#Liberation Of Geoff

[vintagerpg]

After TSR died and was brought back to an undead half-life by Wizards of the Coast, there came a set of adventures that returned to classic 1e adventure sites. The first was 1998’s Return to the Tomb of Horrors box set (which I covered a while back). It was followed a trio of “silver anniversary” branded books and modules, first of which was Against the Giants: The Liberation of Geoff (1999). I know Geoff is a dutchy or whatever in Greyhawk, but I still have a hard time with the title because it sounds like it should be a novel about a guy named Geoff’s sexual awakening, possibly written by D. H. Lawrence.

Anyway, Geoff was invaded and subjugated by giants. You need to kick ‘em out. The first section of the book presents the original G-series modules, updated to 2E. That’s followed by a general sort of sourcebook on Geoff, which is further divided into a collection of adventure sites which are basically towns subjugated by various evil humanoids — orc town, ogre town, wererat town. The three main locales (each accompanied by a couple minor locations) form up three additions G-series modules, sorta. There’s G4: Mount Rungnirheim (more frost giants?), G5: Castle Thrasmotnir (more fire giants?) and G6: Cloud Islands of the Sakhut (cloud giants). It is odd to me that we got more frost and fire (god, just typing that out, I heard it sung by Cirith Ungol) when the stone giants and storm giants are out there, getting no love. The second batch of frost giants at least are prone to having multiple heads, which seems weird but also I like it.

And that’s…basically it. If you want more giants, you got more giants! The book mostly shrugs at the original G-series sub-plot involving the drow — if you finished G3, the plot’s been disrupted, the caves collapsed, the drow in retreat for however long it takes them to build up their nerve again. I’m OK with that!

Brom on the cover. Wayne Reynolds inside. It’s a good looking module.

[haaaaaaaaaaaave-you-met-ted]

Against the Giants: The Liberation of Geoff Cover Art by Gerald Brom

[religion-is-a-mental-illness]

By: Julian Adorney, Mark Johnson and Geoff Laughton

Published: Jun 29, 2024

American communities have been systematically hollowed out over the past 50 years. In Bowling Alone, Harvard political scientist Robert Putnam makes an exhaustively-researched case that confirms what most people who lived through this period already know: community life is on the decline. For most of the first two centuries of American history, people were enmeshed in a dense web of civic associations. We bowled together, attended church, participated in Rotary Club meetings, and volunteered for local political groups together. We played bridge with our neighbors and gathered for regular book clubs.

This vibrant communal engagement fostered a deep-seated trust among neighbors. In 1964, a remarkable 77 percent of Americans agreed with the statement, “most people can be trusted.” But starting in the 1970s, the fabric of American society began to unravel. The strong community bonds that once unified us began to fray, one by one; and our social capital (Putnam’s term for the “connections among individuals—social networks and the norms of reciprocity and trustworthiness that arise from them”) has decreased dramatically.

For instance, Putnam notes that while the total number of national nonprofit associations more than doubled from 1968 to 1997, the average membership per association plummeted—from roughly 10,000 in 1962 to around 1,000 in 1988. This translates to an almost 80 percent decrease in the number of Americans involved with national nonprofits over three decades. Additionally, Putnam cites time diaries showing that in 1965, Americans spent an average of 3.7 hours per month in non-religious organizational activities, such as Key clubs, Rotary clubs, bowling leagues, and others. By 1995, that number had fallen to 2.3 hours per month.

It’s not just organizational ties that are being frayed; we’re spending less time with friends too. As Putnam notes, “In the mid-to late 1970s, according to the DDB Needham Life Style archive, the average American entertained friends at home about fourteen to fifteen times a year. By the late 1990s that figure had fallen to eight times per year, a decline of 45 percent in barely two decades.” 

Since the publication of Bowling Alone in 2000, the societal disengagement Putnam described has gotten worse. The rise of social media and streaming services like Netflix are keeping us increasingly alone in our rooms, plugged in but disengaged from meaningful interaction with our fellow humans. A 2018 Adobe report focusing on the United Kingdom found that Millennials spend an average of 8.5 hours per day engaging with online content. For Generation Z, that number rises to an astounding 10.6 hours per day. When you account for hours spent sleeping, there is little time left for young people to engage in face-to-face community activities. Indeed, data show that they’re not engaging. In his book The Anxious Generation, social psychologist Jonathan Haidt notes that the percentage of middle- and high-school students who report meeting up with friends “almost every day” outside of school has fallen dramatically since the 1990s—a trend exacerbated by a global pandemic that confined everyone to their homes for two years.

[ Source: https://www.anxiousgeneration.com/research/notes-and-figures ]

What does the decline of community life since the 1970s have to do with rising illiberalism? As social animals, our sense of connection greatly influences our happiness. A study published in The Journal of Socio-Economics highlights just how essential community is for our well-being. This study surveyed 10,000 adults in England, examining the factors that make them happy or unhappy. Surprisingly, money didn’t seem to matter much. According to the authors, “Income only plays a small part in influencing our well-being.” Instead, a sense of community was paramount to participants’ happiness. In particular, having a single close friend was deemed as valuable as an additional $150,000 in yearly income.

In 2021, nearly half of Americans (49 percent) reported having three or fewer close friends, a significant drop from 27 percent in 1990. Maybe that’s why so many Americans are unhappy these days. According to Gallup’s 2024 World Happiness Report, America ranks 23rd in global happiness. An MSNBC report also notes that “Self-reported happiness in the U.S. has been on the decline for the past two decades.” Furthermore, 32.3 percent of American adults—and a stunning 49.9 percent of young people aged 18-24—suffer from anxiety or depression.

Could this widespread dissatisfaction with modern life be causing a shift away from liberalism? Data suggests it might be. A study published in the prestigious Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences titled “The rise and fall of rationality in language,” systematically analyzes the relative frequencies of emotional and rational words in massive databases of written language, from Google Books and the New York Times, from 1850 to 2019. Emotional words such as “angry,” “unexpected,” “embarrassed,” and “tortured” are contrasted with rational words like “indicate,” “area,” “program,” and “determine.” The study found that from 1850 to the 1980s, the relative proportion of emotional words consistently decreased, while rational words increased. However, starting in the 1980s, a reversal occurred; our discourse became more emotional and less rational. By 2019, the use of rationality-related words had declined to levels not seen in over a century.

What does this decline in rationality signify? The authors suggest that it might reflect a growing “disillusion with ‘the system.’” As they note, “rationality…helped build and defend the system” in which we all live. Thus, a move away from rationality might reflect our collective anger at the liberal social order that we think is making us lonely and disconnected.

The connection between social isolation and political illiberalism isn’t new; it has been well-established by social psychologists. As Haidt writes in The Righteous Mind, social connectedness serves as a bulwark against totalitarianism.

If people can’t satisfy their need for deep connection in other ways, they’ll be more receptive to a smooth-talking leader who urges them to renounce their lives of “selfish momentary pleasure” and follow him onward to “that purely spiritual existence” in which their value as human beings consists.

In contrast, “a nation that is full of hives [Haidt’s term for civic associations] is a nation of happy and satisfied people. It’s not a very promising target for takeover by a demagogue offering people meaning in exchange for their souls.”

Putnam argues that social isolation may fuel political extremism for a different but related reason: it puts us into echo chambers, which moves us politically towards the fringe.

When people lack connections to others, they are unable to test the veracity of their own views, whether in the give-and-take of casual conversation or in more formal deliberation. Without such an opportunity, people are more likely to be swayed by their worst impulses. It is no coincidence that random acts of violence, such as the 1999 spate of schoolyard shootings, tend to be committed by people identified, after the fact, as “loners.”

In other words, when we feel lonely, adrift, and unhappy, we may be more susceptible to the appeals of extremists on both the left and the right who promise community and utopia contingent on our willingness to overturn the existing social order.

So, if a decline in community life is fueling a demand for illiberalism, what can we do about it?

First, we can robustly and emphatically defend liberalism. We can clarify to people that their social malaise is a product of many factors unrelated to liberalism, and that abandoning a liberal social order is unlikely to alleviate it. We can peel back the curtain and reveal the realities of societies that have moved away from political, economic, and epistemic liberalism, demonstrating how these changes often worsen people’s lives. This is essential work, and we are indebted to the many great organizations and websites (including Reality’s Last Stand and New Discourses) that have been doing it.

But even as we articulate the benefits of liberalism, there is another approach we can simultaneously pursue: rebuilding the American community.

