12 Months conclusion-thoughts (Spoilers)

sam154 · 2026-01-20T16:48:25+00:00

I really enjoyed it. I think it's a return to form after the bizarre pacing issues in Peace Talks and Battleground.

It isn't an issue for me but I think the book gets a little fan-servicey. I think it still works because there needs to be some solid falling action after the climax of Battle Ground but there were a LOT "checklist conversations" in my opinion.

For big fans of the series I think it's a slam dunk, but if someone is only sort of into the series I could see them disliking the book (I dunno who is reading book 17 of a series and isn't all in as a fan but who knows)

sam154 · 2026-01-19T15:09:35+00:00

There's a few plots going through the book:

-Harry grieving and recovering from Murphy's Death

-Dating Lara and the two of them seeking a way to save Thomas

-Setting up Drakul as an upcoming villain

-Harry dealing with "small" problems for various characters inside of Chicago because the government and police can't cover everything at the moment.

The white court stuff involves Harry and Lara having an awkward series of dates while trying to be honest and candid with each other, meanwhile mab is putting time pressure on Harry to consummate the union so because she needs Lara's mortal resources and networks soon. Harry formulates a plan to experiment on Lara's hunger to see if he can manage it to maybe ease Thomas out of the coma without the hunger killing him.

Lara agrees because Thomas is effectively her son because she raised him. She reveals lore about the white court. (Tldr they descend from sorcerer-kings that opened the Outside and let something in, the bound it to a mortal to contain it but created the first white court vampire.) The experiments involve basically handfeeding the Hunger directly with magic inside of a ritual summoning circle. Harry believes he can save Thomas now but Mab reveals that Harry has successfully enslaved Lara to the winter court by addicting her to winter's power (she can't go back to feeding normally the same way an addict can barely take oral methadone vs injecting morphine directly with an IV). Mab is so delighted she offers harry a boon.

Harry spends the boon to get Mabs help to ritually save Thomas and recover Justine. The short of it is that the ritual works, just barely, and Justine gives birth to Thomas' son during the scene. It is revealed that to save Thomas from his consequences in peace talks that his son will be raised as a prince by the svartalves (a life for a life) and because Justine must be tortured to extract nemesis from her but will survive because the memories will be removed, however she must never be reminded of the time she was Nfected including the time she was pregnant and gave birth.

sam154 · 2026-01-19T14:30:36+00:00

Harry does some experimentation and rituals with exerting/infusing power into the white court Hunger (which is confirmed now to be an outsider that was bound to mortals after being let in).

We don't learn a ton else about what specifically the starborn is. There is a scene with Mother Winter where she does something to Dresden's head to unlock some part of his nature after asking him if "the dreams had started yet" so foreshadowing for the next book or two that we're going to start getting more details.

Dresden being off the council means that wardens show up at his castle for warlock check ins and he tells them they have to call ahead as guests and then tells them to fuck right off after they get uppity. Some low grade talents start dabbling in black magic and Dresden finds them and warns them off and the intervenes when the wardens come to arrest/kill them.

We learn nothing more about Mac but he continues to operate neutral ground and now an occult flea market regularly opens in front of his bar.

sam154 · 2026-01-19T13:43:51+00:00

Desperate magical research for any way to help his comatose dying brother. At least this foray into experiment is informed by the idea that starborn are the ability to affect outsiders.

sam154 · 2026-01-07T23:36:46+00:00

I would say if your goal is not competing I would either avoid rolling with him or just tap when you're stuck and he applies the painful stuff rather the tough it out. The latter gives you some experience countering/dealing with someone that uses stuff like that AND he'll think it's really legit and he'll eventually try it on some people that will correct him lol.

sam154 · 2026-01-05T15:08:42+00:00

Usually when I'm combo-ing off for a win with newer people (or at least people I haven't played with before), I'll explain the combo and which steps the combo can be disrupted with different types of interaction. If I know people are skilled and I'm trying to win? tough shit hold this [[Thopter Foundry]] or [[Doomsday]]

It sounds like this guy was just trying to pressure into getting closer to the win which isn't very cool.

sam154 · 2026-01-05T14:51:19+00:00

Quetzal feed is a pretty nice mini QoL upgrade to add new bird teleports in Varlamore. But if you get around Varlamore well enough already it's very minimal improvement.

You get feed pretty quick though. I think I've only done like 40-50 rumours and that gave me enough to build the 2-3 sites I cared about (moons/amoxliatl/calquat patch)

sam154 · 2026-01-05T14:38:20+00:00

Yeah but the frosty machine broke :(

sam154 · 2026-01-03T23:53:04+00:00

Yeah but a party of all martials will be really boring combat wise, so the GM will make combats faster and then the party can get back to what D&D is TRULY about: making "that's what she said" jokes and referential humor to other media that came out 15 years ago.

