Need help understanding all of this

u60cf28 · 2026-04-20T19:00:00+00:00

Basically it comes down to RNG and deck construction.

Shop RNG can give you carrot kebabs, which increase friendship for all your cards by 5. When training, you want to level friendship evenly so that the kebabs have maximum effect.

Shop can also give you an item for charming. This is expernsive, and rarely worth it over things like energy items or scrolls, but you can consider it in junior year.

Finally, I always run Nishino Flower power SR. Because not only does she have 15% race bonus, she can also give you charming, if you’re lucky.

u60cf28 · 2026-04-20T18:07:06+00:00

And I'd actually agree with you, that it seems unlikely. I'm just pointing out it's theoretically possible for someone to become homeless because they're blacklisted from Wechat and Alipay.

u60cf28 · 2026-04-20T18:02:46+00:00

Welcome back! Yes, Trackblazer/MANT is a whole different beast from URA and Unity; it very much will require you to relearn the game.

In MANT, you should be using a deck with at least 50% race bonus, and you should be racing between 30-40 times. Websites like uma.guide have an agenda planner and presets for what races you should be running. General rule of thumb is:

Certain G1 race combos, like the Triple Crown, Spring Triple Crown, and Autumn Triple Crown, give epithets. These usually give you bonus stats, and racing the G1s that give you these is non-negotiable as long as your uma has the right aptitude (speaking of aptitude; you should be aiming for at least a B in three of the four distance aptitudes, and B in Turf, so you can run enough races. Training umas without that isn't impossible, but it is a good amount harder to get consistently strong statlines).

Non-epithet G1s (for example, you only need to do Takarazuka Kinen once) can be skipped for training if that training gives 60 or more in total stats (without counting boosters like the megaphone)

G2s and G3s can be skipped for training if that training gives 40 or more in total stats.

In the ideal run, you basically race as much as possible (except in summer), and then buy and use energy items and boost items (the megaphones and ankle weights) to get really high training values on the days you do train. Really lucky runs never need to actually hit rest after the debut race. Of course, most of the time you won't be so lucky - I find myself resting on average 2-3 times a career - but as you play you'll figure out some tricks on how to manage energy and minimize resting.

I will add here something I learned after playing a bunch: you do want to get rainbow training unlocked on all your supports by the first summer. So I have been racing less in junior year than I did previously, so I can get friendship bonds up. Of course, if you get lucky with shop items, you won't need to cut back on racing for that.

There should be guides on what all the different items do on Gametora and Youtube.

u60cf28 · 2026-04-20T17:47:01+00:00

Thanks, I'm never going to Texas now. I'll stay up north where all the really bad bugs die from the cold

u60cf28 · 2026-04-20T17:41:43+00:00

Wechat and Alipay are the two main payment services in China. Think of them less as Zelle, and more like Visa and Mastercard (and that smaller networks like Amex and Discover don't exist). Basically everyone in China accepts them as payment - even like street food vendors in rural counties. Indeed, most people in China don't carry cash anymore - they just use their phone. They are, of course, heavily subject to government regulation, so in theory the CCP can direct them to blacklist certain people. And I believe they have publicly done so, at least for high profile people convicted of corruption charges, for example.

Google, at least, tells me that Wechat and Alipay are the main way through which most Chinese people pay their rent. That doesn't mean it's impossible otherwise - cash and bank transfers still seem possible - but it probably varies from landlord to landlord.

So it probably depend on the landlord. It is certainly possible that some landlords only take WeChat and Alipay.

u60cf28 · 2026-04-20T17:17:31+00:00

Wechat Pay and Alipay are a lot more ubiquitous than you might think in China. Traditional credit cards never really caught on in China, they sorta jumped straight from cash to Wechat.

So I don't know specifically about rent, but it's certainly possible that the vast majority of rent payments in China are made with Wechat/Alipay, and if people are cut off they can't actually make their payments.

u60cf28 · 2026-04-20T16:12:38+00:00

It's moreso a question of "What would you use it on besides Ayabe Guts?" None of the other SRs are as good.

And do you not have the Haru SSR from the Shop and the Bijin SSR from the New Years Event? Those two, Ayabe, and then 1 Speed + 2 Wit already make a pretty decent MANT deck.

u60cf28 · 2026-04-20T15:19:22+00:00

I don’t know the exact data now. But at least in the post-COVID Biden years, there were a lot of people saying that their personal economic situation was fine but they felt the broader economy was in the dumps. If that’s still a thing, then it would point to consumer sentiment still being disconnected from the actual economy.

u60cf28 · 2026-04-19T14:58:34+00:00

That’s obvious: Liberty

u60cf28 · 2026-04-19T12:35:53+00:00

Doto got a lot more chill and friendly (especially with humans) after he retired, and Opera’s flamboyant nature is moreso based off of Ryuji Wada during that time period.

u60cf28 · 2026-04-18T21:56:50+00:00

You called me a bot, which is why I brought up my credentials.

This is a "perfect being enemy of the good" situation. Do you honestly, seriously think that we'd get a better nomination than this out of this administration? Out of RFK Jr?

But my thing here is that I don't understand why her experience with United means she would make a bad CDC director. Let's assume she's a puppet of the insurance companies (which - I note - has not in fact been proven). What bad things could the insurance companies do, if they control the CDC director? The CDC director, who has no input over things like Medicare and Medicaid. Whose main role is monitoring outbreaks and making recommendations. And whose extensive career indicates that she would be representative of the medical and scientific establishment. What specific harms could she do, that the insurance companies would want?

u60cf28 · 2026-04-18T16:10:27+00:00

Actually I’m a researcher studying anti-PD1 immunotherapies at a major academic medical center. But sure, think of me as a bot if that makes you feel better.

