#CRITICAL HIT MAXIMUM DAMAGE

[thatgirl4815]

Random but I have a theory of a scene that can happen down the line: when Sand finally break it off and Ray tries to get back with him (“I won’t let you walk away”), Ray is gonna become frantic and in a desperate attempt he is gonna offer Sand money again and it’s not gonna go over well. I can SO see it happen

The way I can just imagine how Sand’s face would fall is just…too painful. I guess that would reaffirm that he’s right to walk away though if Ray thinks he can be so easily bought. The money thing worked before the feelings were involved, but now it’s just an insult. Reminds me of the “You think I have no dignity?” line from the OST video. Also, the “If I’m interested, I do it for free” line from Ep2. Sand cares about money for his own survival, but real feelings go way beyond that.

Not to mention this entire scenario would just prove how much of a burden Ray feels like he is, like his wealth is the only thing he has to offer. In Ray’s mind, it would reiterate that he isn’t someone worth loving, that who he truly is isn’t good enough. Perhaps even the thought of Sand loving him is unfathomable.

I honestly can’t decide if I personally think this situation is likely to happen or not, but I do know that the mere thought is a knife to the heart. It’s demoralizing for both of them.

[ventique18]

For non-whale and casual twst players, I think if you want to fully uncap ONE card, it's gotta be dorm Malleus. He is the most versatile general content pick as at level 1 buddy bonus, one critical hit deals 9.5k damage. If you ignore his skill 2 duo and pick skills 1 and 3 same turn for maximum critical chances, he is almost guaranteed to hit this amount x4. And that's at buddy level 1 with Lilia.

Level 100 Malleus with Level 10 buddy bonus with Lilia will make approximately 10.5k each hit (x4) so very roughly around 42k - 7k = 35k damage each turn because his skill 3 is a weak cosmic magic. Level 110 will give you 11.5k per hit.

That is enough to obliterate or severely damage ANY matchup because he doesn't have a weakness. And if you want to ace the cosmic exams, absolutely get him because he's the only one who can make any semblance of a super effective against this category!

Though as I mentioned, he's best for general content. He is incredibly versatile as a filler for any element exam too, but if you want to maximize your potential for the joint exams, the specific heavy hitters for each element like Riddle and Leona are still the best options.

[the-griffons-saddlebag]

💎 𝗡𝗲𝘄 𝗶𝘁𝗲𝗺! Contingency Cards
Wondrous item, very rare ___ When found, there are 1d4 + 2 “contingency cards” in a stack. Each one has a type of circumstance detailed on it. Choose from the table below or roll a number of d20s equal to the cards found to determine what circumstance is written on each card.  | d20 | Circumstance | —  | 1 | When you die |  | 2 | When you roll a 1 on the d20 when making an ability check |  | 3 | When you trigger an attack of opportunity from a hostile creature |  | 4 | When you miss with an attack |  | 5 | When you fail a saving throw against a hostile source |  | 6 | When you’re knocked prone by a hostile source |  | 7 | When you hit a target with an attack |  | 8 | When you fall from a height greater than 10 feet |  | 9 | When you make a death saving throw |  | 10 | When you drop to less than half your maximum hit points |  | 11 | When you’re surprised or trigger a trap |  | 12 | When a spell you cast ends early as a result of “counterspell”, “dispel magic”, or failing a Constitution saving throw |  | 13 | When you finish a short rest |  | 14 | When you roll initiative |  | 15 | When you take more than 30 damage from a single source |  | 16 | When you become grappled or restrained |  | 17 | When you become frightened or charmed |  | 18 | When you score a critical hit |  | 19 | When you yell out “Help!” |  | 20 | The card is blank: write your own circumstance before using it to cast a spell  |   When you cast a spell that targets only yourself, you can use a “contingency card” that you’re holding as part of casting it to recreate the effects of the “contingency” spell from it, using the circumstance that’s written on the card as the one required by the spell. The card then ignites and turns to ash, destroying itself. The spell you cast is then only cast once the circumstance comes to pass for the first time within the next 10 days, as per the “contingency” spell. This version of “contingency” doesn’t end early as a result of not having a material component. ___ ✨ Patrons get huge perks! Access this and hundreds of other item cards, art files, and compendium entries when you support The Griffon's Saddlebag on Patreon for less than $10 a month!

[reality-detective]

Was the Baltimore Bridge attacked? 👇

The Baltimore bridge collapse was an “absolutely brilliant strategic attack” on US critical infrastructure - most likely cyber - & our intel agencies know it. In information warfare terms, they just divided the US along the Mason Dixon line exactly like the Civil War.

Second busiest strategic roadway in the nation for hazardous material now down for 4-5 years - which is how long they say it will take to recover. The bridge was built specifically to move hazardous material - fuel, diesel, propane gas, nitrogen, highly flammable materials, chemicals and oversized cargo that cannot fit in the tunnels - that supply chain now crippled.

Make no mistake: this was an extraordinary attack in terms of planning, timing & execution.

The two critical components on that bridge are the two load-bearing pylons on each end, closest to the shore. They are bigger, thicker and deeper than anything else. These are the anchor points and they knew that hitting either one one of them would be a fatal wound to the integrity of the bridge.

Half a mile of bridge went in the river - likely you will have to build a new one. Also caused so much damage to the structural integrity of the bottom concrete part that you cannot see & won’t know until they take the wreckage apart. Structural destruction is likely absolutely.

Attack perfectly targeted.

“They have figured out how to bring us down. As long as you stay away from the teeth of the US military, you can pick the US apart. We are an arrogant and ignorantly - lethal combination. Obama said they would fundamentally change America and they did. We are in a free-fall ride on a roller coaster right now - no brakes - just picking up speed.”

The footage shows the cargo ship never got in the approach lane in the channel. You have to be in the channel before you get into that turn. Location was precise/deliberate: They chose a bend in the river where you have to slow down and commit yourself - once you are committed in that area there is not enough room to maneuver.

Should have had a harbor pilot to pilot the boat. You are not supposed to traverse any obstacles without the harbor pilot.

They chose a full moon so they would have maximum tidal shift - rise and fall. Brisk flow in that river on a normal day & have had a lot of rain recently so water was already moving along at a good pace.

Hit it with enough kinetic energy to knock the load-bearing pylon out from under the highway - which fatally weakens the span and then 50 percent of the bridge fell into the water.

All these factors when you look at it  - this is how you teach people how to do this type of attack and there are so few people left in the system who know this. We have a Junior varsity team on the field.

Tremendous navigational obstruction. Huge logistical nightmare to clean this up. The number of dead is tragic but not the whole measure of the attack.

That kind of bridge is constantly under repair - always at night because there is so much traffic and they cannot obstruct that during the day. So concern is for repair guys who were on foot (out of their vehicles) working who may now be in the water - 48 degrees at most at this time of year.

When you choke off Baltimore you have cut the main north-south hazardous corridor (I-95) in half. Now everyone has to go around the city - or go somewhere else.

To move some of that cargo through the tunnel you may be able to get a permit but those are slow to get and require an escort system that is expensive and has to be done at night.

For every $100 dollars that goes into the city, $12 comes from shipping. Believe this will cripple the city of Baltimore at a time when they do not have the resources to recover.

