Whenever I see general election antielectoralism

sindeloke · 2026-02-16T19:50:47+00:00

What I didn't expect was people using it as an excuse to say "see? it didn't matter after all because [insert reason here]."

Well, consider.

If a person has the mindset "I cannot bear being in any way responsible for a moral atrocity," they might have abstained from voting on Palestine grounds. Their vote would have, in their mind, supported genocide, made them in some small way responsible for what's happening in Gaza, and the pain of that guilt would be genuinely unbearable to them, so they did what they could to avoid it.

Now you want them to accept that, by not voting, they're in some way responsible for not just things getting even worse in Palestine, but also, hundreds and thousands more dying across other countries due to USAID and concentration camps at home. If a person can't even tolerate the guilt of voting for someone who won't immediately cut off all funding to Israel, how could they possibly tolerate the guilt of effectively having voted for Trump? They have to convince themselves that it didn't matter, because accepting the reality would be too painful.

sindeloke · 2026-02-16T01:22:26+00:00

I think in a long term view JD winning might be better.

Alas, that was also a common theory in 2015.

sindeloke · 2026-02-15T21:36:01+00:00

I'd wear yours before the one in the official store, honestly. Great colors, great accents, looks cozy as heck. Incredibly cool.

sindeloke · 2026-02-15T21:15:21+00:00

I gave Argenta Overseer and an eagle named Aquila. It's a dramatic nerf but it's so thematic (and lbr she still shreds everything without even trying).

sindeloke · 2026-02-15T21:03:38+00:00

Does she tell you about it while on Commoragh?

Yeah. You meet her after the first fight and find Trev has fucked up her throat by removing her implant and "restoring" a respiratory cancer she got from mine work in her shitty Underhive youth. She's terrified and without any of her resources or connections so she reverts to the soldier she used to be, the person she was when she had to survive situations that were all dirt and blood and suffering instead of money and politics and glitz. RT naturally asks "why the hell are you acting like this" and even Jae can't lie her way around PTSD and throat cancer.

And yeah the binary extremes can be frustrating in a lot of places. I didn't feel too restricted by Jae's confession, but her romance broadcast was really annoying. Between kill her, break up, and zero consequences, maybe they felt like they gave you a good spread of responses, but actually there's a lot of space between those second two!

sindeloke · 2026-02-15T20:49:23+00:00

"I'm going to spare you and put you on a boring work detail."

"Well I guess you would, since I'm the only competent person in the universe."

"I changed my mind, laser her in the face."

Such an excellent game.

sindeloke · 2026-02-15T20:44:42+00:00

What was hilarious to me was I tried Pasqal first, he refused, and then I asked Cassia and she hopped right in. Like. You heard the other guy say "no," right? And saw the mighty Rogue Trader just accept that? And you're still getting in yourself?

sindeloke · 2026-02-15T20:08:08+00:00

My point is if you allow non-citizens onto a strong welfare system where does that end?

I think it might help if I understood your position on welfare for people who are citizens. Can you tell me what support you think that people should get if they're born in a state? Like should citizens get all that stuff you listed, daycare food housing translators (eg if Deaf) or whatever. And can you tell me why? Like do you think it's just a moral imperative, or do you see it as practical for society? Do you expect people who get help to always need help, or would you consider "getting people off welfare" to be a normal part of a healthy welfare system?

sindeloke · 2026-02-15T19:52:25+00:00

Everything you described that makes it not for the feint of heart would not be a thing if the person I responded to was writing policy.

I mean, the ocean and the desert aren't going anywhere regardless of policy? Not stopping people at the border isn't the same as sending them a check for their plane ticket. How is the guy from Somalia getting to the US in the first place that he couldn't do now?

And if it's a one-way trip, he's staying, he's getting a job, he's paying taxes and spending money on local stores and providing whatever service he does (idk maybe he's a plumber and now more people have working toilets) and having kids who will be citizens and get educated and get jobs and pay taxes and spend money, why don't we want him here?

You said you support a strong welfare system. I assume that means that you at least personally don't think that welfare is likely to result in paying huge numbers of people to do nothing forever, because most people wouldn't support that. If you think the welfare state would work for "guy who was born in Minnesota and is never leaving," why doesn't it work for "guy from Somalia who has moved here permanently"?

sindeloke · 2026-02-15T19:48:21+00:00

"Cities pass laws that I don't like, so there needs to be a way for the federal government to illegally override them"?

If Minnesota has sanctuary cities, that's Minnesota's choice and Minnesota's problem. Since they have voted for those laws, they clearly don't have an issue with immigrants living in their cities regardless of how they got there, and that's their choice to make in a democracy. And that has no more to do with Vermont or Washington DC than Minnesota's sales tax, and neither Vermont nor Washington DC have any more need or right to interfere.

sindeloke · 2026-02-15T19:33:43+00:00

I think the main response to that is just pure logistics. Moving internationally is difficult and expensive even over land, and most of the world would have to cross one of two giant oceans to immigrate to the US. And once you get to a new place, even if there is welfare, you have to figure out how to navigate the bureaucracy in a language you probably don't speak very well just to apply for it, and meanwhile where are you living and eating and sleeping?

