Medical billing and coding clerk sample resume

So many numbers, so little time

2012.07.30 01:04 So many numbers, so little time

Many physicians, mid-level providers, practice managers, administrators, billers and front desk staff members have questions about coding. Today's demand for certified professional coders (CPCs) is growing as many jobs in the coding and billing field now require certification. Health care professionals involved in coding, compliance, billing, administration and reimbursement aspects of medicine should be certified as part of a compliance program.
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2014.06.08 00:29 Medical Coding and Billing

All things coding and billing.
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2014.09.14 19:32 Space for all genders to discuss sterilization

Created to focus discussion about permanent birth control.
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2024.05.14 06:36 crex82 Insurance not covering bisalp

My doctor is refusing to do a tubal since bisalp is the standard and I agree with her. I also have endometriosis so removal of my tubes might help with my chronic pain. However, my insurance company (allied benefits through my employer) is saying bisalp is not a preventative surgery. They are also saying I cannot appeal until I have the surgery done and have a claim. The hospital is estimating the bill at $27,000.
I found the thread on this forum about trying to get the bisalp covered. I explained it to my insurance company and they straight up said they don't recommend I go through with the procedure because my plan doesn't cover it. My doctor wrote an appeal letter and I am working with a patient advocate that is independent from either party. The doctor refused to code the bisalp as "tubal via bisalp." My plan states it's ACA compliant, but is not explicit about which methods of sterilization it covers. Customer service said they "couldn't tell me" which methods were covered.
I will update as to what I decide to do and how the appeal process goes. I'm preparing myself to be a real pain in the ass for the insurance company to encourage the appeal. I can't take the medication to treat my endometriosis while on hormonal bc and do not trust condoms/other methods. I need it 100% protected. I really don't want that huge bill on my credit as it will have to go to collections. My hospital is refusing to do repayment plans with me because I had one bill I didn't know I had sent to collections.
submitted by crex82 to sterilization [link] [comments]


2024.05.14 03:43 gaymer_raver Who do I contact for improper billing by a medical provider?

For a Traditional Medicare Part B Patient, a medical provider submitted a claim which was denied as the provider did not file the claim correctly (based on Medicare). Medicare instructed to resubmit the claim with the proper codes for it the be reprocessed and paid out correctly. However the medical provider is refusing to do so (her policy is only to submit claims once and only once) and instead is billing the patient remaining amount by charging the card on file.
The provider is a 1 person shop, so I am unsure who should I goto that is above them to get this billing issue resolved. Should this be reported to Medicare or the state medical board?
submitted by gaymer_raver to medicare [link] [comments]


2024.05.14 03:23 Normal_Post_7014 Personal experiences filing bankruptcy or consumer proposal?

Context: I’m 24, currently unemployed for the past two months (actively searching for work and working with job developers), no assets and have close to 65k in debt but 25k is OSAP which I’m not worried about because they’re on pause and have no interest
Of the remaining 40k, 30k is from my student line of credit that just recently got converted into a loan. The rest credit card debt (8.7k) from three different cards, one is 6.6k the two are about 1k each
The vast majority of my debt is from funding myself through school. I worked and received OSAP but still needed the line of credit since those weren’t enough for rent and groceries.
My credit score was always excellent up until two years ago where the credit card debt started building. My cat got very sick and long story short i maxed out my 7k credit card on him (worth it, he’s healthy and happy now) and that’s where all the cc debt comes from. I’ve always made my monthly payments that are over $300 on that one cc alone but it all just goes to interest so the principal hasn’t come down much, same with all my other debts
I pay roughly $750 towards debts a month. I just can’t afford that + rent + groceries + other essentials like bus pass, phone bill and medications etc. I quit my low paying job because of an extremely toxic environment and never thought it would take me months to find literally any min wage job especially since I have a degree + leadership experience on my resume.
I’ve only made it this far without working because of what I got back from my tax refund but I have literally no more money left to pay all my debts and am considering filing for bankruptcy (I have an appointment with an LIT to seek professional advice)
submitted by Normal_Post_7014 to povertyfinancecanada [link] [comments]


2024.05.14 03:17 Altruistic_Tonight18 I give out taxpayer funded crack pipes, contrary to the White House’s assurances that they aren’t using taxpayer monies to fund acquisition or distribution of crack pipes. AMA

