#Nuke Ignorance Busters

[lucyoccupy]

PERMANENT NOTICE: US HIGH RADIATION ALERT

PERMANENT NOTICE: US HIGH RADIATION ALERT

Million a Week Club – YRTW 2019.24 – Your Cumulative Radiation

This radiation stuff does not go away!

By Bob Nichols – July 6, 2019

TOTAL GAMMA RADIATION USA

  Summary

The nearby Targeted Individuals of US nuclear power plants are 160,876,377 people by the official 2010 US Census. The next official census starts in 2020.

The poor souls live within range of a leaking nuclear power plant and…

[adhdvane]

Talking about GW/U&F Under the Cut because it’s gunna be a long ramble

S here’s my rankings (I want to save these and post them in this entry for myself, I want to better keep track of how much I do so I can keep a log of how much stupid effort I end up putting into this godda.mn event each time to see how my progress goes) Individual:

i’m like both proud and dead (ignore dark team, this was fire favored but final rally zeus is light, so kill him with dark team). i could solo nm 100 just fine, like much better than pervious events, including the last wind gw in June 2020 (which does tell me hey, you’ve improved a lot on your fire team in the past year), it’s just soloing nm 100 took like ~10 minutes and required me paying attention. by day 3 burn out was real (despite there being no 24 hours interlude this year because of server issues delaying prelims, lol let me tell you when i went to check the prelims on my break to find out oops sorry we’re delaying prelims a day bc ppl had issues last night when we started at 3 am your time, rip). nm 95, you see, that i could make a full auto team for and just summon the devil and skill cast a couple of the skills click attack and then full auto, and ignore the game for like 4 to 4:40 minutes. so while i did do some nm 100 runs, i mostly defaulted to nm 95 (on another note i could 1 turn nm 90 with my break/od team bandit tycoon/5* tien/summer bea/5* zeta and so during prelims and round 1 that felt really good). on the one hand it hurts that i ignore my main fire set ups for favor a full auto team (rb/sieg/heles/izmir) but like how else do i survive doing that many godda.mn raids without total burn out (and i mean the only difference is playing relic buster instead of lumberjack so no using my prized ullikummi and swapping tien out for heles bc tien is less full auto friendly bc you don’t want her buff skill activating before her damage. also i mean it was nice to let heles get exp so i got her to lv 100 during the event bc i’d leveled her to 95 prior. she has some good damage nukes, and her additional atk/def down stackable meant coverage when sieg or izmir’s didn’t land properly). besides i still got to use my main fire set up and ullikummi when i did the nm 100 runs (look i love my fire ullikummi + lumberjack i will never shut up about how good it is and how happy i was i went through with it originally for a harp memeing only to discover WOW ITS JUST REALLY GOOD FOR MAINHAND PERIOD EVEN WITHOUT HARP MEMEING GRID). sure running nm 95 was. technically not optimal in terms of time/meat/tokens/honors but it was fckin optimal for my SANITY.

crew (day 4 at top - day 1 at bottom):

first of all slkdfsjk can’t believe i actually stayed above top 30,000. WOW THAT IS DEFINITELY A FIRST. third slkdjgsldf 3 of 4 won, one day i’ll get 4 of 4. tbh surprised i managed to win the last one (THE ONE AT THE TOP) (i was... i was raiding from 3 pm - 4:40 am it was bad... i wanted to hit the 400mil individual mark for the reward bc i was close and like it would suck if i was only a little bit away)... it did feel good to actually win some though, i haven’t had victories in a while because despite the fact every gw i was definitely getting more honors than i had the previous one it was getting harder to solo shit when i’m against crews with multiple ppl participating. (HELL LAST GW, THE WATER BOSSES, WAS THE FIRST TIME I ACTUALLY MANAGED TO GET BACK INTO FCKING MAKING THE SOLO C TIER AFTER SEVERAL GW WHERE IT DIDN’T HAPPEN BECAUSE THERE WAS A BIG LEAP IN HOW MANY HONORS THAT 36,000 CREW HAD AT THE BOTTOM. also like lol at work so i can’t really start doing prelims until i get home bc i decided i wanted sleep in the morning)

other:

:) oh boy a single sunlightstone shard that’s going to sit there forever and never do anything bc how the fck am i ever going to do this 10 times. draw box fcking 50 is what i’m on. it takes 10k to empty. i would need 8k more tokens. i would get 100 tokens per extra zeus run.... im not doing 80 more zeus runs... i’ll .... just have to hit “toke draw 100 times” 21 times to use the rest of the tokens which is annoying. i guess. AND NOW WE COME TO THE REASON WHY I PUT SO MUCH GODDAMN EFFORT INTO THIS GW. gbf is a bastard man that wants me to 5* the rest of the eternals (5 of them) before i can transcend shisu to 140 ( ´•̥̥̥ω•̥̥̥` ) i hate it. so in order to get enough rev weapons to work on my next 5* i needed to 36 box for fif (i have 1 fully uncapped copy of her rev from when i was initially going to have to recruit her normally but then seeds of redemption happened in 2020 and i got her free + 50 five-star fragments, since i already had a fully uncapped copy i thought fine she’ll go next bc less weapons needed and also i have one of every other element 5* so i wanted to do her or song either way. plus maybe if i can 5* her i can actually go do that gilbert quest lol). i WOULD HAVE LOVED TO BOXED NW QUARTZ. I WOULD HAVE LOVED TO HAVE BOXED NW QUARTZ AFTER I 36 BOXED HER. BUT I KNEW IF I DID THAT, I WAS PROBABLY GOING TO INEVITABLE HIT BOX 46 BC OF THE RATE I WAS GOING AND IT WOULD FORCE ME BACK TO REV STAFFS AND I’D END UP WITH EXTRA COPIES WHEN I COULD HAVE BEEN STARTING THE NEXT SET I NEED. so instead of boxing the quartz i wanted after i switch to harps and IT sUCK. also depending on if i get the harp draw from the 2000 token i have left... i might continue zeus farm until i get it bc then at least i’ll have an even uncap on my harps (4 fully uncapped, bc i actually had a 1* harp in stash already.... bc those were FROM RANDOM DROPS I’D GOTTEN FROM GW IN THE PAST)

uhg anyways... this was like one of the first times in like a very long time that i didn’t fully burn out by day 3/4. i pushed through to the end like a godda.mn maniac. even in my early days i often just went lol im done on day 4... last gw i thought i was insane bc i got like ~158mil total honors (and EARTH IS LIKE ARGUABLY MY LEAST DEVELOPED). and this time i got over 400mil :) next one is going to be hell because my wind has be improved to 100% double tia crit and i have a my developed full auto team. oh fcking boy. 

[prettycottonmouthlamia]

F/GO 3-star Tier List

It is time for a 3-star Tier list. This one took a lot more time and deliberation and definitely has Servants whose placement is more arguable. There are also just a lot of good 3-stars in general, with most of them being A-ranks, although quite a few are pretty close to B-rank. 

Grails start making less of a difference here, to the point where this is the last time they’re worth mentioning. The boost in statistics helps 3-stars with better kits, typically later released ones, more than older Servants who have less useful kits. While a lot of 1 and 2-stars are significantly improved by Grails, 3-stars get more diminishing returns and so most of the time, bumps up the tier list are smaller. 

Also worth noting here: Casters who are more focused on dealing damage tend to get favored a little more. Assassins can be notoriously difficult enemies to face and having that defensive advantage can be really important. Casters are sub-par DPS usually compared to other Servants, but being anti-Assassin is really important. 

3-star Tier List (help me)

S-Rank Euryale: Euryale is on the lower end of S-rank. She is very focused onto her niche, but her niche is anti-Male, which is very wide and she's excellent in that niche. Between her NPs insanely high damage, her ability to charmlock, np drain, and lower attack, she can keep many Male enemies completely locked down. Even though Mental Debuff Immunity is more common, she still excels against the many male enemies regardless. Her very natrual synergy in Arts team is also noteworthy.

Grails will make her even more powerful than before. Her damage will be extremely high even against neutral and resisted classes, especially with support. Her initial niche problems still remain, but she'll still be really good.

Robin Hood: Robin Hood is one of the most consistent DPS Servants in the game. His bonus damage condition is incredibly easy to fulfill, since it can be applied to basically any Servant, he has two rather good skills, and his damage is incredibly high with zero offensive buffs to go with it. His face card damage is his only flaw as its rather weak, but his incredibly high NP damage will balance that out. An absolutely fantastic Servant. Watch out for Debuff immunity though.

Grails...will make him hit incredibly hard. A grailed Robin Hood can hit around 100k against neutral targets, so he's a very good grail invest.

Cu Chulainn: On the flipside from an extremely powerful nuke Servant, we have one of the most difficult to kill Servants in the game. Between Protection from Arrows, Battle Continuation, and Disengage, he can last a really long time against most enemies in the game. His NP will do a fair amount of damage too, although it has no real damage buffs to go alone with it. It's enough though, to do his job most of the time. Unfortunately, he has a major weakness against buff removal and Pierce Invul, and against certain bosses he might not be able to do enough damage to finish them off before he dies.

Grails help Cu out a lot. The extra HP makes him a lot tankier and he does more damage with the extra attack. A Level 100 Cu has a much broader range of enemies he can tank against effectively, although he still has the same weaknesses as before.

David: David is one of the best budget supports in the game, and it's almost purely because of his second skill, as one of the only sources of AoE protection in the game. He can also boost the party's Attack and has a lot of tankiness himself with his first skill. The only problem is that his NP is pretty weak, even against Saber targets, although it inflicts Skill Seal which can be helpful. David is a Servant that is very likely to end up in your party whenever there is an AoE NP coming your way, or to help protect fragile Berserkers.

Grails will make David's NP do a fair bit more damage, and he'll have fairly decent face card damage as well. It benefits him a lot less than other Servants because he's more support than tank or DPS.

Hassan of the Hundred Faces: If you've ever wondered who the stiff competition is for the Arts Assassin slot, its Asako. Her immediate strengths are not in super high NP damage, but it is in her amazing ability to loop her NP with the myriad modifiers to her ability to gain NP and her 13 hit NP. Not only that, but she also have an evasion skill and a really large heal that's not difficult to use, making her a strong solo Servant or in a party. Her NP will pretty much shut down enemy crits, although it is a little overkill, and she will reduce the enemy's Arts resistance by 20% to help support other Arts Servants.  

Grails will amp up her already rapidly escalating damage as well as give her more bulk. It makes her a more consistent solo Servant and gives her a stronger initial NP in a party. Overall great grail invest target.

Asclepius: Very easily the best healing support in the entire game. Medea Lily, BB, and Irisviel all have their niches, but Asclepius has some much in his kit to make him worthwhile. He has large heals, gives Guts, Debuff immunity, debuff clear, NP charge, NP gain up, NP seal...it's a very, very stacked kit. Asclepius can't really do damage and he's a little less effective if there isn't debuffs involved, but he's absolutely one of the best 3-star supports, period.

Grails will improve his HP, which can help Asclepius in more stall dedicated comps. It's not a great invest target though, because there are better stall Servants and he doesn't have a great benefit from having more ATK.

A-Rank (boy this is gonna be big) Gaius Julius Caesar: Caesar is a one man wrecking ball. He can do incredible amounts of NP damage thanks to his large buff numbers and upgraded NP, way surpassing other Saber DPS Servants like Bedivere. In addition, he can also be used as a viable support Servant, due to the fact that none of his boosts are selfish and either help the whole party or can be targeted. His lack of survivability and his more subpar NP gain hold him back from being a strong S-rank, but its pretty close.

Grails boost his damage to even more insane heights. He will still need help with his defenses since he still lacks any hard or soft survival, but he becomes a lower S-rank Servant with Grails just due to how powerful he is.

Boudica: Boudica requires a specific Servant to do anything, but on the plus side, she works with basically every Servant in the game. She is an insane damage booster support thanks to Romulus = Quirinus, giving a DPS 60% anti-Roman damage, 50% crit damage, 20% Arts performance, and a 20% Attack up, along with some Defense ups. It's enough to really send a Servant's damage sky high, which more than makes up for the specificity. If you're lucking enough to have Romulus yourself, you can use two Boudica for some really silly damage. Of course, Boudica doesn't do much outside of being a damage buffer, but she excels in what she does.

