#anyway so they circumvented the problem very efficiently most of the time

[doyouknowthischaracter]

Do you think the polls are inherently biased, because the well-known characters will be shared more wheras the unknown characters might never even reach their bubble where they are actually known by a lot of people?

Short answer is no.

Long answer is: well, if we want to be pedantic, an argument could be made that no method of collecting data via surveys, even self-administered surveys, is completely free of bias because that's just human nature and all you can do is minimize it by wording questions neutrally, trimming outliers, etc etc. With that out of the way, one very important thing to note here is that this isn't an opinion survey. The question being asked is very straightforward and the answer is not something that can be swayed or influenced by peer pressure, propaganda, unwillingness to disclose private information, or any other factors, be they internal or external. You either know a character or you don't. I mean, people could certainly lie, in either direction, but 1) why would you do that?? it's not even like we have winners or losers here, and 2) there's nothing I can do about it anyway.

Now, when it comes to sampling bias (which, from what I understand, is what you're actually asking about) my answer is still no, I don't think that's accurate. Popular characters will reach more people and get more votes overall precisely because they're more popular. If this were a tournament style blog or if I were asking your opinion on the character in question, then yes, I could definitely see how more well-known characters would be at an unfair advantage (or how tagging the polls with the character's name is encouraging that bias, as it's been suggested before), but this is not that! Well-known characters reaching their bubbles faster/more efficiently than obscure characters is an inherent part of being more popular. Everything is working as intended.

All that being said, there are a few factors which I think could influence results somewhat unfairly, but I wouldn't necessarily call them bias. They're more like limitations of the medium.

Firstly, the time and day of the week when a poll is published. I don't have access to this kind of data right now, but off the top of my head, I'd say Sundays around 10pm is when Tumblr users are most active. That, coupled with the fact that most users are from the United States, means that polls that come out of the queue on US Sundays during that time window have a chance to reach more people than all the others. However, this potential problem is organically circumvented by people going back to see previously posted polls, finding polls through reblogs or from tag searches, etc. So it's not really a significant difference. I haven't noticed the numbers reflecting this yet either, but in theory that's how social media works, so I thought it was worth pointing out.

Secondly, polls that were posted early on when the blog had fewer followers reached less people, on average, than polls being posted at the moment or that will be posted in the future. No argument there, that's just a fact. But, again, this is a limitation of the medium. Potentially, I could repost older polls at some point in the future and reassess characters' popularity, but how do I choose which ones? All of them? Wouldn't we just get stuck in a loop of reposting the same characters over and over then? That'd be no fun. So I don't really think there's anything to be done here, unfortunately.

Thirdly, meme-able characters will be see better engagement and consequently higher numbers of votes. Point in case, Obi-Wan Kenobi. Once again, not something that can be helped, not really. I do my best to maintain uniformity in how I format the polls and which pictures I choose (as high quality as I can find, cropped adequately, consistent size, etc.). But some characters will just have better chances of being shared around by virtue of featuring in memes or having some recognizable line or something like that.

To sum it up, overall I don't think there's an inherent bias in how the polls work at the moment. I do think there are certain factors that could marginally influence voting numbers, but not the votes themselves. (Which is why I've decided to compile two separate lists, by number of votes and by percentage-- they measure slightly different things, but that's a post for another day.) As long as every follower of this blog is delivered every poll to their dash and everyone pinky promises not to lie and screw up my numbers on purpose, then I'd say we're golden.

This is probably more than you asked for lol, but hopefully it all makes sense. And as always, feel free to share your opinion. I'm always happy to hear it!

[pupil-of-law]

👫

Send a 👫and I’ll write four headcanons I have about our muse’s relationship

In Sebastian's mind, he's Mallory's only and most trusted 'agent', and he tells people at MI6 random facts he's learned by spying on Mallory to give everyone the impression that they're really close. E.g. 'Oh I wouldn't give him those biscuits, he's allergic to macadamia nuts.' I'd imagine Mallory has no problem whatsoever embarrassing Sebastian by correcting people if they comment on it.

In the field, Sebastian sometimes goes through phases of psyching himself out so much that he starts thinking that actually Mallory is setting him up, Mallory hates him and Mallory is in fact evil, and late at night he lies awake and devises an intricate plan to circumvent Mallory's evil plans and kill him the next day in a very complicated and efficient way. He then sees him the next morning in the Mess and instantly forgets all about it and tries to sit next to him and talk about something in the Financial Times he thinks Mallory will have read.

If Mallory is ever sick, Sebastian is a complete ballache to work with, slacks off, won't follow orders, is rude to everyone and terrorises the people he's working with until in the end they just tell him to be off-duty whenever Mallory is. It doesn't particularly matter if he usually doesn't speak to Mallory all day anyway, as long as he knows Mallory's in the area Sebastian will be on top form just in case. What's the point in being a good agent if you're not getting validation for it?

Despite the fact that Sebastian would undoubtedly kill Mallory if someone more important told him to, or in the event that Mallory no longer held any professional or moral authority in his eyes, he refuses to admit this or believe it himself, even if Mallory is at least smart enough to know it.

[daintycrow]

HELLO!

Congrats on being a writer despite English being your second language! I'm genuinely so proud of you💜

Here is an easier writing prompt but just as fun!

Writing Prompt:

"Wait... Mermaids have jobs?" His eyebrows furrowed in confusion.

"Uhhh... well, duh! How else do you expect us to live!" The mermaid raised her arms exasperatingly. "Not to mention, you pollute our environment!" She yelled out as she splashed water all over him using her emerald-scaled fin

Hello!

Thank you so much. Also thank you for the prompt. I have actually never in my life written anything with mermaids, no matter the language, so this was pretty new and very fun. I really liked it. And I also haven‘t been able to write anything in the past week, so finally sitting down and actually ending up with a little story was amazing. Thank you a lot for doing this and helping me out! :)

*

He jumped over to the next rock, almost slipping on the wet surface but catching himself just in time. Probably thanks to all the training he had with that by now. If he had been told a few weeks back that he would actually start to enjoy this horrible island and walking alongside the coast, he wouldn‘t have believed it. Sometimes, he still didn‘t. But here he was, jumping happily from one big rock to the next, not even falling anymore.

And of course that thought crossing his mind was the moment he didn‘t calculate right. He missed the next rock by just enough to slip off and before he could even think of breaking his fall, he hit the ground and groaned.

Beside him somebody started laughing. The high, clear laugh that had originally irritated him to no end and he had learned liking a lot since then.

“Stop it.”

But she didn‘t even try. Not even when he turned his head and scowled at her. She just swam a little circle and seemed very content in general. As always.

“This is all your fault anyway,” he said.

She still looked way to delighted but at least she finally did stop. “That you can‘t use your legs properly?”

“I will have you know, that that is harder than it looks. And you are not allowed to judge anyway.”

“Because I don‘t walk?”

“Exactly.” He nodded and stood up again, trying to ignore her quiet snicker. His back hurt. Maybe he should be more careful in the future. Probably. “Where have you been anyway? I waited for ages.” Okay, maybe an hour, but it was still way to long. Usually she was here before him.

“I was held up.” She swam a few feet away, further alongside the coast. He had trouble following her with all the big rocks he had to circumvent now, since he couldn‘t jump over them easily, but it wasn‘t long before they were replaced by gravel. It was easier to follow her after that.

“What held you up?” he wanted to know.

She turned around and swam a circle again, and at the end she dove under and for a moment her emerald scales. He was still amazed at how little water splashed when she swam, compared to when he did the same. Then again, he wasn‘t the best swimmer to begin with, so he probably shouldn‘t compare his abilities to those of a mermaid.

Her head emerged again, close enough to the shore that he could probably sit there without drowning. “Things were just busy today.” She turned around again. “So the boss needed us to stay a little longer.” She shrugged and swam further. He followed her. Until he realized what she had just said and he froze.

“Wait… mermaids have jobs?” His eyebrows furrowed in confusion.

“Uhhh… well, duh! How else do you expect us to live!” She raised her arms exasperatingly. “Not to mention, you pollute our environment!” She yelled out as she splashed water all over him using her emerald-scaled fin.

He raised his arms to protect himself from the water, but of course it was already too late. He was drenched. “Great,” he muttered.

“Also, you have jobs too, right? So why are you surprised that we have them?” Now that he was soaked to the bone she seemed calmer already. Well, he was always glad to help, wasn‘t he? He tried to at least get some of the water out of his hair, so it wouldn‘t run down his face anymore, but it didn‘t really work.

“It‘s not that,” he said then. “Of course you can have jobs.” He tried to at least get his hair out of his face. It didn‘t help either. “I just can‘t imagine there‘s much to do. You don‘t work in office buildings, after all.”

“Some of us do.”

“Really?”

She nodded.

“You have office buildings?”

“Obviously not, what would we need them for?” She shook her head. “You have them though.”

“You work in our office buildings?”

“Sure.” She shrugged. “Not all of us, of course, there‘s enough other stuff that need to be taken care of, but yeah, why not? We can even buy stuff with your money.”

“You have our currency?”

“Don‘t be ridiculous!” She grimaced. “What would we do with that? Why would we use it? No, we rely on trading and community, but we can buy your stuff with it.”