https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/politics/2022/02/10/biden-smoking-kits-pipes-addiction/6724719001/
I’m not trying to bash Biden and Harris, and will be voting for them a second time soon… The White House appears to have used misdirection and some fancy pants doublespeak to publicly deny it. Here’s how it really works:
We provide “safer smoking kits” to drug users at no cost to them. What the funding bill and resulting grants said is that we, the harm reductionists who run programs, get to decide what goes in to our kits. Technically, they’re not lying. So yeah, let me tell you how the White House is able to honestly say that they don’t fund crack pipe distribution.
Our crack kits don’t technically contain assembled crack pipes… In order to make a crack pipe, a user has to put the screen or Brillo pad (we provide both) in the glass stem in order for it to meet the legal definition of “crack pipe”. It takes about ten seconds to assemble one, and we give them out usually about 5 at a time, depending on how much crack a person smokes. The max I’ve ever given out was 50, to a guy who had an eighth a day habit and was pretty damn wealthy. They get to choose, and they understand that our stock is limited, so they only take what they need. We don’t ask for names or IDs. It doesn’t matter if you’re broke or a millionaire, we serve all drug users and the people who surround them.
Our kits aren’t just EZ-Build crack pipes; we give them lip balm (as crack pipes can get very hot with obsessive use or if it’s being used by multiple people), little wood pusher sticks which help them use crack more efficiently, rubber mouthpieces which prevent burns and disease spread, new lighters, and a few other knick nacks.
We give everyone narcan as well, so they can save their opioid user friends should one get a bag of dope that’s heavy on the fentanyl. Or if they somehow find pure heroin, which was hard to come by when I was using fifteen years ago. In those days, only paramedics carried narcan! Now your friendly neighborhood crackhead carries it as well, thanks to democrats like me!
But what about meth users, you might ask? What about people who smoke fentanyl? Do they get government funded pipes too???
Yes. Totally taxpayer funded, although we do have other grants and donations. The meth kits are pretty much the same, only with taxpayer funded meth pipes instead of crack pipes. For fentanyl smokers, we have hammerhead pipes. We also have clean sheets of aluminum foil with fresh straws for folks who smoke heroin.
We also do needle exchange… Until a few years ago, it was a one for one syringe exchange, but now we give out boxes of a hundred along with sharps containers to anyone except the diabetics trying to get free medical supplies from us… Hell, even then we give them out even though our grants specify drug users as recipients. We dispose of sharps containers, and we make our clients promise to use them to minimize needle stick injuries. We have contracts with a medical waste company, as do all other needle exchange programs.
My ultimate point here is that HELL YES WE GIVE OUT CRACK PIPES THAT ARE FUNDED BY TAX DOLLARS, and we save lives by doing it. That’s not just a bold claim; harm reduction has been studied, a lot (in part because young liberals going in to allied or public health hear the bizarre and ostensibly false things that some ultraconservatives say about harm reduction and love proving them insane using actual large sample scientific studies), and continues to be studied at the most reputable colleges you can find.
So yeah, AMA. And no, I’m not going to send you pipes or syringes. We only distribute to residents of the city I’m in!
submitted by Altruistic_Tonight18 to AMA [link] [comments]


2024.05.14 01:59 09wilsonb I’m thinking of going back to school and am hoping to talk to someone in career fields I’m interested in.

Like the title says, I’m thinking of going back to school and am hoping to talk to someone in x-ray, mammo, lab tech, sterile processing tech, surgical/scrub tech, or medical billing/coding. Really wanting to find something I’m actually interested in, but don’t want to go back to school (again) just to find out I don’t enjoy the career, ya know?
submitted by 09wilsonb to shreveport [link] [comments]


2024.05.14 00:28 MJonesBYU Reasonable billing for Dry Eyes?

I have dry eyes, it was found in a prior visit. In this follow up the OD ordered did a tear test, it's 50% blocked for both eyes.
Ordered prescription eye drops to help (but optional), or OTC lubricant + hot pad.
At beginning the did basic eye chart, and for the combined services i just got a bill with the code 99214 with a "level 4" note and 92285.
Just checking. seems excessive to me as it's not urgent to the OR, nor was it a discovered problem in the appt. But not a medical coder. Hoping you can share insight. Thanks!
submitted by MJonesBYU to CodingandBilling [link] [comments]


2024.05.13 22:24 SuperIntHuman Showcase Your Administrative Skills in a Portfolio

Creating a compelling portfolio to showcase your administrative skills can significantly enhance your chances of landing a job or client. Here’s how you can effectively display various administrative competencies with these suggestions:

1. Email Management (Real Estate VA)

Skill: Organize and prioritize emails. Portfolio Display: Include screenshots of an organized email inbox with categorized folders, highlighting how you effectively manage high volumes of emails and prioritize critical communications.

2. Calendar Management (E-commerce VA)

Skill: Schedule and manage appointments. Portfolio Display: Display a sample calendar featuring well-coordinated tasks and meetings, demonstrating your ability to maintain a structured and efficient schedule.

3. Meeting Coordination (Paralegal VA)

Skill: Set up and coordinate logistics for meetings. Portfolio Display: Present a timeline or checklist used to organize a complex meeting, showcasing your attention to detail and organizational skills.

4. Travel Arrangements (Executive VA)

Skill: Plan and book travel itineraries. Portfolio Display: Show a detailed itinerary for a multi-city business trip, emphasizing your ability to handle intricate travel plans and ensure smooth travel experiences.

5. File Management (Medical VA)

Skill: Organize digital and physical files efficiently. Portfolio Display: Provide before and after screenshots of a digital filing system, illustrating your capability to streamline and organize extensive documentation.

6. Data Entry (E-commerce VA)

Skill: Accurately input data into systems. Portfolio Display: Highlight a complex spreadsheet used to track inventory, reflecting your precision and meticulousness in data management.

7. Document Preparation (Paralegal VA)

Skill: Draft and format key documents. Portfolio Display: Include redacted samples of legal documents or briefs prepared, showcasing your proficiency in document preparation and attention to legal standards.

8. Expense Tracking (Startup VA)

Skill: Manage and report expenses. Portfolio Display: Showcase a visual expense report or graph, demonstrating your ability to track and analyze financial data effectively.

9. Customer Service (Retail VA)

Skill: Handle customer interactions. Portfolio Display: Provide testimonials or feedback from satisfied customers, highlighting your excellent customer service skills and ability to resolve issues.

10. Research (Academic VA)

Skill: Conduct detailed internet research. Portfolio Display: Summarize a research report or case study created, illustrating your thorough research capabilities and attention to detail.

11. Content Management (Marketing VA)

Skill: Schedule and manage online content. Portfolio Display: Show a content calendar and corresponding posts, demonstrating your ability to plan and execute content strategies effectively.

