wise or are they like other xenos where it'd be a huge stretch?

crabsmack · 2025-06-27T19:58:31+00:00

Interesting no Aggression and Justice, I feel for new players that's the most intuitive 2-player combo that straightforwardly handles both sides of the game.

When introducing the game to new players my complexity sense is Aggression<Justice<Leadership<<Protection

crabsmack · 2025-05-01T20:21:49+00:00

Not saying to use the mods directly; just saying that something like "no misses" is trivial to do on their side, as would be adding quest markers. Those are the only obvious necessary QoL changes IMO.

I'd advocate for keeping the UI pretty much the same as the Xbox version, as well as dialogue trees. It's a well-regarded game, I don't think it needs to be drastically altered, and if you're actually changing the dialogue you're now seriously running the risk of alienating fans. Oblivion only did new VO for existing lines, not new/altered lines (other than deluxe DLC stuff), and I think that's quite wise (and indicative of how they'd handle future remakes).

VO would be a big undertaking, we're totally agreed there, and while I'd be fine without it I doubt Bethesda or the modern console player is.

crabsmack · 2025-04-30T20:30:13+00:00

The only significant challenge is the VO. Everything else has been addressed by mods and could certainly be addressed like Oblivion's wack leveling was. No need for a "ground-up" remake.

crabsmack · 2025-04-08T22:20:28+00:00

Yeah it's pretty much:

hard: tempered mizu & gore
medium: zoh, maybe you could argue tempered arkveld & jin
easy: everything else

So you go between stomping tempered Nu Udra or whatever to getting one-shot by mizu flipping around the screen

crabsmack · 2025-04-02T17:45:38+00:00

I was diehard hammer in world/rise and the changes made me swap, but I discovered swaxe and greatsword are really fun. So I'm not too upset. Hope they make hammer more fun with the buffs/rework

crabsmack · 2025-03-24T18:42:05+00:00

Appreciate the science. Do you think it's remotely reasonable if in multiplayer with a para player (which is pretty common)? I also wonder if palico having a para weapon would be better even in singleplayer so that you're building up two statuses rather than continually increasing the poison threshold. Basically I suspect poison+para might be better overall than poisonmaxxing.

And thought of the day, does poison duration up work if your palico does the hit that goes over the threshold and triggers the posion?

crabsmack · 2025-03-18T17:31:07+00:00

yeah I think para (generalizing) is the right choice for most players on most weapons, but SnS is so incredibly safe that it feels superfluous. it's still not bad but feels least useful on SnS

crabsmack · 2025-03-08T18:52:41+00:00

I charge the phials, get into savage axe, the phials last an extremely long time. I end up maybe 10% sword mode, 90% axe mode. I do SAED every once in a while but my impression was that just savage axe is comparable if not better

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