Putnam’s analysis is bleak, but he shares an essential silver lining: we have been here before. At the end of the 19th century, Americans faced many similar issues. Rapid industrialization had ushered in unprecedented material prosperity, but small towns and rural villages were being gutted. Increasingly, people found themselves lonely, adrift, and disengaged—but they recognized the problem and went to work. They founded churches, schools, clubs, and political organizations, sparking a social renaissance. Here’s how Putnam describes the “massive new structure of civic associations” that emerged as a result:

In the last decades of the nineteenth century Americans created and joined an unprecedented number of voluntary associations. Beginning in the 1870s and extending into the 1910s, new types of association multiplied, chapters of preexisting associations proliferated, and associations increasingly federated into state and national organizations. In Peoria and St. Louis, Boston and Boise and Bath and Bowling Green, Americans organized clubs and churches and lodges and veterans groups. Everywhere, from the great entrepôt metropolises to small towns in the heartland, the number of voluntary associations grew even faster than the rapidly growing population.

This civic renewal helped to knit the country back together. It rebuilt a new wave of civic associations to replace the ones that had been frayed or bulldozed by rising industrialization.

So, what if we did the same? What if our commitment to defending liberalism inspired us to look out and up, rather than merely down and in? What if we joined—or founded—PTAs, local churches, Rotary Clubs, and sporting leagues? What if we invited others in our community and networks to join with us, especially those who seem lonely and disaffected?

By fostering a civic renaissance, we could not only become happier and more connected; we could also address the root cause of illiberalism at its source.

-

About the Authors

Julian Adorney is a columnist at Reality's Last Stand and the founder of Heal the West, a substack movement dedicated to preserving liberalism. He’s also a writer for the Foundation Against Intolerance and Racism (FAIR). Find him on X: @Julian_Liberty.

Mark Johnson is a trusted advisor and executive coach at Pioneering Leadership and a facilitator and spiritual men's coach at The Undaunted Man. He has over 25 years of experience optimizing people and companies—he writes at The Undaunted Man’s Substack and Universal Principles.

Geoff is a Relationship Architect/Coach, multiple-International Best-Selling Author, Speaker, and Workshop Leader. He has spent the last twenty-six years coaching people world-wide, with a particular passion for supporting those in relationship, and helping men from all walks of life step up to their true potential. Along with Mark, he is a co-founder of The Undaunted Man.

==

Not churches, but okay.

[guster-animations]

The Japanese Version of Deltarune

about a week ago i decided to translate japanese deltarune because i was curious and bored. i found a lot of stuff that i haven’t heard anyone talk about before!

i only translated chapter 2 because i got to the cliffs and remembered that watching/playing chapter 1 over and over again is really boring to me. might do it when/if i finish writing the post.

uhhh a few warnings. i’m not fluent in japanese whatsoever (i’m like n4 level? i think?), and i might not explain this very well to people who don’t know anything about the language. if you’re confused about anything i say, just ask and i’ll explain it in better detail.

i got all of the gameplay from tsuwahasu’s playthroughs of chapter 2 (pacifist and weird route), so all of the screenshots will be from his vods. i picked his vod to watch somewhat randomly so i was very surprised when he not only got all the easter eggs/secrets on a blind playthrough besides the egg room, but also beat spamton neo in one try, god damn

also i’m not the first person to look at the jp version of deltarune. please look at these posts/videos if you want to see stuff that’s already known in better detail:

skellfamily (light/dark world writing, characters’ pronouns and speech patterns) | suzyundertale (ch2 character names, some jokes) suzyundertale again (the gonermaker sequence) | duxarcana and halfbreadchaos (character in the code) | kazarinn (comments from the translators)

reblogs highly appreciated—this took a ton of time!!!

NOW.

LET US BEGIN.

first things first. the gonermaker sequence is one of the most well-known differences in the japanese language among lore fanatics like myself.

in japanese, the first character speaking to you (gaster/Geoff) speaks in kanji (normal) and katakana instead of hiragana (not normal, incredibly strange sounding). the character who hijacks the gonermaker at the end speaks differently, with kanji and hiragana (normal). as suzyundertale mentions in their post, the patterns are extremely similar to a certain fallen child from the end of the undertale genocide route.

another well-known lore Thing in the japanese version is that the hidden “scrapped” lines (AKA the person trapped in the code) use very feminine and childlike speaking mannerisms. this makes it very likely that the person is dess holiday

i’m not going to be going over much personal pronoun stuff, because other people have already covered most of that, though i haven’t seen one thing mentioned by anyone else:

seam uses the pronoun “atashi” (あたし), which is normally a very girly pronoun but in this case it’s meant to make them seem old and wise, since it was a more common pronoun in olden times. their other mannerisms are gender neutral and not feminine, but their name is localized to “nui” (ヌイ)— the word for “seam” in japanese, as well as an actual feminine given name.

does the use of “atashi” combined with having a fem name confirm that they are female? i’m 95% sure the answer is no. do those two things lead native japanese speakers to believe that they are female? i have no idea.

light and dark world

skellfamily mentioned all of this in the post i linked, but i have something small to add

undertale uses mainly hiragana in its text for the japanese version, with some small exceptions for when the fourth wall is broken. this is referencing earthbound, which also did this. this carries over to the light world of deltarune, but kanji is used liberally in the dark world. this is explained by toby fox wanting the light world to make the player think deltarune would be like undertale.

that’s all

small jokes and stuff in the localization

the “librarby” misspelling joke carries over, with it being named “toshonka” (the japanese word for library is “toshokan”).

the AGREE2ALL puzzle was changed to say “YEEES20!!”. this can be read as “yes ni maru” (with the number 2 being read as “ni” in jp and “maru” being the word for a circle), meaning “yes to all” just like in english!

the “apple” keyboard puzzle still says “apple” though ralsei mentions that apple means “ringo” (the japanese word for apple) if you talk to him for a hint.

funnily enough, this joke was kept as is! (“kris, type as i say. f…” “…un!”)

the tasque’s battle lines in english are binary codes, with “me” being 0 and “ow” being 1. this is similar in jp. “nyan” is the equivalent of “meow” in that language, so “ny”=0 and “an”=1. cute!

the “bosom” joke is about the same, if anyone was curious

“breasts / annihilation”

“b…breast?”

“it means tity”

probably my favorite joke in the entire japanese version: in english, before the berdly fight on the roller coaster, he incorrectly refers to lightners as “Light Nerds” . in japanese this is changed to make him use ateji (a combination of kanji that doesn’t mean anything but sounds like an already existing word with their combined readings), calling the lightners 雷斗奈悪 (raitonaa, phonetically similar to the transliteration raitonā which the translation uses). it has the exact same effect (of berdly trying to sound smart but actually being very incorrect), but it’s localized in an outstanding way

“you are filled with the power of not knowing what sugarplums are” is changed to “you are filled with the power of not knowing what christmas pudding is”.

when berdly incorrectly calls susie “susan”, she says “who’s susan?” instead of “my name isn’t susan”. japanese people likely don’t know that “susie” is usually short for “susan”, so it makes sense for her to be even more confused in this version.

the spelling contest in berdly’s flashback is still an english spelling contest, with berdly specifying that it’s english.

instead of saying “susie… a real dragon blazers reference?!” when susie references dragon blazers 2, berdly says, “susie… you’re… a serious dragon blazers player…?!”

on that topic, dragon blazers is instead called dragon blader in japanese. was it called that the whole time? am i misremembering? i legitimately don’t know

the ice-e keysmash puzzle is changed so that you can type it out in japanese as すふぎおろてにぺけなも. it still does not mean anything.

right after susie referenced godzilla with the susiezilla line on the ferris wheel, she references ANOTHER tokusatsu. i think. here (while about to fall on ralsei) she says “ore, sanjou!!!!” (i arrive!), which is a famous catchphrase from kamen rider den-o. i’m like 85% sure it was an intentional reference. den-o is one of my favorite rider shows so this is amazing to me

and lastly. the name of minecrap is changed to マインクシャット (mainkushatto), which seems to be a play on some word plus “minecraft” like in english. i’m not sure what the wordplay is. i’ll get back to you on this

lore-y important stuff

about dess

in japanese, the december typing puzzle still spells out “december” in english.

noelle refers to dess as “onee-chan” (older sis)— it’s common for japanese people to refer to their older siblings like this, and it would be extremely weird if noelle called her “dess”. she could have called her “dess-neechan” or some variation of that, but i highly doubt that the name “dess” is being obscured, especially because “dess” transliterated would sound extremely close, if not alike to “desu” as well as the transliteration of “death”.

the knight

(i took the screenshot and forgot to turn auto captions off, sorry)

this line from a swatchling says something like “it captures the moment where the ‘knight’ creates a ‘fountain’ themself, with their own hands”, but the word for “themself” (みずから/mizukara) is written in hiragana, and “mizukara” could also technically be read as “from water”. was this a deliberate water-darkness parallel? i have no idea.

