Lurker > ElatedVenusaur

http://www.politico.com/story/2017/09/14/inside-trumps-democratic-deals-daca-schumer-pelosi-242745
Apparently, a lot of Trump's current bi-partsian kick has to do with the fact he doesn't like Mitch McConnell, thinks Paul Ryan is boring, and that he apparently really likes Chuck Schumer. It can't hurt that the media covered the debt-ceiling deal positively.

FaytlessHearts posted...

Sounds like a typical piece of garbage. I'm blown away that sick corrupt creature had the intelligence to even write.

Oh please. Hillary is plenty intelligent. She's just spent so much time in the upper echelons of political society that she's entirely out-of-touch with reality. Bubbles are dangerous things, people. She bubbled herself so hard with her cadre of loyalists and craven political operators she managed to lose an election while winning the popular vote.
To Donald J. Trump.

Nate is probably right that the book is more or less accurate, but her attacking Bernie Sanders is proof-positive she still thinks she knows better. This is how intelligent, well-educated people become cynical morons.

I like Fiona, but she's underleveled, has poor base stats, and poor availability. A lot of characters have similar problems in Radiant Dawn, unfortunately.

That's what I say after I wish destruction upon Tom Brady though?

I'm not at all hostile to religion. I had the luck of growing up in a liberal Protestant denomination(United Church of Christ). I remember a time when the church I went to ran a local ad welcoming same-sex couples after another local church expelled a lesbian couple.
Religion is our thing. It is as good or bad as we are, in equal measure. Slave-owning plantation owners cited the Bible to justify slavery, and John Brown cited it as justification for his attempt to spark a slave rebellion. Martin Luther King Jr. and Malcolm X were both inspired by their respective religions, as were some of their opponents(and Malcolm's murderers).

Children of Zodiarcs. I was looking forward to a cool new SRPG, but the story sucks, the balance is bad, and dice rolls are never a great idea.

COVxy posted...

lilORANG posted...

COVxy posted...

lilORANG posted...

open primaries would help.

Doesn't this open up the possibility of people going out and voting against the competitor they don't want to be pitted against?

sure. democracy is a fun thing. use your vote however you want it.

And that isn't just as unfair, if a republican votes against the star democratic candidate to reduce their probability of winning the primary?

You're putting way more thought into this than 99+% of voters would.

Well, at least something good could come of all this. The Dems are definitely too cowardly to do it by themselves.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vu6_5dx3JyI&list=PL2E1B7F571F1A3C59&index=7
RTKVI - Wei Theme
It has a similar feel to the more modern renditions in recent Dynasty Warriors games.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VnJQs8hLOnY&list=PL2E1B7F571F1A3C59&index=21
RTKVI - Imperial Battle Theme
Plays when you're invading the Han capital OR an Emperor is commanding one of the armies.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bkM4DfEdlaY&index=25&list=PL2E1B7F571F1A3C59
Last one. Even if you played the game, you may not have heard it: it plays only AFTER your lord has died. Your leading officers meet to discuss a successor. It's a cool mechanic, but there's rarely any serious dissension.

MachoManSavage posted...

darkphoenix181 posted...

MachoManSavage posted...

Nationalism is beautiful and scary at the same time. As a non American, seeing people sincerely blame Russia is mind numbing

?
the globalists are the ones who blame Russia

Trump is the nationalist candidate

Anyone who believes there country is in the right and other countries are in the wrong I consider nationalists.

From what I gather the American Liberal party are crooked as fuck, but they'd rather blame Russia for exposing them then facing the problem of the liberal party.

The Russians absolutely did mess around, but their impact was slight. What wasn't slight in impact was Comey's handling of the investigation into the e-mails. In spite of the (many, many) things Clinton and the Democrats screwed up, Comey may have tipped the scales by making that pointless announcement literal days before the election. Republican voter-suppression efforts in key swing states was also a key factor.

cjsdowg posted...

All she had to do was listen to Sanders team when they said the the Rust Belt was in question. She didn't and she lost with more votes.