Grails will basically not improve her performance. She's not a tank like Mash and can't really do damage, so the extra HP and ATK are not super beneficial.

Ushiwakamaru: Ushi does really strong single target damage. She's not as absolutely crazy as Caesar is, but she has Evasion to keep her alive. Her buffs will make her do a lot of damage against Casters even on her own and with supports that damage can get a lot higher. She doesn't even have bad NP gain thanks to her first skill. What keeps her from S is that she lacks any utility and is a more selfish DPS than others.

Grails will naturally boost her damage even higher. It's enough to put her at the cusp of S-rank, a very, very high A-rank.

Alexander: Alexander is more of an offensive support Servant. He can certainly do good AoE damage, but he's a little outclassed in that regard but other Servants who are more consistent. His ability to buff the damage of Quick servants and remove buffs grants him a powerful support role while also having the ability to do damage and generate stars. He'll be less useful if there aren't Quick servants, but overall, he can still do fairly well in a support role.

Grails will primarily boost his damage out with his NP. He's still A-rank because his NP is not his primary role, but he makes a good invest target none the less.

Cu Chulainn (Caster): Caster Cu is a supremely sturdy Caster-class. He's got the same Protection from Arrows his Lancer version have, and Caster Cu has a mix of the two for his other skills. His Rune Magic is considerably better since it charges his NP charge, although his Disengage isn't anymore potent. With an upgraded NP and a 20% Buster effectiveness buff he'll do fairly decent damage, but his overall NP damage is still really low since its an AoE NP with only a small damage buff. Like his Lancer version, his strength is in his survival, not his raw damage.

Grails have a similar effect on Caster Cu that it does on Lancer Cu. It pushes him to a low S-rank because he still is a little inferior in terms of survivability and damage than Lancer Cu, but he's better at dealing with multiple enemies.

Lu Bu Fengxian: Lu Bu is one of the kings of single target damage. Thanks to his various buffs, he does a lot of single target damage and functions as a very powerful nuke that ignores defensive buffs. Unfortunately, two of his skills have some fairly hefty demerits and he needs outside support to do much after his NP. It's counterbalanced by his NP doing a lot of damage, but in several cases Lu Bu is not strictly needed and falls into a low A rank.

Grails make Lu Bu do more big boom kill and makes him a little less frail overall. It puts him in high A-rank, as it still doesn't solve any of the initial problems in his kit, but just makes him better at what he does.

Cu Chulainn (Prototype): Cu Chulainn Proto can be considered a more offensive version of normal Lancer Cu. It's a comparison that's waned since Cu has gotten strengthened, but Proto Cu still has very good survivability, crit damage, and anti-Wild Beast damage. He'll still be good in situations where normal Lancer Cu is, but less effective because of his lower overall DPS. Against Wild Beast enemies he'll vastly outperform him however.

Grails will improve Cu Prototype much in the same as Lancer Cu, and put him in a more mid ground S tier, similar to Euryale. Good servants who excel in their niche, although Cu is a little less extreme about it.

Paracelsus von Hohenheim: Paracelsus is one of the best Arts supports in the entire game. He has an amazing ability to enable Arts servants to do more damage and have a much better shot at looping their NPs, thanks to his Arts bonus and very high NP gain bonus. This is pretty much Paracelsus' niche however, as his NP is incredibly weak because of its lacking power and so will even struggle to take out waves of Assassin enemies. Fortunately, you don't really need him to do this, as whoever he is buffing is probably more than capable of doing it themselves.

Grails do not really benefit Paracelsus because he's still not a good farmer even with the extra ATK. He might be able to kill some Assassin waves but there are much better Servants to invest grails in and he basically doesn't change in viability.

Charles Babbage: Charles is probably the lowest A-tier on this list. He's generally pretty decent at dealing with Assassin waves and even bosses because of his good buffs and double buster deck. Unlike other Casters who do lack some synergy because of their triple Arts deck, Babbage can fully utilize a number of supports thanks to his second buster card and star absorption skill. He's not very useful outside of dealing with Assassins, but it is an important niche to have and Babbage is the best 3-star for doing that in terms of damage.

Grails have an unfortunate affect on Babbage. He has one of the lowest ATKs post grail which means they don't actually boost his damage all that much, but rather give him a lot of HP. It doesn't really help his position, but, it can still be useful if you want a decent budget Assassin killer.

Fuuma Kotarou: Fuuma is a pretty good AoE Assassin. He provides a lot of utlity to the team, from crit chance down to a targetable Evade, Buff Block and Def down along with a severe debuff resistance down, and an NP that provides a further defense down as well as the chance to inflict Skill Seal. It's a really good kit that allows him to excel in multiple situations. He's also pretty good at generating crit stars thanks to his good hit counts, but his primary weakness is that his NP is a little underpowered despite the Defense down on his 3rd skill, and his NP gain is not very good as his Quicks under perform in that regard.

Grails will boost his damage output to the point where he would qualify to fit in high A rather than mid-A. He's not quite S-rank with grails because his NP gain is still rather subpar and hence it is difficult for him to ramp up his damage past that.

Tawara Touta: Touta fits in mid A rank. He has a lot of bulk to work with, with his Evasion and multiple heals, and all of his damage buffs last for 3 turns which is very nice for overall damage. His NP will deal a lot of damage against Demonic enemies, of which there are several to where his niche will come in handy, and it can even be good against some Servants. Outside of his niche, he's just a bulky Archer with semi-decent damage, but he is very good at dealing with Demonic enemies compared to other Servants.

Grails will push him a little higher into A-rank, helping to keep his damage a little more consistent and a fair bit higher in his niche. The extra HP will also help his bulk out, and so he is a good invest target.

Bedivere: Bedivere is a very solid offensive Saber Servant. He has a decent Buster up on his NP as well as a modest NP damage up, as well as some defensive skills against debuff and an NP charge. His NP charge is what helps him remain in competition with Caesar as it makes his NP more consistent, although considerably less powerful. His Buster gets a lot better with Overcharge as well, so it is worth exploring that option because his scales considerably well. His lack of hard survival is a downside, and even though he has a 30% NP charge, his overall NP gain is a still a little low for his card set.

Grails help out Bedivere more than Caesar because Bedivere needed the extra power to compliment his consistency and better survival, which puts him in a solid S-rank compared to Caesar's low S-rank.

Jaguar Man: Jaguar Man stands out as the most offensive Lancer in the 3-star lineup. She has three powerful offensive buffing skills that make her face card and NP damage really good. She also has decent survival in her first skill with the 2 hit evasion, and more potential in Forest battlefields. However, Jaguarman isn't without fault. Her cooldown on her first skill is extremely long, and without the added star gen and star absorb on her third skill she may find it hard to crit. These are not insurmountable problems however, and she still has really good damage overall.

Grails boosts her durability which isn't very important but the extra damage you get is. It puts her in high A-rank with a very hard hitting NP and hard hitting crits, but her natural kit problems are still there unfortunately.

Billy the Kid: Billy is really good for being able to instantly pop an NP with Quickdraw and a 50% Starting NP CE. It not only ignores Evade and does fairly decent damage, but it also debuffs crit rate. Outside of that, Billy is a bit more mediocre than most. He has very high potential crit damage but he doesn't have a strong ability to generate stars so he will need outside support for that. He fits very well in low-A around where Babbage is because he is good when you need a quick ST NP, but may fall off.

Grails will boost Billy's damage to the point where he fits more solidly in A, although not quite mid A. It makes his NP do more damage which is what he needed because his NP is consistent already. A good buff in the future will definitely make him considerably better.

Christopher Columbus: The best AoE Rider in the 3-star rarity. He has a strong NP charge similar to Spartacus, as well as 3 steroids to boost his NP damage, one of which comes with a decent star bomb. His NP also comes with a large crit chance down to all enemies which is more than enough to shut them down entirely. He doesn't require supports but heavily benefits from them to improve his damage. He fits into low A because despite being the best AoE Rider and overshadowing numerous others, his NP gain is really bad so he will find it difficult to continue to perform in many cases.

Grails will put Columbus comfortably in mid A-rank. It improves his damage enough so it becomes pretty consistent overall, and although it doesn't help his NP gain, it helps with his initial game plan of a quick NP.

Hozoin Inshun: Inshun is pretty controversial. He has a potentially explosive ceiling to his damage, but can't always consistently reach it. He functions very well as a solo servant or in certain team comps. He's a low A-rank similar to Babbage and Billy, but purely because of his incredibly high damage output. If he were more mediocre, he'd easily fall into B-rank. His kit has really good synergy which makes him good for solos, but he doesn't have the most potent survival options which hampers him a bit. He's tricky to use but not bad, and doesn't require Skadi as many people think. He will work well with many support Servants.

Grails will push Inshun to mid-A. He still only works in those specific situations, but the extra bulk makes doing solos a lot easier and the extra atk pushes his damage ceiling even higher.

Okada Izou: As we move out of the continual low-A ranks, we finally reach a Servant who is probably just one buff away from being an S-rank. He has very good damage on his NP thanks to his incredibly high Humanoid bonus, but also his high crit star generation and crit damage will allow him to continue to do high damage when his Huamnoid buff is in downtime, and he synergizes with crit based Arts supports even better than Asako. There are two main problems though: he is a limited 3-star, which means getting NP5 is more difficult and his viability will fall with lower NP levels because he needs to use his NP consistently, and he's extremely selfish and offers no real utility, just damage. Still a fantastic Servant overall however.

Grails will push Izou right into S-rank due to providing the extra damage he needs to be consistent overall. A fantastic invest target.

Avicebron: Avicebron is one of the strangest Servants on this list. He has a very consistent NP but it is not strong, and only has a modest overcharge effect. The reason he is here is because of his 3rd skill, which provides the party a solid heal and 3 hits of invulnerability when he dies. This is a really, really good skill for coming back from the brink, it works incredibly well with any Servant that has a hard survival option or Guts. He's even more consistent if you have something like the GUDAGUDA Poster Girl CE to reliably trigger his 3rd skill, although waiting for an NP is also a viable decision.

Grails don't really improve Avicebron since he's basically mostly used for his 3rd skill, and not for damage purposes. Extra HP may impede his ability to trigger his skill as well.

William Tell: Tell is a weaker Robin Hood in terms of raw NP damage and consistency. While his NP has similar numbers, it has a much harder condition to fulfill, and as of today, May 9 2020 (I’m keeping this here to show how long this one took comparatively), there is no way to give Evasion to the opponent, so there's no way to fulfill this condition without relying on the enemy. If this was all there was, he'd probably end up in B-rank. However, he has more than simply just his NP. He has a massive 30 crit star bomb, a very solid 3 turn Arts performance and 3 turn debuff immunity, as well as a massive 100% crit damage for 1 turn, so he can function with crit damage as well as NP damage and has enough utility to make it to A-rank, and his NP damage if the opponent has Evasion is even more nutty than Robin's, inconsistent as it is.

Grails boost Tell's damage output, but the problem with Tell is more in his consistency than his raw damage, which is enough as it is. He's not a bad grail invest target for sure, but until more reliable Evasion abuse comes into play, Tell won't rise into high A or S-rank.

Mori Nagayoshi: More is another limited 3-star, and another high A-rank. His damage potential is incredible, with a strong Attack up and an incredibly strong crit damage up as well. He even gives the team a star bomb when he dies, which is very useful. His NP is decent and inflicts a Def down plus giving Pierce Invul, but it is not the focal point of his kit and so even though he is limited, his NP level is less of a liability than Izou. Mori is incredibly frail however, as he gives himself defense debuffs, and once he boosts his crit damage, pretty much all buffs will fail on him. He still remains an absolutely insane crit monster though.

Grails will push Nagayoshi into low S-rank. In truth, he was a very high A-rank to begin with so even though he does more damage, it's not a massive leap in usefulness, but he's a good grail target none the less.