speaking of water!

the roaring knight is referred to as “咆哮の騎士” (houkou no kishi), the knight of the roaring. the word for the roaring itself, 咆哮, means roar or scream. which eliminates the alternate meaning of roaring (also being possibly defined as the sound of rushing water), but that probably doesn’t solidify “roaring” as solely meaning that. there are a lot of terms in undertale that had multiple meanings, but had to be changed to have only one in the japanese localization. “roaring” might be similar to those instances.

angel

spamton calls noelle an angel just like in english, referring to her as “angel-chan”. if there’s somehow anyone out there that didn’t think that line was important, i am here to prove you wrong!!!

more interesting:

this is the line where noelle says that if this was a dream, she would grow wings and fly away— but in this version, she says “big angel wings” specifically. very interesting!

the two (2) other notable changes in weird route

the infamous “you whispered noelle’s name…” line is slightly different. slightly.

the “kris called for help” lines still say that kris is the one doing it, but this one does not say the subject at all. this is normal for japanese, regardless, it’s still very interesting that it doesn’t say “you”. it is still differentiated from the “kris” lines, but not specifically referring to you (the player).

the other difference is so minor that i’m not even sure what it is or if it’s different from the english version.

translation

EVEN IF YOU [Shout] AT THE [Receiver]

YOUR [Voice] WILL EVENTUALLY WITHER

YOUR [Voice]

THEIR [Voice]

AND YOU WILL realize you’re alone.

i do not know who “THEY” is that spamton’s referring to. the term he uses is gender-neutral and singular. is he talking about the player? idfk probably not

miscellaneous spamton-related stuff

spamton’s speech patterns are entirely different in the japanese translation, but they get the same message across. they include:

switching between formal and informal language

using weird mixtures of hiragana, katakana, english letters and kanji

using katakana re (レ) instead of hiragana shi (し)

cutting off words

random spacing

and occasionally using “die” and “death” as homophones for “dai” and “desu”

it’s so wacky and unnerving and strange, i love it :D

other spamton lore bits:

mike’s name is the same (マイク maiku). i somehow forgot to translate the mike-related dialogue. i will get back to you all if there’s anything of note.

the word for “garbage noise” is 雑音, with about the same meaning. unsurprisingly, the same word (the exact same phrase, in fact) is used for both the addison’s line and the gaster phone call line.

the last thing (i think)

in the roaring cutscene, the japanese word for “chaos” is said (in the “all will be plunged into chaos” line), but then says the transliterated version of the word (カオス) in parentheses. tsuwahasu noted that it’s “keyword-like” in the playthrough i watched. is this important? i have no idea

i’m sure there are things that i missed here, so (again) if you want to know about something, don’t be afraid to ask!! the jp version of deltarune should be looked at a lot more—not just for the lesser-known lore tidbits, but also for the cool stuff that was changed to fit the language. it’s a really cool localization!

[snikt111]

hi hi hi hi I found out about Hal Jordan TODAY and am going so autistic over him it’s insane can you please give me a rundown on what his deal is I think you’re the Tumblr Green Lantern guy

omg hi, insane compliment btw, tysm! i'm glad to give you a rundown!! also definitely check out @katmaatui for more hal info, red is SUPER knowledgable abt him. @rillette, @catboyollie, @halcarols, @starsapphire and @yellowcorps (along with so many others that i cant think to tag off the top of my head) have some great hal takes too! (edited the post just to tag more ppl)

apologies if this is a bit rushed/messy, i'm doing this while i smelt stone in minecraft LMAO

that being said... i think this will be a long one, so more below the cut :3

(cw for light mentions of pedophilia, abuse, canon typical violence)

okay, so hal jordan is the first human green lantern of the GREEN LANTERN CORPS. it's important to note that there was technically a human green lantern before him (alan scott, originally from earth two/the justice society, but integrated into main DC canon after crisis), but his power comes from a different source- which is a whole different ballpark that would take ages to explain, lol, so i'll move on from that.

hal was originally introduced in a showcase issue in 1959, but ended up getting a solo run in the mid 60s because of his showcase issues doing well. he's been a test pilot, middle brother, compassionate, rule follower (although being surprisingly liberal for the time) with an interesting relationship with star sapphire carol ferris since those first appearances. for the first 20 odd years of his appearances we had no information on his parents, but we got a lot from other family members, such as uncle titus, cousin hal jr (aka airwave), younger brother jim jordan and older brother jack jordan. through the 60s and 70s those members of his family were developed along with him; with the audience learning that jim's wife sue thought jim was green lantern, rather than hal, and hal himself training his cousin, hal jr.

the most known version of how hal got the ring in the first place is probably based off of geoff john's rewrite in the mid 00s, reiterating the original story of abin sur crashing onto earth and dying, leaving hal with his ring to be trained by sinestro and the rest of the glc, while also changing miniscule details that had been developed in emerald dawn 1 & 2 (which was released in the 90s, more on that later). the main premise of abin sur's crash has stayed the same, but the story around hal's current life, job, family and stability keep changing. for instance, the original comic with abin sur in showcase only showed hal getting the ring, the guardians choosing him. the first rewrite i can think of was emerald dawn volume 1, published in 1989 and continued in emerald dawn v2 (1991). here we get the classic hal watches his father die in a plane crash with carol ferris beside him as a pre adolescent, and some of the biggest implications of the mistreatment from his father. we also get introduced to hal, despite his stick to the rules, straight edge attitude, making some serious mistakes and putting people in danger and even death- with the implication of alcohol abuse. the audience HAS known hal used to be in the air force since sometime in the late 60s or early 70s (sorry, i don't remember the exact issue!), but emerald dawn shows us that hal's moved on from the air force and into test piloting, and that his mother keeps having to bail him out for making mistakes. emerald dawn vol 1 shows the abin sur moment, followed by fights that cost hal's friends life, and is followed up by sinestro training hal in emerald dawn vol 2, where we get to see the iconic scenes of hal finding out about sinestro and his... dictatorship.

along with that; how the guardians and rings are treated and hal and the glc's perception of them is vastly changed over time. in the early days of gl in the 60s, the guardians were really never to be seen. hal was repeatedly summoned to them and then had his memory almost fully wiped- only leaving a vague notion of his orders. the guardian's called hal to them at seemingly the worst times, ending up with him almost getting injured, getting in trouble at work, and even ending up jobless and homeless. the chaos of being a green lantern has been around the WHOLE time, but originally, the green lanterns didnt really... fight it. the guardian's were their masters (and even father figures, to hal) and not to be questioned. the rings in the 60s were also much more powerful, despite the yellow weakness (the yellow weakness is the notion that from about the 60s to the mid 90s the green lantern rings were completely unable to be used against anything yellow). time travel, phasing, teleporting, etc were all very viable and common things- as well as forceful shapeshifting, invisibility, mind control, mind reading, etc etc. these days, writers have dampened these powers down to mostly shooting light and constructs.

okay, it's parallax time. the emerald twilight arc from the mid 90s wasn't an arc that was as thoroughly planned out over a long period of time as it probably should have been. a lot of fans at the time (and even now) hated what happened there, and claimed it ruined hal's character entirely. i can understand why! but, at it's core, the parallax arc is a story about a broken man pushed to the limit, fully grieving his home and family (originally, he lost his brother jim in the destruction of coast city, along with a lot of other family members) and being goddamn fed up with how his "masters" treated him and the rest of the corps. the so called "perfect lantern" (no, he wasn't that much of a rebel, despite what johns wants you to think) snapped and essentially tried to gain as much power as he could to bring back coast city. when the guardians stripped him of his powers so he couldn't, hal became enraged and took down every lantern in his path, just to get to the guardians and that power. long story short, he kills the guardians and absorbs all the energy from the central power battery on oa, becoming parallax- essentially a god. this marks the start of zero hour, an event made by dc to restructure and reset; giving the comics a new generation of heroes. hal destroys the world and remakes it, but is ultimately taken down by kyle rayner, the new green lantern, with the help of the jla, jsa and associates. there are a few more run ins with parallax after this, before kyle convinces parallax/hal that he can make up for all of this by reigniting the sun after it went out- aka killing himself. hal does it, is stuck in limbo for awhile and then becomes the spectre to continue to make up for the horrible things he did as parallax. the spectre is the spirit of god's wrath and vengeance, a weapon used to drag sinners to their very own, self made hells, and scare the shit out of people. the spectre, from it's very first appearance, is a ghost like spirit that takes on a host, and is primarily described using christian terms and is used in a very... christian ideology. HOWEVER, the spectre 2001 confirms that hal is jewish (jewish mom, catholic dad) and that belief system, plus his personality as a whole, literally makes him change the spirit of vengeance into the spirit of redemption, for at least as long as they are bonded. the whole parallax to spectre arc is about grief, pain, cycles of abuse and terror, redemption and guilt. it is NOT about a fear bug that possess hal. (im so serious though, the spectre 2001 is one of the best comics ive ever read. amazing. changed my world view) but... geoff johns changed all of it, decanonized the spectre, and ruined the legacy of parallax and hal's growth as a person by releasing green lantern: rebirth in 2004/2005. this retcons hal's breakdown and journey through grief into him BEING POSSESSED BY AN ENTITY CONTROLLED BY SINESTRO THAT FULLY CHANGES PREVIOUS GREEN LANTERN CANON AND IMPLICATIONS. also, fucks up the importance of kyle becoming ion, but whatever. geoff johns writes hal (and even more so, carol) so very wrong, and change their stories so vastly in ways that go against the stories very meanings.

