#({Slightly Modified for Relevancy})

[taichi-x-koushiro]

Meanwhile with Digimon Adventures' Taishiro {Koushiro x Taichi}, just pre 02

Yamato: Seriously... learn how to tie a tie, you football obsessed person!! TAICHI: its Not MY Fault. I Never wear suits with ties. {LAUGH} YAMATO: ITS KNOWLEDGE EVERY MAN SHOULD HAVE-!! Koushiro, attempting {+Failing} to tie new uniform tie, Off to side: ('I couldn't do it either...') Taichi: {is Oblivious (to Yamatos plight)} YAMATO, Oblivious to Koushiros plight: {SIGHING}

[curlicuecal]

playing science telephone

Hi folks. Let's play a fun game today called "unravelling bad science communication back to its source."

Journey with me.

Saw a comment going around on a tumblr thread that "sometimes the life expectancy of autism is cited in the 30s"

That number seemed..... strange. The commenter DID go on to say that that was "situational on people being awful and not… anything autism actually does", but you know what? Still a strange number. I feel compelled to fact check.

Quick Google "autism life expectancy" pulls up quite a few websites bandying around the number 39. Which is ~technically~ within the 30s, but already higher than the tumblr factoid would suggest. But, guess what. This number still sounds strange to me.

Most of the websites presenting this factoid present themselves as official autism resources and organizations (for parents, etc), and most of them vaguely wave towards "studies."

Ex: "Above And Beyond Therapy" has a whole article on "Does Autism Affect Life Expectancy" and states:

The link implies that it will take you to the "research studies" being referenced, but it in fact takes you to another random autism resource group called.... Songbird Care?

And on that website we find the factoid again:

Ooh, look. Now they've added the word "some". The average lifespan for SOME autistic people. Which the next group erased from the fact. The message shifts further.

And we have slightly more information about the study! (Which has also shifted from "studies" to a singular "study"). And we have another link!

Wonderfully, this link actually takes us to the actual peer-reviewed 2020 study being discussed. [x]

And here, just by reading the abstract, we find the most important information of all.

This study followed a cohort of adolescent and adult autistic people across a 20 year time period. Within that time period, 6.4% of the cohort died. Within that 6.4%, the average age of death was 39 years.

So this number is VERY MUCH not the average age of death for autistic people, or even the average age of death for the cohort of autistic people in that study. It is the average age of death IF you died young and within the 20 year period of the study (n=26), and also we don't even know the average starting age of participants without digging into earlier papers, except that it was 10 or older. (If you're curious, the researchers in the study suggested reduced self-sufficiency to be among the biggest risk factors for the early mortality group.)

But the number in the study has been removed from it's context, gradually modified and spread around the web, and modified some more, until it is pretty much a nonsense number that everyone is citing from everyone else.

There ARE two other numbers that pop up semi-frequently:

One cites the life expectancy at 58. I will leave finding the context for that number as an exercise for the audience, since none of the places I saw it gave a direct citation for where they were getting it.

And then, probably the best and most relevant number floating around out there (and the least frequently cited) draws from a 2023 study of over 17,000 UK people with an autism diagnosis, across 30 years. [x] This study estimated life expectancies between 70 and 77 years, varying with sex and presence/absence of a learning disability. (As compared to the UK 80-83 average for the population as a whole.)

This is a set of numbers that makes way more sense and is backed by way better data, but isn't quite as snappy a soundbite to pass around the internet. I'm gonna pass it around anyway, because I feel bad about how many scared internet people I stumbled across while doing this search.

People on quora like "I'm autistic, can I live past 38"-- honey, YES. omg.

---

tl;dr, when someone gives you a number out of context, consider that the context is probably important

also, make an amateur fact checker's life easier and CITE YOUR SOURCES

[incognitopolls]

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[Last updated 1/22/2025]

[lijoue]

Tutorial: How to Make a CAS Background With Functional Mirror

Overview

This is something that has been highly requested so I hope this tutorial will be helpful for the sims 4 cc community!

This tutorial will have 2 parts for creating 2 different types of CAS "room" backgrounds. Part 1 (The Easy Way) uses a template I created for you to use your own 2D images/screenshots with a simple rectangular mirror. Part 2 (The 3D Room) will result in a better quality background, but it’s not a beginner friendly project so I don’t recommend trying it if you’ve never made any cc before. I will not cover the basics of cc making here, only what’s relevant to making a CAS bg using my template specifically. The Sims 4 Studio forum has a ton of great tutorials for everything else.

In my own research & experimentation, I noticed that (as far as I can tell) EVERY other CAS room with a functional mirror seems to be derived originally from LittleDica's CAS room [link] I want to acknowledge credit to LittleDica for their CAS background which I studied as a reference. But to be clear this tutorial and my templates are NOT derived from another creators' work; I created mine from scratch and it took a lot of time and effort. My version is much more simple and more compatible with Sims 4 Studio because there are no extra mesh groups or diffuse maps. I also made a great effort to make the reflection in the mirror more realistic for the size of the room. I hope you will be able to use this resource to create your own beautiful CAS backgrounds! ♥

Also in case you missed it, you can download my CAS background used in the preview [here] (it is slightly different from the template package.)

Requirements:

Sims 4 studio

Image editor (Ideally photoshop)

my templates (attached below)

—————

Part 01: The Easy Way

The easiest way to create a CAS background with mirror is to use my attached templates.

The PSD template is the best option, but for those of you that don’t have Photoshop, there is a PNG version as well.

You will need 2 images; one for the main background, and one that will be reflected in the mirror. The large top area is the main background, and the smaller rectangle at the bottom is what will be reflected in the mirror behind your sim.

In the image editor, paste your images and resize them to fit into the outlined areas.

For framing your screenshots, it’s important to understand that the mirror is actually just floating in space in front of a flat background. That means you’ll have to fake the perspective a bit and that may require some trial and error to get right. I recommend taking multiple screenshots at a variety of angles so you have options to work with. Use the model sim as a guide to help you with placing your background image. (Don’t forget to hide the model sim and UV layout when you’re done!)

Save as .PNG or .DDS and import it into the template package in Sims 4 Studio.

