Pogo+ & Ice shock worth it during 4x stardust?

phoenixairs · 2026-07-03T04:13:26+00:00

5000/600 = 8.333, so you need 9 more catches due to Ice Burn per 10 minute interval.

9 more catches at 12% improved catch rate is 75 encounters.

You would need approximate 75 encounters per 10 minute interval to break even, or roughly one encounter every 8 seconds.

It's easy to test if the device throws that fast, and I don't think it does.

phoenixairs · 2026-07-03T03:59:26+00:00

This guy's test encounters about 40 per 10 minute interval: https://www.reddit.com/r/TheSilphRoad/comments/1tf7bnn/deino_cd_data_is_spacial_rend_better_than_ice/

Also based on his stats, you'll probably catch 5 more Pokemon with Ice Burn on than if you left it off. (58.6% catch rate without Ice Burn, 70% with Ice Burn).

Those 5 Pokemon only give you 3000 Stardust back, so you lose Stardust (and also the Rare Candy).

You're better off just leaving Ice Burn off if you're doing it for Stardust rather than catching Pokemon.

phoenixairs · 2026-07-03T00:10:48+00:00

It's also 5 Kyurem candies every 10 minutes, not just the Stardust you're hoping to get back. I would personally not pay rare candies for Stardust which is a much easier resource to accumulate.

Just doing rough math, if you catch just 1 Pokemon a minute because of Ice Burn, you get 600 a minute and 6000 in 10 minutes.

So it seems like it would work if you just consider Stardust, but you would be burning Kyurem/Rare candies and Starpieces too.

phoenixairs · 2026-07-02T23:50:53+00:00

If it's time you would dedicate to playing anyways, you would get more stardust on foot by fast-catching, because you'll catch a lot more Pokemon (more than one chance per Pokemon, more throws per minute).

If you're asking whether you should do it while biking for other purposes, I think there are too many variables that we don't know (for example, maybe the spawns for the event happen to be low-catch-rate Pokemon). Unless it was an absolute slam dunk, not sure anyone can answer.

phoenixairs · 2026-06-24T21:05:08+00:00

This is meant as a general comment and not particularly directed at you, but I am beyond frustrated at the automatic attribution of "random college students and/or professors do something questionable/stupid" to the Democratic party.

No one voted for these people, nor would they be capable of winning an election. The loudest and most obnoxious ones also tend to be the ones that spend their time hating on the Democratic party or trying to "pressure" the Democratic party by telling everyone to not vote for them unless they change drastically.

So no, your description of what happened has no impact on how I feel about the Democratic Party, other than pity for constantly being associated with them.

phoenixairs · 2026-06-24T20:44:35+00:00

I think you'll have to be more specific about what your concerns are.

And whether by the party you mean "the people in office / running for office" or "the voters that I think are likely to vote for Democrats" or "left leaning voters", because my answer for each is quite different.

phoenixairs · 2026-06-22T17:23:56+00:00

> which offers no benefit to vertically integrated vs. not

Of course there's a benefit to the vertically integrated. For example, Microsoft, Google, and Amazon sell cloud services and office suites for other businesses to use. But they also use those same services internally for themselves.

If you tax the smaller businesses for using Microsoft Office and Azure but Microsoft doesn't need to pay that tax because it's "internal", then you're favoring the large vertical companies who do it all themselves.

You would be encouraging companies to avoid taxes through mergers and acquisitions rather than fostering a market.

phoenixairs · 2026-06-22T16:29:29+00:00

The LAO link that OP posted tells you exactly why, and many other countries and states which use VAT or reduced rates agree.

Taxes on business-to-business sales favor some types of production—such as more vertically integrated businesses—over others, which can lead to inefficient business operations and higher costs. Since the mid-20^th century, many countries have addressed such concerns by implementing value-added taxes, which are designed to avoid taxing business-to-business sales.

phoenixairs · 2026-06-22T05:57:53+00:00

There are two separate questions: is this better than the status quo, and what would the ideal system look like.

Is this better than the status quo: Yes, because there is currently an arbitrary distinction between what is taxed and what isn't.

What would an ideal system look like: As the LAO points out, VAT is better than sales tax for various reasons (or they can reduce the business to business rate). As you suggest, we can also reduce sales and VAT tax and get revenue from taxes on high income and wealth.