SIGH.

now... time to get started on some rougher stuff. hal jordan misconceptions. i'm saving that arc for last.

- hal jordan wasn't much of a rule breaker or rebel until the 70s/80s, where he BEGAN (very slowly, mind you) to be radicalized by oliver queen during denny o'neil's green lantern/green arrow. hal was painted as more of a conservative during this period (which, admittedly, kind of goes against previous canon... he's always been relatively central to liberal, not to any extremes like ollie though, lol) but gets more and more understanding of how power structures work and how lower classes are mistreated during this time- which ends up opening his eyes a bit to how shitty the guardians are. (this is helped by the guardians literally just. leaving. the green lanterns and kind of disbanding them so they can go fuck the zamarons, lmao). geoff johns tried to change this narrative into making hal a very... maverick-from-top-gun type of character, who punched his way out of the military (when, in reality, the original story during emerald knights in the late 90s was that hal had been framed for stealing a jet and was dishonorably discharged, which he took the punishment for because he knew someone had to) and hits on women constantly and gets ladies and allat (which, funnily enough hal was awful at getting carol to like him for a long time, since carol fell for green lantern rather than hal. not to mention the awkwardness of carol's proposals or hal's many, many failed relationships). hal has always been insecure and lowkey boyfailure, he is NOT a top gun maverick tom cruise sorta guy! fuck you jeremy adams!

- hes not that much of an idiot asshole. hal can be a real dick, he's had that going for him since the beginning, but he isn't what you read in batfam fics. he's not stupid and shouldn't be the laughingstock of the justice league. i assume this idea started from the obsession with batfam and the fact that the jla has quite the history of ignoring hal and his issues (as well as. all of their issues. theyre not so great at work life balance), but it's gone too far. hal isn't making fun of the robins and pissing bruce off bc of that. hal isnt fooling around on the job 24/7 (he takes being a gl and pilot VERY seriously, although he does enjoy some danger and high stakes) or slacking off to get girls. again. not top gun maverick.

- hal has not been a creep since the beginnings. hal was not weird with carol in the 60s. things were weird between them, yeah, but that's based off circumstance and the craziness of star sapphire and green lantern. he was NOT being horribly sleazy! i hate that i even need to say this, but i see this take too much not to

- going off of what was said above, lets discuss the arisia arc. if you want to be a real hal fan, this is unfortunately something you need to know about. in action comics, after crisis and the guardians left to go fuck the zamarons, most of the green lanterns fell apart and seperated. a small group went to earth- led by hal and consisting of hal, john stewart, katma tui, kilowog, salaakk, ch'p and arisia rrab. (also sometimes guy gardner, but that's complicated) previously to this arc, hal treated 14 year old arisia like a beloved little sister, welcoming her and leading her into the corps just like everyone else. things started to change once the timeline gets closer and closer to crisis, where arisia starts showing that she has a crush on hal (who is roughly 30s at this point). any advances made by arisia are shut down by hal at the beginning, because she's a child. now, it's unfortunately a common thing to just call hal a "pedophile" because of what happens in this arc- but it really isn't that simple. still weird and icky, but definitely not to the degree of which some fans like to act like it is- esp to attack hal fans for, which is... an odd choice regarding how many fucked up things every character (esp male characters) did back in the day. arisia ends up using her power ring to artifically age herself up, making her body AND MIND into that of a young adult (the comic makes this very clear). once this happens... hal stops rejecting her. they get together, they kiss. the only person in the group of green latnerns who actually has an issue with it is john (salaakk is meh about it, but he just doesn't like human-esque romance no matter what), and katma even directly encourages their relationship. kilowog ends up crushing on arisia as well, and guy gardner hits on her repeatedly throughout the whole period. eventually, hal and arisia break up, but this legacy (thank so much englehart, for wrtiting this. /sarc) is a big controversy among the comics crowd. "is hal jordan a predator?" personally, and i know a lot of friends/mutuals/other gl fans choose to erase the arisia arc entirely (versus how canon ended up retconning it to be 14 earth years is equal to that of an adult and she didn't really get super ages up, or whatever) and go with the familial relationship between hal and her. that's my preferred version! i know red (@katmaatui) has explored that version as well as an alternate version where the arisia arc did happen, and how it affects arisia in particular, which is really depressing but super interesting. anyway, it's complicated and weird and nuanced, but that whole occurence doesn't mean hal's a bad character or person (cause yk. retcons) and it's certainly not bad to like his character. (definitely ignore any guy gardner fans who try to bitch about this arc. cough cough. guy was ALSO into her and hit on her repeatedly. smfh) most people who bring this up to demonize fans didn't even read the arc, and don't know the nuance or the other weird shit that happens in it. (hal is not a horse, sigh)

OVERALL NOTES!

hal jordan is a super complicated character with an extensive history spanning from the 60s to his worse written appearances in modern age. it's okay to like any version of the character, but it is important to note the changes that have been made, the storylines butchered and lost, and more. he has quite the legacy, and he's particularly interesting as from a moral standpoint. hal's a real sweetie though, when it gets down to it! he's neurodivergent coded (imo at least.. his dad very much gets onto him for being disrtracted, hes kinda shit at social interaction (and then amazing at it the other half of the time) etc etc. "spacecase") and his dad is an abusive asshole, who he desperately doesnt want to be like but thinks he NEEDS to be like!

[aimeedaisies]

King pays tribute to ‘heroism and sacrifice’ to mark 80 years since Arnhem

Monarch’s words spoken by the Princess Royal to remember troops who fought in Operation Market Garden

21 September 2024 5:57pm

The Princess Royal is representing the King at the Arnhem anniversary events PA/Ben Birchall

The King has said the “heroism and sacrifice made by so many in the pursuit of peace” will never be forgotten as the 80th anniversary of a famous Second World War operation was commemorated.

The King’s words were spoken by the Princess Royal, representing the King at events this weekend marking the efforts of troops who in 1944 fought in Operation Market Garden, with the bold aim of ending the war that year.

The Princess, joined by her husband Vice Admiral Sir Tim Laurence, delivered her brother’s speech at a reception staged at the Airborne Museum Hartenstein in Oosterbeek, the Netherlands.

It is a former hotel that served as the headquarters of the British 1st Airborne Division during the Battle of Arnhem, part of the operation that aimed to push through the Netherlands and into Germany just a few months after the D-Day landings.

The Princess met Geoff Roberts, 99, believed to be the only British soldier to travel to Arnhem for the commemorations this year PA/Ben Birchall

The Princess said on behalf of the King: “Eighty years ago, on this very weekend, Operation Market Garden was under way in this region of the Netherlands.

“An ambitious joint airborne and ground forces operation designed to seize crucial bridges to enable the advance into Germany, its ultimate aim was to end the war within a matter of months.

“The friendships made during those difficult days of September 1944 between the Dutch and their liberators continued after the war.”

“I saw this for myself five years ago when, as Colonel in Chief of the Parachute Regiment, I attended the 75th anniversary commemorations.”

The Princess met Geoff Roberts, 99, believed to be the only British soldier to travel to Arnhem for the commemorations this year.

Mr Roberts flew by glider into Arnhem during Operation Market Garden but was captured as the Allies retreated after their efforts. Immortalised in the film A Bridge Too Far, the Allies were thwarted by strong resistance from Nazi troops, and he spent the rest of the war in a German prisoner of war camp.

The Princess Royal watches a fly-by at the Airborne Museum Hartenstein in Oosterbeek, Netherlands PA/Ben Birchall

The Princess continued the King’s speech, saying: “Tragically, despite the endless courage of all those who served in an operation whose renown echoes through the generations, the Netherlands had one more terrible winter to suffer before liberation finally arrived.