- Lara Logan

The traffic issue was mentioned in this 👇 post

Maybe we have to dig deeper into this Bridge collapse further. Could it be a deeper issue? What's in those shipping containers? Who owns the ship?

Is it for this 👆

It has been 3 years and 3 days since the Evergreen blocked the Suez Canal. Does the number 33 mean anything?

Was this a "Black Swan Event?"

I'm just asking questions? 🤔

[prokopetz]

Brief summary of my thoughts so far now that I've done character creation and played half a session (we broke in the middle but may come back to it):

1) 7 players and a GM is too many. I know you know this already but I want to reaffirm it because that was what we had and it was really hard to understand what was going on.

2) I made my character 100% random and then backsolved an identity from there, and it worked better than it had any right to. The Traits are very evocative and I immediately had ideas of what I wanted my God Eater to look like.

3) I'm not sure the Calamity Clock is explained as clearly as I'd like it to be; to be honest, Tests in general are explained in a pretty convoluted way. It felt like some of the less-experienced TTRPG players at the table struggled with them, especially coming from a 5e-only background.

Sorry if this isn't the most helpful feedback; I'm just getting my thoughts down before any more time passes and I forget how the session went. I'll do a more full writeup if/when we finish the session.

(With reference to this post here.)

I definitely agree that the process of making tests could use a cheat sheet, and that's something that will be present in future revisions. However, it's worth noting that it's probably impossible to boil it down to something that a player with a 5E-only background would find intuitive because of some pretty basic differences in what kind of games they are.

In brief, 5E (and Dungeons & Dragons in general) keeps its conflict resolution mechanics almost entirely GM-facing in order to make it easier to onboard new players. Those mechanics are structured in such a way that it's completely feasible for the GM to figure out the target numbers, the applicable modifiers, the range of plausible outcomes, and the interpretation of the results with no player input whatsoever, with the player's sole responsibility being to roll a die with the correct number of sides (and if push comes to shove, the GM can do that part, too).

Eat God, conversely, is designed from the ground up to readily support GMless play (the specific rules for that will be in a forthcoming revision), which means that its conflict resolution mechanics can't be purely GM-facing. It puts a lot more responsibility on the player in terms of figuring out what the hell is going on, both narratively and mechanically, because its design goals mean it has to.

That said, it might help to frame it for a 5E player like this:

Making a test in Eat God is like playing blackjack: rather than rolling as high as possible, you want to roll as high as possible without going bust; "going bust" means all of your dice came up higher than your relevant Facet.

Everybody gets one die to start. If you can use any of your Traits to help with whatever you're trying to do, you get advantage on the test and roll an extra die. Unlike 5E, advantage stacks, to a maximum of five dice.

Instead of having a separate "damage roll", Eat God gets "did I hit or miss?" and "how much damage did I do?" from a single roll. A test's "damage" is the face value of the highest die that didn't go bust; the rules refer to this "damage" as a capital-R "Result".

You can get bonuses or penalties to a test's "damage" based on how effective the GM thinks your approach is. The GM will generally tell you about these modifiers before rolling. A penalty can't turn a success into a failure, no matter your Result; just like in 5E, a successful hit always inflicts at least one "damage".

Instead of critical hits, Eat God has critical fuckups. These have a range of dice roll values that trigger them, just like conventional crits; for example, you might score a critical fuckup on a roll of 11+, just like a champion archetype fighter in 5E gets a critical hit on a roll of 19+. This range can vary depending on how goofy the GM thinks your approach is.

Critical fuckups are assessed on a per die basis, so if you're rolling multiple dice, it's possible to generate multiple critical fuckups on the same roll. Yes, this also means that rolling multiple dice makes you more likely to succeed and more likely to fuck up, and creates the possibility of doing both on the same test. This is intentional.

When you roll a critical fuckup, the GM doesn't have to make something bad happen to you right away. They can do that, or they can take the fuckup and bank it toward a countdown to a really big fuckup that affects the whole adventure. You can see this countdown, but the GM is not obligated to tell you what will happen when it hits zero.

[usafphantom2]

SR-71 “Ichi-Ban” – Buried in the Deepest Ocean on Earth

Throughout the 60s, Lockheed Skunk Works were building some incredible aircraft – the A-12 Oxcart and SR-71 were and still are some of the fastest vehicles ever made. These technical achievements were incredible. Before home computing and the internet, there were aircraft capable of more than 2,000 mph.

But, being on the bleeding edge of technology comes with risks. Either through lack of understanding or difficulty in manufacturing parts to tight enough tolerances, accidents can and will happen. This was to be the unfortunate fate of the SR-71 known as “Ichi-Ban”.

The Lockheed SR-71, known as the ‘Habu’.

SR-71 #61-17974 was based at Kadena AFB, Okinawa, Japan and made quite the scene for the locals who lived close by.

Read More: Lockheed SR-71 Blackbird – The Plane Designed to Leak

The unusual aircraft drew a lot of attention thanks to the unusual shape and jet black paintwork. The SR-71 became known as the ‘Habu’ locally, thanks to its resemblance to the Habu Pit Viper.

The Habu Viper.

The shape of the Habu Viper’s head has a strong resemblance to the SR-71.

As these aircraft were spyplanes, pilots did not become aces in the traditional sense, but with every mission flown a Habu was painted onto the side of the Blackbird. Once amassing 5 missions complete the crew would be considered an ace.

#61-17974 had the most operational missions complete and a large Habu was painted on the tail of the aircraft as a mark of respect. The snake was wrapped around a red ‘1’ and in the local language, ‘number one’ translated to ‘Ichi-Ban’.

The SR-71 known as "Ichi-Ban".

In April of 1989, just like many missions flown before, Pilot Lt. Col Dan House took Ichi-Ban into the skies above Kadena and everything seemed normal.

Nothing was reported by House or by his RSO Blair Bozek that would indicate any issue.

That was until House pushed the throttles on the pair of J-58 engines to maximum power. As Ichi-Ban hit Mach 3.0 the bearing in the left-hand compressor failed and caused the immediate destruction of the engine whilst travelling at over 2,000 mph.

The Wreckage of SR-71 "Ichi-Ban".

The damage from hitting the water was immense.

As the J-58 exploded, shrapnel was sent flying damaging the SR-71 and most critically severing hydraulic lines. Even the best and most experienced pilots ever would not be able to save such a badly damaged plane.

House did not give up, incredibly aware that the death of his RSO and himself was imminent, he managed to steer the Blackbird into a shallow descent and decelerate as quickly as possible.

Ejecting from aircraft is not a pleasant experience for anyone involved and doing it at Mach 3 would have been suicide.

The US could not let the wreckage fall into the hands of the Chinese government.

It was extremely important to recover the wreckage as the technology was highly classified.

However, extreme skill combined with a lot of luck meant that the wounded aircraft found itself below 10,000 at low enough speed for both House and Bozek to safely eject. They landed in the sea where some local fishermen came to their rescue.

Ichi-Ban continued going down and eventually smashed into the waters of the South China Sea.

Despite the age of the SR-71, the US could not let the wreckage be recovered by the Chinese. It was too technically advanced. It was not long before the wreckage had been salvaged and transported back to the Kadena Air Force base.