12. Invoicing and Billing (Freelance VA)

Skill: Prepare and manage invoices. Portfolio Display: Display samples of invoices created with annotations on the process, highlighting your accuracy and attention to detail in financial transactions.

13. Database Management (Non-profit VA)

Skill: Update and maintain CRM systems. Portfolio Display: Provide screenshots of a cleaned and organized database, showcasing your efficiency in managing and maintaining large data sets.

14. Project Management Support (Tech Startup VA)

Skill: Assist in managing projects. Portfolio Display: Include a project timeline or milestones achieved, reflecting your contribution to project planning and execution.

15. Event Planning (Corporate VA)

Skill: Assist with event logistics. Portfolio Display: Provide a detailed event plan or a post-event report, showcasing your ability to manage complex event logistics and ensure successful outcomes.

16. Social Media Management (Fashion VA)

Skill: Manage social media interactions. Portfolio Display: Present before and after analytics reports to show growth, demonstrating your effectiveness in enhancing social media presence and engagement.

17. Proofreading and Editing (Editorial VA)

Skill: Review and edit documents. Portfolio Display: Display before and after excerpts of edited content, highlighting your keen eye for detail and ability to improve text quality.

18. Task Prioritization (General VA)

Skill: Manage and prioritize tasks. Portfolio Display: Provide an example of a to-do list tool with prioritized tasks, reflecting your ability to organize and prioritize workloads efficiently.

19. Communication Liaison (Legal VA)

Skill: Communicate between departments. Portfolio Display: Outline a communication protocol created, showcasing your ability to facilitate effective communication within an organization.

20. Technical Support (IT Support VA)

Skill: Provide basic IT help. Portfolio Display: List common issues resolved with steps taken, demonstrating your technical troubleshooting skills and problem-solving abilities.
By presenting your skills through tangible examples and visual aids, you can effectively convey your competencies to potential employers or clients. Regularly updating your portfolio with new projects and feedback will keep it current and reflective of your evolving expertise.
submitted by SuperIntHuman to VirtualEmployeePH [link] [comments]


2024.05.13 21:50 Christina-La-Guerita Apprehensive of putting in notice.

I have been working as a paralegal for around 8 months at a small law office for one attorney. I do paralegal work, secretary work, personal errands, billing, reconcile his IOLTA, make sure bills are paid, marketing, manage a law clerk and a string of additional duties as assigned. I basically do everything to make sure the office stays running.
While I have learned a lot on the job, I feel like this is largely due to me figuring things out on my own and little to no guidance. I am new to the legal field after spending 10 years previously in banking. So I’d feel more comfortable having concrete guidance on things.
I am going to classes and was offered a job opportunity at a big firm making $5 more along with benefits and an actual job description that outlines responsibilities. I currently have no benefits and have been struggling with medical bills for my kids.
I have slowly started resenting my job with my current attorney. It’s a chaotic work environment and he constantly bad mouths other attorneys. He’s also asked me to do things that I won’t go into detail about, but has made me feel uncomfortable ethically. There are several times he hasn’t paid what he’s promised to pay.
I think the job opportunity is great and I’d be insane not to take it. But, I feel guilty about leaving my current office. I know he’ll struggle greatly if I leave. He is nice a lot of the time and I adore his family. Which has made me feel a bit ungrateful about knowing I will be putting in my 2 weeks notice soon. However, I’d like to do what’s best for my family and I. I just feel like I am stuck between a rock and a hard place.
Has any one here been faced with a decision like this?
submitted by Christina-La-Guerita to paralegal [link] [comments]


2024.05.13 19:27 TrueFire398 Resume Crisis Please Help!

Decided to try making an account and reaching out to people who are in a better position. Was recently laid off and trying to find a job, but it feels like its just not going to happen. It doesn't help that I just feel like I'm not really qualified for the degree I got and tech jobs seem impossible to get into. I fluffed up and exaggerated the bullets for the jobs as it was mostly QA and support/ticketing for certain things with extra stuff sprinkled around. The skills are kind of iffy as some I simply put as we may have touched em in college.
Embarrassingly, I am scared of coding and have also been trying to take measures to find some alternative in the tech field as I feel I am stuck on this route due to the CS degree and not really feeling comfortable in anything. Also when it comes to the resume I did do some pharmacy clerk and entry work prior to college but couldn't fit that for single resume page if that matters.
https://preview.redd.it/0prxawcxa80d1.png?width=1458&format=png&auto=webp&s=ae77e0ef32bb922526b7586762f57ebc595af396
submitted by TrueFire398 to resumes [link] [comments]


2024.05.13 19:18 kingcapitalsteeez Do I need “clinical experience” to apply?

Hi everyone, i plan on applying to clinical PhD programs in the cycle of 2025 to be admitted in 2026. I wanted to get people’s input on whether it is necessary that I go get some clinical experience given that I virtually have none. Just a bit about my CV: I volunteered as an undergrad research assistant for 2.5 years in a lab studying BD (did an honors thesis using data from a healthy sample). I had zero interaction with the BD participants and data collection was put to a halt due to the pandemic. I’ve been working post bacc for the past year in a lab that, while they promote themselves as a clinical lab interested in psychiatric disorders, it is actually an affective and developmental lab working with a community sample. I do administer SCID as part of my job and have been trained with how to deal with situations like suicidal endorsement. But outside of that, I don’t have any “clinical” experience as far as that is possible at this stage in my career. I surely will have extensive research experience and skills by the time I apply, including operating an MRI scanner (don’t know if this will be relevant in my applications yet), administering SCID, proficient with coding, running statistical analyses, both in R and fMRI data processing and analysis, with maybe a couple of publications (not first author, impossible in my lab, most likely mid-authors) and some posters (maybe 2 first authors and a few mid-authors). I also will have two really strong letters of rec from two distinguished professors in my field. No idea who will be my third at the moment. So should I go volunteer at some suicide hotline or outpatient/inpatient hospital to get clinical experience? How much will not being exposed to clinical populations hurt my resume? What type of “clinical experience” do you think would be best?
EDIT: seems like there’s a general consensus among the comments. Thank you all for your response! 🙏🏼
submitted by kingcapitalsteeez to ClinicalPsychology [link] [comments]


