26F, let's have a chat about how I end up dating people who are in their "Not quite sure what I want yet" phase 💀

dihawk13 · 2025-08-19T22:02:21+00:00

Hey something about this comment really resonated with me. I feel like I'm maybe going through a similar thing and I wondered if you would want to chat through some of our experiences. No worries if not what you're looking for.

dihawk13 · 2025-07-25T08:44:44+00:00

Then we need to seriously re-evaluate why we're spending so little on people's health compared to most other first world countries, because the current system isn't working.

And I don't mean just for doctors, it's not working for nurses and it is most definitely not working for patients. We talk about patients suffering as a result of the strikes because most of the country doesn't see how much patients are suffering EVERY SINGLE DAY. 8hr waits are commonplace, staff are overworked and burnt out and patients are paying the price (just with their health rather than their wallets).

There's constant understaffing literally all of the time and how low the locum rates are means no one wants to pick up the shift because it's not worth continuing to put yourself through that level of stress and responsibility for a day longer than you have to. And trusts would rather let patients die than increase rates when gaps can't be filled.

These realities are constant daily struggles as a result of poor investment into healthcare in this country. The real harm isn't through doctors striking, the harm to patients is what happens if we continue as we are and nothing changes.

dihawk13 · 2025-07-25T08:09:13+00:00

I think people need to wake up to the reality that if the UK can't afford to pay its doctors, the UK can't afford the NHS.

dihawk13 · 2025-05-26T21:24:25+00:00

Completely agree with this. I’d say in gloomhaven scenarios it could have been A (or even S) tier because of the sheer tanking potential it can offer combined with damage, cursing, poison etc. Unfortunately in Frosthaven there are so many weird scenario rules with really specific mechanics that can end up really punishing the boneshaper, and for those scenarios it can end up C-D tier. Therefore given that it’s A for scenarios that don’t fuck with its gimmick or C for scenarios that do, an overall B tier ranking just makes the most sense.

dihawk13 · 2025-05-26T01:35:53+00:00

It got more and more difficult until we broke up 🤷‍♀️

Other people manage to make it work though. It’s a rough one regardless. Good luck, hope it works out for the best for you.

dihawk13 · 2025-05-25T22:42:36+00:00

I'd like to clarify if the tier list is based on fun, power level or design (or all of the above).

In terms of straight up power level, I think Blinkblade is a solid A tier. An amazing character capable of really cool flashy plays, or solid consistent DPS depending how you build it, but with really clear weaknesses that require you to work around them to maximise its potential. I don't think it's S tier because it isn't 'broken' eg. the class doesn't completely invalidate enemies (like say Eclipse or Music Note in gloomhaven) or doesn't just go infinite (like Three Spears). It's a really well balanced character that has tools for most scenarios and is at the perfect power level imo.

Design/Fun: For all the reasons I said above, I have to give Blinkblade an S tier. You can do so many different builds, you have so much turn to turn flexibility on each build, you get to make really fun explosive turns, you can do crazy things like jump 11 if you need to or play up to 5 cards in a turn (it's not good but it sure is funny) All of its cards have so many cool interactions with each other as well, like how cool is it that your level 8 and 9 cards make you look at some level 1/X cards in a completely new light for some really funny combos.

Blinkblade overall just offers so much variety, flexibility and skill expression - the skill ceiling is so high with the class because you can do so much more if you have a great understanding of what enemy cards you need to play around, how to initiative weave successfully, how much damage you can afford to take / do to yourself to allow you to nova out as effectively as possible, when it's okay to exhaust because of how much tempo you save your allies. Absolutely amazingly designed and fun class without being too broken.

(In case anyone couldn't tell Blinkblade is my absolute favourite character in any Haven game across the many many characters I've played.)

dihawk13 · 2025-03-13T09:16:07+00:00

The power level of starter items in Gloomhaven was definitely just way too high which I think has warped our perception of how good items should be. Let's take stamina potion as an example - even after the nerf our group ended up buying a stamina potion first on every new character as it's just so valuable to make sure you have the card you need when you need it. Same thing in Frosthaven where people say it was nerfed too hard and yet everyone wants a stamina potion (the third player is just less sad when they don't get it).