Mandricardo: Now for the Blackjack 21 A-rank, Mandricardo. Mandricardo is another solid A-rank, and competes with Ushi for the role of ST damage dealer. He doesn't do as much damage as Ushiwakamaru does, but, offsets that by his NP being an Arts NP, granting him a different set of supports as well as more potential for refund and looping. In addition, he also can give himself a Taunt which is always appreciated even if he is not much of a tank. He lacks any hard survival but makes up for it with good raw damage. His second skill is a great last resort option for dealing huge damage and removing an enemy's defensive buffs.

Grails will push Mandricardo to the very bottom of S-rank. He's a little higher than Ushi here because he's more likely to get multiple NPs off, and so the extra damage compliments the consistency that he is able to get. If he gets an NP interlude soon, he'll fit nicely into S-rank.

B-Rank (yes, they exist) Medea: Medea has some pretty good things going for her. She has buff removal on her NP and a hugely powerful NP charge on her first skill, allowing her to do buff removal on demand, and often multiple times very quickly. She also can clear debuffs and boost NP gain for a turn. Unfortunately, her NP damage is really bad due to having really low damage values on her NP, and with more servants getting buff removal her niche is no longer as strong as it was before. She's still good and with proper support she can do fairly good damage, but she's not always the best choice.

Grails do boost her damage, but unfortunately, its not really enough to push her out of B-rank.

Medusa: Medusa has a few pretty good parts of her kit, including a decent stun, NP charge, and NP gain up. Her NP will also boost the party's star gen and decrease enemy crit chance. However, unfortunately, Medusa's kit is a little disjointed without much synergy, she doesn't benefit herself from the star bonus, and her Quicks are terrible and make using her more difficult. She can be good if paired with Alexander, but she doesn't quite make the cut compared to Columbus, but still a high B-rank.

Grails help her damage out and will help to put her in low A-rank, a little higher than Columbus, since her damage will be better. She also trades Guts for a Stun, which is roughly even.

Romulus: Romulus has a very good kit that ties together really well: a lot of healing, an NP charge, a strong but inconsistent Attack and Defense up, and a targetable Guts with a Buster up attached to it. Romulus can do really surprising damage with his NP when he lucks out with Imperial Privilege, especially since its unupgraded. In addition, his NP will further boost his damage. Romulus is mid-A because his second buff is inconsistent and his 3rd buffs are extremely short lived, especially the Guts which hampers its use as a defensive tool.

Grails will boost his damage, but it doesn't solve the glaring problems in his kit. He will actually do more damage ungrailed with Imperial Privilege than Grailed without it, so it doesn't really change where he stands in B-rank.

Darius III: Darius is a pretty low-B. He has three pretty good skills in Golden Rule, Disengage, and Battle Continuation which all synergize well together. Healing, debuff removal, and Guts provides longevity while Golden Rule helps to make the NP more consistent. His NP will do decent damage to all enemies and debuff them, but he's not very high impact. Like Bloodaxe, who is similar, the lack of good steroids hurts, and both are outclassed pretty heavily by Spartacus.

Grails will put Darius in more of a mid to upper B-rank. He still has his flaws but he does more damage overall which is useful.

Hector: Hector is another AoE Lancer, and while he doesn't have the raw damage Romulus can have, he's more consistent and provides more utility, making him a solid B-rank. His NP drain and Stun are always inconsistent, but it is still a valuable tool especially on a 5-turn cooldown, and he also provides damage cut for the party, and can heal debuffs. His NP is very bread and butter but ignores Defense buffs which can be useful.

Grails will push him to an upper B-rank by giving his NP a bit more power to compete with Romulus more. Outside from that it's not especially impactful.

Fergus mac Roich: The Saber Buster gorilla. Fergus' damage can be kind of surprising because of his triple Buster kit and solid Attack steroid. He even comes with good survival options in an evade and a couple of defense buffs. His NP is AoE, does decent damage, and inflicts a Defense Down for more face card damage. Unfortunately, his NP generally requires either support or a Kaleidoscope to get consistently, which lowers his ceiling, and while his face card damage is good, he won't be able to keep up in ST with Bedivere or Caesar.

Grails give Fergus remarkably good stats, giving him a lot of HP and a pretty good amount of Attack. It's enough to push him into a low-A-tier because of it. Having the extra HP helps with building his NP gauge indirectly as well.

Kid Gil: Kid Gil is a pretty good silver AoE Archer. Unfortunately, he's not that great overall. He benefits from having a solid Charisma and really good NP gain with Golden Rule, but he only comes out of it with decent NP damage and an NP that's incredibly hard to time right thanks to its 1 turn debuffs. His Charm is also really inconsistent and not a strong point in his kit, thanks to having no survival options. He can overperform with the right timing, but overall is just a decent AoE with no real niche other than good NP gain.

Grails help to push him into high B thanks to his higher damage, but he's not going to be able to compete with Touta or Arash most of the time even with Grails. It is still, however, a decent option.

Geronimo: Geronimo has really good NP damage for his class, and his NP has a number of good, if a little underpowered, effects attached to it. The problem with Geronimo is that everything else is completely out of whack, and he barely qualifies for B-rank as a result. His Buster up isn't completely useless even those his Quick up is, and his NP gain is decent enough but nothing spectacular. Geronimo definitely has the potential to rise up into A-rank and be a really good Assassin killer, but he needs buffs to do that.

Grails push Geronimo to a solid B-rank by giving him more damage, enough damage to start being a threat to some neutral weak waves of mobs instead of just Assassins. It's not enough to carry him any further though.

Hassan of Serenity: Serenity fits very nicely in B-rank. She's nowhere near as good at dealing damage as Asako is, since her NP damage is pretty low due to low ATK and no damage buffs. On the hand, she provides a lot more utility than Asako does and fits nicely into more defensive teams. She has NP drain, crit chance down, crit star bombs, Skill and NP Seal. She can even do some fun DoT strats if you have the right units. Her NP gain isn't great though and using her offensiely is really tough to justify.

Grails push Serenity almost to A-rank. It's a sizable boost to her damage and makes her more consistent, which helps with her utility, but she really can't break into A-rank just because of specificity.

Red Hare: Red Hare is middle B-rank, and probably the worst of the 3-star AoE Riders. His kit is more crit based, having more abilities to make crit stars and do decent amounts of crit damage. The problem is all of his damage boosts are burst in nature, only working a certain number of hits, which doesn't work well with the crit strategy, and his NP damage is rather low and he doesn't have a good overcharge. He does have a good evasion though and can be useful, but isn't consistent enough.

Grails help out his damage, especially for his, and because of this he rises to just about Medusa. He can do more damage overall, but timing is still a problem with his skills, especially since they don't last too long.

Antonio Salieri: Probably the highest B-rank, and very close to an A-rank. Salieri is useful because he's a good offensive Avenger, with decent burst damage and crit potential. He's very similar to Red Hare, but being Arts is a bit more advantageous, and his overcharge eff is better on his NP. Unfortunately like Red Hare, he suffers from having similar issues with his skills, although it is more in terms of burst effectiveness rather than timing like Red Hare. His niche in killing Rulers and Berserkers is also really notable, as he doesn't face any competition except from Gold units.

Grails give him that extra oomph to land him in low A-rank, as he'll do more damage with his crits and his NP this way.

C-Rank Kiyohime: Kiyohime can do some fairly decent damage with her NP, but her kit lacks any hard survival skills and lacks any way to make her NP more consistent. She has a very good Quick and Extra card, but they really rely on other Arts card to generate a lot of NP. Her Def up is largely mitigated by her Stalking and her burn and stun gimmicks are too inconsistent to be used reliably. Overall, there are just better AoE Berserkers to use than Kiyohime.

Grails boosts Kiyohime's damage enough that she'll end up in low B-rank. All of her problems still exist, but she can deal enough damage with her NP to take out even more mid-tier waves and so can be useful there.

Gilles de Rais (Saber): Gilles is a heavily outclassed Servant, but can function as a pretty decent damage dealer thanks to his large buffs and psuedo-permanent Buster buff. Some of his weaknesses can be mitigated thanks to Command Codes, which helps out his bulk and consistency. Gilles would be a lot better if his Tactics did something useful to him, or if his NP buffs lasted longer and maybe give him more crit stars, but right now, he's a Servant who has a potentially good ceiling that requires a lot of help to get there.

Grailed Gilles is still a C-rank Servant. He can do more damage than before, and has a lot more HP to tank on, but he is still a flawed Servant that requires support and is only useful in certain situations.

Mephistopheles: Mephisto is a rather unique C-rank, because he does actually have a pretty relevant niche. His third skill inflicts a 3-time buff block, the best in the game in fact, and can make or break certain boss battles. Unfortunately, Mephisto is C-rank because that is pretty much where his usefulness lies. He has a mediocre Witchcraft which isn't ever fully reliable and a poor star regen skill, and an NP which doesn't do anything notable. Even upgrading his buff block doesn't do anything notable. Mephisto is probably the C-rank Servant you'll be using the most, but if you don't need buff block, there's no reason to use him over better Casters.

Grails improve his NP damage but it doesn't change his standing at all. His NP still isn't good and he has no way to boost its damage on his own. Grails aren't going to help someone whose niche is primarily a one-time skill use.

Jing Ke: Jing Ke is really close to being a competent B-rank. Jing Ke can do some really competent burst damage, but unfortunately, its only when the stars align (get it?). Her damage buffs only last for 1 turn and so don't have good uptime, he hit count is bad so she relies on her NP to generate stars, and she's incredibly fragile due to having low HP, no survival skills, and an NP that inflicts damage to her. A lot of launch Servant woes end up compounding onto Jing Ke, and while she's the best Quick Assassin DPS on a budget, it's not a niche that necessarily needs filling all that often, especially since Asako is far better than her on general DPS.

Grails not only boost her NP damage, but also give her more HP which helps Jing Ke have some breathing room. She's still pretty flawed but does become a low B-rank because of how grails help her. You might be better off waiting for more Jing Ke buffs before grailing her, however.

Diarmuid Ua Duibhne: Another high C-rank that is really close to being a competent B-rank. Diarmuid is a pretty outclassed Lancer that suffers from having pretty bad utility and low damage output. He is certainly usable, but has serious flaws. His NP gain is only mediocre even with two Arts cards, his third skill is completely useless on him due to his incredibly low hit counts, Love Spot is very situational and is a null skill most of the time, and his NP, while it removes buffs, does low damage compative to other NPs. Some more buffs to his kit would make him more usuable.

Grails give Diarmuid the damage boost he needs in order to end up in B-rank. A grailed Diarmuid will end up being a fairly servicable Lancer who is fairly useful against female bosses, although he is still pretty outclassed by most other Lancers.

D-Rank Gilles de Rais: While Saber Gilles is at least somewhat interesting, Caster Gilles has pretty much nothing that makes him remotely usable. His only niche is Terror, but if you need someone who has mediocre, AoE Stun, you can use Shakespeare instead. Gilles has pretty much no useful skills, he has a AoE NP with no good effects and no way to boost its damage, and will always be outclassed even by the more mediocre Casters.

Grails will make him do more damage, sure. He will still bring less to the table than other Servants, and hence, will still continue to reside in D-rank.

Henry Jekyll and Mr. Hyde: In contrast to Gilles, Jekyll and Hyde are a very interesting Servant with an incredibly unique gimmick. Unfortunately, having a gimmick is not the same as having a niche. Jekyll is completely dead weight as an Assassin, having no ability to deal damage, providing meaningful support, or generate stars. None of his skils are remotely usable as Jekyll, his hit counts are bad, and his stat spread favors HP. His NP will change his class to Berserker, give him a large Max HP and Buster bonus, and fully heal him, but Hyde is still a pretty mediocre Berserker vulnerable to buff removal. A lack of a damaging NP means he can't really make use of his buffs beyond mediocre face card damage. The best thing about Hyde is the most consistent stun in game at 160%, able to even pierce really high debuff resistance, but the effort required to field that isn't useful. Jekyll requires a Waver level rework to really be worth taking seriously.

Grails make him better statistically, sure, but it has no real impact on his performance. Grail him if you like psycho twinks.

[dgcatanisiri]

Looking over the Sequel Trilogy as a whole... I figure that the way that polarization has worked in just about everything these days, people will dig in their heels either way, but... The Last Jedi really only works in isolation.