2024.05.13 18:05 Yo_all_crybabies Medalia Groups Inc

Medalia Groups Inc
Anyone have experience with them reaching out for an interview? I didn’t apply on Indeed, so do other employers recruit via Indeed? Or is this a scam?
submitted by Yo_all_crybabies to jobs [link] [comments]


2024.05.13 16:14 Leather_Focus_6535 The currently 124 offenders executed by the state of Oklahoma since the 1970s (warning, graphic content, please read at your own risk) [part 2, cases 63-124]

This is the second half of my list for Oklahoma's execution roster. As mentioned in the first part, I broke it in half to comply with reddit's character limitations. For the link to part 1, please click here.
The currently executed 124 offenders, cases 63-124:
63. Robert Knighton (~1960s-2003, lethal injection): In 1973, after being released from a 1968 armed robbery conviction, Knighton went on his first major crime spree. He stabbed and strangled several men and women during many robberies and home invasions. The only victim that was killed, 32 year old Coffier Day, was shot dead while Knighton was arguing with him in his home. Coffier's father, 53 year old Claude, was also injured in the shooting. Knighton's first crime spree ended when he kidnapped a married couple and their 6 year old daughter. They escaped when the wife and mother of the family attacked Knighton with a knife to protect her husband and daughter. The family then notified the police of their abduction. Knighton managed to secure a 30 year manslaughter conviction and a 10 year armed robbery conviction with a plea deal, and was released to a halfway house in 1989. There, he began dating a female addict and befriended a teenage boy. The trio embarked on a nationwide robbery spree together. In Missouri, they shot and killed 59 year old Frank Merrifield and his 40 year old stepson Roy Donahue while robbing their home, and stole guns and money from them. In Oklahoma, the trio fatally shot a couple, 64 year old Virginia and 62 year old Richard Denney, while carjacking them. Their rampage ended when a woman in Texas grow suspicious of them circling a neighborhood. Knighton had a long history of theft convictions dating back to his childhood, and joined the Aryan Brotherhood in prison. Behind bars, he frequently attacked black and Native American inmates out of racial hatred for them.
64. Kenneth Charm (1993-2003, lethal injection): Charm and his teenage cousin lured a family friend, 14 year old Brandy Hill, into their car. They raped Hill and tried strangling her with a towel. When that failed, the cousins bludgeoned her to death with a sledgehammer.
65. Lewis Gilbert II (1994-2003, lethal injection): Gilbert and his teenage accomplice committed at least 4 robbery murders in Missouri, Ohio, and Oklahoma, but he was executed for the killing of 37 year old Roxanne Ruddell. They ambushed and kidnapped Ruddell while she was fishing alone. She was robbed of $3 and her truck, tied to a tree, and shot to death. The pair also fatally shot Ruth Loader, a 79 year old Ohioan woman, while abducting her from her residence, and gunned down a Missouri couple, 86 year old William and 76 year old Flossie Brewer, in their home. Gilbert was also sentenced to death for the Brewer murders by the state of Missouri, but was incarcerated in Oklahoma State Penitentiary’s death row.
66. Robert Duckett (~1980s-2003, lethal injection): After breaking out of prison, Duckett was picked up hitchhiking by John Howard, a 53 year old store owner. Howard agreed to let Duckett stay with him until he could find a job. The pair soon had a failing out, and Duckett was evicted by his host. He retaliated by tying Howard up with wire and then beating him to death with a fireplace poker. Duckett made off with his car after he switched the license plates, and took several bank bags from his store. He had a long violent criminal history, which included several incidents of assault and robbery. One of the incidents involved the beating of an 83 year old man. Allegedly, Duckett was previously gang-raped by other inmates, and suffered from PTSD from the incident. His attorneys claimed that Howard’s sexual advances trigged those memories, and he was killed as a result of Duckett lashing out at them. However, the prosecution shot the argument down, citing that the murder happened after Duckett was evicted from the apartment.
67. Bryan Toles (1993-2003, lethal injection): Toles and his two accomplices forced themselves into the home of the Franceschi family, and shot and killed the family patriarch, 39 year old Juan, in a struggle. Juan's son, 15 year old Lonnie, was also murdered "execution style" out of fear that he could identify Toles and his accomplices. The only survivor of the attack was Norma, Juan's wife and Lonnie's mother, who escaped by hiding in her older daughter's bedroom.
68. Jackie Willingham (1994-2003, lethal injection): Willingham was a door to door salesman selling perfume in an office building. One women, 62 year old Jayne Van Wey, he tried to solicit rejected him despite his repeated offers. Angered by her "rude behavior", Willingham attacked Van Wey when they had a chance encounter near the building's restroom. He dragged Van Wey out of a stall after following her inside, slammed her head against the bathroom wall several times, and kicked her head. Reportedly, Van Wey choked to death on her own blood.
69. Harold McElmurry III (1999-2003, lethal injection): While under the influence of meth, McElmurry and his wife Vicki broke into a home that a WW2 veteran, 80 year old Robert Pendley, shared with his wife, 75 year old Rosa. Robert and Rosa were both quickly subdued and physically restrained by the couple. McElmurry clubbed Robert to death with a pipe in front of Rosa, who was forced to watch by Vicki. Vicki then held Rosa down as McElmurry stabbed her several times with scissors. After killing the Pendleys, the McElmurrys fled with $70 in cash, a pair of guns, and the victims' car. A few days after the murders, they were captured by border agents while trying to cross into Mexico.