Hell, it wasn't even Bernie people as much as actual Democratic organizers on the ground in those states who warned the Clinton campaign that things weren't right.
However, the campaign ignored these warnings, because their computer data collated in Brooklyn didn't corroborate these claims. At least, not until it was too late. IIRC, she literally never set foot in Wisconsin and barely touched Michigan and Pennsylvania. Meanwhile, her campaign poured lots of time and money into states like North Carolina, Georgia, and Arizona. They were so certain they had the election in the bag they started chasing pie-in-the-sky.

ArthasReborn posted...

Yeah, I think it was mentioned before, but early RD is a lot harder than late RD.

Definitely. As TC has realized, only Sothe and Nolan can take a hit, but they don't tank very well(and you definitely want to limit Sothe's kills early on).

Popcorn_Fairy posted...

Well, I mean that was kind of Ashnard's philosophy, wasn't it? He was the big man, he wanted to see what happens with them, if they made it to him, great, he'll bring them down, if they beat him, that falls in line with his philosophy and in the end, is what he wanted, right?

What would your favorite be?

It just always seem weird to me that Ashnard conquers Crimea and then just kind of chills there for the rest of the game. The Gallians are worried he might invade, but he never actually does.

FE7 is my favorite. Also, Hector is (somewhat ironically) not great in his own story mode(Eliwood is actually better, because he can promote much earlier.). He owns everything in Eliwood mode though.

Path of Radiance is definitely my second-favorite. Even if Ashnard kind of just inexplicably sits on his hands, it's just a great game with some really cool characters and a protagonist who is both likeable and unique(in not being a noble) in Ike.
My feelings on Radiant Dawn are much more mixed, but I'm still firm in believing that it's a good game. Just a flawed one.

U.S. released Fire Emblem rankings(by me). For the record, I think they're all good games(except Shadow Dragon).

Fire Emblem- GBA
Still the best. Tight gameplay, well-balanced roster, excellent supports, and a legitimately strong story filled with likeable characters.

Fire Emblem: Path of Radiance- NGC
Nearly as good as GBA FE, except the plot kind of stalls out awkwardly half-way through.

Fire Emblem: Echoes: Shadows of Valentia- 3DS
A remake of the Japan-only Fire Emblem Gaiden, which was like a weird, not-so-great step-child(think Zelda 2). Shadows of Valentia is legitimately good though, refreshingly tight compared to its bloated 3DS cousins, and also embraces Gaiden's mechanical weirdness(magic costing HP to cast, etc.) They also added supports and more characterization, but the plot is straightforward and sometimes dumb.

Fire Emblem: Sacred Stones(GBA)
Everything about this feels generic and vaguely like a knock-off of its predecessor. Still good, but often hollow. The first Fire Emblem to enable grinding outside the capricious arena and to have branching promotions.

Fire Emblem Fates(3DS)
Mechanically bloated. 1 of the three plots is good and 1 makes Radiant Dawn and Awakening seem like intelligently-written stories. Ryoma kills everything, including all semblance of game balance.
And yet, it is so ridiculously over-the-top I can't help but like it. Helps a lot that it has actual map design(a step-up from Awakening) and some genuinely likeable characters.

Fire Emblem: Radiant Dawn(Wii)
I wanted to place this higher. It has some legitimately great map design, but the plot is terminally dumb, they scrapped supports as character building, and large portions of the cast are rendered worthless(some are worthless as soon as they join!) Unfortunately, you have to bring some of the crappy ones to the Endgame.

Fire Emblem: Awakening(3DS)
The plot is transparently nonsensical, and you'll encounter some of the laziest map designs in the series. You can break it without trying, but you can make the game beg for death if you try.

Fire Emblem: New Mystery of the Emblem(DS)
Yes, this is listed, even though it was never released in the US, because there's an excellent translation for it. This is what Shadow Dragon should have been, but it still suffers from many of Shadow Dragon's failings: bland characterization, bland maps, at least 2/3 of the cast is fodder, etc. etc.

Fire Emblem: Shadow Dragon
See what I wrote for the last one? All of the bad parts apply to Shadow Dragon, except they apply more, and also there aren't really any strengths. It's mayonnaise-on-white-bread bland in cartridge form.