“And what do you buy? Fish?”

She rolled her eyes. “There are places where you can buy water.”

“Water?”

“Rivers, lakes, sea, ocean,” she counted.

“You can buy oceans?”

“Well, no, not officially, but … we have our ways.” She grinned.

“You buy oceans?”

“We wouldn‘t have to, if you knew how to take care of them!”

“Okay, yeah, you are right.” He hurried to hold up his hands to protect his face from the water, but apparently his words were enough to calm her down and no water came. He lowered his hands again. “How do you work in our buildings? Since you can‘t walk and all that?” Wouldn‘t he have heard of mermaids working at human work places?

“Who says we can‘t?”

“You can?”

“Sure. Most of us don‘t but we could.” She nodded. “I could, too, I just don‘t see why I would want too. Swimming is easier and way more efficient.”

Yeah, he could believe that. He couldn‘t run as fast as she swam if he trained for years. “How does it work? Do you have legs, once you are on land?”

“I think so, yeah. But I‘m not familiar with any of it, I have never tried and I never really cared that much for the technicalities.”

“Okay.” Wow. How could he have spend weeks with her without ever hearing from any of this? “So where do the ones of you work, that don‘t work at any human places?”

“Depends.” She swam one of her usual circles again. “Some take care of children, some of our politics, some guard our homes, some try to help the environment as good as we can.”

“What do you do?” Probably the environment-thing, right? After her reaction before? An understandable reaction, of course.

“Not much.” She came closer again. “I‘m one of the guards, but usually we don‘t have a lot of problems, so we mostly are on call. What do you do?”

She was … what? She didn‘t seem like a guard. Then again, what did he now? Not much, apparently. “I haven‘t decided yet. I worked at a few places, but nothing permanent yet. What kind of problems did you have today, that you needed to stay longer?”

“Just a little attack, nothing we couldn‘t handle.” She grinned. And then immediately became serious and turned to the sea. “Uhhh… actually, maybe we couldn‘t. I have to go.”

“What?” Where did that come from now? Had she heard something? What had she heard? He hadn't heard anything himself, so why was she suddenly so alarmed?

But before he could ask any of that, she raised a hand and waved at him. “See you tomorrow.” She turned around and disappeared under the surface of the water. There was a little splash when her emerald fin appeared for a short moment, but immediately after the water was as calm as it could be. Almost as if she hadn‘t been swimming there just a second ago.

Wow. She just became so much stranger.

And she had already been strange to begin with!

[greengargouille]

((Here it is, in an hurry, the “I want to talk about my headcanons for Group 2′s remaining bugs but since it’s going to be long I might as well make it into a fic format” post. You know, before KoroQuest destroy it completely :’D Note: 'Peep’, ‘Slumber’ and the Goddess Ring are all things that exist in Dragon Quest. Because you know, if I spend half an hour on the DQ wiki then I might as well use that.))

What makes a good scout, when you explore a dungeon?

The response might depends on the adventurers you ask. Smaller groups need their members to multitask, so someone whose skills in reconnaissance can also be helpful in battle are a must; for bigger teams where people tends toward specialisation, the opposite may apply. However, they would certainly agree on at least two things.

First, a scout need to be observant and patient. Not only it is their whole work to obtain information, the fact they have to move away from their group, alone in enemy territory, means nobody can save them if they fall into a trap. Second, a scout needs to be small, quick and flexible. One that can access multiple places without being seen, while having the capacities to run away if they do end up discovered. 

Surprisingly, finding someone having both points can be hard. Taking class E as an example, Takebayashi and Fuwa both have excellent observation and analysis skills, but they lack in speed and stealth. On the opposite, Okano and Kimura have the perfect physical skills for a scout, but their impulsivity and complete disregard for traps make them surprisingly vulnerable.

Right, someone having all those skills is rare. A small, furtive observer... If there was anyone like that in class E, they would probably have a central role. One might even make them a protagonist. ...Of course, all of this is a bit of a moot point when someone just happens to have a bug circumventing most of those problems.

Mimura’s bug: When alone, monsters who meet him don’t start a fight (doesn’t work on boss or guardian-type monsters)

It was far from foolproof, of course. For one, it was useless against humans, so it offered no particular protection in dungeons like Irina’s tower, back when she was charming villagers left and right. Then, there was still the famous problem of getting caught into traps, though for this one Mimura wasn’t too bothered, as he had a pretty good awareness of his surroundings. More dangerous, there was still the chance of encountering a monster on which this bug wouldn’t work- this had caused him problem during his precedent year, then unaware of the limitations of his bug. No dragon hoarding his treasures, no black knight threatening that none shall pass his bridge, no mimic. Now that one was troublesome, as it means he couldn’t just steal the content of any chest he found on his way; the appraisal skill necessary to distinguish the monster from the object could only be learned by experienced mages, and the items one could use as an alternative were either expensive or an exclusivity of the church, so class E was out of luck on this. Well, except for one person.

“Alright, I checked the way, there’s a room where we could sit down and plan our next moves. Fuwa, there’s a chest there, could you verify it? -No problem!”

Thus was an usual scene for Group 2. Whenever they were low in health and items, and whenever the way wasn’t clogged by a monster, Mimura would scout the area first to make sure they could progress without trouble. And if there was any chest that needed inspection, Fuwa could handle it.

“It’s dusty.” Hayami noted while entering the room. A mostly bare place, with stone walls and wooden benches around a table, a rack stand to put one’s weapons, and most importantly, an massive, tough-looking chest. “It looks like an abandoned rest room. -Right, it’s weird it’s not used anymore.” Nakamura commented. “Even monsters go on patrols. If that chest’s a mimic, though, that might explain why they’re avoiding it.” Monsters or humans, mimics didn’t care much who opened them, as long as they were somehow edible. “Guess it’s my turn to act, then?” Fuwa planted herself in front of the chest. “Peep!”

Nothing seemed to happen, but the girl immediately blinked.

“Hmm... I see a red aura around it, so... probably safe?”

This is a sentence that no other group would be able to hear. Anyone knowing about the ‘Peep’ skill could tell you about the three colours a chest could take under its effect: blue and yellow were nice to have, as they indicated either an item or money. Red, however... definitely some kind of mimic. That is, unless said skill had a bug. Fuwa’s bug: Have access to all appraisal skills from level 1 without using MP, but have a 99% probability of giving a wrong result.

A skill that gave the wrong answer pretty much all the time wasn’t very useful, but with a bit of logic, it still could be a great hint. Appraising an equipment for a curse and knowing ‘this object is safe’ have 99% chances of being wrong was more than enough to deduce it would be a bad decision to wear it. As for treasure chests... A blue or yellow aura was still half a chance to be a mimic, but red was, indeed, a safe result. Of course, there was still the 1% chance of Fuwa actually getting it right, but the laws of storytelling meant it would only actually happen when it would be either tragic or funny. Not during an exposition story.

“Alright, let’s see what this huge babe got inside!” Okajima opened the chest as soon as Fuwa spoke.

“Money would probably be more useful,” commented Nakamura. “Merchants are getting rather cheap when buying used goods, it’s almost a scam at this point. -But if we get more items, we don’t have to rely on them as much in the first place. Ah, shit! -What is it? Found something we can’t use? -No, we can probably use it, but...” The boy put a knee on the floor, arm deep in the chest, from which he pulled a tiny ring. “That’s the only thing in it. -...Stupid standardised chest sizes. -Doesn’t seems to be cursed, at least.” Fuwa informed them. “What is it supposed to do? -Boost one’s Coolness, according to the description. -Great, so nothing of interest for us. -Eh, speak for yourself!” Okajima objected. “If nobody want it then I’m taking it. Actually, if somebody did want it, that’s too late, I claimed it first.” The boy glared at the nearest person near him, that is to say, Sugaya. “Eh, not interested.” The boy replied. “Of course you aren’t,” commented Mimura, rolling his eyes at the scene, “you already have the highest Coolness stat among us boys. -It’s not even that, I still need to wear my Goddess Ring to restore MP. Now that I think about it, it’s weird we can only equip one magic ring at a time. Anyways, are you sure Chiba isn’t the one with the highest Coolness? Like, if he were to part his hair so we can see his e- -What about that Slumber ability you were researching?” Chiba immediately asked, a bit too quickly for it to be natural. “You said it was more efficient to restore MP. -Yeah, about that... I wanted to try it, but sleepwalking is pretty hard, you know? And there’s still the problem of being asleep at the start of battles... -That’s the opposite of a problem, actually.” Nakamura interjected. “I can just switch your status with one from a monster, that’s one less trouble to worry about. -I... guess? I haven’t thought that far away, to be honest. All I can manage for now is falling asleep at the start of classes... -So, nothing different from before.” Chiba noted, not without amusement. “How lucky, I wish I could take a nap that easily.” Nakamura sat down on one of the benches. “Even standing around waiting isn’t that restful. -Right, I guess it’s time to take a pause.” Mimura sat next to her, a bit relieved.