The tail of Ichi-Ban.

There were several options of what they could do with the wreckage of Ichi-Ban: scrap the aircraft and sell the metal to the highest bidder in Okinawa, send it back to the US for disposal, or bury it.

Typically the fastest and least expensive option was chosen.

Read More: The F-22 Raptor – The Fighter of the Future

But, the story does not end there – the Pacific Air Force would not permit burial of the aircraft at Kadena because facilities were constantly under construction for new tenants. Meaning that it may be a possibility that it would need to be dug up and moved somewhere else.

The SR-71 was an important aircraft to many.

Crews were very fond of the SR-71. Fitting that a full military honours burial was done to see her off.

Burial at sea seemed the most fitting option but required help from the US Navy. After all of the bureaucracy was settled the SR-71 #61-17974 was transferred to a waiting vessel.

Her remains were taken out to sea on Christmas Eve 1989 and buried with full military honours. Pushed off the side of the vessel, Ichi-Ban sank 25,597 feet into the ocean where she lies at the bottom of the Mariana Trench.

Are there any SR-71 still flying?

Though the SR-71 still holds the record for the highest altitude in horizontal flight, it’s no longer in use. In fact, Clarence “Kelly” Johnson designed this aircraft for Lockheed with the latest technology of the time. The plane’s pilots even required special suits to survive the extreme conditions the planes created. However, the US retired the planes in 1989 for political reasons and would only have brief reinstatement during the 1990s, after which the US permanently retired them.

@Stealthy360 via X

[klysanderelias]

It's always funny to me when a big-name youtuber argues vociferously that souls-like games DO have a difficulty setting, it's Playing The Game Right (leveling, build, using summons, etc), and then later on in the same video will have a fifteen minute long section complaining about how certain boss fights completely invalidate certain builds or require you to drastically alter your style of play, and i'm like... I thought you were in FAVOR of this.

And of course they're not, they just don't understand what a difficulty setting IS anymore, and that's completely fair because I think that most DEVELOPERS don't either, but it means that the criticism they make is always couched in a fundamental misunderstanding of the thing they're trying to criticise (and also usually a complete misunderstanding of where the criticism comes from).

And I want to be clear, I've beaten basically every single Dark Souls game, I beat bloodborne, I played shitloads of elden ring and the reason I didn't beat it was because I got bored, and I've done speedruns and soul level 1 runs of dark souls 3. I'm pretty much the dark souls power player that everyone expects would argue AGAINST having difficulty options.

But.

I've been playing thousands of hours of battletech, and the battletech difficulty screen has been the singlehandedly biggest argument I've had change my mind.

In the game, Battletech modifies difficulty per mission by changing the total health of enemies, changing their skills and experience levels, the usual fare of difficulty curves (although damage is never affected, thank god). But having all these granular options can dramatically change the way the game is played without simply affecting health values or hit percentages.

Toggling mech destruction and lethality means that losing a mech in a mission or having a pilot be knocked unconscious removes them permanently. They're killed, destroyed, you need to go get a new one. That's a HUGE change from the base difficulty where having a mech be completely destroyed in combat just removes the weapon components and costs a ton to repair. Likewise, changing the number of parts required to buy or salvage in order to complete a mech DRAMATICALLY changes the game - the maximum amount of parts you can get from a single mech is 3, and usually you only get 1. Needing 3 parts means that if you're lucky, you could see a brand new mech in a mission, blow its head off, and get one for free. Moving that scale up both means that rare or expensive mechs take much much longer to earn, but also that replacing mechs takes much longer (meaning that losses are even more painful).

Like, every single one of these options can dramatically affect how you play the game or change the feel of it to something much more interesting to you as a player - do you want to play a rogue-like game where you have to save and scrounge to get new mechs, and each mech and pilot is a precious resource you have to protect? or do you want to powerscale fast and constantly get new mechs and rare weapons?

And like, having extremely granular options for gameplay isn't for everyone, but then again, there are the owlcat pathfinder CRPGs that do this same thing, but have a base 'easy-normal-hard' sort of slider that automatically selects certain options, and you can adjust them if you want. If you're not interested in going through each slider you can just say 'I'd like normal please' and the game automatically makes all the selections, but you can also stop and say 'hey actually let me turn on permadeath too' and you can do that.

And I think that when people think about difficulty, they think about the most basic 'health and damage adjustments' sliders, and not ANYTHING else that actually have much more of an impact. I will hit this point to my grave that dark souls would massively benefit from difficulty options like turning off instakill effects (like curse or petrification) or removing the harsh penalty of dying when you can't get back to your bloodstain because a) that's often what drive new players off the most, and b) it doesn't fuckin' matter anyway, all you're losing is souls, the only thing it does is make you have to go grind more to make up for it.

And of course, there are always EXTRA challenge runs people come up with - nuzlocke runs of pokemon, soul level 1 runs of dark souls, hell, when I do Battletech I often add additional challenges like 'no intentional destruction of civilian buildings' or 'each mech must be assigned to a pilot and if one of them is sidelined, so is the other'

But challenge runs aren't difficulty settings, and more importantly there's no way to unchallenge run a game. You can decide to make the game harder for yourself, but you can't make the game EASIER. And when people say that you can, they're lying to you. Like yeah, there builds that are very strong in dark souls, and leveling optimally will make the game easier, but if you don't know what optimal leveling looks like, it's pointless. If you have a deep and thorough understanding of the game, and you check the messageboards, and delve through the wiki, and use a couple of exploits, the game will be easy! And if it's still too hard for you after that? Well, go fuck yourself, you just spent hours of your life doing research only to give up on the game anyway.

And the truth is, most people who argue that dark souls shouldn't have a difficulty slider are doing it out of bad faith, because they have a certain amount of ego riding on 'being good at hard game' as a character trait, and making these games more accessible frightens them because what if being good at dark souls isn't actually getting them into heaven

but also because they're somehow afraid that having extra difficulty options in the game will tempt them into choosing them? And then they won't get the 'true experience'?

Gamers are some of the most fragile people in existence that the mere option of reducing difficulty sends them into hysterics.

[danse--macabre]

jaheira/astarion headcanons:

he constantly flirts (which is par for the course for astarion), as early as the end of Act 2, but it is just so ineffective. so ineffective. your lies mean nothing pretty boy!

jaheira enjoys rebuffing this and coming up with creative ways to tell him his lines do nothing, lol.

he also constantly winds her up as well. will joke about her being a bare-foot hippie for simply being a druid. has called her 'the great jaheira' and 'the high harper' before ('and what does the high harper think?'), just to annoy. attention-seeking behaviour!

this is admittedly something jaheira will also do. loves to rib him for complaining about the damp, the wet, the cold, the mud, nature in general, walking too much, carrying too much, etc. will call him a soft little baby and an aged old man at the same time.

they are a bickering couple

the fact that astarion couldn't give a shit about nature while jaheira is literally a druid is a running joke and theme when it comes to dunking on each other tbh.

another related running theme: when they finally do hit it off, it's a running joke they never actually have sex in a bed. at camp, in a field, in the dirt, on the floor or against the wall in an abandoned building - but almost never in a bed. (real reason: I did not realise you could rent the elfsong out, sorry. but also astarion does complain about this of course.)