“Today, on this 80th anniversary, it is with a deep sense of gratitude and humility that we remember all those in the British, Allied and Commonwealth forces who served and died fighting for our freedom.

“Let us also remember those magnificently courageous members of the Dutch resistance and gallant civilians who endured so much during the Second World War.

“We will never forget the heroism and sacrifice made by so many in the pursuit of peace and liberation. My wife joins me in sending the warmest possible good wishes to all those taking part in this weekend of commemoration.”

On Sunday, the Princess, in her role as president of the Commonwealth War Graves Commission, will attend the annual service marking the operation’s 80th anniversary at Oosterbeek Airborne Cemetery.

She will join around a thousand guests and will read a lesson and lay a wreath at the foot of the Cross of Sacrifice.

Earlier, paratroopers from eight Nato member countries, including the UK, the USA, Portugal and Spain, parachuted from 12 aircraft into Ginkel Heath, a nature reserve near the Dutch town of Ede.

Some 700 paratroopers took part in the jump, including the Red Devils, the British Army’s freefall parachute display team, as part of the commemoration of the Battle of Arnhem.

Turned into defensive battle

Among those to parachute into the occupied Netherlands were 1,900 allied airborne soldiers from Britain’s 4th Parachute Brigade.

The plan involved seizing key bridges with a combination of airborne and land forces.

But the airborne forces’ landing zones were around nine miles from the bridge at Arnhem, losing them the element of surprise and giving the German troops time to build blockades.

While the operation succeeded in capturing the Dutch cities of Eindhoven and Nijmegen, it failed in its key objective: securing the bridge over the Rhine at Arnhem.

A defensive battle was fought, which saw nine days of prolonged street fighting, until the order to withdraw was given on Sept 25.

More than 8,000 British soldiers were killed, missing or captured in the offensive.

[dailyanarchistposts]

Trajectories for the Future

In "Dark tidings: Anarchist Politics in the Age of Collapse," Uri Gordon paints an ominous picture: "industrial civilization is coming down," so "anarchists and their allies are now required to project themselves into a future of growing instability and deterioration."[20] I am not so sure about the imminent downfall of industrial civilization or the collapse of capitalism, but I concur that we need to project ourselves into some image of the future in order to prepare for it.[21] A complication is that the future is partially decided by how we project ourselves into it and how we imagine it. There is not a predetermined future that we merely need to prepare for. It will be shaped by how we prepare for it and by what future we prepare for. To fixate ourselves on a particular vision of the future could affect us by constricting our capacities in the present to those actions that lead to that future, blinding us to other possibilities.

Gordon mentions some possible future scenarios, summed up as "grassroots communism, eco-authoritarianism, or civil war."[22] As the ecological crisis becomes more clear and people demand change, global capitalism might attempt to recuperate by making minor adjustments and putting on a "green face" without any changes in the system that is actually causing the crisis: capitalism itself. This can only buy time, and as the crisis intensifies capitalism will employ more authoritarian and repressive measures to stay in power. It can do this either in an authoritarian, neoliberal form, deploying superficial, liberal "progressive" rhetoric while preserving existing hierarchies; or it could instead turn to "eco-fascism," combining nationalist, racist and misogynist ideas of population control and "belonging" with the need to protect nature by totalitarian means. Both are tendencies that exist in the present.[23] In either case, it can only be a matter of buying time by managing the crisis until the inevitable collapse. In his piece Gordon suggests a number of praxises that are necessary in order to resist the authoritarian tendencies during this period of interregnum as well as to build alternative communities that prefigure a new way of life, independent of global capitalism.

Another, more recent, theory of possible futures is Geoff Mann and Joel Wainwright's (M&W) "Climate Leviathan."[24] They see four different trajectories: Either the capitalist order will continue under an increasingly authoritarian global sovereign - a planetary regulatory regime that decides who gets to pollute and at which cost ("Climate Leviathan") - or it will continue without such a sovereign as reactionary and nationalist movements refuse any serious collective efforts to mitigate climate change ("Climate Behemoth"). The global sovereign might also emerge as a non-capitalist world order: the state-socialist dream of a global centrally planned economy but with an emphasis on reducing carbon emissions ("Climate Mao"), and finally there is the more unknown path which involves a rejection and transcendence of both capitalism and political sovereignty ("Climate X").[25] Although climate denying "anti-globalist" right-wing movements have gained political power in several countries in recent years, the authors doubt this "Behemoth" will be long-lived: at some point the climate crisis will become so apparent it cannot be ignored.[26] They find the capitalist "Climate Leviathan" the most likely scenario as it can be built on global institutions and structures that already exist.[27] Climate X is less certain but is the only scenario the authors see as a viable strategy for the future.[28]

There are several overlaps between Gordon's and M&W's theories. Gordon's vision of eco-authoritarian capitalism is not that far from their Climate Leviathan: an attempt to manage the escalating crisis while preserving the existing structures of inequality. In his updated version, he admits that the prediction that capitalism would adapt by accommodating environmentalist and progressive concerns has not been realized. Instead capital has tended to "opt for full-blown reaction" expressed in climate denial and national chauvinism[29] - a trend that aligns with their vision of Climate Behemoth. The main point of convergence in the two theories is the hope for "Climate X" / "grassroots communism" - a movement of movements struggling for social justice, equality and self-management. My own theory is close to these. I also think we will see an increase in authoritarianism and inequality, but I posit that this is not really a change in the system but merely an intensification of the tendencies already contained within it. But the growing crises do give room for and force into existence other forces with the potential to create something new. I too, place my hope in "Climate X" - not as a utopian unknown but as concrete and existing praxises that can be expanded and amplified.

My aim here is thus not to critique the previous theories but to supplement them with empirical cases of what is already happening as the world responds to climate disaster - how the state and capital tries to consolidate the existing political structures on one side, and, on the other, how communities are responding by changing their social relations. Examining these cases from the present can give us a better idea of what to expect from the future and where to focus our struggles. I also add an element to "Climate X" that is under-emphasized in the aforementioned works, which focus primarily on protest and resistance to the dominating powers with the goal of preventing the destructive course.[30] Given the fact that climate disasters are already happening we also need to take into consideration how we are going to survive in the future. The politics of adaptation must be considered from the grassroots level.

[bimboficationblues]

as that anon message you got shows, the term "liberal" gets hurled around a lot as an insult on the left. what would you say are the necessary and sufficient conditions to be a liberal? i think having a straight answer for this would help remedy this sort of behavior

not sure what anon you're referring to. regrettably I don't think you're going to get people to stop using terms in loose or disagreeable ways no matter what, it just is the nature of political terminology (definitionally up for contestation) and language in general. part of the difficulty here is that the same term gets used to describe a political system, an ideology or hegemonic worldview, and a form of political identification

but as far as necessary/sufficient conditions go I like Charles Mills' formulation:

an axiology: committed to individual freedom to pursue the Good, governance by 'consent', the guarantee of specific political and economic rights (non-exhaustive list)

a social ontology: equal moral persons who are atomized or individualized and whose individuality, particularly their self-interested pursuit of their own Good, makes a functional society

a theory of history: endless progress, the accumulation of knowledge and the application of it to advancing human well-being (though this can be more or less Panglossian)

and would add a couple of my own:

a political methodology that gives priority to reform and positive law

an economic worldview that emphasizes the efficiency of money and markets and affirms private property as a central right (often *the* central right)

my own sort of working definition of liberalism writ large is that it's a kind of aristocratic legalism which has a key value of "security" (this is inspired by the work of Geoff Mann and Mark Neocleous), an investment in predictable, consistent outcomes that also expresses itself as a fundamental anxiety about the tenuousness of these institutions and of "civilization" as a whole (an interesting point of overlap between Keynes and Hayek). that's what I kind of see as the throughline between the combination of money, markets, law, and reform.

I would say that the elements listed above which automatically send up the yellow flag, for me, are the political methodology and the theory of history - either a sort of blinkered optimism/false realism about the ability to endlessly patch up our existing institutions or someone who has bought into a kind of linear historical narrative of constant improvement

even though I am not a market socialist and think that is probably excessively "liberal" for my own tastes, I think it is plausible to hold that position without being a liberal, if that makes any sense (it may not). inversely, the axiology of freedom, universalism, &c., often get cited as exclusive to liberalism, but I really don't think they are and remain unpersuaded by the various factions (commie, lib, postcolonialist, and so on) that have argued otherwise. not that I think ideas of freedom, equality, etc. are above conceptual critique per se, but I think I wouldn't assume somebody is a lib because they truck in that language.