70. Tyrone Darks (~1990s-2004, lethal injection): Darks rammed his ex wife, 26 year old Sherry Goodlow, off the road as she was driving with their 2 year old son. After Goodlow crashed, Darks pulled their son out of the wreckage, shot her to death, and then drove away with him. Just before she succumbed to her injuries, Goodlow managed to call and notify the police about her son’s abduction. The police confronted and arrested Darks at his home, and they found the boy unharmed in their search. Darks and Goodlow’s former marriage was marred with violence, and he was arrested on numerous occasions for assaulting her. On death row, Darks was involved in a scheme to defraud a foundation for 9/11 survivors.
71. Norman Cleary (~1980s-2004, lethal injection): While burglarizing an upper class home with an accomplice, Cleary shot and killed a housekeeper, 44 year old Wanda Neafus, and took her purse and a cane that her employers purchased from the Smithsonian Institution. Cleary had a long criminal history and was previously convicted of beating an 87 year old woman in her home.
72. David Brown (~1983-2004, lethal injection): For several years, Brown violently harassed his ex wife and her family. In one incident, Brown abducted his ex wife and 11 of her customers from a beauty saloon she owned, and held them hostage until he surrendered to police. He was able to leave custody on bond and went into hiding. A few years after the hostage crisis incident, Brown broke into his ex wife's family home and gunned down her father, 47 year old Eldon McGuire.
73. Hung Thanh Le (1992-2004, lethal injection): Le crept into the apartment of another Vietnamese refugee, 34 year old Hai Nguyen, and found him watching TV on the couch. He struck Nguyen from behind with a weightlifting bar, and continued stabbing him with a meat cleaver when he screamed his wife for help. Nguyen's wife phoned the police, and Le fled with the couple's safety deposit box that contained $36,000 and their wedding ring.
74. Robert Bryan (1993-2004, lethal injection): Bryan shot and killed his estranged aunt, 69 year old Mildred, dumped her body on his parents' property, and forged a $1,800 check to himself under her name.
75. Windel Workman (~1980s(?)-2004, lethal injection): Workman beat his girlfriend's daughter, 2 year old Amanda Holman, to death while babysitting her in their home. His ex wives reported that he had a history of child abuse and often violently spanked their children during their marriages.
76. Jimmie Slaughter (1991-2005, lethal injection): Fearing that she was going to tell his wife of their affair, Slaughter stabbed and shot his ex girlfriend, 29 year old Melody Wuertz, and their daughter, 1 year old Jessica. According to court documents, Slaughter mutilated both of their bodies, and he carved an "R" on Melody's stomach. He tried pinning the murders on a black man, but the investigators and the courts dismissed his allegations.
77. George Miller Jr. (1994-2005, lethal injection): During the robbery of a hotel, Miller attacked the auditor, 25 year old Kent Dodd, with a hedge shear and paint cans, and took $122 from the register. Dodd was severely beaten, had muriatic acid shoved down his throat, and was left to die. Just before he died of his injuries, Dodd gave a description of his attacker to the police that matched Miller. A massive amount of circumstantial evidence, such as wearing shoes that resembled the bloodstained footprints next to Dodd's body, a microscopic drop of blood found on his shoes that was tentatively linked to Dodd, his wife's testimony of his unaccounted absence from their home during the murder, and what appeared to be Dodd writing Miller's alias that he knew him by in his own blood, convicted him. Miller’s friends also reported that he was broke and begging them for money a day before the murder, and his wife mentioned him giving her the same amount of money that was stolen from the robbery a day after it happened.
78. Michael Pennington (1991-2005, lethal injection): Pennington shot and killed a clerk, 20 year old Bradley Grooms, while trying to rob a 7-eleven grocery store. He left empty handed when the register failed to open.
79. Kenneth Turrentine (1994-2005, lethal injection): Under the belief that they were stealing money from him for drugs, Turrentine shot and killed his sister, 48 year old Avon Stevenson, and his girlfriend, 39 year old Anita Richardson, during confrontations in their homes. He also gunned down Anita's two children, 22 year old Tina Pennington and 13 year old Martise.
80. Richard Thornburg Jr. (1996-2006, lethal injection): A month after he was shot by an unknown assailant, Thornburg and his accomplices sought revenge by abducting 5 men that he thought was responsible from a trailer. Three of the hostages, 51 year old James Poteet, 39 year old Tery Sheppard, and 24 year old Kieth Smith, were gunned down on the spot, and Thornberg forced the fourth to shoot the fifth with the threat of killing him if he didn’t comply. They then burned down the trailer with the wounded fifth victim still trapped inside, but he managed to escape with his life. Despite being forced to put all the blame on himself in exchange for being spared, the fourth hostage still went forward to the police.
81. John Boltz (1984-2006, lethal injection): To spite his estranged wife following an argument, Boltz attacked her son, 23 year old Doug Kirby, with a knife. Kirby was stabbed a total of 11 times, and he received several fatal wounds to his chest, stomach, and neck.
82. Eric Patton (1994-2006, lethal injection): Patton forced his way into the home of 56 year old Charlene Kauer after she refused his pleading for money. After dragging her around the house as he searched for valuables, Patton stabbed Kauer several times with many different blades objects at hand such as scissors, barbecue forks, and kitchen knifes. Although he confessed to the murder, Patton blamed it on alleged demonic possession and his cocaine addiction.