Well, maybe these things wouldn't be dying if they weren't worthless. Well, most of them are.
Also, we as a generation have way less disposable income because everyone thought it'd be a great idea to let lenders scam us and colleges price-gouge us.
Oh, and if IIRC, "real" wages(i.e. wages adjusted against inflation) have been stagnant for a little over 30 years now.

Both. I don't want to die now or any time soon, but I cannot think of a fate worse than immortality, so the fact that I will die is good.
As far as I'm concerned, immortality would inevitably result in insanity. Or maybe just being trapped for all eternity.

Don't draft Bills players, unless it's LeSean McCoy. He'll be basically the entire offense.

Here are some tips:

-The avatar is the best possible parent, as children have access to all the same classes as parents, and the avatar has access to all of them(except the gender-restricted ones). Additionally, the avatar's child(Morgan) is always the opposite gender(so male avatar has a daughter, female a son).

-Chrom doesn't pass skills onto his children normally. Daughters get Aether(Lucina, Cynthia, Kjelle), while sons get Rightful King(Morgan, Brady, Inigo).

-Children can inherit skills from classes that they aren't eligible for.

-Panne and Nowi don't learn anything worthwhile in their starting classes.

https://www.currentaffairs.org/2017/08/wait-do-people-actually-know-just-how-evil-this-man-is
I'm just going to leave this here.

https://www.currentaffairs.org/2017/08/wait-do-people-actually-know-just-how-evil-this-man-is
This is a really good article that takes an exhaustive look at just how terrible this dude is. He combines incompetence, evil, and shameless self-promotion. No wonder Trump loves him.

https://www.currentaffairs.org/2017/08/wait-do-people-actually-know-just-how-evil-this-man-is
Here's a great article about Arpaio. It's vital to emphasize that he wasn't JUST an evil racist who systemically violated the rights of latinos, journalists, and any public official who crossed him, his department straight-up ignored reports of crime, especially cases of alleged sexual assault and rape.
Basically, he was uniquely terrible at actual law enforcement in addition to being a monster with no regard for the law or human rights.

"Law and order" for thee, but not for me.

Birds of a feather flock together. I wish I believed in an afterlife, because then there could be true justice for these criminals.

FrisbeeDude posted...

JohnLennon6 posted...

It's the Democrats fault for putting up a candidate nobody liked.

How'd she win the primary if no one liked her?

Because the establishment aggressively dissuaded anyone else from running. Literally the only other person who seriously considered running against Hillary(other than Bernie) was Biden. There were persistent rumors of party leaders pressuring would-be candidates to stay on the sidelines.
That Sanders, previously a virtually-unknown from one of the smallest states in the country and who was not and still is not an "official" Democrat(even if he "de-facto" is), managed to win as many primaries, caucuses, and delegates as he did is indicative that there were lots of Dems willing to vote for literally anyone other than Hillary. Bernie Sanders was ultimately unable to overcome Hillary Clinton, in large part because he started from square zero.

https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/monkey-cage/wp/2017/08/24/did-enough-bernie-sanders-supporters-vote-for-trump-to-cost-clinton-the-election/?utm_term=.83395d823c17
This is a good article about it.
But here's a great nugget: there were (at least) twice as many Clinton-McCain voters in 2008 as there were Sanders-Trump voters in 2016.
This is yet more chaff thrown up to absolve Hillary Clinton of blame for running a bad campaign.

The CTE business is likely to get worse the more we know about it. It largely depends on how effectively it can be mitigated(early signs aren't great). The NFL, of course, is an extremely conservative institution that was and still is trying to downplay the extent of the problem, which will probably make things worse than they need to be, strictly speaking.

For some reason, Marble Zone bothers me way more.

Eh, Labyrinth is fine. It's Marble Zone that sucks. Labyrinth is hurt by the fact that Sonic 1 zones are three acts though. It gets pretty played-out.
Oh, and screw the boss "fight".

I don't really follow the Bears closely, but from what I can tell, they haven't had a competent GM in forever. John Fox basically purged the roster, but forget to actually acquire sufficient young talent to replace it. Wouldn't be surprised if they ended up cleaning house or at least firing Fox after this year, and LOL@that because they just bet the house on Mitchell Trubisky(the least NFL-worthy QB name since Blake Bortles), but only after giving Mike Glennon all of the money.

