Conservatives often say things not because they believe them to be true, but because of what they believe the effect will be. They seek power for themselves, and to subjugate others.

They might say “Free speech is paramount” today, but that’s only because they want to say stuff without consequences. When you want to say something, they’ll say it’s dangerous and unpatriotic. The consistent theme is “I can do what I want. You do what I tell you”. In-groups to protect, and out-groups to bind.

They are horrible people in some fundamental way.

Some of them might not even realize they’re doing it. They’re just riding the waves of their emotions.

when you play competitive games you’re expressing your skill as a player in front of an audience of people.

The first part of your post makes sense, even if I don’t agree with it. But this part stands out- buying a skin isn’t a skill question. It’s just a wallet question.

Some games have stuff you can only earn via achievements or whatever. I could see being proud of, like, a skin you only get if you get 100 perfect whatevers in a row. But, like, just buying it? But I guess the audience has enough people who are impressed by that sort of thing.

spending some money on a skin isnt a big deal you’re just paying devs for the game you love.

Also not to be a negative nerd, but unless the company is very tiny the developers aren’t getting much, maybe zero, of that money. Developers get a salary. Stock options, maybe. It’s not like a tip jar. Profits typically go to the owners under capitalism, not the labor. “Buy skins to support the developers” might be indirectly true, in a limited sense, but it mostly feels like capitalist propaganda.

I feel like no one’s going to make a good Mage game unless there’s some genuine breakthroughs in AI. It’s a very open ended system, and limiting it to pre-scripted “you can use mind-2 to persuade here” or “you can telekineticly slap someone here” would suck.

Most basic game problems just go away for mages. Just starting stats mages are a whole cut above your standard RPG protagonist. Teleport anywhere. Dominate anyone. Rewind time.

I guess. I’d rather not throw away my money, even if it’s not tight. I wouldn’t feel joy about a custom skin. Every time I saw it I would be reminded that I’d wasted money.

But that’s me, not everyone.

I feel like a game in development this long is extremely unlikely to be good.

Also I’m one of the dozens of people that liked Requiem (2e) more than Masquerade. Dozens of us!

Thanks. I even looked up the markdown syntax and still did it wrong. Fixed now.

Well, it doesn’t help that a big faction of one of the two major parties, the republicans, fundamentally doesn’t believe in government or democracy. They do not want a government that provides services to the public.

This reminds me of the famous post about estranged parents the missing missing reasons edit: fixed link

In it, the author writes about how like one of the estranged parents will be like “My child yelled at me and said all these horrible things for 20 minutes. I’ve never heard such cruelty!” But when pressed for exactly what the child was upset about, no reasons are provided.

So here Adams is saying these 'gen z" people are nasty and presumably have demands, but spends no time on what their demands are, on if they’re reasonable. They’re just nasty and wrong and to be dismissed.

Maybe there are reasons people are upset at the country right now. Could be the fascism, the corruption, the economic chaos, the climate crisis being ignored, the anti-vaxxers in power, the economic inequality…

I typically avoid videos because I vastly prefer reading, but I make an exception for those. I just watch them at double speed.

Switched to Linux. Don’t miss windows. Shit like this does not entice me.

I’d heard of him but didn’t think about him often.

I’ve known 3 philosophy majors that I know of.

One had a PhD and was absolutely insufferable. We were coworkers, and he’d often say falsehoods to try to be funny. Like, “Did you write that documentation I asked for?”, and he’d say like “I spent all morning writing it as a series of haikus”. I’m like, my guy, just answer the question. I’d ask him to stop being sarcastic so often in professional contexts and he’d be like “I’m not being sarcastic I’m being ironic.” You knew what I meant, Ryan!

He would also use language to say things that were tEcHnIcAlLy true. Like, “I finished that task (or 1 equals 1)”, except he had more subtle ones.

Was it because he was a philosophy PhD? Probably not. Some of his annoying habits he tied back to philosophy stuff, but he was probably just an asshole. But that’s who I think of (other than chidi)

The other one I knew was fine in a messy nihilist rich kid way. Fun at parties. Can’t be friends.

And the last one is one of the nicest people I’ve ever met. Just thoughtful and patient and a really positive person.

…who is paying a million dollars for a skin??

Ok, but why are you talking about people that live in a village in west africa? The post’s original subtext, to me, is pretty clearly about people selling their labor for less than its true value to survive, while the ownership class tremendously profits. Farmers working their own land aren’t being exploited (not counting interactions with the outside world that might affect them if they try to sell crops).

Or maybe you tell me more about the value of their labor and how somewhere far far in the distance someone is keeping them poor against their will and best efforts.

I’m not an expert but I imagine colonialism and such might have an impact.

These skins have 15% returns? That seems dubious but it could be. I don’t think you can sink $300k into skins like you can vanguard, though.

Who is buying these skins. I feel like such an alien sometimes. I just can’t understand wanting to spend any money at all on a cosmetic skin

It’s always been about “in-groups to protect and out-groups to bind”, and “You do what I tell you. No one tells me what to do.” They have never argued in good faith.

That was the subtext I picked up.

Not sure what this has to do with arguing against capitalist exploitation of labor. The person tilling the soil to grow food has more aligned interests with the office worker than the owners.

Not in the sense people usually use the phrase “action points”.

In D&D, on your turn, you get one action. That might be hitting someone with a sword, casting a spell, or whatever. You can also move, but that’s not typically an “action”. Some classes also get what are confusingly called “bonus actions”, which are extra things you can do on your turn. Rogues, for example, can try to hide as a bonus action even after they did a normal action like shoot someone. A regular fighter who shot someone with a bow wouldn’t be allowed to try to hide on the same turn, but the rogue could.

Because you only get one action (and bonus actions), no one calls them action points. You might say “you already took your action” or something.

Compare with a game like the original Fallout. You get a number of action points based on your stats. For an average character, it’s 7. Shooting someone typically takes 2, a called shot takes 3. I think movement also takes action points. So on your turn you might shoot someone 3 times (six action points) and move a little (1 action point). Or take a called shot (3 AP) and move a lot (4 AP). Lots of options. Divinity Original Sin 1 and 2 also use action points in a similar way.

This is way more explanation than you probably needed. The key thing is on D&D you typically do one thing on your turn (eg: attack, cast a spell). Pretty much every action has the same “cost” in this sense. You can’t really mix and match, and there’s not as much tactical depth on your turn. (Pathfinder 2e gives you three actions per turn, but I don’t think anyone calls them points there, either.)