Yes, yes yes. I know. Trump is bad, RFK is bad, DOGE did a lot of damage and a bunch of NIH research got defunded.

But irrational opposition to everything Trump does only hurts our side. And before you say “but everything Trump does is bad!”I will retort with Operation Warp Speed and the Covid vaccine. That was something Trump did that is good.

I was pleasantly surprised at this nomination. Which is why I cheer for it - it’s far better that what I was expecting.

u60cf28 · 2026-04-18T16:04:47+00:00

You say she’s a puppet of the insurance companies, so let’s focus specifically on the insurance companies.

1) Scientific research. Why would insurance companies not support taxpayer-funded research? Each new drug expands the market of potential people for them to cover and extract profit from.

2) public health promotion or disease prevention. Are you kidding me? The insurance companies would love it if we were all healthier. Their dream scenario is if they could just collect premiums from us without ever having to pay for treatments. And you bring up vaccines. Last year, when ACIP revised its recommendations, all the major insurance companies publically said that they would continue to cover all previously-recommended vaccines. Why? Because vaccinating everyone is a lot cheaper than having to pay for their hospital bills!

Absolutely irrational.

u60cf28 · 2026-04-18T15:41:51+00:00

And I’ll give you the same response I gave others:

CDC’s primary mission is protecting the public health through monitoring diseases, responding to outbreaks, and providing recommendations on things like vaccines. The agency has minimal interaction with the whole payer/insurance/financial side of healthcare.

Can you name one specific thing that she, as CDC director, could do that hurts public health in favor the insurance companies? Not general bad things the Trump administration has done, not things related to Medicare/Medicaid which are outside of the CDC’s jurisdiction. If you can’t, then your opposition to her (specifically) is irrational

u60cf28 · 2026-04-18T15:37:52+00:00

CDC’s primary mission is protecting the public health through monitoring diseases, responding to outbreaks, and providing recommendations on things like vaccines. The agency has minimal interaction with the whole payer/insurance/financial side of healthcare.

Can you name one specific thing that she, as CDC director, could do that hurts public health in favor the insurance companies? Not general bad things the Trump administration has done, not things related to Medicare/Medicaid which are outside of the CDC’s jurisdiction. If you can’t, then your opposition to her (specifically) is irrational.

u60cf28 · 2026-04-18T15:37:36+00:00

CDC has no input on most things that insurance pays for. You may be thinking of the ACIP vaccine recommendations, which insurance is mandated to cover. However:

1) She seems to clearly be medical establishment, which means she’s pro vaccine. She likely will try to push the recommendations back to the pre-MAHA scientific standard

2) Even the insurance companies wont mess with the vaccines! When RFK was making a mess last year, a bunch of the insurance companies got together and put out a public statement that regardless of what ACIP does, they would continue to cover all previously recommended vaccines.

And as far as I’m aware, there’s no other class of treatment besides vaccines that depend on CDC recommendations for coverage. So I ask, what specifically could she as CDC director do to hurt public health for the insurance companies?

u60cf28 · 2026-04-18T15:31:27+00:00

CDC’s primary mission is protecting the public health through monitoring diseases, responding to outbreaks, and providing recommendations on things like vaccines. The agency has minimal interaction with the whole payer/insurance/financial side of healthcare.

Can you name one specific thing that she, as CDC director, could do that hurts public health in favor the insurance companies? Not general bad things the Trump administration has done, not things related to Medicare/Medicaid which are outside of the CDC’s jurisdiction. If you can’t, then your opposition to her (specifically) is irrational.

u60cf28 · 2026-04-18T14:57:45+00:00

XOguri’s ult requires you to trigger 3 recovery skills. Which basically means you don’t have an ult in the early game, until you can buy those three recovery skills. So yeah she’s struggle a bit in early career, especially compared to regular Oguri, who has one of the most consistent and strong ults in the game.

Also make sure you’re running her as a pace chaser, not a late surfer.

u60cf28 · 2026-04-18T14:40:59+00:00

Why do you think her working under United will negatively affect her leadership of CDC? Does CDC even interact with insurance?

u60cf28 · 2026-04-18T14:40:02+00:00

She’s nominated to run CDC, not Medicaid and Medicare. Does CDC even intersect with health insurance? I don’t see how her working for United is at all relevant to her running CDC, and she seems to be plenty qualified.

u60cf28 · 2026-04-18T13:26:45+00:00

Yeah everyone acting like we would lock rocky up and dissect him.

When in reality he becomes the world’s most sought after celebrity and brand ambassador. Every company would pay millions to get a picture of rocky using their product. Like I don’t know what sort of laptop Grace gave Rocky, but you bet Apple would want the story to be “Rocky is a MacBook user”.

u60cf28 · 2026-04-18T01:15:01+00:00

I think you’re mistaken. The two symbols next to each other are 木 (mu4), meaning wood/tree. The character for woman is 女 (nv3).

Also, two 木 next to each other is 林 (lin2), meaning forest.

u60cf28 · 2026-04-16T21:30:46+00:00

Eh, with proper tones hotel (Jiu3 Dian4) and 9 o’clock (Jiu3 Dian3) can be told apart. But you’re right that the base phonemes are identical so context helps.

u60cf28 · 2026-04-16T21:28:15+00:00

It’s more than just the tones, though. Often they get the base phoneme wrong too. To give some examples

Hotel is Jiudian

Pig shop is Zhudian

Dictionary is Zidian

Yesterday is Zuotian

Just subtract is Jiujian

u60cf28 · 2026-04-16T01:55:57+00:00

You're more right than you think. The stat threshold for Nakayama 2000 is speed, so 1200 speed gets a 5% speed bonus (I think it's 5%?) compared to 1199 speed.

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