If it was just him, then he would probably had stayed quiet and continued, rather than make the team wait, so it was nice that someone else agreed to stop and rest for a moment. He supposed that made sense, too: even if the rest of the group, understandably, didn’t accompany him for reconnaissance work, they couldn’t exactly relax and fool around. And it’s not like he left for long periods of time either. Everyone eventually installed themselves around the table, Okajima with an audible groan of satisfaction as he sprawled on it. Hayami used that time to inspect her bow, while Chiba... probably relaxed his eyes, but it was hard to tell.

“...I know this might seems random,” Fuwa said to Mimura after a few minutes, “but I can never find the appropriate time to ask. Do you remember back in Chapter 4, when we had to find the fake? -Chapter 4? -The Ruins of Betrayal. You know how in the first trial we had to prove we were the true ones with our bugs? I was thinking, how did you do with your own bug? -That’s an excellent question.” Hayami admitted, as if slightly surprised by Fuwa. “I didn’t pay attention back then, but some bugs are harder to prove than others, aren’t they. Well, for those who did it the normal way.” She glared at Okajima. “Hey, don’t look at me like that, it would have been hard for Nakamura to prove she wasn’t a fake without my nose, right? -I’m sure I would have done without.” Nakamura replied unhappily. “Though I do wonder for Fuwa too, now, that kind of bug must be easy to fake. -Oh, Korosensei didn’t make me prove my bug,” Fuwa explained. “He asked me a trivia question that only I could reply. -Hm? -’Rank Hunter x Hunter, Berserk, X/1999 and Noragami by how much hiatus years they had in total.’ -Right,” agreed Okajima, “that’s not a question someone besides you can answer on the top of their head. What’s the answer?” Fuwa emitted a soft laugh. She then began to sob. “Ah, Okajima made her cry.” Hayami noted. “That was a jerk move, Okajima.” Nakamura looked at him with an angry look. “How was I supposed to know she would cry about it?! -It’s alright,” Fuwa replied while drying her tears in an handkerchief. “Most of them came back, so I will probably get to see the end of at least one of them... probably... -...Yeah, I don’t think anyone could have faked being Fuwa with this.” Sugaya commented before turning his head to Mimura. “What about you, then? -Well, Korosensei didn’t go as far as trivia... But he did ask me about my bug. ‘With your bug, what would happen if you encountered an undead monster?’ -What? That’s weird.” Nakamura immediately pondered about it. “Undead aren’t really guarding anything, and they’re definitely not all boss monsters. Would that depend on whether they were human before? But our skills definitely register them as a monster... -They’re a special kind, though.” Chiba replied. “Undead and ghost type monsters doesn’t obey to Korosensei who’s supposed to be their king, and they will attack any live monster they find, too.” They all remembered asking their teacher about a cemetery dungeon. ‘Don’t go in there, I won’t be able to help you! And it’s not that I’m scared of ghosts or anything, they just don’t obey me, I’m not scared of them!’ “...How did you even answer, by the way? We never had to fight or met undead. -Right, it’s a bit complicated.” Mimura bit his lip, uncertain whether he should explain. “Something weird happened while I was scouting at the start of the year...”

He was so screwed. Mimura should have known not to rely on his bug that much. His teachers the precedent years said it, too. The humanoid monster in front of him definitely was watching him weirdly, and he was all alone to fight. “You...” The creature spoke while approaching, raising his arm. Mimura closed his eyes, expecting to be hit. But, what came was a gentle tap on the shoulder. “It’s dangerous for smiling mushrooms to wander alone, I heard adventurers were raiding the dungeon. Go find back your group, okay?"

“So what you’re saying is... -Right. Apparently, monsters confuse me with one of them.” Mimura’s bug: When alone, monsters who meet him don’t start a fight (doesn’t work on boss or guardian-type monsters) mistake him for a smiling mushroom.

“...That makes a lot of sense, actually.” Nakamura admitted. “Right,” Fuwa continued, “the ones that actually attacked you so far are those who would attack any monster, right? The guardians or mimics. And a boss would surely be pissed off to see a low-level monster in his quarters... I guess undead monsters would attack you too. -Plus,” Okajima added, “you do kind of look like a mushroom. -I do not! -You do,” the others actually agreed. “...You will pay for this. -If it can reassure you,” Chiba tried to comfort him, “you all look like monsters to me. Well, targets. Sometimes in battle I’m not sure where to shoot. -That’s the least reassuring thing ever!! -So that’s why I felt the arrows were coming kinda close to me sometimes.” Okajima looked uneasy at that idea. “No, that was me.” Hayami admitted. “Don’t worry, as long as I don’t see you as an enemy they won’t actually touch you. -...I feel really worried, suddenly. -At least you’re not the one that’s registered as a monster.” Mimura complained. “If at least it was a cinema dragon... -Right, what is Okajima’s bug, anyways?” Nakamura casually asked. “Whenever someone hit me, there’s a 50% chance I get charmed instead.” Okajima replied in the same tone. Half the table suddenly froze at the reveal. All this time, all the attacks they did toward Okajima...?! “It only works on humanoid monsters though.” Sugaya specified. “Wait, don’t-” Too late. Nakamura already was trying to strange the boy. “Don’t you ever dare to make that joke again! -Please don’t hurt Okajima,” Mimura ordered nicely, “we still need him for battles. -Alright, but once we’re out of the dungeon he’s toast. -I feel so loved right now.” Okajima’s voice was dripping with sarcasm. “But right. It only work on humanoid, female monsters. And only if their Coolness level is above mine. -Pretty much all of them, then. -Jerk. Anyways, that’s why I wanted the ring, not some shameful reason like you all seems to think. I mean, not just for that.” The boy showed the item for emphasis, then removed his right hand glove. “Finally I won’t be a joke character anymore...” Yet, something weird happened when Okajima put the ring. A strange sort of dark feeling. Everyone else around the table felt uncomfortable looking at the guy. As if... “Well, how do I look? Cooler? -...Say, Okajima.” Nakamura asked quietly. “Can you remove the ring? -Why, you’re jealous now? Well, as long as you give it back I’m willing to- Wait, I can’t remove it! -...So it was cursed after all. -Wait, so that mean- -Yeah, your Coolness stat is currently at 0.” That was the most common effect of cursed equipment, besides being unremovable: it drained all points from a specific stat of the wearer. “Ah, I get it.” Fuwa whispered. “What is it?” Sugaya asked, intrigued. “Okajima’s bug is that whenever someone write about him, they feel the need to turn him into a bad joke. -Hmm, sounds about right.”

[jackalopingintothevoid]

Observing Holidays Part 2

Part 1 Part 2 Part 3 Part 4 Part 5 Part 6 Part 7 Part 8 Part 9 Part 10 Part 11 Part 12 Part 13 Part 14 Part 15 Part 16 TBA

On the shortest day of the year, for the first time in John’s memory, Mochou and Changming had started their day at the same time. He’d had to switch up his coffee making and rush to get Changming’s done for him, though luckily Alouette’s wouldn’t be late, and Sampoorna was already off-planet on her way to see her cousins.

Normally, Changming came out later, apparently sifting through the messages and comments made in response to the team’s Chatternet vids each morning. He never had anything definitive from anyone, but he kept cheerful and promised John that if he had anyone out there, he’d find them.

The continued failure didn’t give him much hope.

(Would he be able to tell, if he saw his family or friends again? Would they recognise him, or was he different now than he was before? Could he look his own mother in the eye and not know her? Was he even wanted... ?)

Soon, John told himself, he would investigate the responses himself. He would not let the fear of his own brokenness paralyse him.

This morning, however, the kitchen was alive. It wasn’t at all unusual for Mochou to be cooking first thing in the morning, but she wasn’t making jianbing or stuffed buns for breakfast today-- she was taking the extra stir-fried mincemeat from the night before and cooking it on a low heat with what John recalled was bean paste. She’d also put on a pot of noodles to boil, and Changming had started thinly slicing cucumber and carrot as well.

Hesitating, John stepped closer, peering over Mochou’s shoulder without actually encroaching on her physical space.

“That’s new.”

She still jumped, like she’d forgotten he was there. “Ó! John!” Pressing a hand to her chest, she giggled to vent the adrenaline.

He grimaced apologetically, but Changming was laughing and Mochou waved it off anyhow.

“En, yes! Yes, this is zhá jiàng miàn for ma and ba.”

“Our parents,” Changming clarified, “offerings at our altar. They both loved it the best.”

It was then that the memory clicked; Sampoorna had mentioned the winter solstice as a day of importance. Was this why? Was it a day to honour the lost?

“Can I help?” If he could, he would. He wanted to. But if not, if it was personal, then he would stand aside. He didn’t remember, but he understood.

An excited noise sounded from Mochou. “Omelette! I showed you how to make an omelette, remember? Could you make a plain one for slicing?”

John felt a slight tug at the corners of his mouth, not the first little smile he’d found creeping up of its own volition. “Only one way to find out.”

Changming grinned, setting aside the chopping knife. “Thank you! It means a lot.” This time, he didn’t just pat John’s arm, but squeezed it, and John became acutely, uncomfortably aware that this was the first touch he’d received since yesterday.