Which is a problem for what was movie two of a trilogy and movie eight of a saga.

More long-winded ramblings behind the cut.

Characters repeat beats, learn lessons that they already knew in TFA. It doesn’t properly set up things for the finale - the ONE thing it sets up is Kylo Ren as the leader of the First Order, but then that plot point really just gets Palpa-jacked. Otherwise... I’ve brought it up repeatedly in my critical posts of the movie, there’s not really a sense of hope at the end of the movie, not for the characters we’ve supposedly been emotionally connecting to throughout it. 

TLJ only broadly follows up on TFA, despite picking up almost right afterwards. Luke Skywalker went missing but left a map... to a place where he was waiting to die, alone and forgotten. Finn was critically wounded and left in a coma... then wakes up right away, right as rain. Meanwhile, the guy who got a scar in that same fight gets the emotional weight. Poe sent BB-8 into the desert with the vital intel, knowing that he’d be taken captive by the First Order, tortured and killed, because the mission was more important... then needs to learn the importance of sacrifice from Holdo. Rey becomes determined to reach out to and redeem Kylo Ren... the guy who she watched kill Han Solo, his father, her mentor, and critically wound the first person who came back for her, which was her driving motivation throughout TFA, to return to Jakku because she was waiting for her parents to come back for her.

Also this?

This is not the body language of a woman who has met her great true love and wants to save him from himself. This is a predator stalking her prey as she moves in for the kill. That is not intent to fuck, it is intent to kill. And that? That was the last meeting she had with Kylo Ren - a meeting she had every reason to believe would be their last, considering that Starkiller exploded a short time later.

Which is the OTHER big problem within TLJ’s narrative - the First Order is effectively the Empire in it, having infinite resources to throw at things. BUT the First Order was a fringe group in TFA. They were the scattered remains of the Empire who, in secret, managed to develop a planet-buster. This was their big move. But TLJ frames them as already controlling the galaxy. 

Trying not to get sidetracked, but that’s why the whole Poe-Holdo thing pisses me off. Based on the First Order of TFA, Poe made a sound tactical call in destroying the dreadnaught, depleting the First Order’s limited resources - that ship had to have thousands of FO soldiers and officers, a powerful siege weapon in its own right, and that’s the kind of mission you use bombers FOR, if they couldn’t handle that, they couldn’t handle any other kind of mission and should have been scrapped for parts. It’s just that TLJ treats the First Order as the Empire at its prime, with the infinite resources of a galaxy-spanning organization built on the bones of a thousand generation Republic, not the scavenged corpse of the Empire.

Starkiller’s reveal in TFA was like saying that some fringe political group got a nuke. TLJ says that, within the space of HOURS, that fringe political group took over the galaxy.

That’s another reason I dislike how this trilogy at large (not just TLJ, though that was where it grabbed my attention) portrays hyperspace travel as virtuously instantaneous, it makes the galaxy WAY too small.

In the end, this is also a story about heroic failure. Like, this is the most downbeat movie of the whole franchise in my book - even Revenge of the Sith feels more hopeful than this, because that last scene, of Owen, Beru, and Luke, looking out to the binary sunset... We have the context for those characters. We know that this is the start of hope, for the characters we care for. The end of TLJ? It ends on some kid we have no connection to staring up at the stars, with our heroes, the last hope against the encroaching Empire First Order all packed in to a beat up weed van. This movie presents the bleakest situation, because that’s all the hope we have, and it’s bitter at best.

All of this, ALL OF IT... The Last Jedi fails to connect to the movie that preceded it. Not only that, though... It also kept its main characters separated. None of the characters we’re supposed to care about are interacting with one another, they’re all in very isolated plots. This makes it hard to connect to their emotional arcs, because they’re not connecting or impacting one another. They spend TLJ isolated throughout the story, off doing separate things. Considering that much of TFA was Rey-Finn, and then TRoS features so much time with the trio, that REALLY stands out, and does so poorly. The core relationship of the previous movie is missing, and the successive movie takes it as a given. That’s a problem, a problem caused by TLJ.

The way I see it, Rise of Skywalker did the only thing it could with the pieces given to it by TLJ, it acknowledged them, but also moved on from them quickly. Because TLJ is not connected to the things that came before it, it hangs in isolation, and to try and make it fit detracts from the work you’re doing in the successive story, which now has to act to basically be a fast-paced part 2 AND a concluding part 3, all at once, because you wrote a standalone and called it a sequel.

Had TLJ existed as its own separate thing, this prospective trilogy that is supposedly in the works, a Star Wars Story movie, a mini-series, something like that, it’d have been better for everyone involved, I think. Unfortunately, that’s not what it was. And that makes it a painful and awkward addition to the saga. I’m not saying that Star Wars can’t be unconventional, that it can’t deconstruct itself, that it can’t reexamine things. But it needs to be done in the proper place.

Part two of an ongoing narrative is not that place. This part two discards and ignores character arcs established in the prior film, and really makes no effort to set up a successive film - again, TRoS is basically doing the work of telling part two and part three in the same film, because hey, stormtrooper rebellion, Jannah revealing that other stormtroopers have broken ranks, breaking the reins that hold them... This SHOULD have been established in the previous movie.

Like, if you cut Canto Bight, you really lose nothing of value to begin with, and if you replace it with an infiltration sequence featuring Finn and Rose, you gain a wealth of character development. But TLJ effectively shoved Finn aside - shoved TFA’s male lead, shoved the black man out of the position - for Kylo Ren, for a white guy. 

I imagine that JJ Abrams wanted to do more with Finn (considering he championed for Finn and John Boyega specifically), but he just couldn’t fit it all into the movie as it is - I’m already hearing rumbling that his initial cut of the movie was like three hours, almost an additional hour of film. Which sucks but... I mean, considering the cut down probably happened on orders from the Disney overlords, I figure he couldn’t do or say anything about it.

This trilogy has been very much a disaster on a writing level - trilogies should not be written entirely on the fly, with each film done by different writers. It should have been a singular writer, even if the directors shifted. As it is, I think that TRoS did the best it could with a lot of higher-up handstringing. 

[fgodestinyawakenings]

Gameplay first:

Finished the whole main quest, so the grail goes firstly towards Quetz onee-san! XD Will definitely raised her to 90 for all EXTRA 4* classes!

Sieg-kun’s bond level up and as such, he blessed me with his 2 SQs!

Ou-sama... Yeah, it’d be more perfect that he’s grailed to 100. But he isn’t my #1 husband... At least I’ll do it for his stats! Next one is without a doubt, my baby Herc-chan!

Tamamo Cat unlocked her new interlude, so will work on it when dead week comes!

Jeanne Alter finally ready, except her skills, to start roasting people alive at LB4!

Now, Challenge quest:

My set up: Okita Alter, Quetz-chan, Ishtar & Herc-chan as DPS, support Merlin and taunter George

Not the best setup because of the gimmicks for this entire fight

『Diary of Murasaki Shikibu』 (the grimore at the back) permanent buff

Trigger Upon Defeated: 

Grants Murasaki Shikibu Pierce Invincibility (1 turn) & Attack Damage Up (1 turn) and then debuff all front-line party members with "Inflict Star Generation Rate Down (1 turn) upon self at the end of every turn for 1 turn" [Permanent, Unremovable]

Heals Murasaki Shikibu by 15,000 HP at the end of every turn, as long as this unit is on the battlefield.

Delayed Invocation: After 4 turns, inflict Stun status on a target front-line party member that lasts for 3 turns + Inflict Instant Death to this unit [Demerit] [4 turns, Unremovable]

Genji Monogatari (the grimorie at the front): 

When defeated, grants Murasaki Shikibu 3 ticks of NP charge, and then debuff all Female front-line party members with "Inflict Charm status upon self at the end of every turn for 1 turn" [Permanent, Unremovable]

Grants Murasaki Shikibu Damage Resistance Up against all types of attacks, as long as this unit is on the battlefield. [Permanent, Unremovable]

Delayed Invocation: After 4 turns, inflict Buff Nullification on a target front-line party member that lasts for 3 turns + Inflict Instant Death to this unit [Demerit] [4 turns, Unremovable]

Murasaki herself:

Upon HP break:  Increases the healing received by 100%

This is from my fight and some videos, Murasaki will always resummoned the Genji Monogatari mob after HP break at certain level 

Some fights depend on your luck, Genji Monogatari may or may not always summoned Diary of Murasaki Shikibu after being summoned

Also do AVOID bringing Demonic Servants as her skillset and NP deals higher damage against them

The fight will nevertheless end when you defeat Murasaki herself, even if her two books are alive!

Whole CQ basically summarized start nuking all of them ASAP, which majority were able to went for 2 or 3 turn killing because of the gimmicks above

I tried for that but ain’t working well for my end. Okita Alter’s AOE NP cleared the books ONLY and doesn’t give a single scratch to Murasaki thanks to that permanent buff from genji monogatari

That buff of damage resistance made her receive 0 damage

And Quetz is unfortunately not able to kill her ASAP once the books are gone...

Plus my horrible luck still remains because after HP break, she summon genji monogatari which summoned back diary of murasaki 3 times!! OTL

Okita Alter and Merlin died expectedly, but thank god to George and Quetz-chan guts in keeping them alive along with Merlin’s NP buff

But mostly... THANK FUCKING GOD FOR QUETZ-CHAN BUSTER CRIT THAT KILLED HER AT THE END! OTL

Servants to bring for this fight:

Arash

The infamous suicide NP of his is most recommended in every video I’ve seen

The ideal one to clear the two books before letting your 2 Rider Servants on field with their NP to immediately go for HP break

Also helps in bringing out your support/next DPS Servant after his death

AOE Riders/Alter Egos/AOE Berseker

Budget Riders: Edward, Alexandar, Columbus, Medusa, Red Hare, Ishtar Rider

Can be put as second alternative to clear the books when Murasaki resummoned them at some point in the fight

Medusa’s first skill & Alexandar’s second skill helps to stall time for your team if needed 

Columbus & Red Hare for Ignore Invincibility skill but not really needed in the fight because of the damage resistance gimmicks and her skillset

AOE Alter Ego: Kiara & Okita Alter

After using Okita Alter... They are welcome as alternative if you don’t have good AOE Riders

But note when to defeat the 2 books, as defeating them right when her NP charge is buffing her with ignore invincibility AOE attack... Which their own skill set defense won’t be able to save them if it happens

As they received neutral damage instead, they’ll die quicker if crit fest happens

AOE Berserker: Spartacus, Darius III, Eric BloodAxe, Paul Bunyan, Chacha, Kiyohime

While they do help greatly with their 1.5x damage, you’ll need to set up a team to keep them alive as they receive the same 1.5x damage

ST Riders/Alter Egos/Berserkers (soloing against Murasaki once her mobs are killed):

ST Riders: Ushiwakamaru, Ryoma & Oryo, Sakata Kintoki, George (Yes she is a dragon, George!)

ST Alter Ego: Meltlilith, Passionlip, Mecha Eli-chan (preferably the last one if you got her from last year Halloween rerun)

ST Berserkers: Lu Bu, Jeanne Alter

By trait:

Female: Jack & Carmilla (which definitely not recommend with 3 Caster enemy killing them ASAP)

Humanoid: Nightingale (Izou same reason as the above, but remember to find a setup to keep her alive if you want bed throwing nurse as DPS)

Weak to Enuma Elish (need I say who?)

Support/Taunter servants: Depend on which DPS setup you’re going for, but I prefer for stalling because mob 3 tick NP charge + Murasaki’s NP charge will make her spam her NP more frequently

CEs:

Origin Bullet: Equip on your DPS to deal higher damage on her

500 years dedication: For taunters mostly to stall her from NP spamming

Starting NP CEs: To start your engine early in killing the books and her with NP ASAP!

Despite the above... I’m still not fucking done with point ladder. I got another 1 million point to go... So back to grinding hell!