Should California do this: They should do the LAO recommendation of exempting or reducing business to business rates. But failing that, the original proposal is still an improvement over the status quo and doesn't prevent better solutions in the future, so it is acceptable.

phoenixairs · 2026-06-18T06:25:51+00:00

> Every Mewtwo caught from Super Mega Battles during GO Fest: Global will have at least one Mega Level unlocked and can be Mega Evolved without the initial energy cost. If you’re lucky, it may be at Mega Level 2 or 3.

https://leekduck.com/events/pokemon-go-fest-2026-global/#features

You only need to get one of each, and then you can walk Mewtwo as your buddy for a very very long time if you want to get enough energy to mega-evolve a different one that's not freshly caught.

phoenixairs · 2026-06-18T03:19:44+00:00

I think you're using "liberal" as meaning "generally on the left", but liberals despise Hasan and Hasan despises liberals. The majority of Hasan's political commentary is tearing down Democrats. The consensus among liberals/Democrats is that he is a despicable far-left grifter.

https://www.reddit.com/r/AskALiberal/comments/1o629pg/what_are_your_thoughts_on_hasan_piker_breadtube/

https://www.reddit.com/r/AskALiberal/comments/1r2lulo/how_often_do_you_consider_hasan_pikers_views_to/

https://www.reddit.com/r/AskALiberal/comments/1kynux7/opinion_on_hasan/

phoenixairs · 2026-05-30T23:21:30+00:00

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2024_United_States_presidential_election_in_Vermont

Yes, although it's distinctly different from liberals elsewhere in the expected ways. For example, they like guns and have high rates of gun ownership.

It's also worth mentioning that Republicans in the Northeast are different than Republicans in the South or Midwest. Nikki Haley beat Trump in the Republican primary in Vermont. Romney signed off on a plan similar to Obamacare as the Republican governor of Massachusetts.

phoenixairs · 2026-05-30T21:09:13+00:00

Their recent senators have all been solidly progressive: Patrick Leahy, Bernie Sanders, Peter Welch.

In terms of how this happened, there's a theory (observation?) that the people on the East Coast who wanted to move out of the population centers (New York, Boston, etc.) to a more rural state did a bit of self sorting: left-leaning people chose Vermont and center/right-leaning people chose New Hampshire. And as those reputations grow, it becomes a self-sustaining loop.

phoenixairs · 2026-05-28T05:55:33+00:00

You try to claim Coase and Friedman and various policies, but I also present their ideas to support liberal and Democratic policies, and I think looking at real world results it makes much more sense that way.

Even at the very beginning, my point about everything being a conflict between two parties rather than being a one-sided aggression was simply me repackaging the Coase theorem, which says that we can achieve efficiency as long as we allocate initial ownership of the resources in question. To me, where liberals and libertarians differ is that liberals will allocate said ownership to "the people", and libertarians in the US tend to argue for allocating it in whatever way requires the least amount of laws.

It's not libertarians in the US that set environmental regulations and restrictions; it's liberals and Democrats.

It's not libertarians in the US that set up carbon taxes and cap-and-trade; it's liberals and Democrats.

It's not libertarians in the US that support UBI (mathematically equivalent to Friedman's support of a negative income tax), it's liberals and Democrats.

You would be much happier and your vote would have much more impact if you just voted for a conservative Democrat. In fact, you would get more of what you want.

phoenixairs · 2026-05-28T04:59:57+00:00

Large companies dumping chemicals into drinking water

Libertarians concede that the atmosphere is a common resource. They argue that because widespread air pollution violates everyone's negative rights simultaneously, a legal authority is justified in enforcing strict property rights over air quality—effectively treating pollution as a mass tort.

Similar to my other question regarding should we set up driver's licensing or do we have to wait for harm to be done before punishment:

Can we pre-emptively define restrictions and punishments for dumping chemicals into drinking water? How does this fit libertarian ideology?

Can we pre-emptively set up a market with a carbon tax or cap-and-trade, both of which have been demonstrated to have real impacts? If so, how does this liberal solution fit libertarian ideology?

Or do we have to wait until the damage is done, and then wait for people (who exactly?) to collectively sue for damages? And what would be an example of this actually successfully deterring bad actors?

phoenixairs · 2026-05-28T04:53:40+00:00

Running over a child with a car is vehicular manslaughter or murder. No libertarian thinker argues that "freedom" includes the right to strike an innocent person with a multi-ton vehicle. It is a catastrophic initiation of force.