He’d dreamed something last night, something that slipped away as he woke like all his dreams did, but left him with a hollow ache in his chest and a grasping want for company. At least when his dreams invoked a heart-pounding terror, he woke in safety. Waking up so lonely... Tenzin helped, but his voice was stilted and artificial, his conversation topics limited. As human as he appeared, Tenzin wasn’t a Smart AI. He was static, unlearning code, a set of complex algorithms without any real formulation of self. The realisation that the person he felt most comfortable talking to wasn’t a person at all had caused an unsettled feeling in John’s gut, but even if Tenzin had been Smart it wouldn’t have helped the ache. AIs could do a myriad of wonderful things, but they couldn’t touch.

Damn it, he’d had no trouble ignoring it until now. Changming’s gentle touch would have felt like such a gift just a day before, but now it wasn’t enough. His chest still ached and he still felt separate from them (he didn’t belong), and now it had a taste his skin greedily demanded more. More hands, more warmth, more touch. More, more, more! Why couldn’t he just be content with what he was given? Why was he being so selfish today?

He half expected (half hoped) Mochou would see the moment of contact and add her own as well, but it came and went without her attention. It was odd that she hadn’t offered any physical affection yet, and the absence left him bereft. Enough, he told himself firmly, they’re busy and you should be too. Perhaps it would help him push aside the craving.

It didn’t. John kept to his task and performed it well, but it wasn’t exactly strenuous and his mind kept wandering. More than once he found himself watching the Guan siblings as they cooked, chatting and laughing easily, with a tight feeling pressing on the ache and making it hard to breathe. The pressure made his body tense, made him want to squeeze the handle of the pan until it bent and snapped under his strength.

Setting the omelette near Changming to signal it was done, John couldn’t pretend that this wasn’t causing a problem. He needed something more challenging to focus on. But first, there was more coffee to make.

Part of John wanted to help with the decorating the group was doing. It was very pretty, he supposed, all glittery things and twinkling lights, but there wasn’t any obvious gap he could fill and he’d slow them down with his lack of knowledge anyway. They did their work efficiently and John’s clueless blundering wasn’t needed.

(A taut knot in his chest. Prickling heat behind his eyes. He clenched his fists and stifled the unwanted urge to tear down the pointless pretty things.)

Instead, John made himself a cup of tea and retreated to his quarters to research Christmas.

It wasn’t as nice as the tea Changming made. He’d poured too much water so there wasn’t enough milk, and though he’d stirred in some sugar the sweetness was faint and the aftertaste was bitter. He should have asked Tenzin how it was done. It didn’t really matter; it was warm and wet, that was enough.

Still, John couldn’t focus. There was so much information at the room’s terminal, two thousand years of history and traditions and anecdotes relating to Christmas, and it all just stared back at him meaningless and flat, until it blurred into fuzzy smudges.

He kept thinking about the embrace in the hallway after the failed shopping trip, the comfort Mochou had sought to give him. The way she’d wrapped herself around him on that first day when he was weak and sick, how secure he’d felt as his sore body relaxed in her arms. Waking from unwitting naps with her pressed into his side. He thought, too, of Sampoorna and her massages, how perfunctory it seemed whenever she took his hands in hers, like it was a perfectly normal thing to do. She’d come up behind him once and taken hold of his shoulders, but he’d sharply pulled away on reflex. She hadn’t done it again, but now he found himself fantasising about what might happen if she did, trying to imagine what it would feel like to have Sampoorna’s thumbs rubbing firm circles into the muscles of his upper back. He couldn’t, but if he could it wouldn’t help. He knew what being held felt like, but imagining that just filled him with a sharp longing.

With a frustrated sigh, John pushed away from the terminal and stood, pressing his fingers against the heat behind his eyes. He had to figure out some way of circumventing this... whatever was wrong with him. He glanced about the room, as if something within it held the answer, only to find that it might well do.

Crossing to the bed in two long strides, John scooped up the quilt and shook it out, before wrapping it lengthwise around his shoulders and settling back down again. It was cool to the touch now, but in a few minutes it would be warm around him and he was sure that it would bring the comfortable feeling he needed to assuage himself. It had to. He didn’t know what else to do.

It was a relief to open the window. The kitchen was like a sauna, but at last all the dumplings were done.

It had been a very, very busy day so far. Neither she or Changming had realised until the night before, but all of the dumpling ingredients should have been bought by Alouette... which she hadn’t, because John had been overwhelmed in the store.

Which wasn’t to blame John at all! Mochou thought he was terribly brave, really, but he was still being very hard on himself. Still, it meant they’d both had to start early. Making food and drink for ma and ba’s altar was time-consuming in and of itself, and then there was joss sticks and greetings and prayers, more than their usual daily offerings. Today was a special day, after all.

After that, it was shopping, then the bickering had started about what was going in the dumplings. That stretched the trip out anyway, and then Changming had asked what kind of dumplings John would like, and they both realised that the man himself probably didn’t know, so they doubled back and bought a bit of everything-- and then a bit more, for John’s appetite.

A quick lunch, and then they were back in the kitchen. Dumplings and dumplings and dumplings they’d made, labouring together for the evening’s meal. There was always at least one point in the hours of prepping, steaming, assembling and boiling where Mochou demanded to know why the two of them kept doing this to themselves, and by now her brother just rolled his eyes. She knew why.

But now it was done, and Mochou was looking forward to spending the rest of Dōngzhì with her family.

As everyone came together, complimenting the food with all the usual enthusiasm, Mochou found they were one short.

“En... where’s John? You didn’t leave him decorating when dinner’s ready, did you?”

Riley frowned. “He hasn’t been decorating, I don’t think. Least I’ve not seen him, not since coffee o’ clock. In all honesty, I thought he was with you.”

“What? No, I haven’t seen him since this morning either.”

“Well, bollocks. Anyone else?”

Alouette shook her head. “The same as you, I think. This morning’s coffee, then nothing.”

“Yeah, same. Me and Mochou were busy anyway making zhá jiàng miàn.”

“Did he even come out for lunch?” Fiona asked. John was always there when food was available. If he hadn’t been seen at lunchtime then...

“Wait,” Davis chimed in, “none of us have seen John all day... and no one thought to check on him?”

There was a guilty silence.

“... We’re bad people.”

Worry twisted Mochou’s stomach. “I’ll check his room.”

John hadn’t intended to get back into bed. But he found he kept trying to pull his knees up to his chest, and he was simply too large for that to work in the desk chair. So here he was, folded up and cocooned in the warm quilt, watching vids of people celebrating on Christmas morning.

He’d picked one at random, since reading seemed to be a fruitless endeavour, in the hope that more to process would help stimulate his brain. Instead he found himself mournfully watching happy families and carefree children opening gifts from people who loved them, regularly having to pause and look away. He had no idea why he was doing this to himself. It just made him feel worse, all of it, especially since the more he saw the more familiar it all was. He wasn’t lying to Sampoorna when he said he didn’t celebrate Christmas, but he was starting to realise that he used to.

He could still picture the face of the woman he’d dreamed about. His mother. He was certain she was his mother, but his image of her was a woman Fiona’s age or younger, and in his dreams of her he was a very small child. He was decades older now, and probably dwarfed that young woman. In all likelihood, his mother died that young, one of the countless casualties of the Covenant’s genocidal campaign.

The only person from his life that he remembered, and John would never see her again.

Did they have a tree, a lifetime ago? Stockings for presents from the mythical Father Christmas, special seasonal cookies and songs? Chocolate for breakfast and turkey for dinner? Did he believe in God, once, in the miracle of Christ’s birth?

(He didn’t now. If someone knew the Human-Covenant war and all that entailed was going to happen and had the power to stop it but didn’t... that wasn’t the kind of person John could put any faith in.)

Even in the face of the familiar, all he had was questions.

And then there was a knock on the door.

“John?” It was Mochou, and his stomach lurched. “Can I come in?”

“Yes.” Taking the earphones out, he heard his own voice was more of a croak, and he became abruptly aware of how thirsty he was.

The door slowly swung open, and the smell of food wafting in made ravenous hunger join the thirst. How long had he been in here...?

“Hello.” Mochou said gently. “You okay in there? No one’s seen you all day.”

John swallowed and licked his dry lips, ignoring his sore throat to answer. “I’ve been researching.” He gestured slightly with the COM pad in his hand and remembered he was bundled. He must have looked ridiculous.

But she came into the room with concern on her face, trying to smile all the same, and perched on the bed next to him. Close to him. He swallowed again.

“You’ve been researching a long time. It’s dinner now. Do you want to come eat with us? It’s a family thing, all eating together for Dōngzhì. You don’t have to, though, if you’re not feeling up to it.”

But John nodded before she’d even finished. “I’ll come.”

For a moment, it looked like Mochou was going to get up and leave again, but she paused... he couldn’t keep up with what his insides were doing in response, twisting and lurching. He just wanted the dizzying feelings to stop.

Trying to shake himself out of the miserable stupor that had wasted an entire day, John shrugged off the quilt and swung his legs off the bed, immediately feeling the comparative chill of the air after basking in his own insulated heat for hours. He ignored it. Dinner would be hot.

Mochou stood easily (silently he cursed his knees), then turned and held out her hand.

Was she... going to try and pull him up? Hesitating, John took it.

And sighed. Felt his shoulders slump. He tightened his grip on the tiny hand just slightly and squeezed his eyes shut.