That’s it! My goal was to make it super easy for you. Remember to only use one CAS background in your mods folder at a time since it's an override. Also note that it is not compatible with 'cas blob remover' since the instance for the dropshadow is now used as the mirror.

TOU — PLEASE READ:

I give permission to the Sims community to use my template files and modify them as needed to create your own CAS backgrounds. This took months of work, researching and experimenting, so please respect the effort I put into creating this resource by agreeing to these simple terms:

Don’t re-upload my files. Don’t claim my work as your own. If you use my templates for your cc, please share credit with my username (Lijoue) and link to my Patreon page. If you make any money from cc created with my templates, please consider making a donation via my Patreon. It is greatly appreciated.

download template files here

Part 02: The 3D Room

to be continued…

This part will take more time to finish because there’s a lot more steps involved in creating a 3D CAS room. In the meantime, the template should be enough of a starting point for those of you that already know how to make cc objects, since I already handled the hardest parts. Just understand that the mirror reflection is not automatically calculated, meaning that if you move the mirror in the mesh, you will need to change the Mirror Plane Normal and Mirror Plane Offset in S4Studio Warehouse to match the new angle or position. Otherwise it may look unrealistic or worse, it could reflect the eerie wasteland world that the CAS room is set in. (pictured below)

[titanomancy]

Since the OG resin Mechanicum models haven't been delisted yet, I thought it would be of particular historical relevance to post some side-by-sides of the old models and their newly announced plastic counterparts before they're memory holed forever.

In the case of the Tech-Thralls, it looks like the new kit may only contain las-locks - now modified to more closely resemble a standard lasgun than the previous neutron laser-inspired design.

The new design looks less bulky - the shoulders, particularly, have been slimmed down - and many of the poses present a staggering gait that feels more thematically consistent with the bionic zombies they're meant to be. Great stuff.

The Thallax, meanwhile, give the appearance of being slightly more bulky than their resin counterparts. This may just be an artifact of the photography, although the inclusion of additional armored head options does give those examples a somewhat more tanky profile.

Some superficial changes to their weapons as well - all are still clearly recognizable, with the most obvious change being to elongate the multi-melta to separate the foregrip from the barrel shroud.

Similarly superficial, the Castellax look to be very nearly 1:1 with their resin counterparts. It's tough to turn up any significant variances even on a close inspection, although I'm sure that the switch to plastic will significantly improve the assembly.

The Thanatar definitely benefits from the switch to plastic, showcased by the wide open magnetic containment ring around the muzzle of its plasma mortar. In its original resin incarnation, this assembly is cast as a single, solid ring which sits over the end of the gun. I imagine that it's meant to articulate while firing, opening up to release the containment field as the plasma discharges.

What I find most interesting is the sheer number of modifications to the Triaros Armoured Conveyor. The silhouette is unchanged, but any particular detail you care to hone in on is noticeably different; from the venting on the shock ram to the gimbles of its point defense weapons, to the coils of its flare shield projectors and the suspension of its return rollers.

I'll definitely be curious to see how they approach the rest of the Mechanicum range. We can already infer that the Termite Assault Drill is coming, since it's got an 8mm Legions Imperialis counterpart on the way, and the tooling for the Triaros makes the lightning locked and rad missile loaded Karacnos Assault Tank a lot more likely.

I wouldn't mind seeing a plastic Krios Battle Tank, either, but there's less reason to believe that's imminent at the minute.

[kit-williams]

Nap Together

Male Lead: 91-Yrac Female Lead: H3X Universe/AU: Warhammer 40k/Yandere Space Marine Canon Status: Yes this is after H3X gets some flesh crafted leggies

Yrac cocked his head to the side as this agriworld was not very much relevant to what he needed nor anyone else needed but it's what his little sweet spark needed. He could see her stimming, her hands shaking as she made a low noise from her throat as a bit of spittle ran down her chin. She was excited... elevated heart level and other vitals ran by him.

Her frame had to be modified to handle her mass as that is what her replaced legs were doing but just a bit of a modification and some load bearing adjustments and he watched her touch her legs again as a spider like contraption bore most of her weight until she was ready to give up her legs again.

"Are you excited?" Yrac said wrapping his mechadendrites around one of her own. Watching her nod as she pulled off her boots hissing and whining as she wanted to do it all on her own. Today has been far too exciting for her... seeing equines as well... it's why he chose this planet... they had suitable skull structures that pleased her.

She hissed and jerked her foot back up having stepped on a bramble as she plucks it out and giggles seeing her foot bleed, "It hurt!" She says with tears in her eyes.

"Yes isn't that what you wanted?" Yrac says cocking his head to the other side of him as the imposing towering man follows behind the small woman. His eye brightly glowing as he watches her closely.

She skitters over and puts her new legs with her new toes... into the soft slightly damp grass. Yrac's servo skull watches for combatants behind him but otherwise he is fully focused on his sweet spark. Again she makes her excited closed mouth noise, slapping the ground with not only both of her hands but all her mechadendrites as she stims. He lets her do that till he just watches her hold her head as she's gone and over excited herself.

He moves quickly pulling her off the grass and wrapping her in one of his mecadendrites. "Alright H3X I think we've done a lot today. Wouldn't you agree?"

He watches her nod as he puts her boots back on and leads her to a waiting flyer. This planet really isn't for him it's far more for her.

-----

His fingers drummed on the side of the throne as he was looking over reports his eye dull at the sight of reports but when he turns his head to see his dear sweet spark standing there is suddenly shines brightly, "H3X what is it sweet spark?"

She doesn't ordain to tell him as all she does is crawl into his lap and shove her head under his chin. He feels his pacemaker sputter for a moment before it continues on its rhythm. "H3X? What is-"

"I'm tired and want nap." She says with a pout in her voice.

"Ahhh I see." He plugs his mechadendrite in and reroutes his calls and queries and ways to run the ship from his quarters. "Come on up." He listens to her whine as his own hydraulics whine as he picks her up before she moves on her own. "I know a better spot to nap."

His hands run through her hair as his living eye is closed while he continue to run the ship from the comfort of his bed. Slightly luxurious in its materials but still able to hold up the weight of two tech adepts. Her head on his chest as she fell asleep listening to his processes working inside of his chest. His crew under strict orders to not disturb him lest pain of death and/or slow servitor conversion. The mechanical parts of his brain are running suboptimal as he is in a resting phase and letting it do automated tasks... when was the last time he allowed himself to... nap?