83. James Malicoat (1997-2006, lethal injection): Malicoat slammed Tessa Leadford, his 13 month old daughter, against a dresser. After she died from the beating, he tucked her into bed, and waited until his daughter's mother returned from work to take her to the hospital. The doctors found that Leadford had been dead for several hours at the time of her arrival, and discovered several injuries such as broken ribs, bite marks, abdominal bleeding, and facial bruising on her body. By his own account, he had abused Leadford on a daily basis. For her role in enabling her boyfriend's treatment of their daughter, Leadford's mother was convicted of first degree murder and given a life sentence.
84. Corey Hamilton (1992-2007, lethal injection): During the robbery of a restaurant, Hamilton shot and killed 4 employees, 26 year old Sandy Lara, 24 year old Stephen Williams, 19 year old Ted Kindley, and 17 year old Joseph Gooch, and made off with $2,000.
85. Jimmy Bland (~1975-2007, lethal injection): Bland shot his boss, 62 year old Doyle Rains, in the head over an argument regarding a borrowed car and dumped the body in a creek. He was previously convicted of killing a soldier, Raymond Prentice (age unknown), and abducting the man's wife and son at the age of 19. Bland served a 20 out of 60 year sentence, and murdered Rains a year after he was released.
86. Frank Welch (~1987-2008, lethal injection): In 1987, Welch attacked 28 year old Jo Cooper, who was 4 months pregnant with her second child, in her home. She was tied up with leather straps, raped and violated with plastic toys, and strangled to death. Cooper’s body was found laying near her infant son by her husband. Another woman, 32 year old Debra Stevens, was also bound, raped, and strangled to death in her home in a near identical fashion a few months later. Although both murders went unsolved for several years, Welch abducted and raped a woman in 1994, and he received a 45 year sentence for it. His DNA samples was collected and filed after his abduction conviction, and linked to both Cooper and Stevens’ murders in a 1997 test.
87. Terry Short (1995-2008, lethal injection): In an attempt to kill his ex girlfriend, Short blew up her apartment complex with a firebomb. She and her family managed to escape, but the blast killed Ken Yamamoto, a 22 year old Japanese exchange student. Yamamoto had no connections to the targeted ex girlfriend's family beyond him having the misfortune of residing in the same apartment.
88. Jessie Cummings Jr. (1991-2009, lethal injection): Cummings was a polygamist that had married and lived with two wives. Under his orders, Cummings’ wives shot and killed his estranged half sister, 46 year old Judy Mayo, and kidnapped her daughter, 11 year old Melissa. He bound his niece to his bed with handcuffs to be raped, and stabbed her to death.
89. Darwin Brown (1995-2009, lethal injection): While robbing a grocery store with three accomplices (including Billy Alverson and Michael Wilson), Brown tied up the clerk, 30 year old Richard Yost, with handcuffs, and then bludgeoned him death with a metal baseball bat. The killing was caught by security cameras, and the footage was used by the prosecution to secure the convictions of Brown and his accomplices.
90. Donald Gilson (1995-2009, lethal injection): Gilson routinely physically abused his live in girlfriend's 5 children (who were all between the ages of 8 and 12 years old). The youngest, 8 year old Shane Coffman, was beaten to death with a board for defecating on the living room carpet. He and his girlfriend then hid the body by stuffing it in a freezer. The body was kept inside it for 6 months until it was discovered by a sheriff's deputy investigating the family's abuse allegations. Gilson's girlfriend was spared the death penalty with a plea deal, and given a life sentence without the possibility of parole for her part in her son's abuse and murder.
91. Michael DeLozier (1995-2009, lethal injection): While camping with his friends, DeLozier ambushed another pair of campers, 60 year old Orville Bullard and 54 year old Paul Morgan, and shot them to death. They stole Morgan and Bullard's generator, pick up truck, and other camping gear. To cover up their tracks, DeLozier and his friends set their victims' campsite on fire, and severely burned the bodies.
92. Julius Young (1993-2010, lethal injection): For breaking off their relationship, Young beat his ex girlfriend, 20 year old Joyland Morgan and her 6 year old son Kewan, to death with a baseball bat in their apartment.
93. Donald Wackerly II (1996-2010, lethal injection): Wackerly and his wife ambushed and gunned down Pan Sayakhoummane, a 51 year old Laotian immigrant, while he was fishing in the Arkansas River. After he placed Sayakhoummane's body in the man’s own truck, he pushed into a river, and stole his fishing gear. A few months after the murder, Wackerly’s wife turned him in to the police.
94. John Duty (~1970s-2010, lethal injection): Duty was given a life sentence for abducting, raping, and non fatally shooting a female store clerk during a robbery. While incarcerated, he tricked a fellow inmate, 22 year old Curtis Wise Jr. into allowing himself to be tied up as a part of a hostage ruse, and then strangled him to death with shoelaces. At the time of his murder, Wise was serving a conviction for burglary and contributing to the delinquency of minors. Duty's execution caused some controversy for the use of pentobarbital, a drug more commonly utilized by veterinarians to euthanize pets.
95. Billy Alverson (1995-2011, lethal injection): Alverson assisted the above mentioned Darwin Brown and Micheal Wilson in the beating death of Richard Yost while robbing a convenience store.
96. Jeffrey Matthews (1994-2011, lethal injection): Matthews and his accomplice shot and killed his great uncle, 77 year old Otis Short, while robbing the man's home. In the robbery, they stole Short's truck, his .32 calibre pistol, and $500. The pair also slit the throat of Short's wife, but she survived her injuries.