astarion LOVES to try and get jaheira to talk shit. she presents herself as somewhat above it, but jaheira is probably partial some gossip and I think a habit that does begin in the early stages is they will share a bottle of wine and they will start being old judgy queens together

'you're becoming a bad influence,' she'll say, wrinkling her nose, hitting him lightly on the shoulder. 'Was I not already?' She rolls her eyes, walks away. 'All the best things are, darling!' he'll call out, with a cackle, as she walks away.

when jaheira actually turns and gives astarion a genuine and sincere compliment... critical hit, maximum damage, hits the fucking bullseye.

other ways of critically hitting: any gentle caress to his face after a genuine compliment.

lots of genuine arguments as well about adventuring choices. I think one thing that does draw me is that yes, astarion does have people pleasing tendencies but he does tend to be quite vocal about his opinion. I'm fairly sure he and jaheira will clash often BEFORE he becomes super drawn into any kind of romance arc & I think in some ways that's fairly good for him.

astarion thinks the fact that she can turn into a panther and just tear into something is the hottest thing and quite frankly I think he was interested as soon as he saw her do this in the moonrise towers fight.

on jaheira's end... quite frankly if he wasn't a vampire and if they didn't have a job to do she would have just bedded him sooner, he's easy on the eyes and good fun, so why not? It does hit her in the middle of their flirting period that in another universe she wouldn't have hesitated.

when they do hook up jaheira tries to keep it a secret / on the down-low. this lasts about five days LOL.

it's not actually astarion's fault - he can be discreet and respects her wishes - it's just this camp is full of gossip mongers and lae'zel has bat ears. within five days everyone Knows.

at least one person (probably wyll, since he's fairly insightful) thought they'd been hooking up since they hit rivington.

jaheira doesn't realise astarion is slightly older than her until she tries calling him cub.

he laughs her off as a flatterer. she's confused, he tells her to just go on and guess his age. she thinks he's 120 years old.

'Add another century to that darling and you're almost there'. Cue jaheira being slightly stunned and astarion absolutely revelling in it.

I think she will still sometimes refer to him / treat him as if he is younger and he to her as if she is older though. It becomes a running inside joke.

biting: very much off the table when they do finally hook up.

(this does not stop astarion brushing his fangs against her skin to tease her when they hook up. 'Careful. No biting.' 'Oh, I wouldn't dare').

the fact that he is a vampire actually is one of jaheira's concerns and a small point of contention. jaheira has an interesting banter where she explains about a time she killed a spawn quite dramatically - while she's not a 'kill on sight' reckless moralist, she's got no great love for the creatures, and as much as she does come to enjoy the banter and the company, it's tinged with wariness in the first half of Act 3, because Jaheira is slow to trust and quick to suspect

the first bite happens well after cazador is dealt with. honestly I can see it happening on the eve of the final battle. because of jaheira's initial wariness, it becomes a real moment of intimacy and trust. she lets him drink from the arm, rather than the neck, just to maintain more control, has healing and resurrection scrolls prepared (she does not tell him this because she doesn't want to freak him out), etc. But he's able to stop when she asks. After it's over there is a very warm moment, after astarion gives her his sincere, genuine thanks, of her cradling his face and calling him a messy eater (lol)

speaking of Cazador, that's... honestly, it's a Lot given they're having a 'light & breezy' romance and they're still in the casual dalliance stages, have only just started hooking up if at all. jaheira ends up learning about some of the horrific trauma through seeing rather than Astarion telling and I think it'd be a bit mortifying if he weren't so singularly focussed on the goal.

I think Jaheira offers to share a bottle of wine with him the night after. I think he takes up her offer and it's a mix of talking about what happened in his own words (Astarion is actually fairly direct when it comes to talking about traumatic incidents) and also talking about something completely different when it gets too much.

Things definitely do ramp up in the final stretch / final few days before the Battle with the Elder Brain. Lots of post-battle shenanigans with some honest and quite raw moments? It's one of the most intense points of their fling (which increasingly feels NOT like a fling).

But I think Jaheira instinctively draws back after the final battle and tries to walk back some of the intensity and intimacy that developed due to 'it might be our last chance', due to some ingrained fears of intimacy and loss + trying to rationalise it as an impulsive, heat-of-the-moment thing + an expectation that Astarion would just move on anyway (false).

Astarion goes off to become a hero in the spawn ending. He does often return to the gate and they always arrange to meet for a drink. There's a lot of catching up, chatting shit, but also Jaheira increasingly turns to him for advice and to get his perspective on an issue. I think she trusts his viewpoint and when she can get in her head about not being able to save everything or everyone, or a hard choice she has to make, he'll often just go, somewhat bluntly, 'well you did the important thing, didn't you?' and put things in perspective. You killed the bad guy, you stopped the plot, you saved that woman's life. Trust yourself more. (He'll attempt to walk this back with a joke about how he's still a libertine scoundrel; Jaheira will laugh him off)

'You work too hard' is a common complaint of Astarion's. He's right. Jaheira always appreciates hearing it.

I think it's here we might also get touches of Astarion's 'I want to be close without having sex' we see in Act 2. I think there's at least on occasion where they initiate sex, he backs out, she's supportive and they end up cuddling.

Something Jaheira discovers way too late, following the events of the game: he's damned good at giving a massage. 'You didn't think to tell me this while we were sleeping in the dirt?' (Response is something like: 'Oh Jaheira, you wish you'd used me more for my body? My my.')

As said before, the 'I actually have sincere feelings for you' confession comes unexpectedly during the epilogue party, astarion impulsively ends up telling her. Jaheira... has to suddenly deal with the distance she put up like a wall coming crashing down because Astarion is impulsive and bad at holding things in

I think in an interesting mirror to Astarion's request to go slow with sex, Jaheira says she'll need to go slow with intimacy and romance. It's been a while (more than long enough), but she's not really had anything serious since her husband died.

I think as a compromise they maintain long distance for a bit, Astarion continues to adventure, but he'll visit with increasing frequency and for increasingly long periods. Jaheira will, after a while, insist he stay with her and not just in a tavern, and this gradually morphs into him spending months at a time in Baldur's Gate before a lead will pull him in another direction.

Which I think is good for them both. I think Astarion does well from a chance to just develop an identity for himself without being 'a partner' and grow on his own through adventuring. I think it also helps things develop at a pace Jaheira's comfortable with and means Jaheira can set some very concrete boundaries.

As things become serious and Astarion just drops the mask, they're very much 'fondly rib each other in public whenever one of them is even a displays affection, but deeply soft and sweet with each other in private'

Takes them a long while to say anything like 'I love you'.

Personally I can see them doing it after the other gets injured in battle. Berating them for being reckless and then telling them they love them, they're terrified, etc. Quite frankly I can see this happening to them both, but given Jaheira has lost a love before... more meaningful from her mouth.

Astarion is nothing like Khalid and Jaheira is very thankful for this. He's a different thing entirely, but it's not any kind of lesser love either.