H3X on the other mechadendrite loved to nap as he had ensure there were spots suitable for her to nap in throughout the ship and this was the first time she sought a joint nap. Yrac wouldn't complain about this development hoping that she would request him for more naps. As he holds her close and she holds him.

Fluffuary Taglist: @bispecsual @the-californicationist @egrets-not-regrets @libraryshadow @bleedingichorhearts @liar-anubiass-blog

[isobug]

Dichotomyless / Non-Dichotomy

A representative flag for those who are totally outside of dichotomy categorization of any kind ( Dichotomyless ) and / or not conforming to the orientation / gender / etc. dichotomy in any way ( Non-Dichotomy. )

These terms were not coined by me, but were defined by Anon via my inbox. This was requested as Anon wanted something more specific than Absrose.

The symbol on the flag is "≅". I believe this is a great symbol to represent being Dichotomyless / Non-Dichotomy as it means "approximately equal to" in mathematics. The antonyms of "Dichotomy" are "equality, similarity, harmony, and agreement". This represents those concepts, but avoids exact sameness.

( I want to avoid the creation of a new dichotomy of "similar vs. dissimilar" via the modifier "approximate", which means "close but not exactly the same" aka both and also neither. This can be conceptually similar to or the same as Recursion if you find that useful to describe your experience! )

The symbol itself can also represent the experience of being one who is Dichotomyless / Non-Dichotomy, with the tilde representing the individual(s) in question being literally above or removed from any or a Dichotomy ( represented by the two parallel lines ), but also not totally removed ( again, to avoid another dichotomy of "removed vs. attached". )

I've also chosen "≅" because it's already easily available / accessible as a text symbol, so one could easily put it in their bio, their icon, or recreate it irl for handmade pride accessories and the like.

The flag itself has the blue and purple-pink stripes at the top / bottom to represent any relevant dichotomy or all dichotomies. These colors are often used to show "opposites". The orange-yellow stripe is a color intentionally removed from blue/pink/purple and is "above" the dichotomy stripes, but still slightly overlapping with both ( as well as neither / the rest of the flag. )

The grey expanse is meant to show the "grey area" of every dichotomy, people often think in "black and white" when I've found that every established dichotomy has it's grey areas or those who are literally unable to be fit into "either/or" systems. It is both removed from the other stripes but touching all of them, again representing a lack of dichotomy.

The teal stripe/circle holding the symbol is above but overlapping with the orange-yellow stripe to represent how, even if one were to try and make any Dichotomyless / Non-Dichotomy experience / identity into a Dichotomy ( via "label crunching" and the like ), one would still be Dichotomyless / Non-Dichotomy even in relation to that newly created dichotomy. ( Again, you may related this to the concept of recursion if you'd like. )

I'm sorry if this is a little high-concept or if i've repeated myself somewhat here. These are intentionally broad terms and I want to make sure I'm properly explaining all of my thoughts and reasonings. I'm happy to tweak any language if something isn't totally clear! ( I may have made a few typos, this was a lot to type. )

Taglist - @radiomogai, @revenant-coining

[wetcatspellcaster]

Have you ever thought about what kind of person Rosalie would be without the agoraphobia? Or is it too important a part of her character to imagine without it?

awww, what a sweet question! and also one that's very relevant, because the circumstances of the modern AU (and lack of tadpole) have actually modified this part of her characterisation a little - it's been changed to something slightly milder but still plot relevant (it is actually talked about in the next chapter!)

so I guess my answer is... the modern AU characterisation, but with the magic and wizardry added back in :) I don't think power is ever going to be a motivating factor for her, but passion and study would be, so I think she'd be a funky little languages wizard at a funky little university. maybe Candlekeep, lol (sorry Threnn). she'd be more well-adjusted, so she'd have more friends - probably not as many as the bg3 party, without the tadpole extrovert hack- and she'd have a thoroughly comfortable, quiet life for herself. I think she'd still take the break up hard regardless of if agoraphobia happened or not, so i'm not sure if she'd have a partner yet or not.

she would never reach the heights of strength/power she reaches on any trajectory where the nautiloid happens, because she'd have no motivation for doing so x

[queen0fm0nsterz]

I’m starting to think that the kid the lady is next to in that one painting (when the guest are chasing you) is probably not their daughter or someone important, maybe it was a promotional painting to show people thus “hey, look the lady is good with kids!” When the reality couldn’t be further from the truth.

DUDE I HAVE BEEN SAYING THIS FOR CENTURIESSSS THAT GIRL IS NOT HER KID BROOOO

Look with all the evidence I've gathered atp I am very convinced that the girl in the painting is her. I am compiling everything in a post to answer another anon rn but I deadass started to dislike any theory involving the concept of the Lady being a mother.

I myself have done this in the past (the parallels between her and the Pretender were not lost on me), but tbh I think she works so much better without having a kid for a multitude of reasons.

She does not like people. She wants to be left alone. To go out there and find someone who would have a child with her -- no actually scratch that, FOR HER TO FIND SOMEONE SHE TOLERATES ENOUGH TO HAVE A CHILD WITH would be out of character considering what we know about her.

^ same reason as to why I think she wouldn't adopt under normal circumstances.

^^ a child under her care would last a maximum of 3 days.

None of the children that were indicated as having relations back to her look like the girl in the painting. RCG's hair are too brownish and too long + how would she leave the Maw? Where would she find a hot air balloon near/on a submarine?, the Pretender is albino + the developers went out of their way to make her face very different from the other kids, the Flashlight Girl looks like any other girl in the Maw because they reused her model + she has 0 relevance before and after that + I think the girl in the painting was slightly remodeled and differently rendered just for the pictures like the other Ladies were resized and had their hairstyles modified.

^ These are all great in AU context, but I think canonically none of them would work/line up. The best bet for daughter title was Six and the developers went out of their way to publicly state that they are NOT related in that way.

IN SAID STATEMENT THE DEVS SAID THAT THERE IS NOTHING MOTHERLY ABOUT THE LADY.