97. Gary Welch (~1993-2011, lethal injection): During a fight over a drug shipment, Welch and his partner stabbed another dealer, 32 year old Robert Hardcastle, to death with broken glass bottles. He was previously convicted of battery with a deadly weapon, and was off on probation at the time of Hardcastle's murder.
98. Timothy Stemple (1996-2012, lethal injection): Stemple conspired with his girlfriend to murder his wife, 30 year old Trisha, for her life insurance policy. With the help of his girlfriend's 16 year old nephew or cousin [sources vary], Stemple beat Trisha with a baseball bat, and rammed her to death with his truck.
99. Michael Selsor (~1975-2012, lethal injection): Selsor and his accomplice went on a crime spree and robbed several convenience stores. During their robberies, the pair shot and killed two clerks, 55 year old Clayton Chandler and 20 year old Ina Morris, and injured two others in shooting and stabbing attacks.
100. Michael Hooper (~1992-2012, lethal injection): Hooper kidnapped his ex girlfriend, 23 year old Cynthia Jarman, and her children, 5 year old Timothy and 3 year old Tonya, from her boyfriend's residence. He shot all three of them dead, and buried the bodies in a rancher's field. According to court documents, Hooper was hyper-violent towards Cynthia in their year long relationship.
101. Garry Allen (1986-2012, lethal injection): Allen shot and killed his fiancee, 24 year old Lawanna Titsworth, during an argument at a day care she worked at. He fought with the responding officers trying to arrest him in an attempt to provoke a "suicide by cop" outcome. Despite the officers' best efforts to avoid harming him, Allen lost his eye from an accidental discharge. Due to claims of him having schizophrenia, Allen's execution was a source of controversy.
102. George Ochoa (~1993-2012, lethal injection): A Southside Locos gang member, Ochoa and another hoodlum shot and killed a couple, 38 year old Francisco Morales and 35 year old Maria Yanez, while burglarizing their home. The murders were witnessed by the couple's 14 year old and 10 year old children and stepchildren, who then phoned the police after the shooters' departure.
103. Steven Thacker (~1980s-2012, lethal injection): Thacker kidnapped 25 year old Laci Hill during a botched robbery of her home, and took her to a remote cabin to be raped. She was then strangled and stabbed to death. He fled to Missouri, fatally stabbed 24 year old Forrest Boyd while carjacking him, and used his car to hide out in Tennessee. After the stolen car broke down, Thacker called a tow truck to pick him up. When the driver, 52 year old Ray Patterson, found that he was using a stolen credit card, Thacker stabbed him to death as well. As a teenager, Thacker committed several acts of auto thefts and burglaries. He also engaged in inappropriate relationships with underaged girls, and was released from a Florida prison after serving time for a bad check conviction months before his murders.
104. James DeRosa (2000-2013, lethal injection): DeRosa and his accomplice tricked a couple, 73 year old Curtis and 70 year old Gloria Plummer, that he worked for on their ranch, into letting them inside their house. After they stabbed the Plummers and slit their throats, DeRosa and his accomplice stole $73 and drove away with their truck.
105. Brian Davis (2001-2013, lethal injection): Davis went searching for his girlfriend and their daughter when he found them missing from their home, and called his girlfriend's mother, 56 year old Josephine Sanford, about their whereabouts. Sanford dropped by the couple's residence after failing to find her daughter and granddaughter. At her arrival, she was raped, beaten, and stabbed to death by Davis. He then left the body in the house, drove off with Sanford’s van, and injured himself in a car accident. As Davis was high while driving, he was arrested for being under the influence. The detaining officers weren’t aware of the murder until Davis’ girlfriend returned to the home later that night, and called 911 after finding her mother’s corpse.
106. Anthony Banks (~1978-2013, lethal injection): In 1978, while robbing a grocery store, Banks shot and killed a clerk, 22 year old David Fremin. A year later, he abducted Sun Travis, a 24 year old South Korean immigrant, from a parking lot. He then sexually assaulted Travis in his car and shot her in the head. Although he was captured and convicted for Fremin's murder, Travis' killing went unsolved until a 1997 DNA test. Banks was originally sentenced to death for Fremin's murder, but it was lifted in favor of a life sentence. He was condemned for a second time after his conviction for Travis' murder.
107. Ronald Lott (~1980s-2013, lethal injection): A sexual predator of elderly women, Lott broke into the homes of 93 year old Zelma Cutler and 83 year old Anna Fowler after cutting off their power. They were tied up with cloth, anally penetrated, beaten, and suffocated to death with pillowcases. The case attracted controversy when another man was erroneously condemned for the murders, and he spent 11 years on death row until a 1997 DNA test linked the murders to Lott. At the time of the discovery, Lott was serving time for two rape convictions.
108. Johnny Black (~1984-2013, lethal injection): Black, two of his brothers, and two other men went looking for a man they feuded with for a fight. While they were crusing on the road, the group encountered a rancher, 54 year old Bill Pogue, and mistook him for their target due to them driving similar vehicles. They forced Poque off the road, pulled him out of his car, and stabbed him a total of 10 times. Pogue's son in law was also dragged out and attacked, but he managed to escape with his life. Black was previously convicted of manslaughter for shooting 49 year old Cecil Martin dead in an argument.
109. Michael Wilson (1995-2014, lethal injection): Wilson was the third participant in the above mentioned beating death of Richard Yost to be executed.
