#Loot Hoops

[lunarbard]

Minor spoilers for Chapter 1 of Rogue Trader (currently on Chapter 2), as well as Baldur's Gate 3's ending.

Baldur's Gate 3 gave me a terrible save scumming habit. For all Larian talks about "failing being fun," the learned experience is "failing locks out content (whether quests or loot) and/or leads to combat in an awful position." Or a permanent debuff (I reclassed lae'zel to a wizard in my first playthrough and promptly learned that was a mistake). Or even just taking the wrong dialogue option veering in the wrong direction.

I've kept the habit of quicksaving before major decisions in Rogue Trader, but I have yet to reload a save outside of a tactical blunder (not prioritizing the right targets, downing an ally by overpenetrating an enemy, etc).

I've also managed to not fail many checks thanks to the game using the highest skill rating in your party for a given task (even in cases where it may not necessarily make sense, but I'm fine with it).

There are two more important parts to the difference in my experience though, I think - where/how skill tests are employed in dialogue and how consequences are telegraphed.

Baldur's Gate 3 dialogues generally feel gated behind a swamp of excessive rolls just to get to anything resembling a choice. And typically your "choice" is just a way to minimize the bullshit the game throws at you if you succeed on a die roll. Where the writers try to shove anything like a moral choice into the game, they force the player to pick between choices that are shitty not by the nature of the situation but the artifice of the writers. I'm specifically thinking of Astarion's quest's decision point of "you need to immediately use the vampire lord's staff right now, you can't talk to anybody, and everyone complains about your decision no matter what." Or the fucking awful strongarm into making someone undergo ceremorphosis before the final stretch (or jump through a bunch of hoops with dialogue and sacrifice Gale). "Decisions" that just make you curse the devs & writers instead of engaging with the world.

I'm still just working my way through Chapter 2 of Rogue Trader, but that game has already provided so many moments where I have to really debate with myself about the best course of action morally. The ending of Chapter 1 and the decision on Rykard Minoris had me stuck for a good hour trying to decide the fate of unnamed people on the planet and I loved it in a way because the game established the stakes in the world and left me to choose.

A large part of what makes the decisions work though is that when you make a decision, generally tests will do one of a few things:

Provide more information for your decision.

Make a certain path of argument/dialogue easier

Take a risk for a potentially less compromised path.

I need to actually evaluate my decisions in dialogues for this game and think about who I'm talking to and what people expect of me as a Rogue Trader. The context of the world is well-established, and where you might need more information, your companions will often weigh in - with their own biases to bring into account.

The game doesn't have all the fancy polish and cinematics of BG3 but it has the proper soul I've been hungering for in a CRPG.

[daily-ish-syndicate-headcanons]

attempt two because i accidentally sent the first one too early!

piercing headcanons because i was thinking about my own and then the brain juices started rolling in:

Phil used to have piercings. he got his ears pierced while he and Techno were still in the early/mid stage of their friendship. the two have matching emerald earrings, Phil's was a stud and Techno's was the dangly kind, but he also had a stud, for when he needed to make sure his earring didn't tangle in his hair. after awhile of having his ears pierced though, Phil began to notice his ears would be sensitive whenever he took the earrings in and out, when he would swap them. eventually, they started getting less sensitive and more painful. so, he let his piercings close up, switching his emerald stud with Techno's dangly one. he took the dangly earring, and changed it to where it was no longer an earring, but instead little charm, that he could put on his hat, on a bag, any of those. he only ever got his ears pierced, and he let those close up as they got too painful to handle.

.

Techno has had piercings longer than Phil. he did most of them himself, but he has let Phil help him in the process, making sure he didnt pass out afterwards [especially with the ear piercings, those things make you dizzy afterwards. i dont know about any other piercings, but ear piercings definitely make you dizzy] ect. he has studs, dangly earrings, all the earrings you can imagine. most of them are gold, though there are a few that are made of silver, and the matching emerald he has with Phil. he has a nose piercing, he used to wear those clunky, silly rings in the middle like how people often depict bulls having, but changed to a golden stud with a red jewel in the middle on the side. yes, he may have a pig snout, but he can still have nose piercings, okay?

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Ranboo.. okay, I know this might sound weird, but in my [personal] design of him, he has a small eye of ender hanging from their ear. yes yes, i can hear you now saying "but eye of enders are made from enderpearls, and those are dropped by endermen when you kill them" yes, i understand that its weird to have your species loot as an earring, but it looks nice, and honestly, how about we think of it as a tribute to dead endermen or something. anyways, other than that earring, he has black studs and sometimes, they wear funky little earrings. i like to imagine he and Niki share a jewelry box, and they both have a collection of cute little earrings, like cat paws, rainbows, flowers, ect. just cause theyre cute. Also they have sensitive ears. Can't wear certain earrings, like cheap ones or copper ones.

.

Niki's got nose piercings and ear piercings. She's got a simple stud on her nose, which she'll sometimes change out with a little gold ring. She's got cartilage piercings, lobe piercings, all that jazz. She mostly wears those cute earrings both she and Ranboo own, the ones the two share. She sometimes wears small hoops on her ears. Most of her jewelry is silver, though she does have some metal and gold ones here and there.

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Connor is not to be trusted around needles. No piercings for him.