“John...” She sounded so sad. He lifted his head and opened his eyes again, just in time for her to climb into his lap and kneel there-- then pull his face into her neck. “Have you been in here by yourself all lonely? I’m sorry, John. Someone should have come to see if you were okay.”

She let go of his hand to wrap that arm around his shoulder, the other still cupping the back of his head. For a second, he couldn’t react; then he hugged back, pressing her firmly against him, content to keep hiding his face.

(The press of her skin against his own was... it was so much. He’d been craving this all day and instead of having to pull himself together and pretend he was fine... she was giving it to him. Just like that.)

(it’s okay if you’re not okay)

“Kělián de dōngxī... ” Mochou’s fingers started gently combing through his hair, and the combination of the soft pads of her fingers and the gentle scrape of her nails across his scalp made his whole body turn to pudding. A soft, low sound slipped out, and he squeezed her a little tighter as he tried to stay upright.

“Ó John, I’m sorry. You’re never gonna be in trouble for wanting to spend time with us, okay? And if you ever need a hug, just ask.” She was tracing patterns on his back, then she was scratching a little, and he shivered at the intensity of it. It was such a change from the distress that stole the day, and his voice rumbled in his chest without form or intent.

(it’s okay if you’re not okay)

“Or, if... if asking with words is too hard, you could gesture for a hug? If you open your arms, or something like that, then I’ll give you a hug right away! And I’ll never be mad at you or tell you not to, I promise.”

I promise.

John nodded into Mochou’s neck. It was okay to ask. He had permission to seek... this. She’d promised. She’d promised.

It would be hard to believe, if they weren’t entangled. He’d have happily stayed there forever, but there were footfalls in the hallway.

“Oh... oh dear. What’s the matter then, love?” Riley. Riley coming in, their tone warm, the bed dipping slightly as they sat down next to him. Another noise left him as Riley’s hand started rubbing firm, brisk circles on his lower back. It was so good, it all felt so good.

And then his stomach made a frankly embarrassing noise.

“Oh no!” Mochou sounded so upset that John felt guilty. “Oh no, you’ve been in here all day! You must be starving! Ó, I’m glad I made lots...”

He didn’t want her to wriggle off of his lap and pull away, he really didn’t, but Riley hadn’t stopped and he couldn’t hold either of them hostage.

“Oh, poor John.” Riley cooed. “Come along and have dinner with all of us. We’re gonna sit on the sofa together and watch the Wolf Warrior movies. They’re Chinese, and really bloody old, but it’s Mouse and Mingle’s day so I hope you like subtitles!”

They couldn’t quite fit everyone on the sofa, but John didn’t mind. Mochou had clambered into his lap again, with Changming pressed tightly against one side of him and Riley on the other, their arm wrapped around his own. Alouette regularly reached over and patted him on the knee for no real reason that he could find other than that she wanted to. He felt warm and full (not just full of dumplings either, though John certainly ate plenty of those) and the ache was gone. He felt secure and relaxed, and after he’d finally eaten and drunk his fill Mochou started stroking his hair again, just because.

Between Wolf Warrior 2 and Wolf Warrior 3, Changming piped up. “It was a nice bright day out today. Which means it’s probably gonna be raining on the Lunar New Year. So no fireworks!”

There were groans and grumbles from everyone else on the couch, but John was a happy lump of mush covered in friends, so what was there to grumble about? He didn’t much like fireworks anyway.

[reap-it-and-weep]

The Rework Limbo Needs

In Warframe, I have played almost exclusively Limbo since I started playing (I purchased him outright so I wouldn’t have to start on another character), and with roughly 450 hours in the game so far, I think I have a decent understanding of Limbo, how he works, and his character. I may not know everything about the game itself, but I certainly feel qualified to talk about my favorite frame, Limbo and his somewhat-recent rework.

The rework for Limbo bothers me greatly. It did not buff or improve Limbo, so much as it fundamentally changed his character to be annoying and inconvenient in a different way.

The Old

First, we need to think about what Limbo originally was as a frame. What his character was, his personality was. 

Limbo was an incredibly smart character, a master of the rift. He had complete control over who entered and exited the rift (or was supposed to). A master tactician with a good head for numbers, he made up for his fragile frame via complete control of the situation.

He originally had 4 abilities.

1. Send a single opponent into the rift.

2. Send himself into the rift

3. Increase his own damage inside the rift for a short duration

4. Cataclysm. A bubble area-of-effect that sends everyone into the rift, which quickly shrinks and explodes. Can be detonated to explode early. 

You could generally play the old Limbo 2 different ways. You could use your 2 to keep yourself in the rift, sending individual targets into the rift with your 1 (very safe, but very slow and time consuming). Or you could rely on your Cataclysm, making a giant (but shrinking) bubble that both pissed off your teammates and risked killing yourself with, as you now had no rift to retreat into if things go awry (and thinks go awry very, very fast as Limbo).

Or you could go for pure damage and range, 1 hit KOing very low level enemies. But pretty much any character can do that.

But then his much-needed rework happened, with changes that were...unwarranted.

The New

Let’s look at what they changed.

First, he has a Passive now. His rolls now send Limbo into and out of the rift. This was a wonderful change for Limbo. A master of the rift should not be having to press 2 every minute if they want to stay inside the rift!

Second, enemies killed inside the rift grant Limbo 10 energy. It’s a small thing, but it’s a very good change because it keeps Limbo’s momentum going, as Limbo is a very energy-intensive character. All wonderful changes so far. 

But let’s look at where things fall apart, now, Limbo’s new abilities.

1. Fires an invisible cone in front of Limbo, sending everyone in it into the rift. Can no longer use while inside the rift.

2. Stasis. All opponents inside the rift are completely frozen. Bullets are also frozen inside the rift. Firing just a couple bullets will end the stasis.

3. “Surges nearby Rift-bound enemies with Rift energy. When killed the Rift Surge is transferred to a nearby enemy outside the rift. Surged enemies that leave the Rift perform a radial Banish.” Basically, it makes mini-cataclysms.

4. Cataclysm. Basically unchanged.

Now let’s go through the problems with these abilities, in order.

1. First off, Banish, limbo’s first ability. Being able to send multiple opponents into the Rift was very much needed. Individually sending in people everytime is a very slow process, which made Limbo too slow and inconvenient to use. Pre-rework Limbo that relied on his 1 and 2 would only kill a couple targets a game, at best, even with fantastic efficiency. 

BUT now you send a lot of people into the rift. And it’s very hard to tell who you will and won’t send. There is no visible cone to indicate your range. And now you have a lot of threats to deal with at once, on a very weak, easy-to-kill character. Which wouldn’t be too big an issue, because they all get knocked over when they enter the rift, right? 

BUT that gets to the second, much bigger issue with Limbo’s new first ability: you can’t do it while inside the rift. EVERYTIME you want to rift an opponent, you have to unrift yourself, rift the people you want inside the rift, and then rift yourself again (all while getting shot at, on an incredibly delicate frame). It’s not just dangerous, it’s a time-consuming inconvenience. The new Limbo is just as slow as the old Limbo at getting kills because of this. Only now it’s more dangerous, because by the time you’re back inside the rift they’re already back on their feet ready to rip you a new one inside the rift where your teammates can’t save you.

2. But Limbo does now have one new saving grace, one ability to give him some durability inside the rift (thank christ). His second ability, Stasis. Everyone opponent inside the rift is frozen, for a kinda meh duration of 30 seconds. Considering the duration of Banish is also only 25 seconds, it’s a lot of inconvenient micromanaging that makes Duration mods a necessity, rather than a boon.

I really loved Stasis--for about 5 minutes, before I realized all the problems with it. It sounds super cool, right? You stasis, you shoot bullets at everyone’s face, and then all cool-like you unfreeze everything and their faces all explode. Super dope. But no, that’s not how Stasis actually works.

The limited number of bullets you can keep in Stasis means that, realistically, you’ll only have enough stasised bullets to kill 1 or 2 people at best. It’s horrifically inefficient with the majority of weapons. Shotguns? Don’t even try. Staticor? Nope. Panthera? Can’t even make the chainsaw come out for its alternate fire.

So this leads you into one of two situations if you try to use it this way. You either only have 1 target you use Stasis on, which it works and looks cool, but you didn’t really need Stasis anyway because it was ONE TARGET.

Or, you try to use it on large group of people and either end up running out of energy recasting Stasis and Banish over and over (while unrifting everytime you need to Banish them) or you only use it to kill 1-2 people and get shot by the rest. “Oh, but I’ll just send in 1 person!” Good luck with that, as the new Banish isn’t picky.

So most people end up circumventing this issue by using melee weapons. That’s right, melee weapons. Let me ask you this: What kind of character do you think of when you think of Limbo? A raging barbarian, ripping people apart with his bare hands? No, that’s Valkyr. Limbo...has a tophat and monocle. His entire character is designed around not getting his hands dirty, so to speak. But now one of the most effective ways to kill people using Stasis (which you now have to use, as you can’t send just 1 person into the rift at a time) is melee. 

It completely ruin’s Limbo personality and character wise. It makes no sense.