[monstersdownthepath]

Monster Spotlight: Mngwa

CR 7

Chaotic Evil Large Magical Beast

Bestiary 5, pg. 173

These terrifying man-eaters are a far cry from their original form found in folklore and fairytale, existing only to kill, torment, and punish a particular person, group, or community which has despoiled or disrespected the spirits of the primeval jungles of Golarion. They are hatred embodied, but it's not an indiscriminate hate. No, each Mngwa is born with a Focus of Hate, a creature or group of creatures (up to and including whole cities in some cases) marked for death by the spirits which crafted the shadowy cat, and its these creatures that the Mngwa focuses its wrath upon, ignoring all else unless its murderous spree is interrupted. The Mngwa always knows the exact distance and direction of the closest Focus of Hate, unerringly tracking them so long as they're not shielded by any effect which could block scrying... but a Mngwa is not a stupid, mindless beast. If its focus is shielded magically, then it will track them mundanely, following their scent and the trails they leave behind, stalking them from the shadows when they believe themselves protected, with even the prepared and paranoid often ill-equipped to spot the prowling beasts until its fangs are tearing through their throats.

When I say that Mngwa are nearly impossible to detect in the darkness, I say it completely without exaggeration. Their darkened pelts give them a +23 to Stealth checks when in forest or jungle terrain, and their Jungle Stealth allows them to utilize their full 40ft speed without compromising that intimidating number. They have a constant Feather Step effect allowing them to ignore difficult terrain entirely, and can use both Chameleon Stride and Pass Without Trace at will, the former bringing their Stealth to +27 and making them nearly invisible unless you're standing right next to them, the latter allowing them to evade any attempt to track them without magic. Not that tracking them would do much good, because these beasts are Creatures of the Night and literally stop existing when the sun rises (and are rendered temporarily powerless by Daylight and similar), reappearing near the site of their creation the next night with the benefits of a 15th-level Heal spell nursing whatever wounds they sustained and allowing them to continue their reign of terror.

But doling those wounds out in the first place is difficult, as one must survive the surprise round. As one may expect from a big cat, a Mngwa that has spotted its prey prefers to get the jump on them, which it almost always will, sometimes even allowing its prey to fall asleep first just so it drag away and dispatch the weaker and more vulnerable first like the horror movie monster it is. Once the redshirts are gone and people start staying awake every night, Mngwa charge in with Pounce, allowing them to make their Full-Attack which, predictably, is a Claw-Claw-Bite. The bite deals 2d6+7 damage, while each claw deals 1d6+7 and inflicts 1d6 bleed damage... and all three attacks can Grab onto whatever they hit, and any creature that remains grappled during the Mngwa's next turn can be freely Raked by two additional 1d6+7 + 1d6 bleed claw attacks, letting the beasts swiftly shred anything they get their mouths on. Most creatures targeted by the Pounce rarely survive failing their first Escape Artist check to break its grapple, because that's 6d6+42 damage PLUS 1d6+4 bleed, typically enough to dispatch any creature hovering around 5 Hit Dice even without critical hits.

"1d6+4?" Correct! The Murderous Claws of the Mngwa adds a flat +1 bleed damage to a bleeding target every time they hit, to a maximum of 1d6+7, so even escaping their grapple won't stop the pain, AND it allows the shadow cats to track victims much more easily if they can't staunch the flow. The only mercy offered by the Mngwa's melee is the fact it's got only 5ft of reach, rather than the 10 of a typical Large monster (it still has 10ft of space, though!), so it can only Full-Attack creatures it's standing right next to. Disengaging it repeatedly to force it to step back into melee makes its damage more manageable... provided, of course, you avoided its three grapple attempts when it first Pounced.

Unlike most big cats. Mngwa aren't glass cannons. They have 20 AC and are shielded behind DR 10/Magic, which may as well make them invincible if they're stalking a bunch of level 4 or 5 idiots who have no idea what they've done. Even managing to bypass their DR and cut them down to size does nothing but delay the horror, because so long as the Focus of Hate exists the Mngwa cannot permanently die, returning to life 1d4+1 days later once the sun sets. There are only two ways to prevent the creature's nightly hunts: every single Focus of Hate must die, or the spirits which created the creature in the first place must be appeased somehow.

In the case of the former, depending on what the crime was and how many creatures the Mngwa is focused on, the players may just help the jungle cats in their quest. Of course, ANYONE can be stuck with the jungle's curse, from a dickish thieving invader, to a group of otherwise innocent locals who made a terrible mistake, to the player characters themselves, so this is often not an option. Appeasing the spirits is usually the way to go, so a big part of the Mngwa Mystery is figuring out why it's here, which typically involves finding out precisely who among a crowd it's targeting and getting some answers out of them. Even in a higher-level campaign when the Mngwa isn't a direct threat to the PCs, its relentless inevitability make them a danger to NPCs the party may be tasked with trying to protect.

One way or another, the players have to figure out who it's trying to kill, why, and how to undo whatever they did to enrage the jungle. Mngwa cannot communicate their desires, so some intense detective work is needed! ... Just be careful not to make it TOO intense, or else you may end up with a situation like the most chilling one in it's lore: some unfortunate bloodlines have been haunted by these creatures for generations, the cats passed down from parent to child like a living curse as memories of why the thing is hunting them are gradually lost to time, leaving entire families without the knowledge of why the night itself grows claw and fang to hunt them.

You can read more about them here.

[raeynbowboi]

What Is the Best Party for a Necromancer

With enough time and preparation, a Necromancy Wizard can create a small army of powerful undead, but I got to wondering: what party formation does the best job at supporting the Necromancer's undead horde to reach its maximum potential? So, that's what I'm seeking to do. To create a party of 4-5 characters that best empowers and emboldens the Necromancer's army.

WIZARD SCHOOL OF NECROMANCY

The star and most likely the official team leader of the party, the Necromancy Wizard is the focal point of this team composition. With their 6th level feature: Undead Thralls, the Necromancy Wizard adds their Wizard level (6-20) to each undead's hit points, and their proficiency bonus (3-6) to each undead's weapon attack damage. This means that the Necromancy Wizard makes the strongest possible undead thralls in the game. At 14th level, the Necromancer can place any undead under their control with Command Undead. This gives the Wizard the ability to gain a free Wight, a high CR undead like a Nightwalker, or even notable villains like Acerack, Vecna, Strahd Von Zarovich, or Sylas Briarwood. Intelligent Undead can make saving throws, but a simple Feeblemind can take care of that pesky detail.

PALADIN OATHBREAKER

The Oathbreaker Paladin was chosen because of their 7th level feature: Aura of Hate. Any undead within 10 feet of the Paladin adds the Paladin's Charisma modifier (1-5) to all weapon attack damage. At 15th level, that Aura expands to 30 feet. Not only can this stack with the Necromancy Wizard's Undead Thralls feature, making undead near the paladin stronger, but the Paladin does not need to be the one who created the undead. So the Oathbreaker can lead the undead into battle on the front lines, while the Wizard stands further back sniping enemies with cantrips and low level spells. Unfortunately, only one Aura of Hate can effect a single undead, but in theory, one Necromancy Wizard with 3-4 spaced out oathbreakers each with a 10 or 30 ft aura can effectively organize your undead army into tight formation battalions. But there are other good allies to have in the game.