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ignore this

extra space

i seem

to be

unable to

delete it

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phil fs looks back on his piercing phase like people look back on their emo phase

proud to say that out of the three piercings ive gotten (first and second lobe and helix) i’ve never gotten dizzy 💪💪 also i love the idea of techno with lots of piercings (especially a septum piercing i think its so silly)

ranboo is so real for the sensitive ears thing (sensitive skin haver right here, i literally cant wear anything other than sterling silver or gold i hate it)

niki and ranboo fs match piercings i lobe them theyre so siblings

Do Not Give Connor Needles

i am pointedly NOT ignoring the extra space (L)

[ollywears]

Olly Alexander wearing Emily Frances Barrett Loot Hoops earring in a photoshoot by Hugo Yangüela for Número Berlim - THE SEXXX ISSUE (June 2021).

[gabriestat]

if someone looted me right now my loot would be just like those npcs from pathologic...new legwarmers in my bag, an embroidery hoop unused, glue, 2 books in german two empty tappers and laptop

[toomagazineperfection]

What is hard work? When does lie tell faith of his mar to take her, when? A lie. Think of telling your friends, you worked hard. Truth lies below opinions and takes. Work equals work. Work only stops when you stop taking credit for your real, honest works. He was an author, he wrote. We write. He works. He writes. She writes. Their work differ. How is a working graduate girl differing from a nuanced man? What do we measure? I lied. A fake lover. A sparse girl. A courage of hers. A lie of hers. A leap of hers. A night of the heaven she wrote. A deviant girl. Suppose, she lies. What, of lie? A lie to console she is working hard. A lie. A leap of hers never therefore, a lie of lie. This is slam poetry rouge ahead. A worker rouge. Her. I live of light. A lie of working hard is that we do. We lie. We think we can surpass. We think we can love. We do. We are intense,in what? A lie. A thought. Of responsibility, is that we earn. A lie. A thing of her hoops of tight. A lie of her might. A month of the night. A lie of the work hour. A lie hour. Her weekend. We start to finish up her lying start tries to turn hour into sadness. Work pays money and bills. A light hour and she works like noon. What is wrong? Wrong payments at wrong times. She deserves allude laureates of salaries, what does she do? Get none. Get it. Hour of deep pay. A thought of saying her ink is wrong. Her lover leaving and saying it wrong. Her workers gone rouge. She lies. Her wolf salary. Her bold salary. Pay for hard work. Hard work minus soch. Little talk minus book talks. The dividend is the common girl. Never numerator, she irks. She . Studies. Saddle variety. A lover of her moon. An ink of dais. A link of hoove. A hoover of night. A light of night. A leap. A lover. Her. Her loom light. Her. Taking pearls of dynasties in her ink and skin. Her lie. In the source paradise. Money is discipline. Money equals work. A lover equals. Money. Pay. Her. Her height. Her loom. Her hedge. Her lump. Her light. Her loot. Her. Her vase. The right of salary. A right of moon. Her. Hard work done. Loop. Her.

Sunidhi

Sunidhi

[noyoucannotpushthevoid]

Back on my Bullshit: Blue and Her Boys as Quotes from my Dnd Groups

"I roll acrobatics to climb aboard" - anyone trying to get into the backseat of the pig "Sorry [Henry], there's not enough [mice] to go around" - Ronan sharing baby mice with everyone but Henry "Going in for another whack-a-mole" - Lynch brothers fighting "[Ronan] is a beefcake, alright?" - Hennessey hyping up Ronan "He is longer than the hole is wide" - Jesse Diddley and his cave "[Kavinsky] has one goal and it is to plunder and loot" "There's only one word for that: adequate" - Adam doing staff reviews at work "You take his bedroll and do a happy little leprechaun dance back to your tent" - Ronan stealing stuff from Declan as a child "First the voices, then the bedroll not existing" - Adam being so so tired that he starts to lose stuff "It's fucking library time" - Adam and Gansey "You would have the basketball hoop hamper" - Ronan to Noah who would have a basketball hoop hamper "Romantic hold, you mean uppies" - Ronan making fun of the height difference between Gansey and Blue "Would win: Squirrel or large haldron collider" - Ronan  "[Noah] can still experience terminal velocity" - Gansey trying to convince Ronan not to throw Noah out the window again "Welcome to costco for drugs" - Kavinsky "'You can't lick me' (Noah) 'Is that a challenge?' (Ronan)" "Hey boys, how do you feel about summoning satan tonight?" - Neeve "Bug satan bug satan bug satan" - if you know you know, you know? "As yes, these heathens who read" - Ronan bored watching everyone else do their homework "I mean pricking my finger is pretty simple" - Adam “He’s now nice and damp and gross smelling” - Ronan after tennis/Gansey after rowing “[Gansey]! Is! Caked! Up!” - Henry “No! [Adam], give me your body” - Cabeswater “Your brain is so smooth, I could shine it” - Adam at other students “[Gansey], be our dad” “My pronouns are gay/them” - Ronan any time someone assumes he’s straight “He might just be a little guy, but he can’t sit with us” - Ronan about Henry “You get one rizz between the three of you” - That first night at Ninos when Adam asked Blue out "yea, baby's first flail! let's go!" - Ronan when Chainsaw picks up a knife for the first time “There’s no longer strange creatures in his shirt” - Chainsaw being old enough that Ronan doesn’t have to secretly bring her to school anymore “I wasn’t paying attention because I was too excited about Excel Spreadsheets” - Gansey “The spirit bong” - Noah “I guess you could smoke ectoplasm if you REALLY want to” - The rest of the gang trying to figure out how Noah would smoke as a ghost "all of the hazing is horse themed" - Hazing at Aglionby in bumfuck Virginia "Some people have never been severely mentally ill, and it shows" - Ronan “Magic exists and Big [Declan] doesn’t want you to know about it” - Declan not telling Ronan about the Fairy Market “Don’t be rude-phobic” - Henry when someone’s mean to Ronan "Do better next time white man" - This could be either Blue or Henry, but the white man in question is Gansey regardless