3. Now let’s jump to Limbo’s third ability. It makes mini cataclysms. Clashes horribly with his 4th ability, but also is very random and inconsistent in its usefulness. It might help you, it might get you killed when you accidentally rifted that bombard firing a missile at you. I rarely see Limbos use this. But let’s also look at Limbo’s character and personality again. A master tactician, carefully selecting people to enter his domain. Now both his 1 and 3 send inconsistently-huge crowds of people into the rift. It just clashes with his character design.

4. And finally, Cataclysm. Pretty much the same as before, with the same problems as before.

I was quite disappointed with this rework, I’m sorry to say. It may have been a small buff, but it also destroyed and clashed with Limbo’s personaltiy 100%.

The Rework

But it’s not unfixable, and most changes needed to make Limbo a good/decent frame would be small.

I will go through Limbo’s abilities in order again, marking what needs to be fixed.

1. Banish, his first ability. It was too slow pre-rework, but too dangerous post rework. 

The solution is simply to combine the two. Click 1, and you instantly rift 1 person. Hold down 1, and you fire off the cone, getting a group of enemies. Also give the cone a better indicator of what ground it covers.

Next, make it so you can use this ability while rifted. It’s a massive inconvenience otherwise, and slows down combat considerably. If you want to still ensure some danger is involved for Limbo, remove the knockdown stun when rifting the opponent.

Next, increase the duration slightly. A good 5 seconds extra would be plenty.

And finally, make the damage of rifting someone be based off of a percentage of their health. Power Strength on Limbo is 100% useless in anything but low-level farming. I don’t expect to be killing people by rifting them, but if it could actually take off a consistent percentage of their healthpool it would be useful to get Power Strength up.

2. Stasis, his second ability. Right now it’s utterly unusable with the majority of weapons, and the solution is not to just increase the number of bullets you can keep in stasis. No doubt that would screw over a lot of people, lead to crashing, etc. No, that’s not how you fix Stasis. 

You fix Stasis by making it not effect bullets at all. But that would be kinda broken, right? I agree. Which is why instead of freezing opponents, it should slow them instead. Slow their bodies (like ice), but also slow down their movements. Imagine Limbo sidestepping a slow bombard rocket wizzing past his head, Matrix style. That would not just be super cool, but also allow Limbo to actually use his full range of weapons again. It would also make using his stasis less boring. The way stasis is used now, you freeze them, and then you just press E over and over. You couldn’t have a lower skill ceiling. This way you’ll still have to dodge 

Next, make how much they’re Slowed be based off of your Power Strength. It would give Power Strength another use, but Duration and Efficiency would still be important.

To sum up, it should slow down enemies and their bullets, but not slow you down at all. You’re the master of the rift, after all. But not slowing you down at all brings me to the 3rd ability.

3. Rift Surge, a terrible ability now that doesn’t fit Limbo’s character at all. The old ability was decent, but there were too many things to micromanage already and it was kind of boring to use.

So let’s rework Limbo’s 3rd into something fun and useful, and make it connect to Limbo’s 2nd and 4th abilities better.

Instead of a straight up damage increase, Limbo AND all teammates inside the rift get a speed increase. Faster fire rate, faster movement speed. This scales with Power Strength, giving Power Strength another use (whereas currently power strength is 100% useless on Limbo in mid to high level play). Now not only are enemies slowed, Limbo will be darting in and out among them, a true master of the rift. It would also be much more fun than a straight up damage increase, while also giving it utility AND making it more fun for teammates. Limbo is notorious right now for being unfun to play with in a squad, but now instead of making mini cataclysms that screw over your teammates, you’ll potentially be giving them a speed boost when they hop into the rift via your Passive’s portal or fight with you inside your Cataclysm.

4. And finally, Cataclysm. As it is, the bubble shrinking just makes it a terrible ability. Like Frost’s bubble, but ten times worse. Make the damage of entering and exiting it percentage based, just like Banish, and make that percentage scale off Power Strength. It shouldn’t be a tool for instantly KOing low level mobs, it should be there to weaken enemies of all levels. 

And just make it so the bubble doesn’t shrink. It’s just awful for defending objectives because of this, and makes pouring everything into range and duration a necessity for it to be even moderately useful.

Along with this, Limbo’s augments are in a terrible spot right now and in need of a rework too.

Current Haven: Allies Banished to the rift will have 25% of their health restored.

Reworked Haven: Allies (Including Limbo) inside the rift slowly regenerate health, akin to a more powerful Rejuvenation.

As it is, Haven is 100% useless. This would give it some good utility, but also it would mean you don’t have to individually rift/unrift a teammate 4 times just to heal them. It would also make more sense this way. Why would it just heal them when they go inside the rift via Banish? Why not through Cataclysm or the Passive’s portal? The rift is supposed to be a Haven for the injured, and this should include Limbo too. Plus, the rift already regenerates Energy this way. Haven making it regenerate Health this way too just makes sense.

Current Rift Torrent: Limbo deals 30% more damage for each enemy effected by Rift Surge while inside the rift.

Reworked Rift Torrent: Limbo and allies deal 40% more damage for each ally (including Limbo) effected by Rift Surge while inside the rift.

With the reworked abilities, this would need to be reworked too.

Cataclysm Continuum: Cataclysm duration increased by 1 second for each enemy killed. This is just fine as it is.

So those are my thoughts. I certainly appreciate feedback, so feel free to respond with your own thoughts and opinions on what Limbo needs.

[empiremarketingproof]

Home-Based Business: Are You Ready?

Home-based businesses were round for the long term, even long earlier than the net won the popularity it has today. Earlier than MLM as we realize it, there has been Amway and Avon and Mary Kay. All respectable methods to earn aspect profits. But with the start of comparable possibilities and new business fashions operating in the main online, our society has been covered with the aid of fear of such opportunities, which we are now calling the "home-based totally enterprise phobia." At the same time as there are numerous authentic commercial enterprise possibilities online, there are simply as many "scams" which have been grouped into the equal category. Those are normally offerings in alternate for post-charge (which by no means comes) or pyramid-type schemes that include no actual products, simplest the possibility to earn from recruiting others. Alas, as with most any situation, the bad start to outweigh the fantastic. Before you realize it, home-based totally groups are overshadowed through the reputation of the few actual scams. I consider that the concern of home-based businesses stems from this reality, as well as others. Whilst many ability customers fear the scams without knowing what's and what isn't always, some worry something specific from the norm in terms of incomes a residing. Let's accept it, society increases us to work tough at a physical process. Even from childhood, we are educated to do nicely in faculty up thru within the hopes of securing a decent task. It's far what our mother and father did, and their dad and mom, and all of our ancestors back via time. So when the proposition of earning a first-rate residing without operating at a physical process makes its way into the minds of society's leaders, it's miles considered in a negative light. This, I sense, is because we as people fear something exceptional, or that we do not understand. This is not how we have been raised, this is not how anybody has ever earned a profit before (not a complete-time profit, anyway). Therefore, it isn't without problems commonplace.

The truth is that entrepreneurship is what drives our economy. 

Even the most important companies commenced as mom&pop shops or small-city eating places. Small commercial enterprise and entrepreneurship assist instability out the hold that "huge business" has on our financial system. Without them, big companies might don't have any opposition and therefore no standards to uphold. So precisely what's the most important worry surrounding any home-based business opportunity? I have a concept, and it includes the initial begin-up. Maximum individuals are terrified of dropping the money they could have to invest. They are terrified of the threat involved. But what's so awful about chance? Don't maximum things in lifestyles involve some kind of danger? The adage "nothing ventured, nothing won..." comes to mind. If we in no way step out of the box that society has created, we will never know what may be. We can by no means enjoy distinctive or higher. We can, in short, turn out to be the one aspect that our species fears the maximum...Stagnant! Our global's nice innovations (products and services like electricity, prevent lighting fixtures, and air journey) came from ahead-wondering folks who dared to appearance outdoor of the "norm" for higher and extra efficient methods of residing. Without folks who embraced this mindset, we might nevertheless be dwelling as Neanderthals, slightly the use of hearth to heat caves and prepare dinner food (or even this become forward-questioning for the time).

The dangers we take must always be calculated, to a quantity. 

We must don't forget closely the pros and cons of our decisions. And the choices we make must now not be something that would hurt us, injure our cherished ones, or reason us to head absolutely and thoroughly broke. Properly, a home commercial enterprise does not do any of these items, does it? It does now not threaten or harm us or our households, and if we're discovering and investing wisely, it must no longer dissipate all of our profits either. Home business in its authentic state was not intended to break monetary conditions, however to improve them, either using supplementing the prevailing income or surpassing and replacing it. So the concern is certainly dropping some hundred, or probably $1000 or extra. A valid and understandable worry from individuals who work difficult for every cent they've. But, a part of the point of making money is to position it to paintings for us. This is completed using investing in programs (whether or not via stocks, cash market debts, CD's, savings accounts that accrue hobby, on-line agencies or in any other case) that allow us to earn greater than we have invested. When you put your money to give you the results you want, you've got a better risk of attaining economic protection, that is what we're all running towards. So then, ought to a person go out and be part of each cash-making opportunity they can locate? Of direction no longer! Making an investment or beginning a home business is a sensible selection, however, it should be completed with care. It's far always an amazing concept to do ample research at the program(s) you are interested in becoming a member of. You must keep in mind the whole lot from the legal elements to the goods being promoted. And as a crucial side observe, you should usually investigate the character or entity that has brought the possibility to you. Regularly, this character turns into your "sponsor" in the application, and the only responsible for guiding you and assisting you to get going inside the proper directing. As demanding as it's miles, there are a few "sponsors" who are not in shape to be so. They do little, if anything, to assist their clients or associates. Human beings like this, sadly, give they discern organizations a less than ideal reputation. Maximum distributors' paintings independently of their figure company. Whilst there are positive guidelines to observe, they may be now not constrained within the methods they can put it on the market or marketplace. For this reason, I advocate that once learning home business opportunities, you preserve open thoughts and do simply as a whole lot of studies (if no longer greater) on the person who will become your sponsor.