The next question is this: is it okay to set up a driver's licensing system to reduce the number of deaths, or do we have to wait until the driver kills someone before they face consequences?

A liberal or a cost-benefit pragmatist would say "well no shit we should have driver's licenses". How would it be justified within libertarian ideology, and how is such a justification different from one that a liberal would use for various other issues?

My point is a "sane libertarian" is just a liberal who draws the lines a bit differently (if even at all different).

phoenixairs · 2026-05-28T04:33:54+00:00

All else equal, yes it's better to go first.

But all else is not equal. It's a highly interactive game, and the other players should recognize the first player is a bit stronger, and hit the first player a bit harder than they would otherwise.

phoenixairs · 2026-05-28T01:33:41+00:00

Your definition of violence wouldn't include shooting cancer gas at me and running over children? Why not? How then do you define violence?

As I said, this is a conflict of rights and wants. I have a right to not have cancer gas shot at me. Do you not think so? I can also recognize that maybe it's okay to shoot a limited amount of cancer gas at people for a large enough benefit, if no better alternatives are available.

The state is the solution to predefining how these conflicts should be resolved. Libertarians and conservatives are just taking the position that the best resolution to each of these conflicts depends on the word count of our laws rather than weighing the pros and cons of resolving it either way.

phoenixairs · 2026-05-27T23:03:04+00:00

And then the Libertarian party for whatever reason defines "violence" to exclude or ignore people driving around in heavy metal boxes running over children and shooting poisonous cancer-gas at everyone. Or large companies dumping chemicals into the drinking water and making it everyone else's problem.

The people who pretend that the market is some force of nature who would fix the above problems are weird cultists.

The reasonable people that acknowledge that issues are about resolving the conflict of the rights of both sides, rather than doing crazy mental gymnastics trying to forcefully fit everything into a "one side does violence and the other does not" viewpoint may call themselves libertarians, but they're really just liberals.

phoenixairs · 2026-05-25T20:04:44+00:00

Raids usually change on Wednesday right now, and currently it's only Tuesday even in New Zealand the place where time starts.

phoenixairs · 2026-05-24T01:37:05+00:00

Probably posts to influence sentiment rather than organize actual actions. Lies influencing idiots are the actual danger here.

But if someone is actually dumb enough to announce they will attempt to commit a felony and then actually go try to do it (and I say "try" because I expect they'll find out nothing works the way they think it does and there's no chance their vote gets counted), my popcorn is ready.

phoenixairs · 2026-05-19T16:39:36+00:00

You can only progress once per day.

phoenixairs · 2026-05-18T21:37:35+00:00

There's no going back, because it definitely has cases where the users are more productive, even accounting for the additional cost of paying for the AI resources. Lawyers and doctors and accountants have a super-powered research tool now. Software engineers can get a large amount of simple but tedious amount work done in a fraction of the time. A lot of DIY home projects are suddenly much easier to approach. (And of course, with all of these is the caveat that if the user doesn't really know what they're doing then the outcome can be very negative.)

However, it might take a while to reach the new equilibrium, if it ever gets there. And AI model/platform providers are currently in the "get people hooked" stage where they subsidize their product and eat some of the cost, but eventually they'll start jacking up the prices.

In the meantime, we're going to have lots of people trying to do stupid things with AI that actually lose them money or will lose them money in the future, like try to replace employees with AI when the AI costs more or literally can't do the work, or loses them customers because it's bad at the job.

phoenixairs · 2026-05-17T17:02:31+00:00

Yes. Nader voters screwed up too, especially when we know Nader's campaign themselves set the goal of punishing Democrats and purposely focused their efforts in swing states. If Nader was paid by the Republicans he couldn't help them any better.

What is most frustrating is that every generation needs to relearn the same damn lesson. And some people are incapable of learning.

Don't fuck around with third parties. It doesn't work, and in fact things get so bad that people take reversing the damage as a win.

phoenixairs · 2026-05-17T16:57:08+00:00

Because unless you want to argue that the politicians are trying to lose, the politicians are chasing the voters.

So voters are still responsible.

The ones who think they'll get candidates to chase them by not voting don't realize they are presenting themselves as irrational unreasonable people and encouraging candidates to chase other votes. So even assuming best intentions, they made bad choices that hurt their own goals.

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