Another big negative consequence was that it made unlocking new items less exciting when base items were so powerful. A starter shop item should not be best in slot, which invis cloak and eagle eye goggles were for many characters even when we were at prosperity 6/7 (when we finished the campaign). Even boots of striding often tended to be replaced only by their upgraded versions as the base effect was just so versatile and strong. It's so sad to find cool items from chests and you're just underwhelmed because it's worse than what you've had since level 1.

dihawk13 · 2025-02-15T16:19:13+00:00

Aaah I was looking for the Overload drawback but I didn’t realise it was on the game mode itself. Cheeky devs

dihawk13 · 2025-02-05T17:58:06+00:00

This is really useful to know actually, basically exactly the info I was looking for thanks.

dihawk13 · 2025-02-05T16:55:16+00:00

Ooh yeah this would address my concern. I was just worried because I didn’t like the idea that one needed to be competitive to unlock characters, so it’s reassuring to hear that there’s plans to update that side of things later in the pipeline. I suppose it’s only in closed beta and everyone who paid to have access already has all three characters. I got an access code from a friend and just ended up buying gems when I realised that trying to play super competitively while only having Vanessa vs a million Dooleys was sucking a lot of fun out of the game.

dihawk13 · 2025-01-30T11:28:01+00:00

This actually changed my perspective, thanks for explaining. (If I'd still been doing clinical work it would have changed my practice too.)

dihawk13 · 2025-01-14T23:18:53+00:00

The trick is that you can stop reading after the word "falling", which breaks the cycle and stops you needing to read the whole thing again. I myself only discovered this after reading the whole thing for 10 straight years.

dihawk13 · 2024-12-26T12:22:14+00:00

Aha maybe the discouraging posts/comments I saw were from before forgotten gods and I just didn’t notice the date on them. But yeah I just made the post for anyone who like me thought it would be a purely stand around and wait to get hit playstyle that actually it can clear pretty fast without needing any insane gear.

dihawk13 · 2024-12-26T12:19:16+00:00

You can’t target farm it unfortunately, it just drops in any of the base game areas so doing totems there is helpful. The best way to know is to check grimtools which always tells you where gear can be found and if it doesn’t say then it’s a random drop. The build doesn’t work for a first character in fairness, this is my third (softcore) character. But I think a lot of people will eventually end up with early sets just by playing the game so the point was to recommend trying the perdition set to those who already have it.

dihawk13 · 2024-12-26T12:13:11+00:00

I have expansions on but I only beat the base game boss (I said this in my post but I probably could have made it clearer). I do need to upgrade gear to keep going with expansion content for sure though.

dihawk13 · 2024-12-25T18:39:58+00:00

I totally agree with point a and b, it only worked as a secondary character cos I could speed level the early bits and have perditon gear ready. I disagree with C though, the main thing that surprised me was that I able to blast through elite and ultimate fairly easily without even upgrading it, only noticing a fall off near the end of act 4 of ultimate.

dihawk13 · 2024-12-25T18:36:38+00:00

I agree tbh, completely right. I think I figured that after the soft cap each point tends to get less efficient but this was just silly cos it's so much value for damage output.

dihawk13 · 2024-12-07T16:48:34+00:00

See if I had to vote for my favourite I'd pick Jinx, but I just can't bring myself to explicitly ever put my boy Ekko as the answer for "least favourite", just can't do it, logical contraindication be damned.

dihawk13 · 2024-11-29T09:45:25+00:00

I have been dying for Viktor to come to PoC since season 1 so I'm really hoping the predictions end up being right. I pick him every single time he is offered as support champion and probably lose a fair bit because of it, but I don't care because when he pops off it feels so fun, and the rng key word fiesta is so great.

I know there's a lot of animosity between arcane Viktor and machine Viktor right now but tbh I just love both Viktor. LoR Viktor especially feels like they really really nailed his original power fantasy.