[fapangel]

Unless the US resorted to an all out nuclear attack, there is no way that we could be certain of taking out all of NK's nuclear weapons. Any such all out attack would result in many millions of casualties in both North Korea and South Korea and almost certainly in Japan, China and Russia. Due to the fact that those US nukes would have to be detonated on the ground, in order to destroy widespread and deeply buried underground fortifications, as airbursts wouldn't be effective against deep bunkers

the resulting radioactive fallout would be particularly nasty and widespread. Not only would all of Japan (With a population of 130 million) be at risk for lethal levels of fallout, so would all of the West Coast of the USA (Alaska, Washington State, Oregon and California), as well as the coastal areas of western Canada and Mexico. Additionally, all of the Pacific fisheries would become poisoned due to the fallout and would be rendered toxic and unusable for decades to come.

Then there is the issue of sparking off a direct nuclear conflict with China and Russia. Once again, the simple reality is that the USA does not have conventional weapons that are capable of taking out all of the NK military/nuclear fortifications in one single surgical strike.

Without diving into a full argument in favor of counter-force strike, allow me to illustrate just how incorrect these misconceptions are. This isn’t your fault - everything you typed I have seen expressed, verbatim, by journalists, academics, and other people who should damn well know better. 

You have been lied to, deliberately and consistently. 

Lie #1: 

US nukes would have to be detonated on the ground, in order to destroy widespread and deeply buried underground fortifications, as airbursts wouldn't be effective against deep bunkers

Not if the B-61-12 is used, the latest modification of the B-61 nuclear freefall bomb to make it a precision-guided, earth-penetrating, low-yield bunker buster. The precision guidance (GPS/inertial) alone makes it far more effective, as doubling the accuracy of a weapon increases its destructive potential eightfold (a simple consequence of the inverse-square law.) The earth-penetrating ability increases the “shock coupling,” i.e. the kinetic energy transferred to the earth (to collapse deep bunkers like an “earthquake bomb” does,) and of course, the low yield greatly reduces the collateral damage and fallout effects. The only publicly disclosed data on the Mod-12 puts the maximum yield at 50 kilotons, but based on prior configurations of the B-61s “physics package,” the weapon probably has a variable yield ranging from 0.3kt to 50kt. On its lowest setting, the bomb will only have a yield of three hundred tons. A sub-kiloton yield. Especially at such low yields, the earth-penetrating nature of the weapon is likely to reduce fallout, especially when hitting hard rock (less loose soil to be blown into the air; only rock actually vaporized by the very small nuclear fireball would be put into the air.) This is hard to gauge, as no declassified equations exist for working out fallout from a shallow sub-surface detonation. In fact, the excellent nukemap.com cannot calculate fallout even for a surface burst, as its equations only cover detonations of a kiloton or over. 

It should be noted that the B-61-12 is in qualification testing as we speak - the weapon is finished, and given the urgency of the current crisis, could reasonably be rushed into service in low numbers.

Lie #2:

Then there is the issue of sparking off a direct nuclear conflict with China and Russia.

Even ignoring the existence of the B-61-12 described above, this claim completely ignores the bomber-based leg of the American nuclear triad, which still operates the AGM-86 Air Launched Cruise Missile (variable yield of 5-150 kilotons) and the B-83 freefall bomb (variable yield up to 1.2 megatons,) both delivered by the B-52 strategic bomber - some of which are based on Guam (and have been since the early days of the Cold War.) The B-52 has had an unescorted deep-nuclear-strike penetration mission ever since the AGM-28 Hound Dog debeuted in 1960, a massive nuclear-armed cruise missile designed to simply vaporize SAM sites and entire Soviet fighter bases so the B-52s could reach their targets and deliver their heavy freefall bombs. The modern incarnation of this would involve B-52s carrying ALCMs or B-83s internally, and carrying MALD-J decoys and/or JASSM-ER stealth cruise missiles on their external pylons to jam, confuse, and outright destroy North Korea’s painfully antiquated air defense network before moving in to deliver their nuclear strikes. And this is without escort or assistance from fighter-bombers and/or OECM aircraft based in Japan, Okinawa or South Korea, which they would have. 

It is possible - though extremely unlikely - that Russia or China would panic and assume that a low number of incoming ICBMs/SLBMs from America’s direction were actually aimed at them, and decide to commit suicide by launching a massive retaliatory attack even before the tracks of incoming warheads had been “firmed up” by radar (even though China doesn’t have a “launch-on-warning” policy.) It is not possible that they will interpret lumbering Cold-War era bomber aircraft a legitimate nuclear threat to their very capable, modern, and dense IADS - even the ALCM is a dated, non-stealth design. Even if they should construe these aircraft as “attacking them,” by sheer dint of their numbers and possible kiloton yield per aircraft alone it’d qualify as a tactical useage of nuclear weapons, not a strategic one demanding immediate massive retaliation. 

There is absolutely no credible argument for the employment of tactical nuclear warheads against North Korea leading to a full-on strategic nuclear exchange between Russia/China and the United States, and anyone telling you such is a lying bastard trying to play on your emotions to avoid making a real argument. 

Lie #3:

Once again, the simple reality is that the USA does not have conventional weapons that are capable of taking out all of the NK military/nuclear fortifications in one single surgical strike.

The hell we don’t. 

Meet the AGM-158 JASSM (Joint Air-to-Surface-Standoff Missile), a fully stealthed air-launched cruise missile that also has an ER variant (a full 600nm range) and a penetrating warhead variant for hardened targets. 

The B-1B “Lancer” can carry 24 of these weapons in its internal bomb-bays. The B-1B is an intercontinental capable bomber (with suitable tanker support.) 1/3rd of the currently active US fleet (20 aircraft) can thus deliver 480 of these weapons - in a non-stop round trip direct from Dyess Air Force Base, Texas, as they have done many times in sorties to Afghanistan and Iraq. 

Estimates of DPRK Transporter-Erector-Launcher numbers range from 150 to 300. Even if every single one was located inside its own dispersal bunker, the JASSM would be more than capable of destroying it, as their penetration ability is enhanced by the ability to conduct a guided attack (i.e. a 90-degree dive with full engine power to enhance the kinetic penetration prior to detonation.) This is indeed the worst case scenario, as any TELs located in large facilities under mountains can be interdicted simply by collapsing the tunnel entrances with similar weaponry - a TEL cannot fire a ballistic missile though a hundred feet of solid rock, after all. This vulnerability is almost certainly why the DPRK is observably building individual dispersal bunkers in close proximity to probable (and in one case, identified) under-mountain SRBM facilities. 

Note I have not touched on the TLAM-D Tomahawk and its Tactical Tomahawk Penetrator Variant warhead (which put those neat holes in the hardened shelters at Shayrat AFB,) which is carried in copious numbers by the warships of 7th fleet (and by the four converted Ohio-class boomers, each mustering a staggering 154 weapons, for a total of 616 Tomahawk missiles deliverable with complete surprise,) nor the B-2 Spirit stealth bomber (capable of delivering a pair of the uniquely powerful 30,000 pound GBU-57 “MOP” bunker-busters, among other weapons,) or B-52s (both capable of inter-continental attacks as well,) or utilizing F-35s and F-22s in the strike role (with the F-22 lobbing Small Diameter Bombs, themselves capable bunker-busters in their own right,) nor any of the tactical fighter-bomber assets already in-theater, including US Air Force F-16s and F-15s in South Korea, or Navy/Marine Hornet/Super Hornets in Japan and Okinawa, all of them capable of delivering standoff cruise missiles and the JSOW glide-bomb with either a submunition or BROACH penetrating warhead. 

Even if one assumes utilization of in-theater airpower is limited by the need to hide preparations from espionage, it is foolish to claim that the United States does not have an overwhelming capacity to deliver ordinance in a SURPRISE, surgical attack, even against extensively hardened targets. The only real limit on the United States’s ability in this regard is locating the targets, but given the massive superiority in ISR assets deployed to the peninsula - including U-2S spy planes and RQ-170 stealth drones capable of operating in DPRK airspace with relative impunity, combined with the relatively compact dimensions of the Korean peninsula, this is hardly an insurmountable obstacle. 

And then there is the simple fact we needn’t intercept every single missile launcher and/or WMD warhead before launch, as South Korea and Japan will both be defended by a tested, multi-layered ABM shield. South Korea is covered by the SM-3 (late exoatmospheric intercept), THAAD (very high altitude endo-atmospheric intercept,) the SM-2ER/SM-6 (mid-atmospheric terminal intercept) and Patriot PAC-3 MSE/ERINT (medium to low altitude terminal intercept.) Japan won’t benefit from THAAD, but has several of its own destroyers armed with the SM-3 and can thus provide more for its own defense - and North Korea has far fewer MRBM/IRBMs capable of ranging Japan in the first place, and they’re larger, easier-to-find targets to begin with, making it very unlikely they’ll preserve enough assets through the initial strike to overwhelm even our limited ABM capacity as it currently stands. 

It Is All Bullshit, My Friend

This is just the tip of the iceberg. Much, much, much more goes into planning a war than just this; there’s logistics, turnaround time, the need for redundancy (multiple weapon strikes for a single target, weapon duds, necessary re-strikes, Bomb Damage Assessment, the difficulty of coordinating Time on Target, communicating with/preparing one’s allies without telegraphing the blow, and so on,) but that just goes to show the most basic claims against counter-force strike that you’ve been fed by the media and the academics outright ignore known, tested military capabilities. This goes beyond saying “we can’t find TELs because we couldn’t do it 27 years ago in Desert Storm.” It requires ignoring seventeen years of hunting down elusive enemies in the mountainous and heavily-tunneled terrain of Afghanistan. This level of ignorance is willful and deliberate. When the existence of entire classes of weaponry and indeed, the staggeringly vast power-projection/deep strike ability of the United States is flatly and out-right ignored, one may well ask if a deliberate attempt to influence public opinion via lies (of omission or otherwise) is underway. 

None of this means that I am right, of course - that argument will have to stand on its own merits. But I can assure you that the arguments you’ve been fed are laughably, blatantly wrong. 

[djgamek1ng]

FFBE... Oh boy, Cloud banner

He has finally entered the battlefield, wielding his Buster Sword and dealing a great amount of damage: Cloud Strife. He is our introduction to the TDH meta. For those that don’t play FFBE or don’t know what TDH stands for, it’s True Doublehand. Doublehand is when you only equip a weapon and get extra attack for that, it’s Bartz’ trust master reward (TMR). With normal Doublehand, this only affected one-handed weapons. With True Doublehand/Buster Style, it affects two-handed weapons as well.

What Doublehand does in FFBE is that it takes whatever flat attack that you have across all your equipment and increases that with a percentage. DH gives 50% more (so if you had 100 flat ATK across your armor, head, weapon and accessories, you would get 150 ATK instead). TDH works on two-handed weapons and in Cloud’s TMR form (Buster Style) gives 100% instead (so 100 ATK would become 200). You can stack this effect with another TMR of a unit I’ll be discussing shortly. This has a max cap of 300% though (so 100 ATK can maximum become 400 ATK), but you can also increase your % ATK on equipment and materia alongside it.

Sooo...How good is Cloud? He’s pretty freaking good... only problem being that he needs a hell of a lot to properly get going. To maximize his TDH effect and get the best weapon to go with that, he needs: 1 of his own TMR, 2 of the second 5* base’s TMR (accessories) and 1 TMR of the 3* base (two-handed great sword), Conrad. That’s 2 other 5* bases you have to pull... on a split banner! That’s ridiculous to get him properly geared. This isn’t even talking about the fact that you want Prishe’s TMR (5* base) for a hat, the Demon Mail (which is a trial reward, thank god) for his body piece and Proud Fencer (Werei’s TMR, who is a 4* base), Sworn Six’s Pride - Dark (Veritas of the Dark’s TMR, who is also a 5* base) and Large Sword Mastery (another trial reward, thank christ). That’s 4 other 5* bases you would have to pull to give him his Best in Slot gear! BUT, to be fair, Prishe and Veritas of the Dark are sought after anyways, since they both have amazing TMRs which are often pieces for BiS gear under physical attackers. 