Allow's communicate approximately a number of the alternative fears surrounding the house-based totally business. 

One of the maximum common ones is that the possibility is illegal; not authorized via nation and government regulations. The very best way to circumvent this trouble is to check with local and country officers (generally the state lawyer general). If you are interested in a program, touch your state professional to learn the necessities and regulations for involvement in a domestic-based total enterprise. And of the path, after you join, take the necessary steps to record your income to the IRS, and to sign up your commercial enterprise with the federal government.

Other less verbalized fears pertain to our talents. 

Many people feel that they do not have what it takes to run a domestic enterprise. They will feel they lack skilled inside the enterprise, or lack competencies essential for marketing and customer service. The majority of home commercial enterprise applications in lifestyles these days provide a few kinds of schooling and assist. Whilst some programs are higher than others (according to current and past contributors or associates), it isn't tough to advantage the capabilities and enjoy vital to be triumphant. In case you are inquisitive about joining a domestic business, ensure that your research consists of the research of the company's (and sponsor's) training regimen and guide. Be a part of only if you are satisfied that you may acquire the individual help you need to your skill degree and situation. In conjunction with this, many fear that they may want massive budgets for advertising their enterprise. This problem too may be solved via the schooling supplied with the possibility. There are numerous methods of advertising-free which are very powerful (although they may be a piece time-ingesting). Your chosen domestic commercial enterprise application ought to recognize a great variety of these methods and be inclined to teach you on those techniques also. Be sure to invite if they encompass this in their training and help. If they do now not, pass on to getting to know every other opportunity.

One of the final fears I have encountered is the funding of time. I

ndividuals worry that operating a home business will take too much of their time; time faraway from their jobs, faculty, circle of relatives, or interests. The factor of operating from home (however you pick out to do it) is to allow you greater time at domestic to spend your own family or interests. An ordinary task in the workforce takes extra time from those hobbies than a home enterprise could. While jobs and faculty may additionally appear cozy, they do not permit you the liberty which you so rightly deserve. Home commercial enterprise programs are seeking to remedy this hassle by providing you with the freedom to set your hours. Additionally, home corporations, even as they will take a chunk extra time in the beginning for preliminary set-up and advertising, can ultimately run from simply 2 or 3 hours of effort in line with day. Consider incomes greater from a sale sooner or later than you'll earn in 2 weeks or even a month from your activity and five fewer hours of work? Is that not what we in the end strive for? Time is vital, especially because it isn't guaranteed to any folks. The great way to maximize your time right here in the world is to do what you could to experience more of it. A home-based enterprise can result in an opportunity for freedom that most folks by no mean idea possible, way to society. Why no longer move for it, when there may be so little to lose? At the same time as all the fears discussed are valid, none are so disheartening as the opportunity of no future stability, no protection, or no retirement. Greater than something, I fear needing to come out of retirement to make ends meet. I worry about having to compete with a younger, sharper, and extra technologically-inclined era for a process at an older age. I fear no longer being able to retire when I want because I have not built up a deep-sufficient income or secure-enough future. I fear my kids no longer being capable of going to university if they want, or now not having enough to offer the entirety they want and need. I fear to work to the point in which I have overlooked out on life's maximum precious moments...My children growing up, my courting with my spouse, my grandchildren, and so on. Most of all, I worry to skip on not anything but money owed to my cherished ones. For me, those fears far outweigh the opportunity of dropping cash or mastering something new. It is for this reason that I have become worried about the house commercial enterprise. I'm younger, and as so many say have my whole existence beforehand of me. I would like the personal and monetary freedom to experience a number of it. I would love to begin my marriage on a strong and relaxed plane. I would like to stay at home with my kids whilst they're born. I would like to peer them off to school every day (or even home-school them), teach them new matters, attend their performances and video games, and be there to encourage their individuality. I would love to have something to bypass on to each of them (a domestic, a vast inheritance, a vehicle...A future). I don't want my circle of relatives to "want" for something. My home-based business is permitting me to do all of those things and greater!

Some thoughts to folks who are considering a domestic business on their very own.

What is preventing you? What is it that you worry maximum about investing in a domestic-based enterprise? Do you now not want all of the matters defined above? If all your fears were addressed and dispelled, would you still be hesitant? In that case, why?

The ugly truth is that state-of-the-art economy and our group of workers do no longer provide financial safety. 

Your role can be terminated or passed on to another at any time, and without any be aware. Most agencies, especially huge companies, cognizance only on the desires of the commercial enterprise. In case you, your pay grade, or your capabilities stand inside the manner of those desires, you pose a hazard and can be removed without tons of attention. And unfortunately, this kind of remedy is a felony in maximum states. Does this sound like protection to you? Would not you rather have control over how your circle of relatives is authorized to stay than an organization that cares little approximately them? Wouldn't you want an again-up plan in case this takes place to you? It's far another sad truth that maximum individuals live and assume interior their little bubbles. They see unfortunate matters happening all around them, however, by no means forestall to assume that it could manifest to them at any time. None of the people are proof against such occurrences. None of the people is invulnerable to the rigors and tribulations of existence. It can be someone else, however, it can always just as effortlessly be us! One greater idea...If a chief scenario passed off the desired a huge amount of cash to remedy (a hearth, your most effective vehicle breaking down, a flood, a destroy-in or robbery, even a baby being born), might you be able to manage it without depleting your life's savings? Would you have the ability to take care of it immediately? Or would it take months to keep up enough? A domestic enterprise can be a superb addition to any lifestyle. Maximum do no longer take exceeding quantities of time to work, maximum do no longer rob our wallets of incredible quantities, and that they permit us to earn sufficient to significantly supplement our modern incomes, even replace them! With such a lot of greater professionals than cons, why shouldn't you recall a home-primarily based enterprise of your personal?

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[dailykhaleej]

Cheaters never prosper, except maybe in a pandemic

RIYADH: Because the second semester attracts to a shut, college students, mother and father, and lecturers alike wait to see the impression quarantine has had on grades. The coronavirus illness (COVID-19) pandemic drove everybody in academia into a frenzy. Colleges and universities shortly shut down, and college students and instructors had been compelled to adapt to on-line courses and exams. With no finish to the lockdown in sight, nobody knew how last exams had been going to work. However whereas finals for a lot of faculty college students had been finally canceled, with their grades decided by the primary semester’s outcomes, college college students had been nonetheless obligated to take them from house — making it simpler for them to cheat. Arab Information spoke to a few of those college students about how and why they cheated on their finals. As a result of controversial nature of the topic, the scholars requested for anonymity. Their names have thus been modified. Badr, a faculty freshman, stated that even with college countermeasures in place, there have been nonetheless loads of methods to cheat on digital exams. “Most exams will give you a time frame in which to log in, so you don’t have to enter right away. There’s a window of about 15   minutes. What we’ll do is have the best student go in first, start solving questions, and send screenshots via WhatsApp or another messaging app,” he defined. “We’ll all log in at various times after them and check the chat whenever we need answers. Even if the questions are randomized, we’ll know the answers either way,” he added.

A well-designed examination ought to have evaluation questions, questions that depend upon the coed’s means to resolve a downside or attain a conclusion.