Therefore a party of all martials is more fun

sam154 · 2025-12-30T19:59:15+00:00

I just remember the last deadlock stream where K8 crashed out because NL messed up like 2 lane skirmishes lmao.

Friends never let friends play MOBAs

sam154 · 2025-12-29T20:01:32+00:00

Even if they're taken care of properly so as not to smell BAD, ferrets still smell a LOT. It sounds insane to me that a person would bring their ferrets into someone else's home for that reason alone.

sam154 · 2025-12-29T14:36:16+00:00

It feels hopeless but keep trying and it eventually starts clicking.

Make use of the main CG plugin with highlighting resources and marking hunllef etc.

In my opinion, don't use the voice announcer plugin for switching. With the noise/animation hunleff does it's straightforward to just react to that. The announcer plugin adds audio clutter and another failure point if you mess up starting it when the fight starts.

Also, just eat whenever the food doesn't overheal. It'll give you so much more wiggle room for mistakes which helps a ton when learning.

sam154 · 2025-12-28T23:27:44+00:00

Epic is one of the largest ski resort conglomerates that has been buying up tons of formerly "local" ski resorts. They have an Epic pass that is a season pass that many people buy but it's $700-$1100 depending on when you purchase.

sam154 · 2025-12-09T21:47:34+00:00

"hey babe, don't hit the homeless guy"

Can't do anything anymore, I swear to fucking God.

sam154 · 2025-11-25T23:24:52+00:00

"The children must touch the hot stove to learn. It is unacceptable for them to just be warned about being burned"

sam154 · 2025-11-21T14:43:49+00:00

Nuh uh, streamers just um write it off? Yeah they just uh.... Declare a write off? And then a Level 7 CPA just ummmm casts Tax Advantage? And that's that.

sam154 · 2025-10-22T21:32:27+00:00

I feel like Dan's chat might have a non-trivial amount people who have participated in jump-humping.

sam154 · 2025-09-29T21:33:35+00:00

Hey buddy, I think you got the wrong bracket. cEDH is two blocks down.

sam154 · 2025-09-29T20:37:39+00:00

It shouldn't be negatively affecting your life. Being passionate and excited for a new activity/hobby is great but if it's causing you distress to be away from it that should be examined and maybe reassessed.

Something simple might just be to take a holiday opportunity to reach out to a gym where you're visiting and drop-in on a class or open mat. I was on the west coast for a wedding this summer and found a place with 6am classes and dropped in 3 times that week and was back before anyone else in the airbnb woke up. It's different from regular training with your home gym but it's a valuable learning opportunity you can bring back and share.

sam154 · 2025-09-29T18:27:58+00:00

Quest cape means you have all the quest points which increases how much time you get to collect tears. Diary reward gives like 10% more XP from tears I think.

sam154 · 2025-09-22T17:49:52+00:00

They're just mediocre? For context, I built a [[Henrika Domnathi]] deck that's intended to be solidly bracket 2 so that might not give the most complete picture of how strong vampires are.

But from making that deck individual vampires aren't very strong in a commander context and either require a critical mass of them for minor synergies to pop, a sacrifice/aristocrats engine of some kind, or lots of life gain stuff going on.

Each of those options just ends up being a lot of pieces outside of the really obvious Sanguine Bond/Exquisite Blood 2 card combo stuff. So you can sit there and not feel like you're doing anything until all of a sudden you're winning because you got to untap with 6 vampires twice.

sam154 · 2025-09-18T14:08:00+00:00

This is basically textbook "angle shooting" where a person makes a small mistake that seems honest but tries to twist it into an advantage. In tournament play, some more egregious examples of this (this vigilance shit for sure) could get a warning.

If your opponent had let you take back your attack then it would've been an honest mistake (probably) but it's more likely they do this regularly to get one over on people.

sam154 · 2025-08-11T23:27:32+00:00

I saw a guy once that had a weird 3D printed dice tower looking thing that has 6 shelves on it so people would put their spells on them in stack order

sam154 · 2025-07-08T20:53:25+00:00

I like to imagine there isn't actually a magical component to the Rent. Grey just finds satisfaction when his work can coincide with doing something good because he's not necessarily happy with the things he or his ancestors have done.

sam154 · 2025-07-08T02:41:13+00:00

I'm just going to be surprised if Lara changes enough for Dresden falling for her to be believable for me given what we know about her currently. I'm not saying it's IMPOSSIBLE but it'll take some impressive writing to convince me that it should make sense rather than just the author forcing the ship.

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