[alternian-life-advice]

No quirks, hemotyping, or any other identifying information will be included in this submission. I refuse to put myself or the bastard fucks around me in danger with this line of question, so I will only ask the following: How do I care for a grub? Finding them a lusus is out of the question.

I have plenty oof experience with this oone... Due too the *circumstances* that goot my subgrub destrooyed. Buy doouble whatever yoou usually buy (if soomeoone asks, say yoou've goot a particularly upset mooirail that your feeling jamming with) and doon't ever parade it aroound, yoou'll hurt a loot oof troolls by making it super knoown. Hoope yoou and yoour grub are safe!

[zydrateacademy]

First Impressions - Starfield

I have a friend who once told me that Starfield is a game of compromises, but I can't deny that an open world Bethesda game still scratches an itch that does not get satisfied very often. The likes of Cyberpunk 2077 (which is already three years old, ho' hell...) and Baldur's Gate 3 come along to scratch my back but I still always hold hope for the next Bethesda game. So while I enjoy the game for what it is, this review might have a lot more bad to say than good, because the good is just 'good' and there's just a lot more to say about the bad.

The good here still works. Running around in a new world, picking everyone's pockets (oh yes, the "stealth archer" archetype is just as valid here if a bit twitchy), fiddling with gear and the like. It doesn't quite scratch the same tech/tactical shooter that I eventually turned FO4 into with mods but I think it has the potential when the modding tools are released soon.

Now that is always an ongoing debate. Modders should not be tasked to 'fix' a developer's game, and the baseline game has to be good and enjoyable enough to attract said modders to eventually spend years of their life toiling. As of this writing, Skyrim has 500 new mods published -this week-, and that's not even bothering to look up what's been updated as well. All that said, it still most certainly helps.

The general gameplay loop still works, generally just looting and shooting and slowly upgrading my gear as the enemies acquire better stuff while I level up. I enjoy some of the spaceflight but it's more thin than I expected. Spaceflight is not a "pick a direction and go" but more when you fast travel to planets there may or may not be some kind of encounter, between fighting mercenaries or having your cargo scanned for contraband. Once you're done with the encounter, it's done, and there's no reason to continue flying around.

I still really enjoy spaceflight and I truly wish there was more of it. But so far in ~20 hours it has mostly amounted to "kill three ships, now land on the planet towards your objective".

There's a contraband feature I'm a bit mixed on. Every now and then, notably when you're exploring "abandoned" structures on planets (so far, always occupied by pirates), you'll find some very high-priced illegal item packs you can take to the Trade Authority to hock. Unfortunately this is basically just a special item with extra steps. There's only one or two viable places to go to, to avoid the authorities scanning your ship and I've found a backpack full of high-priced guns can yield more cash than the specialized contraband which has an expected huge markdown when I go to sell them anyway. It's a fun idea but not implemented as well as it could be.

Very quickly, I am hit with this strange double-triple-unlock perk system. Things like upgrading your weapons and gear are behind a tiered wall so you might have to dump points in a line you're hardly interested in (I don't really care that my scanner gets 10 more meters, I'm running towards the thing I'm scanning anyway) just to be able to get the capability of upgrading your own stuff. After that you need to 'research' your ability to craft these things. At a certain point I might just cheat in 100 units of various materials just to skip the research part.

It's basically Fallout4's system but worse, with extra hoops to jump through. At least in FO4 your perks were just locked behind the attribute level and nothing else. But in order to fly the 'best' ships you will need a bunch of perks in the tech tree, for a game you really don't spend that much flying in.

I think the game has a scaling problem. While you can't fly planet to planet manually hoping to run into random encounters (ala~ random spawns on the roads of Skyrim that are different on every playthrough), it also has trouble with on foot traversal itself. People complained about planetfall on the first Mass Effect as just amounting to a square foot space to run around and explore in but I think Starfield would have benefited from that system here. So far in my experience I have simply done the Mass Effect thing and explored the three or four points of interest on a planet and left it at that. You can choose a point and land anywhere on planets and maybe establish an outpost but there's very long expanses of nothing and running between PoI's made me wish for some kind of hoverbike. Or a Mako.

Minor nitpick: Beth games really need to give their merchants more money. Scrolling through some reviews there's one that formatted very simplistically. Perfect? No. Overhyped? Sure. Fun? Yes. A lot of that I agree with. I won't deny Bethesda has some real work to do here (with a major patch coming in a couple of days) but I'm still enjoying the experience.