The fact that so many people want to push the mother theory onto her really sounds like a scapegoat to not explore her character further. I would not be as upset if I hadn't seen her be dismissed as just a "heartless mother who hates her daughter/wants their beauty/is envious of her child" and yadda yadda yadda so many times.

Do you know how many times that trope has been done? And for it to be applied to such a layered, complex character as her only traits? That and being vain maybe if you're feeling generous, when the truth is that she is quite literally the most complex LN antagonist -- much like Six is the most complex protagonist. Six and the Lady are/have both been victims of fandom misogyny and it kills me to my core send tumblr post

I'm sorry for the rant. Again, I do enjoy the thought of the Lady being in a motherly role (I HAVE MADE A LADY MOM AU MYSELF) but not if it means assassinating her character. The only Lady assassination I support is the one carried out by Six.

[ask-princessandromeda]

[Hey y’all, I’m doing some blog cleaning. Not sure if it’s relevant to anyone, but a few posts might be modified slightly]

[crystalelemental]

"books-are-my-life-stuff: Yeah... The Arc Outfits Lance-Steven-Cynthia are basically the improved version of their OG versions, but are made separate units, with slightly modified outfits, and, uh, I guess they're broken units, but as you mentioned, the game has never been that difficult. Overly complicating the gameplay by adding more roles and new mechanics are unnecessary."

It's not even just that, it's that...we had all these systems for improving performance: 5/5 grids, 3/5 expansions, EX Roles, hell the boosted energy cap. And what's the solution to powering up now? Selling back the same thing. These aren't new pairs. They have a new outfit, but they're the same character/Pokemon combination we've always had, and this is the only way they're going to upgrade them now. Not by adding mechanics to keep old things relevant like they used to, but by re-selling the same pair with the upgrades you'd want, on significantly worse rates and higher pity requirements. And they're couching all of this as a "Celebration of the game." They can fuck right off with that.

"Oh and by the way, Lillie got an alt, a free alt even, with Solgaleo. But her outfit is basically just her Anni 2021 outfit with the colors adjusted to Solgaleo's color scheme."

I did notice the Lillie but by that point I was too in awe to really parse that it was her. Can't wait for this free Solgaleo to be stronger than her Lunala alt!

"But yeah, that 500 scout points fucking sucks. DeNA will definitely release some popular characters (like N) there, and probably Volo's "true form" is gonna be called Arceus Outfit whenever it's released eventually. And then I'll have to deal with that stupid scout point just to get a copy of him. Good thing I don't play that much anymore."

It's just absurd. I can't even say I'm that surprised, but upping the pity requirements on rates that are already so bad you have around an average chance you needed to spark before this adjustment is just wretched. This is the kind of change that should decimate their sales with how many people leave, but the addicting factor of gacha as it is, the noose will tighten for those who stay and their profits likely won't be impacted anyway. It's disgusting.

[sovereign-skyy]

So was the cypher just a 22 shift cypher with + at the end of the alphabet or did you do something special beyond that? Bc while I know what the correct translation should be I can't quite put together why an answer with just the 22-shift would be close if the decoder is just using the regular alphabet but completely off when using a 27 letter alphabet of A through +. I know the paragraph before is supposed to have all the clues but there's definitely something I am missing and I gotta know what. Sorry to just pop up randomly and ask you this but I saw Amity reblog another question about it and just like zeroed on your blog in bc cryptography and flirting is so fucking cool and your rules do say to send you an ask.

First of all, don't apologise for popping up out of nowhere I love this! I have it in my bio for a reason lol

For anyone who didn't see the cipher in question (which I expect to be almost everyone who sees this) here's the link to @k1nky-r0b0t-g1rl's post (I'll also be quoting the relevant stuff but if you wanna try to kinda still solve it for yourself start there, I'll be explaining it in detail here):

I'll make this a more comprehensive explanation for anyone who wants it so it's probably gonna contain quite some stuff you already know, if you want to skip it just scroll until you see 'NOW FOR THE GOOD STUFF' in big text!

SO

Here we have the original message:

E sxjp pk ejopxhh x oqynkqpeja ejpk ukqn ouopaio pdxp ixgao ukq osepzd ejpk dknju ik+a sdajaran E oxu "Kd Xiepu gjkso sxuu ikna xykqp pdxp," ok pdxp E zxj ixga ukq atlhxej atpnaiahu zkilhezxpa+ pklezo sdeha ukq'na oq++ajhu qjyaxnxyhu dknju xj+ pnuejc +aolxnxpahu pk de+a ep.

And this is the hint I gave:

There's three important parts to this so I'll go through them in order

Firstly, the hint is about Julius Caesar, hinting at the fact that the later text is encoded by a Caesar cipher. This is a cryptographic method where you move all the letters forward a certain amount (called the shift) of letters in the alphabet. So a caesar cipher with a right shift of 1 shifts all the letters one space forward, eg. A -> B, X -> Y. Generally the right shift is the default so I left it at that. A better hint would have also incorporated the right part but eh I'm not perfect.

Secondly, I talk about 23 people stabbing him, which indicates a shift of 23, giving us the following conversion table:

where the top row is the original letters and the bottom is the shifted letter values. If we left it at this and tried to decode the message we'd get:

H vams sn hmrsakk a rtbqntshmd hmsn xntq rxrsdlr sgas lajdr xnt rvhscg hmsn gnqmx ln+d vgdmdudq H rax "Ng Alhsx jmnvr vaxx lnqd abnts sgas," rn sgas H cam lajd xnt dwokahm dwsqdldkx cnlokhcasd+ snohcr vghkd xnt'qd rt++dmkx tmbdaqabkx gnqmx am+ sqxhmf +droaqasdkx sn gh+d hs.

Which is very much not correct. Now, we can cheat a little and change this to a 22-shift cipher (which is not correct) and get the following:

I wbnt to instbll b sucroutine into your systems thbt mbkes you switdh into horny mo+e whenever I sby "Oh Bmity knows wbyy more bcout thbt," so thbt I dbn mbke you explbin extremely domplidbte+ topids while you're su++enly uncebrbcly horny bn+ trying +espbrbtely to hi+e it.

Then we see something comprehensible, but not quite correct: there's some random B's, C's and D's in there and still some plusses in the middle of words. Regardless, you can make out from this wrong result what the message was supposed to be (an oversight on my part, and something I will take into account if/when I do it again)

And now comes the spicy part!