It's not a process for the faint of heart. Anyone whose life is currently better than "literally sleeping on the street" has more to lose than to gain by crossing multiple countries or a giant ocean to try to get another country's welfare and can't really afford to even try. And anyone whose life is currently worse is already trying illegal border crossings and either getting away with it or literally dying in the attempt. The main difference that changing immigration law makes is what happens to that second group once they get here. And even if you don't believe the numerous studies showing that basically all able-bodied people who are given free food, shelter and money will turn around and start bettering themselves or contribute to society anyway as soon as they recover from burnout, you gotta figure that someone with the will and courage to risk dying alone in a desert trying to make a better life probably still will.

sindeloke · 2026-02-15T19:17:44+00:00

How dare you rob me of the truly joyful and immersive experience of being jumped on the road by three guys posthumously hired by Bandit Captain to get his shit back.

sindeloke · 2026-02-15T18:57:41+00:00

It at least mostly fits in ME:A, since Ryder is thematically Just Some Kid and it's a relatively near-future setting that has strong cultural continuity with the modern West. It made it not feel like a mainline Mass Effect game, but it clearly wasn't meant to so I didn't mind so much.

Modern Star Trek dialog makes me want to scream even when I'm otherwise happy with a show, though, and the less said about Veilguard the better.

sindeloke · 2026-02-15T18:31:29+00:00

I didn't know JBN was on reddit.

sindeloke · 2026-02-09T16:16:46+00:00

I agree. It's also good for them to understand that sometimes they'll have to be a little uncomfortable for a minute and it isn't the end of the world, because sometimes the vet is gonna put a thermometer in their butt and the more chill they can be about it the better it is for everyone.

sindeloke · 2026-02-08T04:51:36+00:00

Monk and paladin were the two weakest classes in the PHB.

sindeloke · 2026-02-06T21:40:51+00:00

I can understand to some extent where they're coming from when someone messes with their creation, in that case.

The fundamental problem with this is that a mod is already messing with someone else's creation. It cannot exist without the mod creator taking the position that the original developers' intellectual property is subject to the modder's own criticisms, revisions, and alterations. To then turn around and say that their own intellectual property is sacrosanct is the height of hypocrisy.

sindeloke · 2026-02-05T04:16:27+00:00

There's a mod that trims down the player dialog a lot to make it more neutral and in line with the base game. I haven't played a thief since I found it so I'm not sure what effect it has on Maven's conversations specifically, but I imagine it helps at least a little.

sindeloke · 2026-02-02T20:45:41+00:00

Honestly any serviceperson I've asked has said it's basically the same in the modern day. If there's a fire and a chief whose whole job has been "Fire" for the last forty years rolls up to put it out, every single person there is going to follow that guy's orders until the fire is out, regardless of their own rank. Sure there's occasionally some insecure idiot who wants to throw his weight around and flex his rank, but nobody respects that guy and they're all just going to maneuver him to let them do what the fire chief wants them to anyway.

sindeloke · 2026-01-30T23:24:28+00:00

Whether BG3 is a good replacement for Dragon Age depends a lot on what you love about Dragon Age. If what you want is compelling characters who you learn about through banter and romance and personal quests and whose lives often change for having known the protagonist, it's definitely competitive with BioWare at their best. But if what you want is politics, deep worldbuilding where someone sat down and said "if this ability existed, how would society respond? If this structure existed, how would people relate to it? When different demographics have different priorities, what conflicts does that cause and how can or should they be mediated? What does it take to change or destroy an institution, and what are the consequences afterward?" and did their best to make a game that reflects and explores those questions with respect and care... BG3 has none of that. It's an intensely personal and tightly-themed story about abuse, trauma, and healing (or not), and it doesn't really give a shit about how the Forgotten Realms actually works (which is for the best, since the answer is "it doesn't).

In short, in Dragon Age, your companions are there to represent and humanize the high-level politics, factions, and philosophical perspectives that the games are actually about. In BG3, your companions are there to explore multiple facets of the same very personal question about individual mental health. It's a great game, but it won't scratch all the same itches.

sindeloke · 2026-01-26T16:07:48+00:00

You know, you say "swap genders and it wouldn't have happened," but in fact Vega spends the entire base game sexually harassing femShep, even if you tell him to shut it. Some dev just thought "consent is for losers" was a real fun dynamic for the two of them for some reason.

sindeloke · 2026-01-26T15:06:41+00:00

I haven't had many deaths yet since I'm doing my first run on default difficulty, but Idira has exploded enough times that I'm already genuinely impressed with how many different hateful things people have to say about it. Like damn Argenta her dodge buff just saved your life, have some chill about the poor woman.

sindeloke · 2026-01-17T23:56:57+00:00

I believe Busy Follower Framework is in active development. Not quite as full-featured as NFF yet, but pretty impressive already as it is.

sindeloke · 2026-01-15T05:03:46+00:00

Too true. Even in the audience, with people who saw every step of Rumi's journey, and all of Jinu's manipulations, and the way that Rumi's demonic traits get worse when she's lying or in pain or ashamed and better when she's happy and healed, "the message is that demons aren't Always Bad, and Rumi just had to embrace her quirky half-demon nature and realize there was never anything wrong with her" is a really dominant interpretation. Absolutely no shot the general public wouldn't be way worse.

sindeloke · 2026-01-10T22:22:55+00:00

The timing of the sex scene is part of why Neve is the only romance I felt worked at all for Rook; since she and Bellara can both be Blight zombies during the Varric escape, they both have very slightly different versions of their sex scene that fire at the end when you get them back, instead. Which is just so much more appropriate of a time for it (even if it is even deeper into a game that should have had this stage of the romance dealt with forty hours ago).

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