So here's a thumbs up if you're anything like me and are just suffering from the general dry spell of open world RPGs. It'll do for now.

[niuttuc]

Today’s budget commander sleeper(s) are a bit less sleeper-y than most of the ones covered here, we talk about it all the time in our content, and they’re played in thousands of decks on EDHRec each. However, I think it’s important to write down this argument for them regardless due to how easy they are to see as terrible cards. So, symmetrical card draw...

These effects are actually pretty fantastic, and possibly deserve the staple treatment for white decks currently, and not just mono-white. Almost as much as Cultivate or Rampant Growth are for green. Seriously.

Getting card draw is integral to keeping up with longer games of commander, and getting three cards for as many mana is a great rate in any color, without any hoops to jump through. Two is not quite as good, but Your Temple Is Under Attack has more flexibility, instant speed is pretty huge and protecting your board is also a very useful mode.

But of course, there’s the downside. Or is there? Giving cards to your opponents in magic is generally a bad thing. Every player wants to draw cards, and they’re your opponents, so you don’t want them to get what they want. But commander is multiplayer, and every opponent is also the enemy of your enemy. It is very rare in commander that everybody is at parity, generally a player will be behind. Maybe they extended and got board wiped into misery. Maybe they just didn’t find their land drops. Maybe they were flooded, or they’re in a bad match up. Whatever their problem is, two or three extra cards will help, and it doesn’t take much to make them your ally then, or at least get an agreement they won’t use these cards against you. Then, if they use it against another player, it’s almost like they’re your own cards, pointed at one of your common opponents, except you don’t even have to yourself pay the mana to cast the cards. Since you choose who gets the cards, you can almost always pick the player farther behind, or the player you want the good favors of or is least likely to threaten you, to get the cards. If you yourself are the Archenemy and the primary target of everyone else, you probably don’t need the push, but also concentrating the cards on one opponent means they likely won’t be able to cast all of them in time, though it is the time the spell doesn’t shine, when you’re already winning by far.

Furthermore, Commander is generally a social format. You want everyone to enjoy their time at the table. Giving a few cards to keep a player in the game when they struggle is also a great way to ensure nobody’s miserable at the table because of variance stopping them from doing anything, which isn’t to underestimate.

Now, where these break down is when every card given to the opponent risks killing the entire table. You do not want to give cards to dedicated combo opponents, be it storm, locks, or basically any cEDH deck. If you have a lot of this in your environment, I’d say to avoid these cards, since there’s no “not using the card against you” in the case of a game-winning combo, and seeing more cards ensures it comes quicker. But I think you’ll agree this isn’t the most common table of commander, and you know when you’re in a playgroup like that.

Specifically on Your Temple is Under Attack, also note that the instant speed on it allows extra tricks that further removes any downside from it. At instant speed, you can cast it during an opponent’s end step, not only ensuring you use your cards first, but also that if they already had seven in hand, which is common to have one player at the table be in commander, they’ll immediately go to discard and have gotten a loot of two cards instead of a draw. And of course you get the indestructibility that makes it doubly interesting in any creature deck.

So, to reiterate, these cards are well-costed (and versatile) card advantage in white, that makes you a friend at the table and ensures games are more fun for everyone in the playgroup. Avoid them in higher power and combo environments, but otherwise, I’d recommend trying them in almost any deck with white in them. Also they’re both pennies to grab.

[makowo]

fuck LOOT tbh why doesnt it allow you to manually edit the load order. i know better than her sometimes just lemme move it up a little instead of jumping through all these hoops

[sanguine-salvation]

YOU HAVE JUST DIED.

↳ what loot items do you drop?

Viktor Zsasz has dropped:

a combat knife, well-worn at the handle and covered in flecks of blood

a leather collar

another knife, one of Roman Sionis' steak knife set

an old scratched-up poker chip from the Iceberg Lounge, it looks like it was carved into

a pair of very nifty sunglasses

a set of hoop earrings, amongst a lot of assorted piercings

Tagged by: @masquenoire (thank you!!) Tagging: whoever would like to~

[team-au]

Chapter 1 — Shady Brook Elementary

The Shady Brook Elementary School gymnasium is well-preserved and under-utilized and that’s where Vernon goes to blow off steam. Shooting hoops reminds him of the good ol’ days, reminds him of what life was like before the world ended and every waking second became about survival.

Dribble, dribble, jump, shoot. Dribble, dribble, jump, shoot.

His sneakers squeak on once-shiny hardwood, bringing him back to his childhood. In 5th grade, he’d played basketball for his own elementary school – the St. Mary’s Bulldogs. Vernon tries not to think about the original Broncos, the kids of Shady Brook Elementary who would have played floor hockey and freeze tag and kickball in this gym two years earlier.

It’s best not to think about kids in the apocalypse. It’s hard enough to wrap your mind around a massive loss of adult life, let alone kids, but living inside a grade school doesn’t make it easy. There’s still artwork hanging in the classrooms, kids’ names written on bulletin boards in the hallways, pink jackets and Spider-Man lunchboxes in the lost-and-found. It’s a tough reality, one the new Broncos face every single day, but that’s the price of living indoors.

Dribble, dribble, jump, shoot.