Thirdly, I say "a little (+) at the end" which (as you correctly identified in your ask) refers to the fact that I didn't use the default 26-letter alphabet, but instead used a slightly modified 27-letter alphabet with a + at the end, so we'd have the following letter order (I'll be referring to this as alphabet+ for brevity)

ABCDEFGHIJKLMNOPQRSTUVWXYZ+

If we try to decode the message as a 23-rightshift caesar cipher with alphabet+, we get the following conversion table and message:

I want to install a subroutine into your systems that makes you switch into horny mode whenever I say "Oh Amity knows wayy more about that," so that I can make you explain extremely complicated topics while you're suddenly unbearably horny and trying desparately to hide it.

Which is finally correct! Yay, we have the original message!

NOW FOR THE GOOD STUFF

But now we finally get to your question: why does the regular 22-shift almost work if it's totally wrong for alphabet+?

For that, we can consider the equivalent left-shift operations of our right-shift decodings:

For any standard alphabet caesar cipher, the 26-shift (left or right) operation is the same as the unencoded version (because A + 26 spaces is once again A), which means that we can also express our right-shift operations as a left-shift operation of shift 26 - R where R is the shift of our right-shift (if this doesn't make sense to anyone I'm happy to try to expand on it btw).

For the alphabet cipher, that means a 23 right-shift is equivalent to a 3 left-shift, and a 22 right-shift is equivalent to a 4 left-shift.

However, for alphabet+, it doesn't take 26 shifts to get back to normal, but 27 (since there's 27 characters in alphabet+). This means that a 23 right-shift alphabet+ operation is equivalent to a 4 left-shift and NOT a 3 left-shift.

Now, since they're not the same set of characters, an alphabet 4 left-shift is not the same as an alphabet+ 4 left-shift. However, it's good to take into account that the solution in alphabet+ is also very similar to our almost-solution in the regular alphabet.

If you'll look at Table 1 and 2 again, you'll see that while A, B and C translate to X, Y and Z for both 23 right-shifts, the + in the middle for alphabet+ messes everything up and leaves us with an icky leftover left-shift of 1 (which is close, but still incomprehensible to humans since it's such a big portion of letters)

However, if we create a conversion table for the 22 right-shift of the alphabet we get the following:

If we compare this to Table 2, we see that A, B, C & D are not the same for both. However, from E on, these two are EXACTLY the same. The part left of the + just has a right-shift of 1 (which is symmetrical to the left-shift of 1 we saw in Table 1).

So, in conclusion: because of the difference in amount of characters, both the 22 and 23 right-shift alphabet decodings are not EXACTLY the same as the 23 right-shift alphabet+ decoding. However, due to the similarity of the lower 4 left-shift, the 22 has more correct characters and is therefore more comprehensible.

I hope that helps a little and I didn't make it more confusing lmao, this is longer (and also took longer) than I thought it would be but it was fun to write, so thanks for asking! If anything is still unclear feel free to reblog with a question or send me an ask (that counts for anyone reading this btw)! Also, since you said you're a fan of flirting + cryptography, how about I unleash the next cipher on you? ;)

[furiousgoldfish]

(seeking advice, for people who understand OSDD and DID well)

I've explained recently there's been a host change, and right now we understand a little more of what happened, and why the old host broke. It turns out that the primary protector was broken for a while, and decided to keep it quiet and just distance themselves away, which in turn eventually broke the host, who could not keep on going without a single protector in the system.

However, what we're trying to figure out right now is whether I'm an alter who is separate from the old host, or did I break off from the host, and split into a new one? I'm thinking this might have happened, because I seem to have all of the skills the old host has, I know what to do in the same way they did, I have extremely little memories, but I don't feel foreign in this body, it feels like I've been in here before, I have gotten used to the mirror reflection easily as well.

I have no memories of existing any second before I became the host. I have no idea where I've been or what have I been doing, and I have memories specifically just from the last few months. I keep getting flashbacks from primary school time and high school, but they're only flashes and moments, I can't seem to remember anything in detail, even if I have general context for what happened in life.

It also took me 3 days to realize that I was not the old host. Even without any memories or feelings, I just thought it was the stress getting to me and that I was the old host. I only realized it after 3 days have passed.

What is different from me and the old host is that I can easily control and manipulate the inner world, I can make or modify anything that's going on inside; the old host could not change a thing, not even with their greatest efforts. That is confusing. It feels like we might have been able to create and control the inner world, again around the end of primary school, beginning of high school, but since then, it's all been set in stone and untouchable. Until now.

I can more easily manage day-to-day life because I don't experience anxiety, stress, worry, or self doubt, the only feeling I experience continuously is anger. Some might have noticed that the posts are slightly more angry in tone since I took over.

I have empathy for the old host specifically, and not for anyone else. I believe that if I had existed before the break, I would not have allowed it. I would have prevented this. I can't imagine existing and not doing anything about it.

The other thing that leads me to believe we might have split, is the pain. When I first came to, I was experiencing unbearable amount of pain, the amount that would make anyone suicidal. I felt nothing about it as I have no feelings, but I acknowledged that it is the amount of pain that would make a person suicidal very fast. The old host would sometimes theorize that splitting must be extremely painful for a person, and would mourn the past instances where they felt they must have split, and tried to remember how it felt. I remember this pain vividly, and I do believe that it would kill us if the old host was not switched out.

The pain went away within a few hours after I took over and I've experienced severe depression for several days, unable to recall any non-traumatic memory. When I finally caught a positive memory, I came alive and was able to continue living while feeling generally neutral.

I am currently both the host, and the protector, and I'm holding a lot of trauma in me.

What are the odds that the old host split in two and I'm the half that feels no emotions, and has no memories, except those instantly relevant to the current situation? Would I, in any way know this is the case? How would I check it?

[darkx-the-dragon-kn1ght]

Chapter 38- Part 2

Now…if I recall, starter Pokémon have pretty low catch rates, they're not easy to grab. But maybe this game modified their catch rates somewhat, since you're able to encounter them in the wild? Let me test that by paralyzing it first-

It has Aura Sphere?? Well now I wanna catch it even more, that's so good! How about a Great Ball, can that-

Shoot! I don't wanna use Acid Spray and accidentally knock it out, if I reset it may have a different moveset. Let's see- it's raining, so Crater's Lava Plume should be fine, right?

