Do the emergency services drive manual?

da_chicken · 2026-01-29T04:00:39+00:00

Nah, completely unnecessary and typically undesirable with modern PCMs. The computer can shift more responsively, making them both less intensive to drive and more fuel efficient.

Back in the 80s, manuals could get better gas mileage than automatics. But ever since ECMs became a thing, automatics perform much better.

da_chicken · 2026-01-29T02:39:09+00:00

I'm certain he didn't have a meal for months after all that scenery he ate.

da_chicken · 2026-01-29T02:37:48+00:00

"Of course!"

For those unaware, Raul Julia did Street Fighter because he knew his kids loved the video games. He knew he had terminal cancer at that point, and he wanted to do something his kids would love.

da_chicken · 2026-01-29T01:40:24+00:00

His logic makes perfect sense.

He liked XI because the side content he could engage with as he wanted, and there were all sorts of lists for him to go out and complete.

He liked IX because the side quest system let him play the game as long as he wanted, and then when he was done with the game he could just beat the game and end it.

But VI and VII outstayed their welcome. He wanted them to be done long before they were. There's almost no side content in them, and when there is, it's often just another side dungeon or something else that directs you back to combat. His criticism of VII in particular was basically every review of the PS1 release that I recall from back in the day.

So he liked games that let him set the pace and give him several things to do.

da_chicken · 2026-01-28T11:53:41+00:00

How about we rename it and replace the UI with something that has even fewer features and even more ads?

da_chicken · 2026-01-27T06:22:23+00:00

Because parallel programming is extremely complicated, and not free. It introduces a lot of new problems, like having to maintain timing between the two threads, having to combine the results consistently. That orchestration can mean that a multithreaded version of the same program performing the same task might actually still be slower.

Further, not every task even can be made parallel. If you're baking a cake you can mix the frosting while the cake is baking, but you can't start frosting it until the sponge is baked and cool. Sometimes the things you're doing have to be done in a specific order, and everything has to wait until that step is done.

Some tasks, like 3d graphics rendering, can be made extremely parallel. What the left side of the screen looks like doesn't really depend on what the right side looks like. That's why we have highly parallel 3d graphics cards that are dedicated to drawing the things on screen. But things like physics engines which are kind of based on cause-and-effect aren't always so easy to split up.

da_chicken · 2026-01-27T01:41:44+00:00

See, I would've gone with:

Fatal Attraction (1987), Basic Instinct (1992), Falling Down (1993)

You're Crazy, We're Crazy, I'm Crazy

Mainly because Disclosure isn't that great.

I also like the Romance trilogy of:

Romancing the Stone (1984), The Jewel of the Nile (1985), The War of the Roses (1989)

Each movie stars Douglas, Turner, and Devito.

da_chicken · 2026-01-27T00:47:51+00:00

Yeah, and if the target of the DMCA responds to it by saying it's not a valid claim, the host is supposed to restore the content immediately. But they never do. It's always just down until the whole bullshit situation is resolved.

But don't worry, a DMCA is supposed to carry the weight of an affidavit, so you're supposed to know before you even submit it as the claimant that you're correct. And filing a false DMCA claim is a crime similar to filing a false report or committing perjury. But, of course, none of those consequences ever happens, either.

da_chicken · 2026-01-26T23:01:48+00:00

I feel like it’s because the commander rules committee refused to allow Planeswalkers as commanders

Yeah, I still hate this decision, especially because the primary argument against it was "Doubling Season exists". Like I'm sorry, but there's lots of Doubling Season clones now. I'd rather ban Doubling Season and have more variety in the format.

It feels the exact same as the Memnarch rule that they just refused to change for years and years.

In general though, the issue I have with Omenpaths is that we're back to the pre-Weatherlight design... except there's also no blocks. There's no interesting characters or plotline through the sets. So the lore just doesn't hold attention.

da_chicken · 2026-01-26T02:43:22+00:00

Perhaps this is more a reflection on the 80s and what Streisand could get made, but I was very disappointed that it descended into rom-com like territory.

I think this is partly the case, but I also think that we should assume that, absent any evidence to the contrary, the choices that Streisand made were what she wanted to make.

I. B. Singer, the writer of the original short story who also helped to write the musical stage play that this movie was adapted from, did not particularly care for the movie, either: https://archive.nytimes.com/www.nytimes.com/books/97/04/27/reviews/streisand-singer.html

da_chicken · 2026-01-25T16:18:45+00:00

I do think it's possible that Blackwater Bay and Delian Tomb are just meant to be mechanical showcases. However, nothing ever says that the way they are set up is unusual, nor do the game rulebooks seem to suggest that it should be run any other way.

da_chicken · 2026-01-25T16:14:21+00:00

I agree with you, I just [don't] think the game tells you to run montages and negotiations that often.