The swish of the net is simple, satisfying. Vernon doubles back, sprinting to the other end of the gym as fast as he can because he likes the feeling of his heart pounding in chest. He runs back to center court, feet planted on a faded vinyl decal of a red horse head, and throws the ball as hard as he can. Against all odds, and with an ugly bounce against the back of the rim, the ball goes in.

He’s so surprised by own his athleticism that he doesn’t hear the gym door open and shut.

“Nice shot,” says Seungkwan. He’s standing near the bleachers, apron tied around his waist. When Vernon sees him, Seungkwan smiles. “Jihyo’s looking for you.”

“Uh-oh,” Vernon says. He jogs after the rebound, then tosses the ball back into plastic crate that houses four more basketballs, two soccer balls and a wiffle ball bat. “Am I in trouble?”

Seungkwan shrugs. “Fuck if I know. I don’t ask questions. I just–”

“–do her bidding?” Vernon teases. Still smiling, Seungkwan gives him the finger. “Is Jihyo in her office?” Seungkwan nods once. Vernon passes him on his way out the door but before he steps into the hallway, he stops and asks, “Hey, what’s for dinner tonight?”

“Thanks to a hefty box of tomatoes from the Slums,” he says, “we’re having black bean salsa on slightly stale saltines. And if you’re really nice to me, I’ll sneak you a not-that-expired fruit cup for dessert.”

Vernon laughs out loud and reaches out to slap Seungkwan on the shoulder.

“Good man.”

It’s a short walk from the gym to the principal’s office. The Broncos have long since cleared superfluous materials from most of the main rooms – they burned a lot of books and papers for bonfires, traded the instruments and art supplies to the Slums in exchange for vegetables, looted cubbies for backpacks and non-perishable snacks – but some decorative clutter remains.

Vernon ignores the small, red and black handprints painted on the wall outside the principal’s office and turns the corner, stopping in his tracks when he hears an argument.

“I know that, Sana, but what do you want me to do?”

“I want you to actually look at this map and give me a real reason not to go for it.”

Vernon shifts his weight awkwardly from one foot to the other, more inclined to eat literal rocks than interrupt a marital dispute between Jihyo and Sana.

“Do you trust me?” he hears Jihyo say. “Do you trust that I’m trying to do right by this group?”

“Of course I do! But what is the point of Dahyun going out and scouting new locations if you refuse to explore any of them? Why do we even have runners if they’re not allowed to go out on runs?”

Jihyo makes a noise halfway between a scoff and a laugh.

“Jesus, Sana. When it comes to runs, you really value quantity over quality and that kind of overwork is exactly why Junhui is laid up right now.”

“Are you really blaming me for Junhui getting sick?”

Wildly uncomfortable and beginning to feel a bit too much like a voyeur, Vernon awkwardly clears his throat. Jihyo and Sana stop fighting and Vernon bravely pokes his head inside the principal’s office.

“Very sorry to interrupt,” he says, eyes glued to the floor. “Seungkwan said you wanted to see me?”

Jihyo laughs a little, humorless. She’s standing behind her desk, hands gripping the top of her chair. Sana’s a few feet away having a much harder time hiding her emotions.

“Vernon,” Jihyo says. She forces a smile and looks back and forth between her wife and the man hovering in her doorway. “Isn’t it awkward when Mom and Mom fight?”

Sana blinks, annoyed, and says, “We’ll finish this later.” She turns to leave and Vernon all but dives away from the door, giving her more than enough room to pass.

Once she’s disappeared down the hallway, Vernon says, “Sorry. I never did have great timing.”

Jihyo smiles and waves him off. “Forget about it,” she says. “Take a seat.”

There’s two chairs in front of her desk and Vernon takes the one closest to him. The principal’s office looks a little bit more like a bunker than it does an educational place of business. Gone are the motivational posters, filing cabinets and potted plants – Jihyo’s office is fit with maps of the city, inventory lists, boxes of miscellaneous ammunition and cases of bottled water. On a low table against the far wall, Vernon sees two handguns and a few half-full bottles of liquor.

“Is everything okay?” he asks.

Now sitting, Jihyo sighs heavily and says, “Everything is okay.” Her eyes fall to the doorway and Vernon can tell that Sana is still on her mind. “My wife and I aren’t currently seeing eye-to-eye on a few things but it’ll pass. Storms always do.” She spends another few seconds staring and then, appearing to remember what she’s doing, Jihyo clears her throat and sits up straighter in her chair. “I have a favor to ask of you.”

“Lay it on me.”

“We’re down a runner,” Jihyo explains, but Vernon knows all about it.

“Junhui’s still sick?”

Nodding, Jihyo continues: “Jeongyeon says he should be fine in a few more days. She thinks it’s just the flu. He’s young and otherwise healthy so it shouldn’t be too big a deal in the long run but fever and dehydration can be dangerous when you’re…” She trails off, unsure of where her sentence should end. “Anyway, I know you don’t usually go on runs but Minghao and Nayeon are still away and I don’t want to send Momo out her own. We could really use some extra medical supplies, especially if this flu starts making its way around the school. You won’t have to go far. Dahyun scouted out a middle school twelve miles west of here. Somehow, we’ve missed it until now. They should have some first-aid kits, maybe some ibuprofen, maybe some disinfectant. It’ll go a long way.”