Not when Squirtle switches to Water Pulse! But no, it's just using random moves, it's a wild Pokémon, so if I heal it should use a different move…

And then we can use Lava Plume!

That helps too. So, to keep Crater from dying, let's switch back to Glare…

And just to make sure I get it this time, I'll use an Ultra Ball.

I named his Blast more as a reference to his evolutions, I mean- Blastoise has literal cannons on its back, it works.

Now then- leaving the Wasteland, there's a specific Pokémon we need for this next event: a Chingling. Real talk, I was just about to head to the Grand Stairway to catch one, went down the ladder and everything, and then I remembered…Xera already had one!

Yeah, remember Ring? The Shiny Chingling caught during the very first excursion into the Grand Stairway? Never thought she'd come into relevance in this very specific way, I just wanted to catch a Shiny, but here we are. Of course, I still need to evolve her into a Chimecho, but it's nighttime so that's already half the battle.

And building up friendship is the other half! But I'll just take Ring with as I go about these other encounters. Like this other one!

Once again- no escaping this place or the memories associated with it. 

Now, I was slightly wrong before when I thought there was just the one Strength boulder here. There's another one, up on the third floor-

Push it down that hole, jump down the hole too, and you see…

A little guy! And another starter, at that!

Luckily, the Tepig didn't go too far- in fact, it's a spot we saw not too long ago.

The other boulder location! Guess this Tepig really likes pushing rocks around.

And now, we're still not leaving Pyrous Mountain, but rather we're going to another familiar location…

One world-weary sigh from me, and we press forward-

I'm…guessing this Shard would have been useful if I chose to battle Cal up here instead of Victoria, fair enough.

But more importantly, the Tepig is right over there, sooo-

Only Lv. 15, huh? Unironically- I think Ring is the best option here.

We'll use Yawn, wait a bit for it to fall asleep…

And now, we'll try a Great Ball!

Dangit, even that's not enough? Hmm…Ring’s only proper damaging moves is Confusion, and I don't know if Tepig can live that or not with the level difference. I guess…I can try it…?

Previous

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[skyboxeye]

Capturing the ambience of Age of Mythology's (2002) menus

Despite having a reputation as a sleeper hit, AoM has been remastered and re-released a few times: 2014's Extended Edition and 2024's Retold. This guide will focus on the original Gold version of the game.

Running the game

The DVD release (I used the European version) of AoM is recommended for its Windows 10-friendly DRM. During installation you can use the following Product Key for the base game:

XDWXF-2JCVG-VTX6T-6KYQ9-QDC4G

And for the Titans expansion:

CVF7C-QB3KY-GQW23-4DPF6-JDTVG

After installation patch your game using the DVD-specific patch.

Optimizing visuals

Be sure to set Graphics Detail to High inside AOM's in-game menus. This will enhance the visuals and unlock dynamic menu backgrounds scenes. Don't change resolution / bit depth - we'll adjust those later.

Now, close the game and follow this guide to maxing out AoM's graphical sub-options. It will walk you through the User.cfg and gfxconfig files.

If you find yourself stuck with a bad configuration, open persistent.cfg and verify its contents. Be sure to completely restart the game after any changes.

Extracting content

To unpack BAR archives use AOMed. I also found BAR Explorer but it didn't completely extract some archives, e.g. sound2.bar.

For Retold, try MissionLemur128's Resource Manager.

Removing the HUD

Pressing Ctrl + Up and Ctrl + Down only toggles[1] some UI elements, and doesn't work on the main menu. Thankfully I discovered two alternate solutions: modifying layout files, or applying console commands at runtime.

Option 1: Modifying UI layouts

Using an existing XML file, such as those contained in a mod or extracted from data.bar as a reference, we can provide replacement file(s) with all elements (AoM's engine calls them "gadgets") removed.

To hide the main menu UI, remove all elements inside the MainMenu gadget tag inside uipregamenew.xml. To restore the UI, undo your XML changes or delete your replace file altogether (assuming its parent BAR is in place).

Option 2: Developer console

To enable this, add +ShowConsole and +developer to your User.cfg. You can now use the grave, AKA tilde, key[2] while in-game to open a command line. Once open, we can cycle through commands, and see some documentation of each, using the Tab key (Shift + Tab cycles backwards).

Some commands, like uiEditorToggle as one example, seemingly do nothing. Others are contextual - for example, terrainFlatten only works inside the editor. Few text-outputting commands did anything for me, with notable exceptions like configDump().

To hide the in-game UI, we can run uiGameToggle(). Note, this does not do anything on the main menu, or in the editor. We can follow this up with uiHideCursor(). Maximize visibility with fog() and blackmap().

To hide the main menu UI, use gadgetToggle("MainMenu") after starting AoM. Gadget names can be found inside the relevant XML file for your layout.

Bonus: Opening menus in the editor

We can also load AoM's menu "scenarios" for exploration and editing. To do so, unpack the scenarios.bar and scenarios2.bar archives (using AOMed). For example we could remove each menu's iconic cloud borders[3]. This is all slightly easier in Extended Edition, where extraction is not required.

Catalogue of menu content

AoM has two scenes: Water and Norse. Titans introduced its own Water, plus several other unfinished ones that are only visible by browsing the game files. Of these, Greek, Egypt, and Underworld seem relatively more finished. In fact, the Greek scene from Titans serves as the menu background for Extended.

Speaking of EE, installing Tale of the Dragon will place you onto a new China-themed menu.

Footnotes

We can also use the uiMinimizeMainBackground and uiMaximizeMainBackground developer commands for this (see below)

Customizable inside your game.con and gamex.con files, under the Console Gadget Mode header

A surprisingly tricky process since the emitter is not well-visualized inside the editor - try blindly deleting Player 1 objects, centered on where the clouds form

[machiroads]

Machi's 2023 Year In Review

'23 was a bit of a wild one. A toast to the last twelve months (both in fandom and IRL) under the cut.