So, is Cloud worth it? As a unit... Eh? I guess he both is and isn’t. He is a finisher, the one dealing the final hit after a long chain! And because of that, he isn’t going to be used much outside of 10 man trails and raid events... However, when even close to properly geared, he actually does a ridiculous amount of damage... especially with his LB. If you have even heard of Cloud, you know what his LB move is: the mighty Omnislash. This thing has the highest modifier currently in the game when maxed at an impressive 10.5x. Oh, but it gets better: it ignores 50% of DEF, which means that modifier gets doubled. That means his LB comes when maxed comes in at an outright ridiculous modifier of 21x! That’s literally insane. If you can get his LB often, he’s literally the best damage dealer in the game... buuuuut, his LB is one of the slowest to charge up. Tied with Noctis, it takes 30 LB crystals to charge up. However, unlike Noctis, Cloud gets a passive that gives 3 LB crystals at the end of each turn to him. Plus the TMR from the other 5* base give 2 LB crystals, so if you have equipped two of them you get 7 LB crystals per turn. He takes a lot to get going, but he is a great damage dealer. Bulky, a crap ton of damage... What more could you want?! Supportive abilites? Huh... Does he have any? *Checks his kit* Nope, he doesn’t and that’s his major drawback: it’s pure damage. He does bring a lot of it, but it’s only damage and NOTHING else.

Personally when I saw the banner, I wasn’t excited for Cloud. I was excited for the other 5* base on this banner... AND NO, it isn’t a FFVII character! The next FFVII character you can look forward to is Sephiroth in about half a year at the earliest. Anyways, the other 5* base on this banner is a FFBE original character named Elfri- Whoops, almost going off her JP name! She’s called Elfreeda... Seriously, what is with the recent name changes? Lorraine in JP > Loren over here. Mistair in JP > Mystea over here. Grom in JP > Guromu over here. Elfried in JP > Elfreeda over here. I legitimately do not understand why this is...

Anyways, Elfreeda is a very interesting unit. She’s a tank with many many counters. She has a counter that lowers the enemy’s ice resistance with 60% which is her most common counter, she has a counter that does a bit (0.8x modifier) of AoE damage which is the second most common and lastly she has a single target nuke (6.5x modifier) which is by far her least common counter. Also, that nuke is guaranteed to crit, which I believe gives it another 3.25x (half of the original modifier) and makes it essentially a 9.75x modifier. Her provokes are also interesting. She has 2 100% provokes (so 100% chance that single target attacks will hit her), one breaking the enemy’s ATK and MAG with 45% and the other giving herself 80% ATK and DEF buffs. These only last for 2 turns though, so every other turn you’ll have to recast them. She also has 4 skills that do this: it dispells the enemy and leaves a 45% break on them for ATK, MAG, DEF or SPR. She has 3 attack skills, one being an AoE ice attack with a weak modifier of 2x, another being a slightly stronger modifier (3x) but single target ice attack and it gives you an ice element on your weapon for 5 turns. The last being a 3x modifier elementless attack, which lowers the enemy’s ice resistance with 50% and is guaranteed to crit. Aside from this she has Shin-Doublehand (TDH, but with 50% instead of 100%) to allow for some harder hitting counters and she has immunity to paralysis and confusion. One thing: why the heck does she not have blind immunity?! A boss or monster that blinds her essentially leaves her counters useless... She really should’ve gotten blind immunity in my opinion. Anyways, I’m using her since I got her and I’m loving her! Aside from her being able to be blinded, I think she might be another favorite of mine! Now to fit a personality on her and think of stuff that could happen with her there c:< Regardless, I’m using her in my full waifu team. She’s good, but not great. Her counters are alright, but especially since Demon Rain is a thing, they aren’t considered great... I’ll rant about him another day.

Also, quick update: I was in rainbow heaven for a while. I’ve gotten so many rainbows lately. These are all of my 5* bases (excluding 2 Kelsuses... Kelsi?) I got before the rate up: Merc Ramza, DKC, Olive, Prishe, Fryevia and Lunera. After the rate up: Luneth, Knight Delita, Noctis, Loren, Marie, Veritas of the Dark, Emperor and now Elfreeda. I’m not sure if my luck has run dry at this point and I actually don’t wanna find out. I have it feeling it has though... Just a hunch, since I had to spent 5000 lapis on a 10+1 pull to get my Elfreeda. Glad I did though, I love her! <3

Anyways, just a quick “little” thing! Thanks for reading as always! :D

[diallokenyatta]

Brother Diallo, since Trump and Kim are threatening each other with nuclear annihilation, what is the likelihood of full scale nuclear war in the next 100 years? You have children? Do you think they will live to see nukes being used by an insane piece of shit?

First off, the earth has already endured a Nuclear Holocaust. White Nations have been building and exploding Nuclear bombs, creating and spreading nuclear waste since 1945; that was the start of the “Nuclear Age.” White have been mining and contaminating ecosystems with uranium since the early 1800s!We didn’t have to have a Nuclear War to bring about global Nuclear contamination, and all of the resulting negative environmental and biological affects.  The world has endured over 2,000 nuclear bomb explosions on land, in the oceans, and in the atmosphere since nukes were first invented, and that’s known test; nations like Israel, Pakistan, India, North Korea, Iran, South Africa, and China engage in secret testing and explosion of nukes to this day, while the Western Powers still test and deploy nuclear weapons in the open!So, the West has already set us on the slow path to Nuclear Annihilation, Western Europe is the most radioactive landmass on the earth...until Japan had it’s nuclear meltdown in 2011.So, if you are just getting up in arms about nukes and the potential for nuclear contamination of the earth, of our ecosystems, of our bodies, you way late to the game.Also, the US is not about to have a Nuclear War with North Korea, they just need to stoke these conflicts to sustain Global Capitalism, the Military-Industrial-Corporate Complex, and to distract us from domestic corruption and social erosion. Also, nuke are being used by the US in the form of “micro-nukes” on the tip of bunker buster bombs (EPWs), depleted uranium rounds, and other nukes that are not classified as nuclear weapons.  Afghanistan and Iraq have been turned into nuclear hot-zones during the War on Terror.  Here’s a rule of thumb: if the corporate media is telling you to fear something, it’s 99% likely that you don’t need to fear that shit at all, look at the shit the corporate media, the elites, and the State ignore, or tell you not to fear; that’s where the real trouble is. Start to follow and study the research of Dr. Helen Caldicott; she’s the most honest and informed researcher and advocate on the issue of nuclear contamination and the nuclear warfare: http://www.helencaldicott.com/

[lucyoccupy]

Dilapidated Nuker Plants!?! MILLION A WEEK CLUB - YRTW 2019.38 - THE MOVIE by Bob Nichols

Dilapidated Nuker Plants!?! MILLION A WEEK CLUB – YRTW 2019.38 – THE MOVIE by Bob Nichols

  https://yourradiationthisweek.org/2019/10/26/million-a-week-club-yrtw-2019-38-the-movie/

The radiation increases in the last six weeks are sudden and abrupt from these dilapidated nuker plants in the States. What could go wrong? #NotFixable on Twitter – Bob Nichols

NOTE TO READERS: My editorial work is solely crowd funded…

[prettycottonmouthlamia]

F/GO 2-star Tier List

Come here for the drill in how this is done.

2-star Tier List

S-Rank Georgios: Georgios is a bit of a lower S than some other S-ranks that might show up, but he earns his spot. He is the most reliable 3-turn Taunter in the game, with Taunting, Defense up, Healing, and Guts that make his role incredibly reliable. While his NP will not do a lot of damage, it also provides additional Defense which can make it useful for surviving strong attacks. D'Eon may be able to survive an NP but is less bulky than Georgios is overall.

Grails will boost Georgios' ability by increasing his HP. This will make it more likely he can use his Taunt skill multiple times and protect the rest of the party a lot more effectively.

Hans Christian Anderson: Hans is a very valuable support unit. Access to critical star regen, NP regen, critical damage up, attack up, defense up, and HP regen make Hans a very good overall support. He can fit into a wide variety of teams and isn't really strictly outclassed by some of the higher rarity support Servants, as he offers a lot of everything. This doesn't mean Hans is perfect, as the extra survivability he gives can be less than other supports and he may not be able to guarantee everything you need, but he'll still be very good.

Grails give him more HP, but because he's more of a support unit than a tank it is not worth as much for him as other units. Since he is not a burst supporter, it can still be useful however.

Chen Gong: Chen Gong might look at initial glance like a discount Merlin, but Chen Gong offers enough to the table in addition to a completely unique niche that make him an easy S-rank Servant. First of all, he has one of the only two targetable taunts in the game that also comes with a crit rate down, dramatically reducing RNG. He can boost survivability, which is especially useful for the class he most synergizes with, Berserkers, and his third skill is a strong Buster up with a Max HP and critical damage buff for Berserkers. The Buster bonus is enough to make him useful for any class though. By far the best part of his kit, however, is his NP, which not only has Arash level numbers but also kills the frontline unit, allowing for easy switching out of supports for potentially massive damage outputs for a Servant. It also allows for the easiest solo set-ups in the game.

Grails will boost Chen Gong's damage output, and this will allow him to delete waves in farming a lot easier. It won't strictly benefit him if you use him purely for support, but it makes his NP even more potent.

A-Rank

Leonidas: Leonidas is a rather incredible Servant, but a bit more flawed than Georgios is. His personal Taunt skill comes with a massive NP gain up which makes his NP a lot more consistent than it otherwise be. He also packs a really useful Buster boost for the entire party, as well as a fairly decent Guts. His NP is a 3 turn Taunt with a decent Def up that generates a lot of crit stars. Leonidas however isn't perfect. It can be difficult to build his NP gauge if the enemy doesn't have a lot of hits to their attacks and you don't get his Arts card quick enough, and he's less sturdy overall than Georgios is. He's more offensive and tempo based than Georgios; less likely to be consistently useful but has the definite possibility of completely changing the game.

Grails are great for Leonidas, and boost him up to a decent S-rank. He'll still be less consistent than Georgios but will have more bulk to tank hits, and can even be useful against Archers as a secondary DPS if need be thanks to hit crit star bomb and Buster up.

William Shakespeare: Shakespeare qualifies as a lower A-rank Servant. He's very outclassed by Merlin, but Shakespeare is still good on his own and one of the better Buster supports. Enchant provides the party with a large Buster up that isn't focused on one Servant, and his 3rd skill provides a massive Star gen up that can help make Servants like Raikou or Suzuka a lot more consistent. He even has the ability to protect himself if need be, although this is more important if you want a CE with Taunt on it. Unfortunately, his NP is pretty bad, and doesn't do a lot of damage even with Enchant.

Grails don't improve Shakespeare's situation much. You really don't want to use him for damage since he's better off supporting better DPS and the extra HP is arguably a hindrance since he's a very burst support.

Hassan of the Cursed Arm: Cursed Arm qualifies as one of the best budget Assassins due to his Protection from Wind, giving him a lot of survivability and bonus star gen. He also has pretty good NP gain, and a crit damage boost to do extra damage. Cursed Arm is more meant to be a survival Servant rather than a strong damage dealer, which is something he does very well. He can even provide support with two star bombs wrapped into one skill. His major flaw is that his damage isn't especially high, especially without an upgraded NP.

Grails will massively boost Cursed Arm's performance. The extra HP goes a long way with his survivability and it helps his damage. It puts him at the very tip top of A-rank, and if Hassan gets an NP upgrade in the future or a buff to his Self-Modification, he'll be an easy S-rank.

Paris: Paris is often compared to Robin Hood, and two work pretty similarly. Paris works best against an opponent who will often buff itself, and he can do massive damage to them. He also debuffs crit rate which is very useful, provides himself some protection, healing, and debuff resistance. Paris can consistently do a lot of damage, and as an added benefit, doesn't have to worry about Invulnerability thanks to his NP. However, his major flaw is that his NP gain is rather seriously gimped, only having decent NP damage on his Arts card, which while mitigated by an NP charge, can hurt his consistency. It's why he's A-rank instead of S-rank.

Grails will boost his damage output considerably and give him some truly incredible numbers, making him an easy S-rank. A grailed Paris will easily outperform Robin Hood in terms of damage, which is kind of crazy to think about.