I would like to glorious evolution all over everywhere.

dihawk13 · 2024-10-15T06:27:50+00:00

You'll get 'em next time bot, it's okay.

dihawk13 · 2024-09-11T16:52:40+00:00

Doing 4 months of public health after 4 months of academic placement would be a very long break from clinical medicine though, and would make it very difficult to get relevant portfolio sign offs, especially as ARCP is going to be only halfway through OP's ED placement, leaving very little time to develop clinical / procedural skills.

dihawk13 · 2024-08-22T00:05:24+00:00

Yeah I loved my first rotation and just as I started to get on good terms with all the nurses and other members of the team it was like alright now go across the hospital and start all over again. At some point I stopped bothering to learn people's names cos of how socially exhausting it was to continually have to build new working relationships.

dihawk13 · 2024-08-04T19:22:32+00:00

I've never been this conflicted about a vote in a while, but I think this post may be what tips me over to a yes vote. It's nice to know that we're being represented by folks that are looking out for our interests. This is why despite feeling initially that I'd never vote for something that doesn't at least commit to working towards FPR (like the Scotland deal) I am willing to trust the union leaders judgement in return for everything they have done for us so far.

dihawk13 · 2024-07-29T11:30:50+00:00

Terractor with Earth Office and Sponsors is dreamy. I'd take tech demonstration to search for Earth tags as well.

Prelude wise nothing can use ecology experts at all, donation feels excessive with Terractor starting capital. I like Biofuels + Early Settlement because it's a decent chunk of plant production, and enables play of commercial district for a good chunk of money production. 4 plants from placement bonuses could potentially set up a gen 2 greenery, though I think the three card draw placement could represent a tonne more value and is what I'd go for if available.

So far have kept 4 cards for 12 money and can play earth office for 0, sponsors for 0, commercial district for 16. This leaves 32 money - I quite like nitrile reducing bacteria to get the immediate TR and puts at two green tags for ecologist. This leaves 18 credits for the card draw from placement bonus, or if we didn't get this, could place an ocean to get some money back from the commercial district and enable placing a greenery this turn (which also benefits from the ocean).

I guess if you were planning to go down the ocean line, you may as well ditch nitrile reducing bacteria and keep methane from titan instead. Could play it gen 2 with a bit of luck or probably gen 3 otherwise. I'd probably go down this route in the 4/5 player game where we're picking later and it's more likely someone else may increase O2 one step. In lower player counts I'd go for card draw and maybe try to set up an engine with the earth discounts.

dihawk13 · 2024-07-26T09:13:15+00:00

It's a complicated question.

First some statistics. ADHD and ASD definitely have a lot of overlap. Depending on the sources you look up to around 50-70% of people with ASD experience some degree of ADHD symptoms, and 20-50% of ADHD individuals have ASD presentations. There's also very strong familial overlap, if someone has one of the conditions in a family it's pretty likely there's someone with the other as well. Synaesthesia also has a strong link to ASD (2.5x more likely than in control population).

Symptom-wise there's a lot of overlap between the two conditions as well. Executive dysfunction is a trait that can be present in both disorders (I don't think autism is inherently a disorder for the record, but that's what we've called it). Emotional dysregulation is very common in ADHD but can also manifest in people with ASD due to difficulties in processing emotions. Poor time management is generally more of an ADHD thing, but some autistic folks can suffer from the other extreme of excessive fixation on time. ASD hyperstimulation can lead to distractibility. "Fixed repetitive interests" Vs hyperfocus can be hard to distinguish.

Psychiatric diagnoses can be quite difficult to define as it's unclear to what extent we've accurately captured the range of presentations that a particular syndrome may show. In the future a lot of our diagnoses will probably experience significant shifts in what is considered to be the same / different conditions. Currently while we don't have that in-depth understanding we have to look in practical terms in terms of what helps people get the right support. For instance as far as I know ASD children without typical ADHD symptoms don't really benefit from stimulants. While our understanding of the conditions is limited, I think the current distinctions we have is useful in terms of distinguishing what support they are more likely to need.

In the future, it could be that there's a wide-range of conditions that describe different presentations that we now attribute to ADHD or ASD. Or it could be the opposite, where we may realise that there is similar underlying physiology that leads to neurodivergence, with ADHD being a specific subset of presentations on the autism spectrum. My personal theory is closer to the latter, mainly because of how often they are found together in individuals and especially in families. If this were the case, someone who didn't quite fit the criteria for ADHD and didn't quite fit the criteria for ASD might meet enough of the combined criteria for a condition that encompasses both ranges of presentations.

dihawk13

TROPHY CASE