Vernon listens attentively, patiently, and when Jihyo’s done selling, he says, “Whatever you need.”

Another smile, smaller this time, but genuine.

“Thank you,” she says. There’s relief in her voice – maybe she hadn’t expected him to say yes so easily. “We’re still doing fine on food and water but medical supplies…” She shakes her head. Vernon has never been able to get a read on Jihyo or guess what she’s thinking but he has noticed that her air of authority seems to thin whenever she’s speaking to someone one-on-one.

“Medical supplies dwindle quickly,” he says. He’s neither a runner nor an inventory manager but Vernon is observant. He’s quiet, stoic, basically unassuming and people tend to spill their guts whenever he’s around. He knows they’re running low on medication, bandages and certain types of ammo. He knows that their food supply is fairly strong, especially since Seungkwan can take just about anything he’s given and turn it into breakfast, lunch and dinner. And he knows that Jihyo and Sana have been having trouble getting on the same page.

“Yes,” Jihyo says quietly. “They really do.”

“I’m happy to help however I can. Going on a run will be a nice change of pace.”

“You’re a team player,” Jihyo says, “and I appreciate it. Momo will come find you after dinner tonight and give you the details. You guys will leave tomorrow morning. Seungkwan will have breakfast for you an hour before everyone else eats. For the rest of the night, though, take it easy, okay? I want you well-rested for tomorrow.”

Vernon nods once, stands, then pushes in his chair. He’s about to leave but hesitates, standing in the middle of the office, looking around. He’s lost in thought, a side effect from apocalyptic living, and Jihyo gives him another thirty seconds before prompting, “Vernon?”

“Sorry,” he says. “I was just trying to remember if I’d ever gotten sent to the principal’s office as a kid.”

Jihyo cocks her head to the side, equal parts surprised and charmed by his frankness, and says, “I doubt it. Something tells me you were a really good kid.”

Suddenly feeling embarrassed, Vernon bows his head, exits the office and closes the door behind him. There’s no one else in the hallway, most of the Broncos tending to their respective duties for the day, and Vernon relishes in the quiet.

Now that he’s got explicit orders from the boss to kick back and rest, his schedule is clear. Briefly, he weighs his options; he could go back to the gym and play a little more basketball, he could go to the cafeteria and see if Seungkwan needs help prepping dinner, he could go back to his room (classroom 108) and read until it’s time to eat or he could check on Seungcheol and the hunting dogs.

Before he goes anywhere, though, he finds himself staring at the wall of handprints again. He knows better than to think about Shady Brook’s former students. He knows better than to worry about what became of the kids and their families when the world ended. He knows better than to let his mind drift back to his nephews, to his sister, to the fate of his family. But still, he reaches out his hand and covers one of the small, red handprints anyway.

Vernon stays there for just a minute, feeling all the feelings that he works so hard to avoid on a normal day and imagining the school alive with music and laughter and homework. He remembers school plays and art class and tater tots and recess and hopes against all hope that his nephews are someplace safe. Then he breathes deeply, slowly, and walks away, leaving all of his emotion and worry right there in the hallway.

He may not be able to help the former Broncos but he sure as hell can make a difference now.

[aurora-light-blog]

The Pirate Prince of Yi Ti: Raids past the Saffron Straits *3 of 3*

   by Shella Longclaw

               “I look back at this voyage with both wonder and regret,” quote from Prince Choq Nen. Having plundered the Jade Sea and Summer Sea, the twenty-one-year-old Pirate Prince decided to journey for new riches further east. He sets sail for the first time on his dragon skin vessel commonly called the Tanned Boat. He figured that he needed the fire resisted vessel to survive the perils of traveling through the Saffron Straits.

               Like Tarth the Sapphire Isle, the Saffron Straits aren’t named this for either growing saffron nor for a saffron trade route. It’s called this for the native large, saffron colored crabs which are the size of elephants. The deadly creatures are known to feast on men from time to time. Though, the crabs didn’t devastate the people of Ulos. According to Yi Tish records, the kingdom of Asshai had conquered the small islanders and brought every last one of them over to their kingdom as slaves. Though, it wasn’t Asshai that concerned the Pirate Prince. “My men and I keep one eye open for tiger-men’s ships prowling hungrily the strait.”

               After the defeat of the Bloodstone Emperor, his allies, the tiger-men relocated to the lands of Ulthos. That is one place, which would be amazing to explore, though first meeting the powerful tiger-men must be done carefully. Scribe Ayo Ve wrote that the Pirate Prince and his crew were fortunate to not run into any of them as the pirates traveled through and back in Saffron Straits.

               The description of the land, the people and animals of these lands will not be supported nor discredited by me. To the kingdom east of the tiger-men are called the Kay-eri, who are known for their mushroom hats and friendly nature. They ride foxes, as they herd their cattle. The pirates looted nothing there, but they traded seeds for moonstones.

              Past what we now called the Shadowlands, the pirates spotted a serpopard devouring a blue crow by the shore. They raid merfolks on the edge of land before endless sea. They gained blue and green pearls, and red and orange coral, and hooped snakeskin. The loot is currently held in the palace of Yin. The Pirate Prince and his men venture into the unknown sea for five days. They had decided that if nothing is seen, they will sail back.