Fic

Here's what went out the door in '23:

Naruhata Noir

I started posting NN in December '22, about a month after finishing 9L. At one point last year I joked about finishing the entire thing in the week between Christmas and New years. Evidently, this did not happen for a variety of reasons:

A) A series of events occurring in my personal life that do not merit further detail that I will herein refer to as "the conga line of nonsense". That kicked off during last year's holiday season and bled into like...May. Which leads directly into:

B) Tears of the Kingdom came out. And;

C) A general loss of motivation in the project.

During the aforementioned Conga Line of Nonsense, I had a goal of finishing before TotK came out, but I only managed to cobble together another 4 chapters between January and May. After somehow managing weekly to biweekly chapters for 9L, NN was much more sporadic, and at one point I had people asking me if I was still alive. Which. sucked, since I generally strive to be a somewhat reliable person.

Once the TotK hyperfixation hit, I managed maaaaaaybe another 2 chapters before I finally got bored of grinding monsters to upgrade outfits. I did manage to meet the third self-imposed deadline of finishing before going to Japan for 2 weeks, so at least that's one W.

In addition to the distractions of Life, NN was more challenging to write for a few main reasons:

Aizawa is not the narrator. Look, I'm mature enough to acknowledge that he is Blorbo From My Shows, and everything I write wants to revolve around him. Taking a step back from that and trying to get into another character's head after spending 8 solid months on 9L was an adjustment. It took me a bit of time to find Shinsou's voice.

Most of the relationship dynamics in this fic are non-canonical, and pulled directly out of my ass. Shinsou's relationships with the Hottas are central to the back half of the fic, and his relationship with Mirko also becomes prominent at times. NONE OF THESE CHARACTERS HAVE EVER INTERACTED IN REAL LIFE I'M JUST SMASHING DOLLS TOGETHER LIKE I DID AS A 7 YEAR OLD.

Trying to parallel something I already wrote several months ago is hard. I wanted NN to make sense on its own, but also follow the relevant bits from 9L. This was next to impossible to accomplish without sounding clunky. Almost from the very beginning of the fic, the outsider's perspective of Aizawa's first steps, I felt the urge to change the dialogue because the story that I wanted to tell from Shinsou's perspective was different from the one I wanted to tell from Aizawa's perspective. I locked myself into that rigidity for a while, until I finally decided just to say fuck it at the end and modify the 9L dialogue slightly because the story had taken on a life of its own.

Erasermic took a major backseat in this one, but I still needed to scratch the itch, and I think that's why I ended up writing 2 emic one shots in between chapters.

I don't think a direct parallel spin-off is something I would try writing again, and the fic was probably a lot longer than it needed to be, but at the end of the day, I'm satisfied with the way it turned out, and I'm happy I was actually able to finish it this year.

Here's a collage of my inspo for Aizawa's apartment cobbled together from google maps and japanese real estate websites.

Being No One, Going Nowhere

The first of the 3 one shots that I put out this year, and a proof of concept that I can slap together 3k in a day and a half fever dream and call it a fic.

This one in particular was instigated by one of @o0fyuu0o's tweets that refused to leave me alone. And maybe also the two broken arms story from reddit, but you know, like, less incesty.

Mic was extremely pathetic in this one, which is immensely fun to write. Just a pathetic little meow meow. Sopping wet cat of a man.

College AU was fun to write, emboldened in part by @kyurilin's fic Stray. After being married to canon-verse for both 9L and NN, this was an exercise in just making shit up, and also living vicariously through the memories of the house I lived in for the better part of 2 years as an undergrad. I graduated 7 years ago and it is still crystallized in my memory.

A Tumultuous Sea, You and Me

I've been nursing a healthy crush on Pirate!Aizawa (or Paizawa, as the kids on JP Twit call him) since the Volume 35 character page came out in June '22. Paizawa even killed a 2 year long art block, that's how powerful he is. (Look!)

I do not remember what exactly spurned this one on, but it also got written in the span of about 2 days. I think I reread The Art of Drowning at some point this year, but I do not remember if it was during the writing frenzy, or sometime before it.

Aizawa gets to hold the meow meow card again in this one. His 2 sentence rivalry with Vlad is one of the best things I've ever written.

Of the 2 days I spent writing this, I probably spent 75% of that researching pirate ships. I used almost none of it, and have forgotten almost all of it by this point.

I feel like everyone that dips their toes into the realm of merpeople has a different interpretation on it, but I wanted to spend approximately 0 minutes on worldbuilding, so it's just kind of a chill coexistence between the pirates and the mermaids in this one lol. People were intrigued by said "worldbuilding" however and wanted more, but I think I've scratched the mer-pirate itch for now haha.

1966 Ford Nutstang GT350 Shelby

@kyurilin made a tumblr post that misspelled "mustang" as "nustang" and I skim-read it and saw "nutstang" and was like "you know what would be a terribad nickname for the car? Nutstang." At which point I immediately informed her, which led down the rabbit hole of a very loose RP (as it often does) and I decided YOU KNOW WHAT? I SHOULD JUST TURN THIS INTO A CRACK FIC.

At which point I had to sort of construct a loose plot around the entire bonkers concept. Nemuri held a key role in the pseudo-RP, but I ended up wanting to keep the fic tight and her role was mostly cut. But rest assured she is there in spirit, though, judging.

The plush nutsack is just a bastardization of a kangaroo ballsack coinpurse I saw in a Crap Souvenirs From Around The World calendar I had many years back that has imprinted on my memory. At no point did I seek out visual reference for it, and neither should you. It is up to the reader's imagination.

On the topic of bastardizations, the reappearing nutsack plotline is borrowed from the drawfee gnome saga.

Mic yelling GOOD MORNING and Aizawa banging his head on the underside of his desk is S tier slapstick.

PEOPLE MADE ART????

Some wonderful listeners readers are still making art for 9L, and we have been blessed with two beautiful new pieces this year:

Mic and Eri's selfie, from @kaleidoscopedrawsjpg

The Only One Bed scene, from @guiltyfixations

@obsessed-dragon also drew the photo of Shinsou holding Miso from Naruhata Noir, and Black Spider Eyes drew Aizawa dangling out the window from Tumultuous Sea.