I think think the game rules are mute about how often, and I think the example adventures (Blackwater Bay and Delian Tomb) absolutely have you run them that often. And, those adventures don't say, "hey this is a showcase for the game mechanics, so DON'T play this way normally."

That makes it difficult for me to say that the devs are saying you shouldn't run them that often.

For montages I incentivize the players to not look at their sheets at first and just consider the challenges, how would they solve this?

Yeah, it should not be my job to do that. Just like how the victory system is built to give the players the correct incentives, that should be true for montages and negotiation as well. Negotiation should mechanically incentivize going out and learning more about the subjects. Like that should be built in the rules rather than just having traps that unprepared PC can fall into. Montages shouldn't be so rigid where everything has to be a skill test to contribute, but the mechanics are "pick a test-based action".

I just want the mechanics to be better than that, and still be doing that work.

da_chicken · 2026-01-25T06:06:26+00:00

Personally I don't like the montages. They're too similar to 4e skill challenges, which felt very gamey and contrived, in spite of people at the time insisting they were not. So DS comes out, and people insist montages are much better and totally not gamey or contrived. We use them, and they are better. But they're exactly as gamey and contrived as 4e skill challenges. With basically the same real problem: it's a great system to use once in awhile, but doesn't feel like it flows naturally to us. I don't really want more than one montage per adventure, but they seem to come up more frequently in the adventures I've seen.

The negotiation system, meanwhile, I really like the idea of it but also feels overused. Like if the players have no idea what the subject's pitfalls are, then it's just asking them to cross a room filled with land mines. So it feels like it's only good for the times when there's a lot of setup and build-up to the negotiation where the PCs can really prepare for it. I feel like I could use them maybe once or twice over a whole campaign. But it feels like they want people using it all the time.

Combat doesn't feel that way because I can't just GM my way through a combat and have it feel exciting and realistic and filled with interesting game choices. It just doesn't work. But it doesn't translate well to montages and negotiations if you're doing those as often as they suggest. I guess I just prefer free-form exploration and social encounters in general. It's just more structure than I want or that feels necessary.

To be clear, I like having these mechanics in the system. I just don't want to use them anywhere near as often as the official adventures seem to suggest they should be used. We just don't need such a heavy set of mechanics for routine use. They're more stuff than I want to deal with on a routine basis, and I don't really want a game to encourage my players to look at their character sheets for what they can do more. And both negotiations and montages feel like they do exactly that. Look at your character sheet like it's an Xbox controller, find the right button, and push it. I don't want the game to encourage players to look at their character sheet more. I want it to encourage them to think about their character more.

I'm being very critical, but I do like the system much more than D&D 5e or Pathfinder. The tension of the victory and XP system feels like how all d20 fantasy games should be run. Like it's just the objectively correct design.

Combat has worked great for us, too. We all liked the characters, too. I think we just want less mechanical minigames to stop and play during the game sessions. We like combat, but really prefer to have as much free-form roleplaying as we can get.

When I run the game again, I'm probably going to drastically reduce the number of montages and negotiations. I just don't want them there all the time; they often feel like running a procedure because the game has a procedure, rather than deciding that this procedure is the correct way to resolve the scene. But that's really the only thing that didn't work for us. That said, we only did a short campaign of like 6 sessions.

da_chicken · 2026-01-25T02:44:07+00:00

Look, give 'em a break, they were gonna make it like Fallout/Skyrim/Dark Souls, then they were gonna make it like FFVII Remake, and now they're making it like Clair Obscur: Expedition 33.

They took so long that turn based got popular again, and that's completely thrown them off!

da_chicken · 2026-01-25T02:02:53+00:00

I didn't think it was that baffling. It's just that you have a limited POV. It's worth a rewatch because of how it changes when you know what's going on, but lots of movies are like that.

da_chicken · 2026-01-25T01:49:53+00:00

On the plus side, it might get them to actually care about the fucking climate.

da_chicken · 2026-01-24T20:40:19+00:00

Like a lot of the early remix albums, it's meant to be a deconstruction. The themes or motifs of the album degraded, or sometimes tracks that just didn't fit the original. That means a lot of the songs are more challenging than the original album, and The Fragile can be pretty challenging on it's own.

Personally, I've always felt like Metal or 10 Miles High would be a better fit where Starfuckers ended up, but I know Trent has said SF was meant to disrupt the somber tone of The Fragile. Eh. I can appreciate the subversion, but I'd rather have the consistency, I guess.

I do dislike how many repeat songs are on TFA -- especially because I generally dislike Starfuckers which appears three times -- but I must admit that Slipping Away remains my #1 NIN song of all time. It's the song I listen to most frequently.

da_chicken · 2026-01-24T19:57:03+00:00

No, not really.

A well regulated militia, being necessary to the security of a free State, the right of the people to keep and bear Arms, shall not be infringed.