[pluckyredhead]

Hi! I've been reading through your character profiles recently (they're incredibly well done, and I love learning about less popular DC characters, so thank you for making them) and in one you said Hawkman mutilated his own godson, and now I'm overflowing with curiosity. Did he actually do that? Why? That sounds horrific.

It is SO BAD, friend!

So this happened during a 2004 JSA/Hawkman crossover called Black Reign in which Black Adam decides to liberate his home country of Kahndaq from a brutal dictator (and become, um, a benevolent dictator, but that's neither here nor there). To do so, he assembles the following squad:

Atom Smasher (Al Rothstein), who is there because he's frustrated that the JSA won't kill bad guys and also because he's hot for Black Adam

Brainwave (Hank King Jr.), who is there because he has a worm in his brain making him evil (yes really)

Alexander Montez, who is there because he's possessed by Eclipso

Nemesis, who is there because she's a random forgettable villain

And Northwind (Norda Cantrell), who is there because...

Well, we don't know! Norda, like Al and Hank, is a former member of Infinity, Inc. with a particularly goofy backstory: his father is Black human man and his mother is a bird lady who kind of looks like a sexy version of Woodstock from Peanuts. So Norda is a Black biracial man who is also part bird. He used to look like this:

He pretty much hadn't been seen for like a decade after Infinity, Inc. disbanded, but Black Reign reintroduces him like this:

Note his head and how much more animalistic it looks. Note the narrative box explaining that he can't speak anymore, because something something evolution.

Geoff Johns decided to take a Black character who had always been characterized as gentle, thoughtful, sensitive, and kind, and turn him into a savage, murderous animal, who is literally incapable of speech. He's the only character in this story given absolutely no motivation, because he cannot speak to express one. He's already been thoroughly dehumanized, and we haven't even gotten to the mutilation yet!

(It's also implied that Norda is the only one of Black Adam's squad, besides Adam, who knows that Hank has a worm in his brain that's controlling him/eating said brain, and just literally doesn't care. That's his friend! What the fuck!!)

Anyway, even though the people of Kahndaq welcome Black Adam as a liberator, the JSA decides to go into another sovereign nation and attack its new ruler with zero authorization from either the US or the UN, because obviously a Middle Eastern nation couldn't possibly have self-determination and a bunch of very very VERY old white American men know best. I'm not saying this is a simple political or ethical situation but I AM saying the story treats it like it is, and like the JSA completely and totally has the right to fart on over to another country and declare war. Probably worth pointing out that this was only three years after 9/11.

ANYWAY. Hawkman ends up fighting Norda, who is his godson, a fact which Hawkman reminds Norda of before doing this:

Jay is, correctly, horrified, and the following dialogue takes place:

It's okay! Sure, Carter ripped one of his godson's limbs out of its socket, but it'll probably grow back! Maybe!

It does in fact grow back, and it's worth acknowledging that Norda was totally ripping out random dudes' entrails at the beginning of this story so he's not exactly innocent here. But for me this particular moment has three key takeaways:

The obsession that comics in the post-9/11 era had with showing heroes doing ever more gruesomely violent, morally suspect things is just as exhausting now as it was back then, and ultimately contributes very little of substance to any conversations about heroism, justice, or the wars in the Middle East.

The treatment of Norda in this story is racist, full stop.

Norda has not appeared in any significant way in the 20 years since. He was never going to be a character with a major spotlight, but this sure didn't help.

[thisbelongsto-nohbodys]

I'm salty about The Ghost and Molly McGee's cancellation and how it's another example of networks and studios screwing over a show that didn't earn a profit despite doing next to nothing to help it earn a profit.

You got some fluffy headcanons about the show to help this poor salty soul.

Still mulling things over for post-series headcanons. I do have a few but I wanna wait till I have a good list and some designs before posting. I can give a few tho', 1 per major character.

Sharon worked through her grief of losing Scratch and created a series of wonderful art pieces which both hang in the Town Hall and in a museum in the capital.

Pete eventually manages to get a victory for Brighton over Perfektborg with an excellent redesign of the market district. While Perfektborg would win the next year, Pete was still hailed as a hero by the Brightonians.

Molly became Mayor of Brighton when she got old enough and felt she was ready to run, the previous Mayor Brunson even endorsed her run and she won easily. She has been enhappifying the town even more since for both the living and ghost citizens of Brighton

Daryl went legit...kinda. He still has some shady dealings but the other businesses he has are 100% legit (mostly thanks to Andrea's help and business know-how).

Libby became a popular author after with the encouragement of Molly, she sent in a manuscript and was published at 16. Since then she's been writing a bunch of stories of various genres (even outselling her father which brought her a bit of joy)

Andrea worked with Molly to rework her (Andrea's) life plan and it's been working great for her. The new "honest Andrea" image has been working well for her and has found it liberating not just for herself but against her family who has been trying anything to regain their empire, meanwhile Andrea has been happy separate from them

Ollie is a living therapist to the dead and has been helping ghosts with their unfinished business. While not his main job, it is the one he finds the most satisfying.

June continued her research on ghosts and now that actual ghosts are friends of her and family, she has direct test subjects. Her research was at first laughed at by "ghost experts" but after a few years of her advice was proven to work she got the respect that her parents never got.

Geoff & Jeff visited the McGees more often after Scratch left. While not the best at giving life advice, Geoff still tried to help Molly and co while growing up (Jeff, while supportive of his husband knows that he isn't the best with that stuff and would correct things)

[chronotsr]

No. 1 - G1, The Steading of the Hill Giant Chief (July 1978)

Author(s): Gary Gygax Artist(s): Erol Otus, Dave C. Sutherland III (cover), David A. Trampier Level range: Average of 9, preferably 5+ players Theme: Standard Swords and Sorcery Major re-releases: G1-3 Against the Giants, GDQ1-7 Queen of the Spiders, Against the Giants: The Liberation of Geoff, Dungeon #197, Tales from the Yawning Portal

I'm not sure if G1-G3 are the most remastered adventures of all time, but it's gotta be competitive. I think Tomb of Horrors might have it beat, but I haven't counted. The 4e conversion [the Dungeon #197 one] is really weird in particular because…4e feels like the edition least interested in the legacy of DND? It was boldly doing its own thing. A good quality, actually.

Anyway, it's time to slag off* on a beloved adventure. Note, I am using the earliest copy of G1 I can find, which is from waaaay later when D3 was complete. I apologize.

*And by slag off, I mean "be critical of at all". In practice, this module is actually showing some unusual acumen compared to its contemporaries.

EDIT: I forgot to mention a rather important thing when this was made live -- note the title there! We are officially in ADND land now, so put away your little brown booklets and switch over to the fuck-off awesome player's handbook with the iconic Moloch statue!

Somehow I had gotten my whole life at this point never really…understanding what this structure was supposed to look like? It looks like this.

I honestly think exterior shots of dungeons are critically underrated. Handouts are amazing and being able to flash the back cover art to safely show the party "like this" is actually great, I deeply wish that….any? of the previous modules had done that? I think the only one that did was Tsojconth. Weirdly, the interior drawing is very subtly different. Look at how the logs face:

Not a huge deal but, a kind of weird inconsistency that top one looks like a stockade and the bottom one looks like a log cabin. Side note, we know that the long dimension of this is using 210 feet tall logs, which is to say, the size of an average redwood. These are some big fuck-off trees -- which could be a very interesting detail about the local area.

Now the setup is pretty simple. You were hired to go beat up the giants because they've been raiding the local humans, figure out why they're raiding, and comeback posthaste. The locals have kitted you out with horses, guides, maps, et c -- but no compensation, they have simply omitted a finder's fee (cheap bastards). Also, if you fail, they'll execute you. With friends like these, who needs Giants?

Gary starts with some mild railroading (you accepted the job already, you are already kitted out, you already walked to a nearby cave, you waited til dusk to approach, you notice two guards are missing, and the cave is guaranteed to be moderately hidden. Sure, whatever, I'm going to ignore that if I run this tho. Gary notifies us of a few critical details:

Don't run this stock, that's immoral

Any surviving giants will flee to G2 if they have the opportunity (which, kind of inherently punishes clever play that avoids combat?)

There is a 2% chance per round that the wooden structure will be lit on fire due to chronic rain (why is this a dice roll??)

If you will permit me a tangent, player arson is truly the bane of interesting scenarios everywhere. Whenever a player wonders, "why are all the GM's dungeons underground or in stonework buildings?", it's because doing anything else invites arson as the default and best answer to all problems. Magic items are fireproof and most metal items will not get hot enough to be destroyed, so very often the best solution is to burn the place to the ground and loot it the next day. So, yeah. No wood buildings. Gary's fix is to have all the giants flee into the basement, then waste a week of the PC's time for daring to use arson. Kind of sucks!