Gareth: Gareth is a hybrid tank and damage dealer in one. Her skills have really solid synergy and she can do good damage on her own, along with the ability to ignore invul. She gets even better with even budget supports, such as Leonidas or Bunyan, but has special synergy with Chen Gong, thanks to her second skill. Gareth + double Chen Gong is a high risk, high reward team comp that can make Gareth do an incredible amount of damage, with 180% Attack up and 100% Buster up for her NP. Her Taunt, Defense up, and Guts allows her to tank as well, although not quite as good as other Taunters, she makes up for it by doing quite a bit of damage.

As is becoming a common theme with 2-stars, a grailed Gareth is also S-rank. She definitely benefits the most from Grails due to her unique role of both a tank and a damage dealer, giving her a lot more HP and damage output.

Salome: Salome is probably the most controversial choice here, but she warrants the spot. She has the very unique niche of being an Arts Berserker, something only shared by two 5-stars, and has a very powerful first skill. There's enough Lawful Good Servants to make the extra damage modifier good, and she does a lot of damage in that regard. Her second skill provides extra survivability if you're using her as a tactical nuke. Her 3rd skill is very unique but hard to pull off, as it requires a dedicated team built around her. Her ability to fit into Arts teams, and her damage bonus are more important overall, but it is fun to get her 3rd skill off. Salome is very frail even with her second skill though, which hampers her.

Grails boosts Salome's power output, but they don't do much for her survivability. It's not really enough to bump her into S-rank, because overall she is less useful than Vlad is, but it makes her a high A-rank instead of a low A-rank.

B-Rank Edward Teach: Teach is a very straight forward Servant. He has a lot of damage and a Buster AoE NP. It's good, and his Guts has an infinite duration which can be really good if used correctly, but he has a lot of competition with some Silver and Gold servants for the Buster AoE slot. His third skill is unique and potentially viable, but there aren't a lot of Buster supports that are female, and Teach is only a mediocre support Servant. His NP gain is the real limiter to his viability, and its pretty bad all things said.

Grails will improve the amount of damage he can do, but its not enough to make him go into A-rank. He doesn't have enough that's special about him, even with the extra damage.

Caligula: Caligula has two roles that are interesting. The first is that his skills give him the potential for massive face card damage, granting some very large Atk and Buster ups, with his Buster up on a very low cooldown. The second is his NP, which inflicts three turns of NP Seal and Skill Seal onto all opponents, which will basically shut down all enemies for 3 turns and lock them into normal attacks. This is very useful against certain bosses with high hit counts. However, the problem with Caligula is that he requires support for both roles, and more importantly, cannot be put into a team where both roles happen at the same time. This makes him a lot more gimmicky than inconsistent than most Servants, but his output in either role is enough to stick him in B-rank.

Grails will boost Caligula's damage and make it higher, but like Edward, its not enough to bump him up into A-rank. Potency is not the issue with Caligula, its consistency, something which grails do not provide.

Eric Bloodaxe: Bloodaxe is a very by the numbers AoE Berserker. He does decent AoE damage to all enemies, but has some survivability mixed in as well with an Attack down, Guts, Debnuff clear, and Max HP up. Unfortunately, he still can deal pretty quickly to enemies, his debuffs last only two turns, and his NP's effects aren't potent and cost HP. It's not that Bloodaxe is bad, but AoE Berserkers is a niche with a lot Servants and Bloodaxe, without big steroids or a way to make his NP more consistent falls behind.

Bloodaxe rises to a low A-rank after Grails. He'll naturally do more damage, and it's good enough to make a difference, but the extra HP he gets is the real winner, as his kit is more defensive and he can have a potential 14k HP after Grails, making him tougher than expected.

C-Rank Sanson is a rather unfortunate case. He'd be so much better if certain skills were made more usable, but with a complete dud of a 3rd skill except in incredibly niche situations. His only damage up is against Evil enemies, and although it is a pretty large boost, he has nothing for general use which means his damage is very middling. Coupled with his low NP gain and he just ends up being a mediocre damage source. If his third skill worked on Servants he'd probably be a high B-tier, but he doesn't have enough damage unfortunately.

Grails will push Sanson to a low B-tier. He'll do good damage against Evil Servants, but his overall damage will still be pretty mediocre in all even with Grails.

Musashibo Benkei: Benkei is really close to being a solid B-rank. He's got a pretty powerful Taunt skill with a large Defense buff, and a powerful NP Seal ability. Unfortunately, for as good of a defensive tank Benkei could be, he falls short in a few ways. His first skill only inflicts Skill Seal, which isn't great, his NP seal, while AoE, is inconsistent and has a huge cooldown, and his NP doesn't do anything useful. He's already got some of the fundamentals, but he needs more to shine and become a good tank.

Grails will give Benkei more HP, but its not useful for him.

D-Rank Phantom of the Opera: Phantom has exactly one niche: the ability to dramatically reduce all enemies debuff resistance for 6 turns. If you don't need that, Phantom will give pretty much zero value to team comps. His NP does not do a lot of damage, he has bad NP and star gen, and his stun only works on Female enemies.

Grails won't make Phantom much better. It's not that Phantom's stats hold him back, it's his lack of utlity and niche.

Angra Mainyu: For the only budget Assassin, Angra falls really short of the mark. His skills are decent, although mostly defensive. Crit rate down, NP drain, and Atk down are nice, but don't have a lot of synergy. His 3rd skill is crazy powerful but insanely risky, especially before getting to Bond Level 10. It will kill Angra after using it, and even with the upgrade and the Guts, it undermines his defensive skills. His NP is basically dead weight, maybe only useful for a heal.

Bond Level 10 is special for Angra as it unlocks the buff for his third skill, and a bond CE with a unique niche of being anti-Beast. This, along with Grails, will put him into C-rank. He's still not strong enough to be very effective without support, as his niches are incredibly specific and he lacks a damaging NP, but it gives him something unique, which is always appreciated.

[velmaemyers88]

If Democrats want to win, they need to learn this lesson from Obama’s presidency – ThinkProgress

Imagine, for a moment, what 2009 would have looked like if the Senate’s Democratic supermajority showed up for its first day of work and immediately nuked the filibuster.

In such a world, the White House didn’t have to beg Republican senators for the votes it needed to enact President Barack Obama’s stimulus package. Though Democrats eventually achieved a 60-vote supermajority in the 111th Congress, it was only after Pennsylvania Sen. Arlen Specter switched parties and after Minnesota Sen. Al Franken prevailed in a protracted electoral recount. The result was a watered-down bill short $110 billion in stimulus that three Republicans demanded as the price of their vote.

Indeed, in the world without a filibuster, the White House also could have ignored conservative Senate Democrats whose desire to fix the economy was tempered by their fear of deficits. The result would have been a stronger economy in 2010 that could have mitigated Democratic losses in that year’s elections.

In a world without the filibuster, conservative Senate Democrats also could have been sidelined during the Obamacare negotiations. The result likely would have been something more similar to the House health care bill, which included more generous subsidies, a larger Medicaid expansion, and a “public option” that would have allowed many Americans to opt into a publicly owned health insurer.

In the world without a filibuster, Obama could have filled the federal courts with lions of the civil rights, criminal defense, poverty, and consumer protection bars. If the economy continued to struggle into 2010, Congress could have enacted a second stimulus bill and potentially saved the Democratic House majority. Buoyed by additional stimulus, the economy would have been stronger in 2016 — potentially strong enough to give the incumbent party just enough of a bounce to keep President Donald Trump out of the White House.

But of course, the idea that Senate Democrats would have removed the biggest roadblock to democratic governance in 2009 is a fantasy. Less than four years before Obama took office, several Senate Democrats capitulated to the Bush White House’s demand to confirm three very conservative judges in order to prevent filibuster reform from happening in 2005. Around the same time, many liberal operatives launched misguided and, at times, ridiculous campaigns to save the filibuster — such as an ad campaign “in which an animated character, Phil A. Buster, asks viewers to help ‘save checks and balances.’”

There simply wasn’t a meaningful call for filibuster reform within the Democratic Party in 2009, and there wouldn’t be one until Democrats spent more than a year discovering just how effectively the Republican minority could wield the filibuster to sabotage their agenda.

Flash forward 10 years, and no one is creating animated mascots for Senate obstructionism.

To the contrary, as Politico reports, a coalition of 15 left-of-center organizations launched a campaign to push senators to abolish the filibuster. The groups include old guard unions such as the American Federation of Teachers and juggernauts of the newest class of progressive groups, such as Indivisible. As one of their first initiatives, the coalition will “spend six figures on digital and print ads pushing [Sen. Michael] Bennet to support a bill making D.C. a state — and to do so with just 51 Senate votes, bypassing the filibuster.”

This initial move appears to be a warning shot over the bow of other Democratic leaders tempted to oppose procedural reforms that would make the nation more democratic. Bennet, who supported the 2013 filibuster reforms allowing most presidential nominees to be confirmed by a simple majority, has since reversed his position on that vote.

He also argued, implausibly, that if Democrats didn’t attempt to filibuster Neil Gorsuch’s nomination to the Supreme Court — thus leading Senate Republicans to change the rules to allow Supreme Court justices to be confirmed by a simple majority — that Republicans would not have made this rules change during the fight to confirm Justice Brett Kavanaugh.

The name of the coalition fighting for filibuster reform is “51 for 51,” a reference to the coalition’s twin goals. It seeks to admit the District of Columbia as the 51st state — and to allow the Senate to vote for D.C. statehood with a simple majority of 51 senators.

Senate malapportionment is, if anything, an even greater threat to democracy than the filibuster. The bloc of senators who confirmed both Gorsuch and Kavanaugh represent less than half of the nation. Similarly, the bloc that prevented Obama’s Supreme Court nominee, Merrick Garland, from receiving a confirmation vote also represented less than half the country.

And it’s going to get worse. By 2040, according to a University of Virginia analysis, about half of the country will live in just eight states — which means 16 senators for one half of America and 84 for the other half. Meanwhile, there is a strong correlation between population density and partisan voting, with less dense areas tending to favor Republicans. That means that Republicans may soon have a permanent supermajority in the Senate regardless of what the voters prefer.

Admitting D.C. as a state will not solve this problem. The Senate is so fundamentally rigged in favor of less populous states that re-balancing it would likely require chopping up large states like California into many smaller states. But permitting the overwhelmingly Democratic voters of the District of Columbia to elect two senators would at least mitigate the unfair advantage Republicans now enjoy in the Senate.

Ultimately, the most important lesson of Obama’s first two years in office is that good ideas, a popular president, and even a crushing electoral victory are not enough to ensure American self-governance. If the next Democratic president hopes to be more than a figurehead, they will need to think in terms of structural reforms that will restore some resemblance between the popular vote and the composition of the United States Senate.

And they will become a failed president if a majority of Senate Democrats are not also committed to these reforms.

Credit: Source link

The post If Democrats want to win, they need to learn this lesson from Obama’s presidency – ThinkProgress appeared first on WeeklyReviewer.

from WeeklyReviewer https://weeklyreviewer.com/if-democrats-want-to-win-they-need-to-learn-this-lesson-from-obamas-presidency-thinkprogress/?utm_source=rss&utm_medium=rss&utm_campaign=if-democrats-want-to-win-they-need-to-learn-this-lesson-from-obamas-presidency-thinkprogress from WeeklyReviewer https://weeklyreviewer.tumblr.com/post/186390842087

[reneeacaseyfl]

If Democrats want to win, they need to learn this lesson from Obama’s presidency – ThinkProgress

Imagine, for a moment, what 2009 would have looked like if the Senate’s Democratic supermajority showed up for its first day of work and immediately nuked the filibuster.

In such a world, the White House didn’t have to beg Republican senators for the votes it needed to enact President Barack Obama’s stimulus package. Though Democrats eventually achieved a 60-vote supermajority in the 111th Congress, it was only after Pennsylvania Sen. Arlen Specter switched parties and after Minnesota Sen. Al Franken prevailed in a protracted electoral recount. The result was a watered-down bill short $110 billion in stimulus that three Republicans demanded as the price of their vote.

Indeed, in the world without a filibuster, the White House also could have ignored conservative Senate Democrats whose desire to fix the economy was tempered by their fear of deficits. The result would have been a stronger economy in 2010 that could have mitigated Democratic losses in that year’s elections.