Every time a piece of art drops on my dash, or I see my fic being recommended to other people, my brain does a lil short circuit and I have to go get up and walk around for a bit. I'm not sure words can express how much it means to me that people have enjoyed my writing enough to recommend it to other people, or sit down and create something of their own based off of it. It's humbling, and I'm truly grateful for every kind word or "sketch I should have maybe spent a little longer on" hahaha

Stats!

Look, I'm an engineer. I can't resist the thrall of Microsoft Excel. So here's A Chart.

I value Bookmarks the highest of all the stats that AO3 spits out. Views are pointless (skewed higher in the context of multi-chap fics). Kudos are an indicator of how many people read and liked enough to leave a kudos, but bookmarks are my indicator of how many people liked it enough to keep it around to read again, or recommend to others.

The bookmark-to-kudos ratio is (in my unscientific opinion) a measure of how many people loved the work vs how many people just liked it.

From the chart above, we can propose the following conclusions:

9L is still, far and away, the most popular, and most well-loved thing I've ever written. I'm fine with that.

The Nutstang fic was a certified cult classic, with a bookmark-to-kudos ratio of almost 0.3, second to only 9L.

NN is at a respectable ratio of 0.24 (middle of the pack), but in terms of number of kudos, is not that far ahead the mer-pirate fic. NN was not tagged as erasermic, so I do think this checks out in terms of sheer exposure.

Still Cooking:

FFXII AU

I started this one in March during the conga line of personal life nonsense. I somehow lured in Robbirdthe8th and @o0fyuu0o and @obsessed-dragon and got a solid month of drafting done before I was like "maybe I should work on NN again" and then it sat dormant until like. October.

It's up to almost 30k across 3 partially written chapters already, and I outlined 9 chapters. It is almost certainly overambitious, and I will almost certainly run into the same motivation issue I had with NN because it's a rooftop 4 fic and not just erasermic, and it has a demographic of approximately four people as an AU of a game that came out in uh........2006.

I thought I'd get at least some of it out in '23 but I'm taking it easy and just writing when inspiration strikes at the moment.

Fortuneteller AU

I started this one maybe a week-ish ago, in my quest for a pitch for the erasermic zine (surprise! they haven't made official announcements yet, but I'll be in it. this is an easter egg for those of you who made it this far). It's going to end up far too long for the 3k word limit for that, so I'm just co-opting it for another one-shot. Taisho era urban fantasy dabbling in some Violet Evergarden/FMA-esque post-war themes. Mic with pince nez. Aizawa in hakama. Gratuitous amateur tarot. It has gripped me by the throat.

More from the Nine Lives Extended Universe (canon-willing)

I've got 3 more spin-offs to 9L simmering, just waiting for canon to figure out its business. These are:

When The Battle's Lost and Won

A final battle post-mortem in 4 parts (if 3baka all make it out alive that is). Every few chapters of canon that come out, something gets added or tossed. Extremely fluid at this point, but there are some good quality blurbs and bullet points in there.

Kintsugi

The erasermic epilogue to 9L, from Mic's perspective. An exploration of their relationship beyond the final battle, with an overarching theme that I've borrowed from a Dorktown documentary on former Toronto Blue Jays pitcher Dave Stieb: Not at all, and then all at once.

This one's just pure body worship, punctuated by an extremely casual marriage proposal. A lot of people still comment on 9L like "THIS CAN'T BE IT, WHERE'S THE REST OF IT?", so I hope this will satisfy those looking for some closure from a relatively open ending.

The Way of the Househero

With the impending graduation of the hell class, and a body that doesn't quite move the way it used to, Aizawa has a bit of an existential crisis and semi-retires so he can be a full-time parent to Eri while figuring out what's next for him. Mostly slice of life. No real plot to this one yet, mostly just vignettes. Aizawa finally gets cats of his own, makes mom friends, and becomes more of a knife slut (only its in the kitchen now instead of on the streets).

IRL

Painting

Every room in my home is painted some sort of bland pastel, and this year we managed to purge pastels from four rooms: my home office, our living room / dining room, and our bedroom. I am enormously pleased with how each of these have turned out.

Gardening

We moved to this house in January '22, and last year was mostly seeing what came up in the garden. This year we cleared out a lot of the decorative shrubs in our backyard (turns out you can hock shrubs on facebook marketplace), and planted a veggie garden. The extent of my gardening experience prior to this year was mowing the lawn as a teenager, so this year was a continuous learning experience, and likely will be for many more years to come.

We had some big wins (potatoes, tomatoes, carrots, cherries, squash, dear god the squash), and some losses (apples that were infested with tent caterpillars, arugula that bolted, and lettuce that got eaten by bunnies to name a few).

In addition to veggies, we also did a lot of general cleanup around the rest of the yard, including clearing out some invasive species and thinning out some partially dead shrubs. We mostly let the yard do its own thing last year, and the previous owner of our home died about 6 months before we moved in, so it was probably neglected for a while. I cut out a blackberry cane that was as long as our driveway. I bought a wood chipper and a compost aerator and am learning the art and science of turning yard trash into yard treasure. (I have not peed on my compost pile yet, as recommended by /r/composting. Maybe some day.)

I also adopted a clipping from my sister-in-law's monstera, which has done quite well (except for the parts my cat has taken a mild interest in nibbling on from time to time)

Travel

Probably too much travel this year ¯\_(ツ)_/¯

3 Weddings (4 if you count the one in December '22 that's included in the Conga Line of Nonsense). Got covid at 2 of them. Invited to a fifth next year. Wishing everyone of marriageable age I know IRL a very elope

Trips for work to Winnipeg and Calgary (to which I have never been before, but are both underwhelming). Also got to fly on a floatplane for the first time, which is noisy, but the views are unbeatable

I turned 30 this year, and after the Conga Line of Nonsense, I said fuck it, we're going back to Japan for my birthday. 2 weeks, 8 cities. L: Shimanami Kaido cycle (still somehow 30 degrees in September x full sun x forgot sunscreen x 80km = pain) (my husband has proofread this and insists that this is not an L but agree to disagree) W: Hokkaido (beautiful scenery, incredible food, not 30 degrees in September lmao)

Anyways

If you made it this far, thanks for reading, and thanks for your love in '23. I hope to provide you with more of the same nonsense in '24. Let me know if you want a spinoff cats + gardening + DIY blog, since that's just my life now. Happy new year 🍾