CLERIC GRAVE DOMAIN

We want the Grave Cleric for many reasons. Firstly, they get a lot of necromancy spells, so while their horde won't be as strong as the Wizard's they too can create a horde of undead, making an even bigger army. Their Channel Divinity: Path to the Grave makes it so that an enemy is vulnerable to the damage of the next attack that hits them, which sets up nicely for the Oathbreaker to lay down a devastating smite, or the Necromancy Wizard to ensure a fresh thrall from their Finger of Death. Sentinel at Death's Door can be used to nullify critical hits, which can keep not only party members, but even undead minions from being obliterated. The wizard's Wight that controls 12 zombies is probably an asset you don't want to risk losing, so having a way to save that valuable asset is useful. And, should the Necromancer forget to reassert control over their horde in time, the Cleric's Destroy Undead feature can help the party mow through the bodies.

DRUID CIRCLE OF THE SHEPHERD

I know, I know. A Shepherd Druid and a Necromancy Wizard in one party is a DM's nightmare, but there's a reason we're choosing this subclass. It's not the animal summoning, it's the Totem Spirit. See, the Totem Spirit radiates an aura in a 30 ft radius. And that aura bolsters as many creatures as you want within that aura. Meaning that not only can the shepherd provide aerial support with swarms of ravens and buzzards, but that aura also applies to the Wizard's undead horde. The Bear totem grants the undead Temporary Hit Points, and the Unicorn Spirit makes it so that when the Druid heals anyone outside the aura, they're also healing every creature inside the aura. While they can't target undead creatures with their healing spells, the aura's healing factor does not exclude undead, allowing the Druid to heal a party member, and in doing so, heal every undead within 30 feet of the totem spirit. The fact that the Druid can summon a stronger horde of animals is just a nice little cherry on top. There's also nothing saying you can't reflavor your animal army as being undead animal corpses with DM approval to fit in with the necromantic themes.

WARLOCK FATHOMLESS PATRON

This is the least useful of the five, but it does have its uses, so while it is the most expendable of the options, there are reasons to use it if you have a five man party. At 6th level, the Fathomless Warlock gains the ability Guardian Coil. Their summoned tentacle can defend a single ally creature, reducing damage the creature takes by 1d8, or 2d8 at level 10. At 14th level, Fathomless Plunge can be used to teleport the Warlock and up to five other creatures to any source of water within 1 mile. The Fathomless Warlock, The Shepherd Druid, and the Grave Cleric can cast Create or Destroy Water, and a puddle is a source of water, letting the warlock teleport fresh undead to the front lines, or move injured undead to the backlines. If the Druid has their Unicorn Totem, this can be a useful way to teleport party members or important undead like Wights to the Totem's aura, and giving the party ways to move important creatures. The teleported creatures also do not need to be near the Warlock, they simply need to be able to see them within 30 feet, allowing the warlock to give the undead horde greater mobility. Make your patron Davy Jones, The Captain of the Flying Dutchman, or the Eldritch Lord of Shipwrecks to keep on brand with the themes of undeath and necromancy within the party, tying yourself to those lost to watery graves.

SPELLS AND SYNERGY

The core spells of Animate Dead, Create Undead, Danse Macabre, and Finger of Death can be used to create undead thralls. Wizards get all four spells, while the Cleric only gets Animate Dead and Create Undead. Oathbreakers also get Animate Dead, but only get up to 5th level spell slots. Warlocks can learn Animate Dead through an Eldritch Invocation, but only once per long rest, and only at 3rd level. Warlocks also learn Danse Macabre and Finger of Death. They also get Create Undead, but can only cast it at 6th level.

Both the Warlock and the Wizard get access to Negative Energy Flood, which can be used to heal an undead, or to damage a living target. Like Finger of Death, a creature killed by Negative Energy Flood rises as a zombie.

Aura of Vitality is a spell for Clerics, Druids, and Paladins that creates a healing aura within 30 ft of the caster. The spell's text does not exclude undead from benefitting from this aura, however only one creature can be healed with a bonus action. While this isn't super useful given it only heals one creature, the Druid using this spell to trigger their Unicorn Totem every turn with a bonus action does make this more useful, as you're able to heal the undead army multiple turns in a row while only using one spell slot. And unlike Healing Spirit, the initial healing can also be applied to an undead. The only caveat is that the healing needs to go a creature outside of the unicorn totem's aura in order to trigger the healing. Luckily, the Totem does not have to be within any given distance of the Druid, which gives the Druid more flexibility in their positioning.

Every creature that can be created with Animate Dead and Create Undead (Skeletons, Zombies, Ghouls, Ghasts, Wights, and Mummies) are immune to Poison damage. As such, AoE spells that deal Poison damage, such as Cloudkill can be dropped on top of your undead horde without harming them, but harming any living enemy near them. Your undead can also attempt to grapple foes, holding them in the Cloudkill, preventing them from leaving as they suffocate. The Necromancy Wizard is the only member of the party that can learn Cloudkill.

Both the Grave Cleric and the Druid can learn Antilife Shell, which pushes living creatures away from the caster, while allowing undead creatures to move through the shell harmlessly. This can be a great way to keep Strength-based enemies at a distance. Unfortunately the shell is not a proper force field, as weapon and spell attacks can still pass through, so this is not a way to protect the Wizard. It only keeps melee-ranged threats at bay.

BALDUR'S GATE III

While we can't recreate this team set-up perfectly in Baldur's Gate III, we can still do a weaker version with four party members: TAV as a Necromancy Wizard, Astarion or Karlach as an Oathbreaker, Shadowheart as really any Cleric subclass, and Wyll as a Fiend Warlock with a Pact of the Tome. The Tome will allow Wyll to cast Animate Dead and Create Undead, Tav and Shadowheart will also be able to create undead, and Astarion or Karlach will be able to use their aura of hate to strengthen those undead thralls. It's not as good as what we built above, but short of mods, it's the best we can do. It doesn't really matter who's what, this is just an example of a party composition. Astarion could just as easily be the necromancer and TAV the Oathbreaker, you could have Gale as the Necromancer, or Lae'zel as the Oathbreaker. What really matters are the classes. The Cleric can still clear any undead that turn on the party, the paladin still bolsters the already stronger undead, and every member of the party is pretty much able to make equally strong undead, the Wizards undead are just juiced up to the max.

[thirdtofifth]

Plague Spewer Huge undead, neutral evil Armor Class 15 (natural armor) Hit Points 189 (18d12 + 72) Speed 40 ft. Saving Throws Con +8, Wis +5 Damage Immunities poison Damage Resistances necrotic Condition Immunities poisoned, paralyzed, exhaustion Senses darkvision 60 ft. passive Perception 11 Languages understands the languages it knew in life but can’t speak Challenge 10 (5900 XP) Undead Fortitude. If damage reduces the plague spewer to 0 hit points, it must make a Constitution saving throw with a DC of 5 + the damage taken, unless the damage is radiant or from a critical hit. On a success, the plague spewer drops to 1 hit point instead. Actions Multiattack. The plague spewer uses Vomit Rat Swarm if it is able to. It then makes two slam attacks. Slam. Melee Weapon Attack: +11 to hit, reach 5 ft., one target. Hit: 16 (2d8+7) bludgeoning damage plus 13 (3d8) necrotic damage. If the target is a creature, it must succeed on a DC 15 Constitution saving throw against disease or become poisoned until the disease is cured. Every 24 hours that elapse, the target must repeat the saving throw, reducing its hit point maximum by 5 (1d10) on a failure. The disease is cured on a success. The target dies if the disease reduces its hit point maximum to 0. This reduction to the target’s hit point maximum lasts until the disease is cured. Vomit Rat Swarm (4/Day). The plague spewer vomits a swarm of rats, which appears in an unoccupied space within 10 feet of it. The rat swarm acts on its own initiative count. On their turn, each rat swarm attacks the creature nearest to it other than the plague spewer.