Dr. Hala Ismailm, assistant professor and chairperson of the Division of Linguistics at Prince Sultan College in Riyadh

For more durable questions, or ones that contain written solutions, Badr and his pals will merely fall again on Google. “Sometimes you get lucky and your professor is kind of lazy and will just lift questions from teacher resource websites. Even though the exam software our university uses won’t let us exit or minimize the screen unless the exam is completed and submitted, anyone with a phone, iPad, or second laptop can circumvent that easily enough,” he stated. Amira, a senior graduating in laptop science, stated that even in a discipline that requires a lot of private enter, comparable to in coding or fixing math issues, folks have discovered methods to cheat. “Someone from my class paid a private tutor to FaceTime them while they were taking a math exam and had the tutor do all the work while they just copied down the explanations and answers. Lots of tutors do it because they can make good money from it. With everyone worried about money during this pandemic, I’m sure they aren’t hard to find,” she stated. Amira stated that college students will seemingly at all times discover methods to cheat, particularly when working unsupervised from house. For some, the temptation may be too nice to withstand. For others, they may merely reap the benefits of the state of affairs and resolve to take the simple method out. “I just want to be done with this chapter of my life as I feel like the odds are stacked against me at such a critical juncture. It’s making me do things I normally wouldn’t,” she stated. Each Badr and Amira imagine that dishonest is ethically mistaken. Given their present circumstances, nevertheless, they really feel they haven’t any alternative. “If I were the only one doing it, I would feel bad about it. But I guarantee you, everyone is cheating now. The odds are against me anyway. I can study hard and work, and someone who cheats will still get a better grade than me. That’s not fair,” Badr stated. Amira echoed his sentiments, saying that the exams they had been taking from house had been far more durable than these they might have taken usually. “In normal circumstances, I would never cheat. But our exams have been way too hard since we began taking them at home. In trying to stop us from cheating, our professors have actually driven us to cheating since that is the only way we can actually do well on their exams,” stated Amira. As for the instructors themselves, most are totally conscious that college students are going to cheat it doesn’t matter what. Their emotions on the matter are blended. Dr. Hala Ismail, assistant professor and chairperson of the Division of Linguistics at Prince Sultan College in Riyadh, stated that college students have loads of misconceptions about what makes an examination simple or arduous to cheat on. “A lot of students assume that it’s easier to cheat on digital exams but in reality, it’s easier to cheat on a poorly designed exam. A well-designed exam should have analysis questions, questions that depend on the student’s ability to solve a problem or reach a conclusion, not just parrot back knowledge copied from their books or lectures,” she stated. Ismail, who teaches skilled ethics, believes that training in tutorial ethics can even profit college students who won’t pay attention to the true penalties of their dishonest. “I like to ask students what they would do if they knew that their professor had cheated. Or if they would trust a doctor whom they knew had cheated on all of his university exams. I tend to find that these discussions make it very hard for them to cheat,” she stated. “As an educator, you want to evaluate your students fairly and make sure everyone gets what they deserve from the course. When students cheat, it makes it harder for us to be fair. It also makes it harder for us to design good exams,” she added. Dr. Orchida Fayez, chief of the digital humanities analysis group at Prince Sultan College, stated that she believed the entire training system has modified and that the time of conventional exams had already handed. “We should do away with the traditional format of giving a student an essay or task to complete in a limited time, the results of which we correct afterwards,” she stated. “Starting a project or activity in class and holding several dynamic discussions in which everyone participates equally is far more effective, engaging and enjoyable for the students.” Fayez identified that in this age of know-how, college students and lecturers each have extra entry to data and sources on the Web and mustn’t waste vitality specializing in issues that don’t matter. “Being fixated on cheating is wrong. Going through a lot of trouble to make things too difficult is not the solution,” she stated. She suggested instructors and educators to as an alternative maintain discussions with college students and comply with up on their progress by way of assignments. She additionally believes that non-traditional examination strategies, comparable to open-book exams or asking for a last venture as an alternative of an examination, might be rather more efficient. “Open book exams, for example, aren’t just exams where you can copy what’s written in the book. It’s all about the analysis of the information,” she stated.

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[armorroofing]

Wow! Armor Roofing - Joplin MO Roofing Company

The article Wow! Armor Roofing - Joplin MO Roofing Company originally appeared on Armor Roofing Kansas City.

Your roofing is a major portion of your house. A family house is actually the essence of a person's existence. A roomy house provides you the space crucial to establish a life with your family. But you have got to initially check that your house is the perfect locale for all to thrive. You will need to make it so that your residential house is usually well prepared and there will not be some unfortunate circumstance there that can help to make everyone come to feel uneasy. Consequently, it is really important that you maintain your roof structure.

Without a roof perfectly working correctly, you might as well stay outdoors. If you are experiencing complications with your roof, now is the time to begin with correcting it, especially if you live in Joplin, and are in search of a roofing company around Joplin, you really should e-mail us for the top rated roofing services you will ever end up getting.

Armor Roofing LLC has been providing excellent service in the Joplin area for over two decades and we place customer full satisfaction above all else. We are very pleased to carry a top A+ scoring with the local BBB as a verification of to our duty to superiority. Are you worried as to the likelihood that your home insurer is able to pay off the claim? Our company has made it possible for many homeowners in navigating through the insurance paperwork to end up with the payment they have earned. Whenever you employ the service of our roofing company, you do not need to become anxious about the project being finished correctly. We stand behind our services, providing a complete certification on all services performed.

A minimal attention to detail as we speak will likely save you from a whole lot of problems from a water leak later in life. Phone us now for a no obligation risk-free inspection.

Call Us Today!Call Us Today! (816) 331-7663

In order for your roofing to make it through the strong storms common around the Joplin community, then you preferably should make certain your rooftop is very well maintained and fixed when appropriate. A whole roof replacement can indeed be incredibly costly, nonetheless not ensuring it is dealt with quickly is never ever advisable. There are different arguments why. Because water begins spilling into the home simply because you delayed the replacement, handling water destruction would likely be a tad more excessive priced than the original roof price level you were circumventing. A roof structure is able to tolerate a limited amount of pounding from severe storms in the long term prior to the need to be replaced to recuperate its structure.

You'll discover several necessary points to understand. Few affected roof structures require a costly roof installation. In truth, a great number of can be managed by means of an uncomplicated to accomplish patch. Last, whether or not you should have a more pricey 100% roof replacement, the home loan ınsurance coverage will cover the expenses only if the procedure is competently done. Which means that it could make sense to opt for the ideal roofer to maximize the odds the service is actually done with the desired workmanship, and thus, your insurance adjuster is completely satisfied.

Does Someone Want Replacement Roof covering in Joplin?

Answer the pursuing problems to start with:

Do You Know The Types of Pluses Pertaining To Roof Replacements?

Is there any decay of the wood with regards to the roof covering's parts? It does not call for an opinion from a great physicist to perceive this is, in fact, a difficulty. In the case when you now have this defect, you will need to hire a roofer to do some kind of renovations or get the whole roof structure replaced as fast as possible. Your putting it off may be a catalyst for much larger conditions and you might have to execute a massive reconstruction of your house as a consequence of water leak wreckage.

Has the stainless steel roof structure corroded through areas? This damage would likely be the symptom to at the moment put together maintenance tasks or to get started with substituting the corroded parts with newly purchased ones. The last thing you certainly should not prefer is without question for water to trickle out due to the damaged metal.

Are a number of roof tiles crumbled? You need to unquestionably exchange the wrecked tiles and then perhaps need a thorough roof replacement if the issues appear major.

Where uncovering some injury, you will need to set forth to understand ways to most efficiently to overcome the damage caused. Almost all people might need to search for a roofing contractor equipped with wide-ranging knowledge previous to making a final determination as to whether or not a roof top patch up or roof replacement is excellent. It is most useful that you use the professional as quickly as possible because you quite possibly have got better actions to execute than scale on the roof looking out for trouble.

You will not regret it if you simply call Armor already for a complimentary roofing material exam, thereby you possess zero motive to manage the inspection by yourself.

Call Us Today!Call Us Today! (816) 331-7663

The ring at Armor Roofing LLC right away by simply clicking on the button here below. The moment you have the veteran's help, request him or her to study whether his team would need to accomplish a totally new roof or only a lesser spot undertaking is going to be appropriate. Just after the examination, if a roof installation is urged, though optional, in this case there exist a couple of things to evaluate once completing a decision.

So Why Would Someone Go For A New Installation?

Just who does not aspire to have now an all new rooftop when supplied with the chance? You can easily repose with no burden for a heck of a long time simply because your roof covering definitely should make it through just about anything nature tosses at it with the exception absolute devastation. A painless refurbishing tends to be beneficial anyway, presuming the breakdown is insignificant.

Probably one of the most usual considerations for adding an absolutely new roof covering is undoubted that you are hoping to put the family house up for sale soon. People will look for a family house consisting of a sound rooftop and that is why maintaining, or just updating your roof covering may possibly raise the selling price quite notably.

The Reason To Dodge A Brand Spanking New Roof Structure Package in Joplin

A roof covering renewal solution usually takes longer than a basic fix. This is a single rationale for why you wish to enlist the services of a contractor that has sufficient laborers to carry out the re-roof in an expeditious manner. With respect to the price, $7-thousand and $8-thousand has become the prevalent price range associated with a rooftop replacement. However this is a fundamental range, and quite a lot is going to depend upon the kind of supplies you and the roofing contractor get for the new roof. The good thing is just about all persons will not fork out nearly anything for a 100% great new roof structure assuming the contract is in fact performed and examined professionally simply because of residential home coverage. Armor Roofing has been satisfying customers in Joplin for some time and is aware of many of the native insurance companies and the situation compulsory to ensure the demand is picked up.

Armor Roofing will certainly work with you in a case where you believe your roof covering could perhaps be demanding some mending. Explore quite a few powerful critiques using the web provided that you expect to consider what precisely a number of our clients think of our duty to leading quality. Please don't chance it with a roofing integrity. Call up Armor instantly at (816) 331-7663!

Call Us Today!Call Us Today! (816) 331-7663

Armor Roofing LLC - Kansas City 6600 NW Tower Dr #104 Kansas City, MO 64151 (816) 935-9312 http://kansascity.roofsareus.com

The post Wow! Armor Roofing - Joplin MO Roofing Company appeared first on Armor Roofing Kansas City.