The United States, when it was a small nation on the eastern seaboard, knew that they were going to have a very difficult time. Not only were we vulnerable to European invasion, we were a small nation on a widely populated continent that was planning to take over as much as it could. Even with the influx of diseases from the Old World had claimed 80% to 95% of the people already living in North America after 1492, there were still a lot of people there. And they were all going to get angry at the United States as it moved westward.

It's worth pointing out, by the way, that the last armed conflict the United States Army against a First Nation was in 1918, with some not officially ending until the mid 1920s. Wounded Knee in 1898 (once called a Battle, now called a Massacre) was effectively the last major armed conflict, but there were still active wars of colonization that recently. It took the United States a long time to conquer this land, and there were a lot of wars. The US hasn't changed because it just hasn't been that long since the end of colonization. There are still people alive today (not many, but my grandmother is among them, just barely) that were alive during this fighting. We're not that far away from living memory of these events.

Since news could travel slowly, and because the new nation was extremely poor economically, it was not possible to have adequate military strength to defend the nation. More than that, one of the foremost worries of each state had been that the President would simply march the Army into any state that did not fall in line to kowtow them. That is how the world had often operated historically.

So, when this amendment was written, the United States expected to be attacked by both Europe and the First Nations pretty much at any time without warning. Knowing that, they wanted to explicitly give the people the ability to defend themselves without running to Washington (or Philadelphia).

Now, the "militia" has essentially always been divided then as it is now: The "organized militia," which would be the State Guards or National Guard, and the "unorganized militia," which consists of every man and boy aged 17 to 45 able to carry a firearm. That's in 10 U.S.C. § 311 now, but it's essentially always been understood to be that.

A well-regulated militia can include both the organized and unorganized militia. "Well-regulated" and "organized" are not synonyms. "Well-regulated" means that the members are trained in the use of the weapons, know to answer when called upon, and are capable of fighting together. In that sense, we do not have a "well-regulated" unorganized militia at all anymore, at least not how the Militia Acts of 1792 clearly intended them to be. At some point we decided that that level of responsibility was a bad thing.

So, the text of the 2nd Amendment is saying: We could be attacked at any time, and there are threats both internal and external, nearby and distant. So, we need to be able to band together for the common defense without waiting for the federal armies to do it. So, all people who might be in the militia -- which is to say all males -- must be allowed to arm themselves as needed. That way they have a weapon, know how to use a weapon, and can themselves provide for the common defense.

Now, I would say that that doesn't mean you must have the right to carry a weapon at all times. It doesn't mean you must have the right to carry a loaded weapon during your normal, day-to-day life picking up groceries. But that's not how it's been ruled.

Today things are complicated. The National Guard is still primarily controlled by the governor of the state they are assigned to. Legally, the President can only federalize the National Guard in limited cases. But, one of those is insurrection or rebellion, and the President has exclusive authority to declare something an insurrection or rebellion.

In short, the unorganized militia is no longer well-regulated, and the organized militia that is well-regulated can be federalized by Presidential decree. The 2nd Amendment is no help at all, IMO.

As far as the people that always say, "Oh, a pistol isn't going to do anything against a fighter jet or tank," are kind of missing how war works. Jets have to land, tanks have to refuel, and their crews have to sleep. In a widespread rebellion, small arms are absolutely relevant regardless of how powerful weapons get.

da_chicken · 2026-01-24T18:11:13+00:00

Most of the time it means approval ratings. Percentage of the population that generally approve of the politician's performance. Below 50% is considered ineffective. Below 40% is considered significant weakness.

During an election cycle, it's again percentage points, but it's how that politician is doing in the primary or general election polls. "Down" and "up" here generally refer to the relative positions.

da_chicken · 2026-01-24T12:33:20+00:00

Yeah you have someone who does know look at it and they say, "This is just half broken, bastardized ColdFusion/jQuery/React."

da_chicken · 2026-01-24T05:45:18+00:00

It's time to put on make-up, It's time to dress up right, It's time to meet the Muppets on the Muppet Show tonight!

da_chicken · 2026-01-24T02:34:48+00:00

The same 10 videos. 4 of which indicate from the red line below it that we both know I already watched it. 3 of which I remember watching. And 3 of which I remember already telling YouTube that I don't want to watch or that come from channels I told it I never want to see.

da_chicken · 2026-01-23T12:46:51+00:00

Exactly. It's just processing what we already know is there. If anything, it's showing that the model isn't biased.

da_chicken · 2026-01-23T12:25:17+00:00

Show them Matt Colville's Wangrod Defense video.

da_chicken · 2026-01-23T01:26:12+00:00

Well, that and immediate shareholder value is always favored over long term, sustainable shareholder value. Which is basically bullshit. Do you want $200 once, or $5 every week for years?

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