The origin of these horrifying creatures is unknown. Perhaps created by an ancient necromancer or plague god in some forgotten age past. They lurk in catacombs or about the countryside, spreading rot and disease wherever they go. Plague spewers stand around 22 feet tall and weigh 10 tons.

Originally from the Monster Manual III.

[cloaksandcapes]

Can anyone guess what the inspiration or Twitch Prompt that led to the creation of this blessing was?

Blessing of the One Fist

Blessing, permanent boon, rare

“When this blessing is placed upon a mortal, a series of tattoos appear on the back of the palms. These can manifest in different designs depending on the person, but as the power is used each day the tattoos fade and reappear during the next dawn.” When you make an unarmed attack you can choose to do so at advantage. This attack can be a critical hit on a roll of 19 or 20 on the d20. If the attack hits you deal maximum damage. You can use this property a number of times equal to your proficiency bonus, regaining expended uses on a long rest.

Join us on Twitch every Mon\Wed\Fri to create new Homebrews and check out our Patreon for 517+ magic items, tokens, maps, and more.

[thydungeongal]

Imagine Rolemaster never existed ( I know the horror, but imagine). What would the consequences on the ttrpg scene be like? How does it change things?

Genuinely, it would actually have lots of strange ripple-on effects!

We never get Warhammer Fantasy Roleplay's funny critical hit tables, because those were heavily inspired by Rolemaster! In fact, the idea of critical hits that actually cause tangible injuries and not just extra damage might not be so popular.

But most impactfully, D&D 3e would look completely different. I've spoken previously about how Monte Cook was a Rolemaster guy before he went to work for TSR, and that clearly shows in the design of D&D 3e. If you ever wonder where D&D 3e got a lot of its weird tendencies for simulation, it's probably Rolemaster. Skills with different maximum ranks and rates of skill development according to class is very Rolemaster, as is the idea of armor check penalties, as is the idea of spell failure in armor, and so on.

So like besides being an objectively worse reality in many different ways, it would also have a clear effect on D&D 3e's design.

[the-griffons-saddlebag]

💍 𝗡𝗲𝘄 𝗶𝘁𝗲𝗺! Ramp-Up Ring
Ring, very rare ___ The swirls that cover this golden ring seem to slowly writhe. The ring can hold up to 3 charges, and it gains 1 charge at the start of each of your turns in combat. If you score a critical hit while in combat, it immediately gains 3 charges, up to its maximum. While the ring has 3 charges, you gain a +3 bonus to damage rolls from weapon attacks, and the minimum number you have to roll on a d20 to score a critical hit with a weapon attack is reduced by 1. The ring loses all charges when combat ends or when you remove the ring. If you're wearing the ring when it loses these charges, you then gain 4 temporary hit points for each charge lost. These temporary hit points end early if you remove the ring. ___ ✨ Patrons get huge perks! Access this and hundreds of other item cards, art files, and compendium entries when you support The Griffon's Saddlebag on Patreon for less than $10 a month!

[mistswalker]

Genuine question!! You'd mentioned hating scholar runes and I keep looking for alternatives because they're so UNGODLY expensive (because of how recommended they are for builds). What recommendation would you have for a DPS build instead of Scholars? (@ratasum)

I'm trying to get more into endgame content so I really would love the advice!!

Hey there! I'm happy to help how I can. Unfortunately this is going to be one of those questions that has a longer and more beneficial answer as well as a shorter, more direct but less beneficial answer, so I apologize in advance and thank you for bearing with me lol. The short and direct answer is that there are many instances in which runes of the Eagle, the Pack, Strength, and Rage can perform just as well as Scholar for a fraction of the cost. And even when they don't meet the exact output, whichever one works best for your build will get you pretty darn close. Berserker and Ogre are other very solid DPS runes for condi/power hybrids and power DPS respectively, but they've become frequently recommended alternatives to Scholar and their price has risen nearly as high now.

That said, my longer answer is that there is no general direct substitute rune that will work better for all DPS builds all the time, but this is also part of what is wrong with the way that Scholar runes are ubiquitously recommended on meta build sites.

Every rune in gw2 has a fairly unique set of circumstances in which they function best, just as the different classes and specializations all have different benefits and limitations, and the key to a well optimized (or min-maxed) build is to play into a particular niche of combat as hard as you possibly can. Scholar runes provide a total of 175 power and (now) 225 ferocity in pure stat points, but their main claim to fame is their 6th slot bonus: "Increase strike damage by 5% while your health is above 90%".

For clarity, "strike damage" in gw2 refers specifically to power-based damage or "direct damage". Damage that can critically hit. It does not apply to condition damage. Strike damage is also mitigated by the target's armor and Toughness stat. Condition damage, on the other hand, is not.

Scholar runes became so recommended because of two misguided notions:

That "strike damage" amplifiers increase all outgoing damage dealt by the player, making them the most important "stat" to stack. And,

That the best defense is always killing something dead faster than it can hit you, and that if you ever take damage the answer is always "git gud". (People treating defensive stats as "training wheels" for gaming is certainly not unique to scholar-runes enthusiasts, but nothing displays it quite as potently as tying your stats to how often you can keep your HP at 10k/11k.)

The truth of the matter is that there is no shortcut stat to a solid build in this particular game, and it takes balancing a number of stats and fine-tuning traits and skills to optimize your build.

As an example, I'm going to use this Power Deadeye build copied from a popular raid build website. Full details can be seen at the link, but notably it uses full Berserker armor, Scholar runes, and sigils of Force and Impact. These are the final stats on the Power Deadeye build as given:

This build is noted by its creators as not being beginner friendly, and having a rotation which requires "extreme precision and pristine conditions". I cite this only to better illustrate that this build is intended to be the most optimal thief build for endgame content.

The rotation's main loop is as follows, and the skill screenshots' numbers are based on the attributes of the equipment given assuming the player is above 90% health. It is stated that Malicious Backstab must be used from behind.

This loop provides a maximum total of 15,464 direct damage, plus an additional maximum 5,288 condition damage from one loop. Accounting for the build's perpetual fury bringing critical chance to 99.33%, and the fury-increased critical damage of 270.47%, this increases the total direct damage of this loop to 41,545, and leaves us with a grand total of 46,833 damage per loop. Now, how close can we get to those numbers on that exact rotation without Scholar runes?

For this comparison, I swapped the Scholar runes for Runes of Strength. Also, noting that the Impact sigils were only giving their base 3% strike damage bonus since this build has no stuns or knockbacks to make use of its secondary feature, I exchanged the Sigil of Impact for Sigils of Strength to synergize with the new rune choice. [Rebuild Link] The sigil choice plays on the build's near-100% crit chance by giving a stack of might on each critical hit, and with the runes' increased Might duration, this means you will passively accumulate and maintain 15 stacks of might while in combat. So what do the numbers look like now?