In a world without the filibuster, conservative Senate Democrats also could have been sidelined during the Obamacare negotiations. The result likely would have been something more similar to the House health care bill, which included more generous subsidies, a larger Medicaid expansion, and a “public option” that would have allowed many Americans to opt into a publicly owned health insurer.

In the world without a filibuster, Obama could have filled the federal courts with lions of the civil rights, criminal defense, poverty, and consumer protection bars. If the economy continued to struggle into 2010, Congress could have enacted a second stimulus bill and potentially saved the Democratic House majority. Buoyed by additional stimulus, the economy would have been stronger in 2016 — potentially strong enough to give the incumbent party just enough of a bounce to keep President Donald Trump out of the White House.

But of course, the idea that Senate Democrats would have removed the biggest roadblock to democratic governance in 2009 is a fantasy. Less than four years before Obama took office, several Senate Democrats capitulated to the Bush White House’s demand to confirm three very conservative judges in order to prevent filibuster reform from happening in 2005. Around the same time, many liberal operatives launched misguided and, at times, ridiculous campaigns to save the filibuster — such as an ad campaign “in which an animated character, Phil A. Buster, asks viewers to help ‘save checks and balances.’”

There simply wasn’t a meaningful call for filibuster reform within the Democratic Party in 2009, and there wouldn’t be one until Democrats spent more than a year discovering just how effectively the Republican minority could wield the filibuster to sabotage their agenda.

Flash forward 10 years, and no one is creating animated mascots for Senate obstructionism.

To the contrary, as Politico reports, a coalition of 15 left-of-center organizations launched a campaign to push senators to abolish the filibuster. The groups include old guard unions such as the American Federation of Teachers and juggernauts of the newest class of progressive groups, such as Indivisible. As one of their first initiatives, the coalition will “spend six figures on digital and print ads pushing [Sen. Michael] Bennet to support a bill making D.C. a state — and to do so with just 51 Senate votes, bypassing the filibuster.”

This initial move appears to be a warning shot over the bow of other Democratic leaders tempted to oppose procedural reforms that would make the nation more democratic. Bennet, who supported the 2013 filibuster reforms allowing most presidential nominees to be confirmed by a simple majority, has since reversed his position on that vote.

He also argued, implausibly, that if Democrats didn’t attempt to filibuster Neil Gorsuch’s nomination to the Supreme Court — thus leading Senate Republicans to change the rules to allow Supreme Court justices to be confirmed by a simple majority — that Republicans would not have made this rules change during the fight to confirm Justice Brett Kavanaugh.

The name of the coalition fighting for filibuster reform is “51 for 51,” a reference to the coalition’s twin goals. It seeks to admit the District of Columbia as the 51st state — and to allow the Senate to vote for D.C. statehood with a simple majority of 51 senators.

Senate malapportionment is, if anything, an even greater threat to democracy than the filibuster. The bloc of senators who confirmed both Gorsuch and Kavanaugh represent less than half of the nation. Similarly, the bloc that prevented Obama’s Supreme Court nominee, Merrick Garland, from receiving a confirmation vote also represented less than half the country.

And it’s going to get worse. By 2040, according to a University of Virginia analysis, about half of the country will live in just eight states — which means 16 senators for one half of America and 84 for the other half. Meanwhile, there is a strong correlation between population density and partisan voting, with less dense areas tending to favor Republicans. That means that Republicans may soon have a permanent supermajority in the Senate regardless of what the voters prefer.

Admitting D.C. as a state will not solve this problem. The Senate is so fundamentally rigged in favor of less populous states that re-balancing it would likely require chopping up large states like California into many smaller states. But permitting the overwhelmingly Democratic voters of the District of Columbia to elect two senators would at least mitigate the unfair advantage Republicans now enjoy in the Senate.

Ultimately, the most important lesson of Obama’s first two years in office is that good ideas, a popular president, and even a crushing electoral victory are not enough to ensure American self-governance. If the next Democratic president hopes to be more than a figurehead, they will need to think in terms of structural reforms that will restore some resemblance between the popular vote and the composition of the United States Senate.

And they will become a failed president if a majority of Senate Democrats are not also committed to these reforms.

Credit: Source link

The post If Democrats want to win, they need to learn this lesson from Obama’s presidency – ThinkProgress appeared first on WeeklyReviewer.

from WeeklyReviewer https://weeklyreviewer.com/if-democrats-want-to-win-they-need-to-learn-this-lesson-from-obamas-presidency-thinkprogress/?utm_source=rss&utm_medium=rss&utm_campaign=if-democrats-want-to-win-they-need-to-learn-this-lesson-from-obamas-presidency-thinkprogress from WeeklyReviewer https://weeklyreviewer.tumblr.com/post/186390842087

[weeklyreviewer]

If Democrats want to win, they need to learn this lesson from Obama’s presidency – ThinkProgress

Imagine, for a moment, what 2009 would have looked like if the Senate’s Democratic supermajority showed up for its first day of work and immediately nuked the filibuster.

In such a world, the White House didn’t have to beg Republican senators for the votes it needed to enact President Barack Obama’s stimulus package. Though Democrats eventually achieved a 60-vote supermajority in the 111th Congress, it was only after Pennsylvania Sen. Arlen Specter switched parties and after Minnesota Sen. Al Franken prevailed in a protracted electoral recount. The result was a watered-down bill short $110 billion in stimulus that three Republicans demanded as the price of their vote.

Indeed, in the world without a filibuster, the White House also could have ignored conservative Senate Democrats whose desire to fix the economy was tempered by their fear of deficits. The result would have been a stronger economy in 2010 that could have mitigated Democratic losses in that year’s elections.

In a world without the filibuster, conservative Senate Democrats also could have been sidelined during the Obamacare negotiations. The result likely would have been something more similar to the House health care bill, which included more generous subsidies, a larger Medicaid expansion, and a “public option” that would have allowed many Americans to opt into a publicly owned health insurer.

In the world without a filibuster, Obama could have filled the federal courts with lions of the civil rights, criminal defense, poverty, and consumer protection bars. If the economy continued to struggle into 2010, Congress could have enacted a second stimulus bill and potentially saved the Democratic House majority. Buoyed by additional stimulus, the economy would have been stronger in 2016 — potentially strong enough to give the incumbent party just enough of a bounce to keep President Donald Trump out of the White House.

But of course, the idea that Senate Democrats would have removed the biggest roadblock to democratic governance in 2009 is a fantasy. Less than four years before Obama took office, several Senate Democrats capitulated to the Bush White House’s demand to confirm three very conservative judges in order to prevent filibuster reform from happening in 2005. Around the same time, many liberal operatives launched misguided and, at times, ridiculous campaigns to save the filibuster — such as an ad campaign “in which an animated character, Phil A. Buster, asks viewers to help ‘save checks and balances.’”

There simply wasn’t a meaningful call for filibuster reform within the Democratic Party in 2009, and there wouldn’t be one until Democrats spent more than a year discovering just how effectively the Republican minority could wield the filibuster to sabotage their agenda.

Flash forward 10 years, and no one is creating animated mascots for Senate obstructionism.

To the contrary, as Politico reports, a coalition of 15 left-of-center organizations launched a campaign to push senators to abolish the filibuster. The groups include old guard unions such as the American Federation of Teachers and juggernauts of the newest class of progressive groups, such as Indivisible. As one of their first initiatives, the coalition will “spend six figures on digital and print ads pushing [Sen. Michael] Bennet to support a bill making D.C. a state — and to do so with just 51 Senate votes, bypassing the filibuster.”

This initial move appears to be a warning shot over the bow of other Democratic leaders tempted to oppose procedural reforms that would make the nation more democratic. Bennet, who supported the 2013 filibuster reforms allowing most presidential nominees to be confirmed by a simple majority, has since reversed his position on that vote.

He also argued, implausibly, that if Democrats didn’t attempt to filibuster Neil Gorsuch’s nomination to the Supreme Court — thus leading Senate Republicans to change the rules to allow Supreme Court justices to be confirmed by a simple majority — that Republicans would not have made this rules change during the fight to confirm Justice Brett Kavanaugh.

The name of the coalition fighting for filibuster reform is “51 for 51,” a reference to the coalition’s twin goals. It seeks to admit the District of Columbia as the 51st state — and to allow the Senate to vote for D.C. statehood with a simple majority of 51 senators.

Senate malapportionment is, if anything, an even greater threat to democracy than the filibuster. The bloc of senators who confirmed both Gorsuch and Kavanaugh represent less than half of the nation. Similarly, the bloc that prevented Obama’s Supreme Court nominee, Merrick Garland, from receiving a confirmation vote also represented less than half the country.

And it’s going to get worse. By 2040, according to a University of Virginia analysis, about half of the country will live in just eight states — which means 16 senators for one half of America and 84 for the other half. Meanwhile, there is a strong correlation between population density and partisan voting, with less dense areas tending to favor Republicans. That means that Republicans may soon have a permanent supermajority in the Senate regardless of what the voters prefer.

Admitting D.C. as a state will not solve this problem. The Senate is so fundamentally rigged in favor of less populous states that re-balancing it would likely require chopping up large states like California into many smaller states. But permitting the overwhelmingly Democratic voters of the District of Columbia to elect two senators would at least mitigate the unfair advantage Republicans now enjoy in the Senate.

Ultimately, the most important lesson of Obama’s first two years in office is that good ideas, a popular president, and even a crushing electoral victory are not enough to ensure American self-governance. If the next Democratic president hopes to be more than a figurehead, they will need to think in terms of structural reforms that will restore some resemblance between the popular vote and the composition of the United States Senate.

And they will become a failed president if a majority of Senate Democrats are not also committed to these reforms.

Credit: Source link

The post If Democrats want to win, they need to learn this lesson from Obama’s presidency – ThinkProgress appeared first on WeeklyReviewer.

from WeeklyReviewer https://weeklyreviewer.com/if-democrats-want-to-win-they-need-to-learn-this-lesson-from-obamas-presidency-thinkprogress/?utm_source=rss&utm_medium=rss&utm_campaign=if-democrats-want-to-win-they-need-to-learn-this-lesson-from-obamas-presidency-thinkprogress

[lucyoccupy]

Google it! MILLION A WEEK CLUB - Your Cumulative Radiation! Transcend Censorship and Share with Your Smart Friends

Google it! MILLION A WEEK CLUB – Your Cumulative Radiation! Transcend Censorship and Share with Your Smart Friends

Million a Week Club – YRTW 2019.38 – Your Cumulative Radiation

Read the full article here: https://yourradiationthisweek.org/2019/10/12/million-a-week-club-yrtw-2019-38-your-cumulative-radiation/

https://twitter.com/yourrads

Wow!  Facebook Censorship is hitting new levels, isn’t it.  Another site link called a ‘violation of FB community standards’ is Bob Nichols Said WHAT about Your…

[lucyoccupy]

MILLION A WEEK CLUB - YRTW 24 - Plus More Cities by Bob Nichols --- This nuke stuff gets real serious, real quick....!

MILLION A WEEK CLUB – YRTW 24 – Plus More Cities by Bob Nichols — This nuke stuff gets real serious, real quick….!

“The Rad rides the Wind”

  Are you in a city that gets a Million Counts of Radiation a Week? First, how on earth are you going to find out? Folks, that is a secret, isn’t it? Radiation?

This is a Bad situation for all exposed to the Rad.   – Bob Nichols

  Read all about it:

MILLION A WEEK CLUB – YRTW 24 – PLUS MORE CITIES – by Bob Nichols  

  [youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HprueB8Fakg&w…

[lucyoccupy]

Total Gamma Radiation 2017.6 Year to Date USA Today by Bob Nichols

Total Gamma Radiation 2017.6 Year to Date USA Today by Bob Nichols

RADS ACROSS AMERICA -The Table of Poisoned American Cities and Ten Years of Annual US Radiation Measured Totals

READ Total Gamma Radiation 2017.6 Year to Date USA article here.   Thank you, Bob Nichols!    Source:  Bob Nichols, Veterans Today Total Gamma Radiation 2017.6 Year to Date USA Copyright by Bob Nichols © 2017: Reproduce and distribute with full attribution to Bob Nichols.