Tangent complete.

Here's some random interesting bits:

Gary explicitly states that you can pass yourself off as hill giant kids, which is extremely funny. Minus the implicit child murder.

Naturally there are giant moms doing giant housemaid shit in several rooms. Presumably they have giant curlers too.

The secret door is, literally just a doorway covered by a pelt. I have to hand it to them, that'd trip up most players in 2024 AND make them feel stupid for not figuring it out!

The big reveal that Eclavdra the Drow is secretly behind it all is so lightly teased that it feels downright tasteful.

A giant that uses a ballista as a crossbow (based) and spears for arrows (also based) -- between the prevalence of lightning spears and greatarrows, one starts to think of a certain famous video game. Genuinely I think it'd be a fun exercise one day, for someone who is more knowledgeable than me about Japanese fantasy roleplaying culture, to talk about how anglophone fantasy works made their way into Japan and were interpreted.

One of the cloud giants has hidden a sentient giant slaying sword that speaks all the giant languages, it feels like there's a hell of a story going on there that is only alluded to!

To my knowledge, this is the first official depiction of an orc in DND? Which implies that Gary is team pig-orcs, which is cool. Frankly, I love porcine orcs, or even better just pigfolk in general, they're great.

I think it is actually a rather bold early stance for Gary to hold that, even here in 1978, Chaotic aligned creatures are not automatically friends. Granted, that's how it is in Elric, so it's not THAT bold, but clearly everyone else missed the memo. The orcs are willing to side with you at least in the short-run, and in our previous modules it was very rare to have groups of chaotic-aligned creatures fighting one another. It was always just personal beefs. In fact, the overall theme of G1 so far is that despite the boxy-ass dungeon design, there's already a command of naturalism that even modern dungeons really struggle with. Factionalism truly is the gift that keeps on giving for the GM!

So the big reveal internally to G1 (just think of that -- a reveal internally to G1, and externally to the GDQ supermodule -- we're already getting pacing!) is that the orc slaves have rebelled. And -- hey -- good for them. There's also a kind of…built-in companion refill system going on here? So in oldish DND the way it works is, the expectation is the party is not just 5 guys with swords. You've got companions to help fight, and you've got hirelings to do other stuff (test suspected traps, if you're evil). And you can only hire so many of these guys from town, but attrition is going to happen. So the modules simply provides, automatic replacements should you negotiate worth a quarter of a shit. A dwarf slave here, an orc slave there. Maybe a giant dissenter if you're really clever. One of the potential "rewards" you can get is more dudes to throw at problems.

More interesting bits

There is, what I can only really call an abortive idea going on here where there's a scary temple in the basement? But no one worships there and no information is provided. It is merely a fucked up altar. I think I vaguely recall that it's retconned Tharizdun in one of the remakes? They always retcon things to be Tharizdun. Busy man, Tharzy.

Gary, Gary no. Stop it. Stop this 78 guys bullshit. I thought we had established that giant rooms of giant clumps of guys was bad. I know you have terminal Napoleonics brain but stop.

Wait, Steading is a noun? I always thought it was a verb. Yknow, like "Steading those hill giants", taking 'em down a notch. Apparently, a Steading is a small farm -- same etymology as Homestead. I guess mark that as our first Gygaxism?

Our second Gygaxism is gill, which is "a quarter pint of an alcoholic drink", which is to say a few mouthfuls

Always end your adventures with weird, ominous non-diegetic text. On the flip-side, absolutely do not do what the adventure does, and end on a teleporter that takes you to the next dungeon. That is the worst option.

Anyway, that's the whole Hill Giant situation. Honestly, it's better than I remembered, but in proud module tradition up to this point it gets weirdly filler-y in the basement. There's just something about basements that makes dungeon designers stop giving a shit, I swear. I do need to give the man his due, even though he was a shitass person: Gygax wrote an 11 page module that is of noticeably higher killer-to-filler ratio than any of his contemporaries. G1 is better than any of its predecessors, pound for pound. It is way, way shorter which is I suppose a plus to me and a minus to others, but -- there is a clear internal logic to this place that is tragically missing from (say) The Dwarven Glory. And that internal logic is the beginning of good adventure design. Anyway, we have two fun tidbits to discuss before we end for the day.

First up, we have an of-the-time account of events in Dragon #19! It turns out that in Origins '78 they played G1-G3's prototype. The account is of the winners (mostly West Virginians, a few Michiganders), who used their magic extremely liberally to hide what they were doing as well as to scout. They did opt to light the place on fire, good for them! If you want to check this out, it's on page 3. I will mention G2 and G3 here as relevant later.

Second up, there's a weird interquel hiding in Dungeon #198! Hanging out as an informal G1.5 is "The Warrens of the Stone Giant Thane!" I will not review it in full because my understanding of 4e is, basically just skimming the PHB and reading the DMG, but essentially the Stone Giants are hypothetically aloof and not particularly loyal to their Fire Giant superiors, but someone gave them The Rock That Makes You Crazy and so now they are. Smash the rock!

Man, map design in the 4e era was so fucking bad. It looks fine, but like, this is four circles. And downstairs is, of course, cave as far as the eye can see. Aren't stone giants supposed to be skilled carvers? Anyway, If you feel like G2 would be too big of a jump mechanically compared to G1, this exists. I'm sure you could use it if you liked, and certainly there is a Genre of Grognard who would be kinda tickled at the thought of finding "lost content" for el classico GDQ.

Next week, we cover G2, which was also in July. So was G3! They're triplets!

[that-ari-blogger]

The Wizard Is Wrong (Wonderful)

Across the story of Wicked, the audience has been introduced to characters with varying relationships to the concept of truth. From Elphaba’s unwavering honesty, to Glinda’s dissonant worldview, to the Wizard, who is an idiot and a liar.

I don’t think either of the observations about the Wizard are particularly groundbreaking. What I think is interesting, is how these two cancel each other out. As in, when the wizard tries to lie, he ends up saying things that are true. But this isn’t as obvious for most of the musical because the Wizard spends the entirety of it lying through his teeth.

But what happens when the Wizard tries to be honest? Well, then you get Wonderful.

Let me explain.

SPOILERS AHEAD: (Wicked)

The context around this song is that Oscar Zoroaster Phadrig Isaac Norman Henkle Emmannuel Ambroise Diggs (The Wizard) is trying to convince Elphaba to join him. He has tried deceit and bargaining, but Elphaba is clever, and has called his bluff. So now he is trying a different tactic, honesty. Unfortunately for him, that's not something he's good at.

“Then suddenly I'm here Respected, worshipped, even Just because the folks in Oz Needed someone to believe in Does it surprise you I got hooked, and all too soon? What can I say? I got carried away And not just by balloon”

In other words, Oz was like this when I got here, I can’t possibly be to blame, right? And if we were to use his version of events, things are simple.

But as it happens, the audience has already been told that this is false. It isn’t an accident that Doctor Dillamond taught history, and that provides some more information. Diggs came to Oz after a drought, and people were looking for people to blame.

The Wizard then stepped into this world, and because he fell from the sky, he was handed everything on a platter. Essentially, Diggs is living a power fantasy.

But on an even more basic level, the people looked to the Wizard for help, and he used that need for personal gain and to oppress a specific group. Even from what he said, he is fully culpable for the current state of Oz, because he actively made the problem worse.

“So you lied to them” “Elphaba, where I'm from We believe all sorts of things that aren't true We call it ‘history’”

This is… complicated. It’s a half-truth misremembered and twisted to fit Diggs’ beliefs. The real idea that this is inspired by is historical bias. By which I mean, if you are being pedantic, it is impossible to be 100% accurate about historical events. You can get really close, but because of biases and contexts that weren’t written down and fragmentary evidence, being entirely accurate is impossible.

There is a difference between “not having all the information”, and “believing a lie”.

Voiceplay is an Accapella Band who gave their take on the musical as a whole that I highly recommend, and Geoff Castelucci's bass during Wonderful is really good.

The Wizard exists under the effects of a pretty strong Bandwagon Fallacy. Everyone else is doing it, so that makes it ok. But he’s wrong about everyone else, and he’s wrong about whether other people’s actions justify his. In that way, he is an equal opposite to Elphaba, who seeks to do the right thing despite nobody else wanting to make that choice, while Diggs uses those around him as an excuse.

"A man's called a traitor or liberator A rich man's a thief or philanthropist Is one a crusader or ruthless invader? It's all in which label is able to persist"

This is, again, a misremembered half-truth. Because yes, historical bias does exist. There are historical figures who were less than perfect. But that doesn't mean reality changes to match modern biases.