            On the fourth day, three islands appeared on the horizon. “It appears men that pirates have already claim this spot, though they claimed it poorly.” A ship was observed on one of the island’s shore raiding. The islanders were winning the battle against the invaders. Since the islanders were allied with the merfolk, Nen joined the fight and supported the unknown pirates. Despite the language problems between the two pirates, they were victorious against the islanders. The loot was split fairly between the two invaders’ sides. This is where things start sounding familiar.

          The unknown pirates claimed to hail from isles further east. They picked all the iron ore and left the platinum for the Yi Tish. Nen called them Iron Pirates because they seemed to cherish iron. They had slaves rolling below the deck of their ship. The two groups shared a meal together in peace. It was then that sailor Koi gutted a poisonous kumi lizard and showed an Iron Pirate’s daughter how to do it. He fancied this woman Lady Salt and asked for her hand in marriage. Koi gave an old pirate a dragon bone hilt Valyrian steel dagger for her. The old evil pirate used the dagger to stab Koi in the back. A fight erupted between the Yi Tish pirates and the Iron Pirates.

         Thankfully, another band of pirates with grey leather skin and two large fangs attacked the Iron Pirates, and Nen and his men were able to escape. Though I don’t doubt the account, I do believe there is more to the story. The interpreter had been a failed scribe who admitted in his journal that he couldn’t completely comprehend the strangers. He didn’t know if the young man and young woman’s name was Rock and Salt, or if they were simply comparing them to salt and rock. I believe these strangers are actually the Ironborn. If this is true, it would give a reason for the sudden attack.

          A Yi Tish man commonly gives a dowry for a lady, while in Westeros, a father of the lady gives a prospective husband a dowry. Koi’s polite gesture might have been view as an insult by the Ironborn who believed he sought to buy the young woman as a slave. Sadly, both Koi and the young woman perished in the conflict, and the dagger was taken by an Ironborn. I can’t be certain of this, so I ask if a maester might inquire of the Ironborn about this event to confirm it or deny it. I am curious about what happened to the dagger as well.

          In any regard, this was the last voyage of Prince Choq Nen. “Koi was my brother, and the crew has always been my family if only I had been blessed not to be a prince. I must retire my post because I can’t bear to lose any more of you, and a good captain is fearless.” He gave up his ship and position as captain to one of his men. He married a deceased sailor’s widow and lived on one island of the Manticore Isles. It’s rumored to this day that his home became a haven for Yi Tish pirates.

          His legacy has captured the hearts of young Yi Tish sailors. Over thousands of years, many pirates would hold titles such the “Master of Currents” (a title which Nen referred to himself) and Indigo Pirates in honor of him. As for his astonishing ship the Tanned Boat, its fate is uncertain. Some scholars claimed that it was destroyed in a battle against another pirate, while some scribes believed that a second dragon skin ship had been destroyed, and Prince Choq Nen’s descendants kept the vessel. No one knows.

[adw520]

Better Dylan Info Post (aka Dylan Lore Dump 1)

because I realized in the light of day that my last post was not very well organized or worded (I was very tired)

First off have another picrew. Baydews' character creator is my favorite one out there. Djarn's comes in close second, but I haven't made Dylan there yet.

☆ Her full name is Dylan Strand. For etymology nerds like me, Dylan is from the Welsh prefix 'dy', meaning to/towards, and word 'llanw', meaning tide/flow. Strand is from the Old Norse word for beach. Assuming the site I used to get this information is accurate, anyway.

☆ On a slightly related note, apparently Dylan isn't really used for girls outside the US? I wasn't aware it was such a unique thing.

☆ Her birthday is Summer 21. I used a random date generator and converted it to Stardew time. I think I still have the calculations somewhere in my phone's notes.

☆ She's 5'10", which is a little on the tall side. She has her mom to thank for that.

☆ Blue Moon Farm is on the forest map, which is without a doubt my favorite farm map.

☆ Dylan's mom lives off the east coast of the Ferngill Republic. Dylan and her dad moved to Zuzu City when she was about 6 to be closer to her grandpa, but returned to visit every year for Dylan's birthday. Her grandpa loved to talk about Blue Moon Farm and show her pictures from its heyday. He passed the year she graduated high school.

☆ She loves to fish and can rival Willy in skill. Some might think it's magic, but she's actually just had a lot of practice.

☆ While she generally follows the universal gifts, she loves Golden Coconut, Dragon Tooth, and Seafoam Pudding. She likes all kinds of fish as well as Sea Urchins. She's neutral about all Tackle, Bait, and Monster Loot, as well as Fairy Dust and the Tea Set. She only dislikes Joja Cola, but she hates Qi Fruit.

☆ She likes bright colors. Her favorite is yellow.

☆ I mentioned before that Dylan has trouble localizing sounds. In humans, the shape of our outer ears plays a big part in localizing sound. Dylan has no real outer ears, and her inner ears are structured a little differently to help with hearing underwater. If she were to keep her fins out, they'd do a fairly decent job of helping to localize sounds. However, they're more effective for that purpose underwater than on land, and they're not much help at all held flat against her head and hidden by her hair.

☆ Her fins are pierced! She normally wears a pair of large gold hoops, but she owns a few different pairs of studs for times where there's a risk of the hoops getting yanked out. She also likes necklaces, but isn't a fan of bracelets or rings.