Trump is merely a symptom of a much larger problem.

Nah. Replace them all with a statue of either Nat Turner, William Tecumseh Sherman,or John Brown. We'll even let them choose which.

Good on him.
https://pbs.twimg.com/media/DHytFYkVoAACX9x.jpg
Pictorial evidence. And I have a list of the players:
Seth Devalve(TE), Duke Johnson(RB), Jabrill Peppers(S/KR), Jamar Taylor(CB), Kenny Britt(WR), Jamie Collins(LB), Isiah Crowell(RB), Ricardo Louis(WR), Terrence Magee(RB) and Calvin Pryor(S) are kneeling.
Britton Colquitt(P), DeShone Kizer(QB), Jason McCourty(CB), and Shon Coleman(RT) are the players standing.
Most of the players involved are at or near the top of the depth chart at their respective positions(DeValve included, I think).

There's nothing wrong with emotions or appeals to them.

Darmik posted...

I like the Sonic/Shadow levels when they're a bit more open. The early ones are pretty good. But for Sonic specifically his last two levels weren't good. The ARK level with the gravity switches was incredibly awkward. Sometimes you fell into pits before you could even see them. There is a section where you jump on a spring and it looks like the camera is pointing you to a platform forward but you actually need to jump backwards. It feels so wonky.

Then you had that level with the grinding rails. When it worked it was fun. When it didn't you would get flung to your death before you could even do anything. You could lose your momentum easily and get stuck behind a loop. And the level goes on and on for ages.

Wait until you get a load of the last Shadow level's gimmick.
Mostly, it seems like the underlying physics engine is shaky as hell and it has a tendency to do weird things all too often(that are often fatal). Then there's the camera: most 3D platformers of that era struggled with the camera, but it's especially egregious in SA2. It's a bad combination. And it's made worse, oddly, by ambitious design: it doesn't feel like the team that actually designed the levels was aware of the short-comings of the engine and the camera.
Even so, most of the Sonic/Shadow stages are pretty good and fun to play.

There's no need to discuss the other parts, as they're bad in ways that are both obvious and boring.

Boldin had a pretty good year last year though, so he may well still have good football in him.
https://pbs.twimg.com/media/DHtmOkwXkAELDNo.jpg
Two players who are better than any other receiver on the Bills roster(ok, so Jordan Matthews is probably better than 37 year-old Q, but that's it).

More of the same.

Jabodie posted...

I mean I'm pretty sure we would have dropped a lot more if they hadn't surrendered.

We had already used all the bombs we had at the time.
Also, we insisted on unconditional surrender, but the Japanese wanted assurances that the Emperor would be allowed to remain. Which, of course, we ended up doing anyway, even though he was definitely complicit in Japanese war crimes. Plus, we dropped the second before they even really wrapped their heads around the first one.

QB- Aaron Rodgers.
I happened to see all three of those Hail Marys. Still can't believe they actually happened.

RB- LeSean "Shady" McCoy
Homer pick! Seriously though, he cuts and accelerates so smoothly. Reminds me a little of Barry Sanders. Any play he gets the ball could be a big one.

WR- Steve Smith Sr./Larry Fitzgerald
I know the former is retired, but he was a ridiculously small receiver who frequently out-muscled much larger defensive backs. At least, when he wasn't burning them to a crisp. Fitzgerald was faster than a man that large ever should be in his prime, and has become one of the best move-the-chains type ever in his twilight.

TE- Would be Gronk, but he's a Patriot and I hate the Patriots.

DE- J.J. Watt
Do I have to explain this one? He is a giant amongst mortal men. I pity Andy Luck if he and Clowney are ever healthy at the same time.

DT- Kyle Williams
Another homer pick. Kyle Williams basically looks like a random fat, white guy, like the multitudes that can be found tailgating outside of Bills home games. He has good strength, but his secret weapon is inhuman acceleration and anticipation. Guy just explodes off the ball and regularly wreaks havoc, but is often overshadowed by flashier players like Jerry Hughes or Marcel Dareus. He's been a Bill forever. Even played nose tackle one year, and was somehow good at it despite being a terrible fit.