Also, this doesn't actually answer the question he was asked. Diggs was told to justify his decision to become a cult of personality, and his answer was: "history is made of lies". Again, there is a difference between historians simplifying thigs and a person making up a persona for themself. But again, the Wizard suffers from a Bandwagon Fallacy, and so he thinks that this makes him right.

That there is the key, the Wizard is convinced that he is in the right here. But he isn't. The world doesn't work the way he thinks it does. So when he finally leads into his offering, it is already dubious.

"At long, long last receive your due long overdue Elphaba, the most celebrated are the rehabilitated There'll be such a whoop-de-doo A celebration throughout Oz That's all to do with you"

The Wizard is offering Elphaba what he thinks she wants, because it's what he wants; praise. The Wizard covets attention and is convinced that everyone else is the same, so Elphaba must want that same praise, right?

Not anymore. In The Wizard And I, this is explicitly one of the things Elphaba dreamed of, but now she has learned too much. Diggs is ok with Oz's flaws because they benefit him, Elphaba can't be.

I'm sure The Wizard believes that second bit, but I don't agree. Based just on Oz itself, in what parallel timeline will the people just accept Elphaba after the metric ton of trite that has been talked up about her. The Wizard thinks that prejudice will just go away if you conform, but that isn't how it works at all, and Elphaba knows it.

"If that's love, it comes at much too higher cost."

Different song, but it's a perfect putdown to the entirety of the Wizard's antics. He may believe what he is saying, but he is wrong. The acceptance he offers is fake and means that Elphaba must sacrifice everything she wants to achieve it. That isn't worth it.

Final Thoughts

For all of his posturing, the Wizard is a remarkably simple character. He wants power, and he lies to get it. But if you combine that with his utterly scuffed worldview, you get some really interesting side effects.

He is also narcissistic, which doesn't exactly help his position. The world has bent over backwards to service his needs, and he has never truly known hardship. He is the stereotypical Iseki protagonist that gives the rest of the genre a bad name, the true Mary Sue.

The problem is, he's also bloody charismatic and fun to watch, which means people listen to him. I've heard people in real life agreeing with his line about labels, and it drives me up the wall.

Next week, I will be looking at the reprise of I'm not that girl, and Glinda's self reflection, as well as As Long As You're Mine. So, stick around if that interests you.

Previous - Next

[haaaaaaaaaaaave-you-met-ted]

Against the Giants: The Liberation of Geoff Cover Art by Gerald Brom

[tomorrowusa]

Nikki Haley suspended her campaign for the GOP presidential nomination months ago and has not campaigned since. But she still got 21.7% of the vote in Tuesday's Republican primary in deep red Indiana. She passed the 30% mark in four Hoosier counties including Marion where Indianapolis is located.

If a fifth of Republicans go out of their way to vote for a non-candidate this late in the race to show their objection to Trump, it doesn't bode well for The Donald in November.

While Indiana should still be considered solid for Trump, the continuing significant showing for Haley could mean trouble for him in toss-up states like Georgia and Pennsylvania.

Former President Donald Trump faced warning signs in the Indiana GOP primary as former Republican rival Nikki Haley received more than 20 percent of the vote despite dropping out of the White House race two months ago. [ ... ] Haley also received more than 26 percent and 18 percent of the GOP primary vote in the key swing states of Michigan and Arizona respectively, amounting to hundreds of thousands of votes. Several polls have indicated that many Haley supporters will not go on to vote for Trump in the 2024 election.

Trump has a problem even if 75% of those Haley voters in GOP primaries decide to hold their noses and vote for Trump in November.

Trump's appointment of anti-abortion fanatics to the US Supreme Court who then overturned Roe v. Wade does not sit well with some pro-choice Republicans.

And those Trump comments about being a "dictator on day one" and "retribution" should horrify anybody concerned about the rule of law.

A Republican former lieutenant governor of toss-up Georgia announced that he's voting for Joe Biden in November.

Former Georgia Republican Lt. Gov. Geoff Duncan says he is voting for Biden in November

Mr. Duncan understands that the only way to defeat wannabe dictator Trump is to vote for Biden. Casting a blank ballot, writing in somebody, or voting for an impotent third party will do nothing to protect democracy in 2024. That goes for liberals as well as conservatives.

[raytorosaurus]

re: ur tags about mcrs apoliticism too, like even w leathermouth as a (pretty weak) outlier, there's that one interview frank did w ljg where they both got to answer what drew them in to punk she goes on to talk about politics and he explicitly says (like he's been saying forever) that to him it's always been about the diy ethos more than any kind of activism. like it's okay, there's plenty other political bands, people trying to paint mcr or frank projects as inherently political to any meaningful extent def feels like setting themselves up for disappointment. the way i personally see it the most "radically political" thing they did was probably just be openly supportive of their largely queer/female fanbase, groundbreaking enough for the time and the scene

ya totally, that's a really good point. the diy ethos is the foundation of personal ideology for a lot of people in frank's general social circle - and that conviction is something i really admire in frank and a lot of diy values do align closely with political leftism, but it's a mistake to assume someone like frank is coming from a strong political background. like in the end the new jersey hardcore community (especially the localised scene in new brunswick, which mcr were just on the fringe of) was largely made up of college-educated white men who probably hadn't had much reason to closely examine their political opinions and class consciousness beyond a surface level. you hear it a lot from the kind of podcast hosts who interview frank, geoff rickly etc. (some of them will occasionally seem slightly taken aback by geoff's more overt class politics because yeah, their opinions are more rooted in their experiences with diy communities than activist ones, tho there's some overlap).

and like i kind of touched on in my tags earlier, yes leathermouth is definitely more political than mcr, and the lyrics of kill the president are great and all, but i find it a little misguided to overly praise them for that when they're on the same album as songs about murdering prostitutes or shooting up a school told from the perspective of the perpetrators adjgkaljg. it's possible i'm not giving him enough credit but i feel like the anarchism in leathermouth, while rooted in genuine dissatisfaction with bush's policies etc, is more aesthetic than it is purposeful. i know there's legal issues surrounding it but frank hasn't really said anything particularly meaningful about that song to my knowledge. again, not a criticism of frank! just of the discussion around his (and mcr's) music that often gives them all too much credit. i also mentioned how rtl has some of the only overtly political lyrics from an mcr member in that they address police brutality, racism etc., but not in any radical way whatsoever. and ray himself said that politics weren't something he was particularly conscious of/attentive to until his kids were born and he started thinking about the world he wanted them to grow up in and how he wanted them to contribute to it. like...the sooner we all accept mcr are all just ex-working/middle-class liberals who came into wealth a couple of decades ago now and are generally decently progessive people but not political activists the better sjfkljsjfl

[aydascomprehendsubtext]

If, as Negri says, “the necessity of Keynesian ideology” arises in a “tension born of desperation,” it is not provoked by communism but by the onset of bellum omnium contra omnes that looms on the Keynesian horizon.31 This is the tension that motivates Keynes’s most famous contribution, The General Theory. That work, and virtually all those concepts and policies we call Keynesian, are essentially moments in a political economy of anxiety and hope—efforts to subdue the sources of social disorder and animate the untapped social and economic wealth immanent to what Keynes called “modern communities.” … Far more than the renewed interest in Keynesian economics, or Keynes the economist or statesman, it is the precariousness of “civilization” that makes the question of Keynesianism urgent. We are witness to the desperate refusal to abandon the belief that a non-revolutionary bliss is out there to be realized, that “something will turn up.” This anxious hope and trepidation are not confined to elites, governors, or the ruling class, and they exceed the realm of liberal politics. They are, rather, widespread across otherwise quite rigid lines of difference—millions of us have become, as Keynes was once described, “Geiger counters of future headlines.”33 ...

This cul-de-sac is precisely where Keynesian reason leads us. Many of those political features that make Keynesianism make sense to “progressives” are significant obstacles to a vital, mass-based progressive or Left movement—that is at least part of Keynesianism’s raison d’être. I am of course far from the first to point this out; some variation on it is a “radical” axiom. The problem that is almost never mentioned, however, is that recognizing Keynesianism’s limits, or even excoriating it for its “reformist” or “collaborationist” bases (as some “radicals” are often wont to do), does not thereby cut the ties that bind the Left to Keynesianism. Keynesianism is not something that the Left in the liberal capitalist North can just disavow at will. It has always been a crucial element of that social formation, and there is no politics that can escape its time. Keynesianism has been at the core of both liberalism and the critique of liberalism for more than two hundred years.36 It is, unintentionally but inescapably, no small part of what “progressive” or “Left” has come to mean, however much some might wish it were otherwise.

- Geoff Mann, In the Long Run We Are All Dead, 2017