☆ The effect of the full moon isn't entirely because of her heritage. There's a psychological aspect to it as well. The spring tides from a full and new moon have equal pull on her, but because new moons lack the light of a full moon, she doesn't have that visual indicator. With a full moon, it becomes a sort of self-fulfilling prophecy. She's so worried about giving into the pull that it happens. Her umbrella is a visible barrier between herself and the moon to help put her mind at ease and keep from working herself up into an unplanned nighttime swim.

☆ I'm putting the Stardew lunar cycle at 20 days. It's a lot longer than a direct conversion would have it, but 9 days seemed a bit short for my liking. I'm also aware that spring tides are technically the high tides the night after a full or new moon, but I'm choosing to ignore that. My made-up lore, my rules.

☆ She has some small scales scattered around with her freckles. She also has gills hidden under her jaw. They seal themselves when she's above water, and open when she submerges.

☆ The forest magic the wizard gave her almost made her sick enough to go to the clinic. Fortunately, her body adjusted to it before it could get that bad. A full ocean spirit wouldn't have been so lucky.

[toomagazineperfection]

A night of heaven.

A start of night.

A tell of tale.

A time in keep.

A mouth in her.

A lie.

A seep.

A soot.

A simp.

Her kajol.

Her lepa on kshi's height.

She was a twin of brotherly ink.

A swadesh wasi.

A sight-loshi.

A mouth.

A leaf.

A light.

A leap.

A lape.

A loon.

A slight.

A date.

A right.

A same.

A light.

A lane.

A loot.

A size.

A hop.

A hoop.

A line.

A boundry.

A light drew her.

She is her.

Sunidhi

[cielsosinfel]

FFXII has a lot of hidden OP items that are so extremely exhausting to get... and it's honestly making me nostalgic for when this was the norm in JRPGs, for there to be ultra-rare but extremely OP weapons and armor and whatever, or hidden bosses with quadruple the stats of any other in the game, that you need to jump through hoops to unlock.

I actually really miss these kinds of gameplay elements, because even though they're usually too tedious for me to go through, they add this like... mystery to the game? Some excitement over discovering something so gamebreaking and outside the bounds of the base game? The accomplished feeling of finally getting a rare item or beating a ultra-difficult boss after hours of life spent suffering through the steps and the Game Overs. Wondering at how the HELL anyone worked out the steps to unlock the damn things. IDK how to describe it lol it's the kind of thing I feel has been lost in the era of DLC.

Right now I am struggling through hoops to get a Nihopalaoa, an accessory that reverses effects of items used on a target. This leads to the potential to throw a Remedy (status condition cure-all) at an enemy, and inflict them with every single negative status they're susceptible to (so some enemies you can toss it on and they'll get Sap/Disease/Doom/Poison/etc all at once.)

this is TL;DR and absolutely uninteresting to anyone else probably

To get this item in the Zodiac Age remaster, you have several options:

-Play through the optional Trial Mode, where you defeat waves of enemies to get to the next Trial, and after every 10 trials you get a rewrd. This accessory is stealable from the mobs on Trial 70 (out of 100)

-A chest in Henne Mines Phase 2 Dig. The chest only has a 25% chest of spawning. To access Phase 2 Dig, you first collect 10 espers (basically optional bosses that you defeat to unlock summons), and defeat a VERY difficult Hunt quest. This is actually the location for Zodiark, the most difficult esper boss to defeat, and the area is packed with over-powered mobs.

-A chest with a 5% spawn chance at Subterra, which is basically near the very end of the game

-A Bazaar purchase. The Bazaar is a way of purchasing items that only unlock as you sell Loot; different combinations of loot will unlock different bazaar goods. Nihopalaoa is unlocked by selling: Blood-stained Necklace x3, Death's Head x2, Leo Gem x3.

Leo Gems are a rare loot drop that can only be stolen from Diresaurs (basically big T-rex mobs.) They have a 3% steal rate. For the other two, you can't get them as Steal loot until you unlock the Warmage Monograph, which requires opening the Hunt Board 30 times so you can purchase the monograph form the bazaar. Blood-stained Necklace can only be stolen from Shambling Corpses, which only spawn in the area where you find the esper/boss Adrammelech. They are also continuously spawning and you are easily overwhelmed fighting them, especially if you're unable to take down Adrammelech. Death's heads are a 10% steal loot from Dark Skeletons. Dark Skeletons are in two places: Paramine Rift, where they randomly spawn in a couple zones; and Golmore Jungle, where they spawn in one specific zone only if you destroy every other mob on the map and defeat the Rare Elite Mob that spawns.

So which one of these is the easiest, most accessible option? The fourth one that involves hours upon hours of grinding in the hopes of stealing some rare drops from mobs in very annoying locations????

Yes. Yes that's the easiest one.

Anyway it took me 2 hours across a couple days to steal 2 Death's Heads and I now must go and attempt to steal 3 Blood-Stained Necklaces (thankfully I have Thief's Cuffs so the drop rate is doubled to a whopping 6%.)

Wish me fucking luck. I don't even need this accessory. I just want boss fights to be as easy as possible without losing my mind getting the ultra ultra ultra OP but extremely tedious arms.