S- Jairus Byrd
He's broken now, but he was awesome before he died in New Orleans. He was basically mostly a center-fielder type: tracking receivers and eyeing the QB, waiting for the ball to come out. Then he'd go there and make a play. Was somehow always in the right place, at the right time.

PoopPotato posted...

Yeah, that makes sense. How do we keep people from using their extra 10 grand on cheetos and coca cola, though?

We don't.

This is all kinds of humiliating. This literal Nazi won the Electoral College. We should probably just pack it in and beg the British to take us back, at this point.

Foppe posted...

3rd_Best_Master posted...

Foppe posted...

3rd_Best_Master posted...

Foppe posted...

Taking them down is just a bad attempt to censor history.

They were erected to whitewash history. Their removal is merely correcting a wrong that should have never been allowed in the first place.

Lets whitewash an earlier attempt at whitewashing history to make us look better!

Just like erasing a misspelled word. Mistakes happen so best they get dealt with.

Lets censor history and pretend that it never happened.
So what mistake will we remove next?
Slavery is bad, so lets pretend that it never happened.

Putting up statues of Confederate generals to commemorate slavery would be like putting up statues of Hitler to commemorate the Holocaust.

Balrog0 posted...

how can people still say that the civil war was about states rights when the states rights argument was originally used by northerners to fight fugitive slave laws, including the 1850 fugitive slave law which was drafted by Senator Mason of Virginia and supported by a wide array of southern politicians, including Senator Barnwell who ended up serving in the Senate of the CSA?

Hey, don't leave out Alexander H. Stephens, Vice-President of the Confederacy. He even gave an entire speech about it.
http://teachingamericanhistory.org/library/document/cornerstone-speech/
I'll provide some money quotes. Buckle up, they're pretty vile:


"The new constitution has put at rest, forever, all the agitating questions relating to our peculiar institution African slavery as it exists amongst us the proper status of the negro in our form of civilization."

"Our new government is founded upon exactly the opposite idea; its foundations are laid, its corner- stone rests, upon the great truth that the negro is not equal to the white man; that slavery subordination to the superior race is his natural and normal condition."

"Many governments have been founded upon the principle of the subordination and serfdom of certain classes of the same race; such were and are in violation of the laws of nature. Our system commits no such violation of nature’s laws. With us, all of the white race, however high or low, rich or poor, are equal in the eye of the law. Not so with the negro. Subordination is his place. He, by nature, or by the curse against Canaan, is fitted for that condition which he occupies in our system."

This dude was appointed vice president of the Confederacy.

P4wn4g3 posted...

Dugtrio is actually 3 dudes having sex with their heads poking out of the ground.

3 bald dudes. Alolan Dugtrio is 3 dudes having sex who are all also infested by the same mullet-like parasite.

creativerealms posted...

Only the second episode was weak.

This. A shame, because the concept was good enough.

I can only imagine Garbodor's expression being horror at its own existence, since it seems to be a super-sized Trubbish that has split apart. It's at least more interesting than Gulpin/Swalot, which manage to make being a giant stomach boring.

I'd be fine with a lady Bond.
Cara Delevingne is just not a good actress though.

Popcorn_Fairy posted...

Reset. Brom isn't as good a tank as Gatrie was.

Volke is surprisingly good in a fight.

The Laguz are badass.

Also, how do skills work in this one? Do they learn them as they level like in Awakening/Fates?

Brom just plain isn't as good as Gatrie, unfortunately, but Neph is truth and Brom is, like, one of her two support options, so he has that going for him? I guess?
Oh, and if you ever need any info on any FE game ever: http://serenesforest.net/
As far as your question, I'll expand on Mastery skills: Paladins are already OP, and Sol is an excellent buff to their survivability. Neph and Gatrie/Brom get Luna, which halves the enemy's defense, which is pretty good. Swordmasters get Astra, which is pretty strong(provided they're not doing negligible damage in the first place). And Volk benefits from Lethality a little, since it does proc separately from crits and knives are laughably bad, but that's not an effective use of one. The others are straight-up bad.
Whatever you end up doing, make sure you give one to Ike. He has BY FAR the best mastery skill in the game.