In this version of the loop, we get 16,565 direct damage, and 10,418 bonus condition damage. When we account for critical hit the same way we did before, this amounts to 42,035, giving us a grand total of 52,453 damage dealt per loop. So in this instance, replacing Scholar Runes and Impact Sigils with Strength Runes and Strength Sigils gave this build a DPS increase from the recommended build.

Now, this doesn't mean that every build could be improved by those same changes, but there are often very few changes that would need to be made to adjust a build for the removal of Scholar runes. If nothing else, I hope this helps to illustrate how there is no one-size-fits all answer to runes, let alone to builds as a whole, no matter how popular a specific item is with metagamers.

The key to all builds, DPS or not, is synergy between elements. When equipment, traits, and skills build on each other rather than acting alone, you're going to find way better performance, and usually, have way more fun with your build.

[theterribletenno]

Patriot the 1999 Warframe

Man I just realized how long it's been since I first started Patriot. Anyways. He's based on a combination of 90s military technology and the Metal Gear series.

Health: 650 (750 at rank 30) Shields: 150 (250 at rank 30) Armor: 750 Energy: 175 (225 at rank 30) Sprint Speed: 0.95

Passive: An expert in anti-personnel arms and munitions Patriot is uniquely experienced at countering enemy grenades. By running over enemy grenades Patriot will kick them at the nearest enemy, causing hostile grenades to become friendly and doubling their damage. Patriot can also kick friendly grenades, but they will not receive bonus damage.

Ability 1: Frag Out, 25 energy. Patriot pulls out a frag grenade and throws it at his corsshairs. Once thrown this grenade has physics including projectile arc, bounce, and momentum. The pin is pulled when the ability key is pressed, and the grenade is thrown when the key is released. By holding the ability key Patriot can cook the grenade. Pulling the pin is a 2-handed action, cooking is a 1-handed action. Frag grenades from Frag Out have a 4 second fuse. Fuse time scales with ability duration. If the fuse burns down while Patriot is still holding the grenade it will explode in his hand, knocking him down. When the grenade detonates it deals 1000 times 1+X (where X is equal to the enemy's level divided by 10) blast damage with a guaranteed blast status proc to all enemies within a 10 meter radius. Frag Out applies an additional blast status proc if T.W.I.N.K. Mesh Vest or Violent Cycle are active, or two if both are active.

Ability 2: T.W.I.N.K. Mesh Vest, 50 energy. The pinnacle of 90s personal defense, the T.W.I.N.K. or Titanium Weave Integrated Nano-fiber Kevlar Mesh Vest protects Patriot from harm with a reinforced armor layer. When T.W.I.N.K. Mesh Vest is activated Patriot receives Overguard with 1000 base health plus Patriot's total armor multiplied by 200%. Upon activation, T.W.I.N.K. Mesh Vest is invulnerable for 4 seconds, during which all incoming damage is absorbed and added to the Overguard. T.W.I.N.K. Mesh Vest cannot be reactivated until Patriot has less than 1000 overguard remaining.

Ability 3: Violent Cycle, toggled ability, drains 3-6 energy per second. Combining military tactics with Tenno power Patriot can engage in a deadly Violent Cycle during which every kill with one of his weapons empowers another. While active Patriot's kills with his primary weapon increase secondary weapon damage by 5%, kills with his secondary weapon increase melee weapon damage by 5%, and his melee kills increase primary weapon damage by 5%. All three scale up to a maximum of 500%. When Violent Cycle is initially activated it will drain 3 energy per second, increasing to 4 when any weapon's bonus has reached 100%, 5 when it reaches 250%, and reaching a maxmium drain of 6 energy per second when any weapon's bonus reaches 500%.

Ability 4: APEx PoInt, toggled ability, drains 3 energy per shot. Patriot is never surrounded, he just ends up in target-rich environments. With the activation of his APEx PoInt Patriot summons his Anti-Personnel Explosive Portable Interdictor, an exalted full-auto grenade launcher made to decimate enemy infantry. The APEx PoInt is categorized as a heavy weapon, accepts archgun mods, and has a full-auto trigger. Projectiles fired by this weapon have travel time and arc, and stick to enemies and surfaces upon contact. Very high per-shot damage at the cost of slow firing speed, high critical chance at the cost of low status chance. Direct hits deal a modest amount of pure impact damage with a guaranteed impact status proc. After landing or striking an enemy the grenades fired by APEx PoInt have a 4 second fuse before exploding. Explosion has a 6 meter radius and deals high values of impact, puncture, slash, and blast damage while also applying guaranteed impact and blast status procs. Pressing the alt-fire button immediately detonates all grenades currently stuck to enemies and surfaces but reduces their damage and explosion radius by 33%. This weapon has infinite ammo and never needs to be reloaded.

Subsumed ability: Frag Out.

Signature Weapons Twin Ninety Nines: A pair of iconic SMGs based on P90s made to hold large magazines of small-caliber munitions. The rounds fired by this weapon are specially designed for defeating infantry armor, and combined with their high rate of full-auto fire this oversized sidearm is as iconic in 1999 as it is in the far-flung future. Very large magazine & max ammo capacity offset by a slow reload. Very high rate of fire offset by low per-shot damage and middling accuracy. Deals equal values of impact and puncture but no slash. High critical chance and critical multiplier but low status chance. As Patriot's signature weapon the Twin Ninety Nines have increased accuracy while sliding and aim-gliding when he wields them. Twin Ninety Nines are crafted from two single Ninety Nines, a primary weapon with similar attributes to the twin version, but half the magazine size, max ammo, and fire rate but higher status chance and perfect accuracy as well as an alt-fire 4 round burstfire with superior damage which is absent from the twin version. The blueprints for Nintey Nine and Twin Ninety Nines are obtainable from enemies slain in 1999. Krava: Patriot's signature sparring weapon, a set of jagged metal guards for the hands and feet that enhance one's close-quarters lethality without the need to store, carry, or draw a conventional melee weapon. Deals equal values of impact, puncture, and slash. high status chance at the cost of low crit, and high per-hit damage but low attack speed. This weapon's stance polarity is Unairu, matching the Grim Fury sparring stance. This weapon grants a +0.05 bonus to sprint speed while equipped. Every time this weapon strikes an enemy with 5 stacks of either impact or puncture status affecting them there is a 50% chance the enemy will be knocked prone, rendering them vulnerable to melee ground finishers. As Patriot's signature melee weapon when he wields the Krava finisher attacks will terrify up to six enemies within ten meters, causing them to flee.

Closing Notes: One of my big goals for Patriot was to make him synergize with corrupted mods. In particular he is able to make great use of negative duration since all it will do to him is make his nades pop faster. He probably works with negative range too if you play smart. His passive will be able to affect certain other Warframe's grenade-style abilities like Vauban and Protea's.

Patriot will have his first augment released with him, available from Albrecht Entrati in 1999 and included in his premium platinum bundle. This augment - Backwards Violence - reverses the order of Violent Cycle, meaning instead of the cycle going primary, secondary, melee it will go melee, secondary, primary.