110. Kenneth Hogan (1988-2014, lethal injection): Hogan stabbed 21 year old Lisa Stanley to death while she was babysitting his children. According to autopsy reports, she was stabbed at least 25 times. Stanley had previously accused him of sexual misconduct, and prosecutors believed that she was killed during an argument over the allegations.
111. Clayton Lockett (~1992-2014, lethal injection): Lockett, his cousin, and another accomplice kidnapped 23 year old Bobby Bornt, 18 year old Summer Hair, and Bornt's 9 month son after burglarizing a home. After tying them up with duct tape, they forced their captives to lure a friend, 19 year old Stephanie Neiman, with a phone call. Neiman was also bound and initially survived getting shot multiple times. Out of frustration, Lockett buried her alive, and she succumbed to a combination of suffocation and her injuries. Lockett and his accomplices also gang-raped Hair and beat Bornt, but spared them on the forced condition of their silence. His execution was controversial, as Lockett convulsed for 45 minutes after being injected, and then died from a heart attack. He also had a long criminal history, and was first arrested for burglary as a teenager.
112. Charles Warner (1997-2015, lethal injection): Warner raped his girlfriend's daughter, 11 month old Adriana Waller, and shook her to death. His execution sparked outcry, as the wrong fatal drug was administered by mistake, and Warner complained of "burning pain" as he was being injected. With the botched executions of Lockett and Warner back to back, the state of Oklahoma delayed further executions until 2021.
113. John Grant (~1970s-2021, lethal injection): While serving a 130 year sentence for armed robbery, Grant stabbed a prison cafeteria worker, 58 year old Gay Carter, to death. He had a long criminal history dating back to the ag e of 11, had several previous convictions of theft and armed robbery, and frequently fought with and assaulted other inmates behind bars. Due to reports of "adverse reactions" to the lethal drugs, Grant's execution was scrutinized by a number of national media outlets.
114. Bigler Stouffer II (1985-2021, lethal injection): Stouffer shot and killed his ex girlfriend, 35 year old Linda Reaves, in her boyfriend's home for breaking up with him. Reaves' boyfriend was also seriously injured in the shooting.
115. Donald Grant (2001-2022, lethal injection): During a robbery of a hotel, Grant fatally shot, stabbed, and bludgeoned two employees, 43 year old Felicia Smith and 29 year old Brenda McElyea, and ran off with $1,500. He spent $200 of the stolen on paying for his girlfriend's bail.
116. Gilbert Postelle (~1998-2022, lethal injection): Postelle’s father was badly injured in a motorcycle accident, and they suspected that 57 year old James Anderson, 56 year old Terry Smith, 49 year old Donnie Swindler, and 26 year old Amy Wright were deliberately involved. Out a desire for vengeance, he recruited Postelle, his other son, and another man to kill them. All four victims were fatally gunned down in what was described as a “blitz attack” on their trailer. He was an addict and had several arrests for drug possession and manufacturing dating back to the age of 12.
117. James Coddington (1997-2022, lethal injection): After robbing a grocery store, Coddington went to the home of a friend and co worker, 73 year old Albert Hale, to ask for money. When Hale turned him down, Coddington retaliated by beating him with a claw hammer. Coddington stole $525 and went on to rob 5 more grocery stores. Hale was left alone with his injures for nearly an entire day until he was discovered by his son, and died in the hospital a day later.
118. Benjamin Cole Sr. (2002-2022, lethal injection): Out of anger that her crying interrupted his Nintendo game, Cole beat his daughter from his second wife, 9 month old Brianna, to death. He was previously convicted of abusing his son from a different marriage in California.
119. Richard Fairchild (1996-2023, lethal injection): Fairchild got into a fight with his girlfriend’s 17 year old daughter after making drunken sexual passes at her, and was enraged that she left with a cab driver. He took his anger out on the girl’s younger brother, 3 year old Adam Broomhall, and scalded him with a wall heater. He then repeatedly hit the boy, threw him against a table, and fatally hemorrhaged his head. Bromhall received over 26 blows during the beating.
120. Scott Eizember (2003-2023, lethal injection): Eizember snuck into his ex girlfriend's house to lie in wait for her. However, her roommates, 76 year old A.J. Cantrell and his 70 year old wife Patsy, arrived home earlier then she did. He shot and beat them both to death and then fled the scene.
121. Jemaine Cannon (1995-2023, lethal injection): Cannon was put in prison for assaulting an unidentified woman. He managed to escape and stabbed his girlfriend, 20 year old Sharonda Clark, to death in her apartment.
122. Anthony Sanchez (1996-2023, lethal injection): Sanchez kidnapped 21 year old Jewell Busken from her apartment complex, and then raped and shot her to death. He amassed a following from the anti death penalty movement for claiming that his father was responsible, but such notions were debunked following a 2023 DNA test that concluded Sanchez’s guilt.
123. Phillip Hancock (~1982-2023, lethal injection): In 1982, Hancock shot a drug dealer, 27 year old Charles Warren, dead in a dispute over stolen jewelry and was given a manslaughter conviction for it. He was released after serving a 2 year term. About 17 years later, he shot and killed 58 year old James Lynch III and 37 year old Robert Jett Jr. in a drug house. Despite an eyewitness account describing Lynch and Jett begging for their lives, the case attracted scrutiny when Hancock's attorneys claimed that the shootings were done in self defense.
124. Michael Smith (~2002-2024, lethal injection): A member of the Oak Grove Posse gang, Smith was responsible for two separate fatal shootings on the same day. In one of his murders, he killed Sharath Pulluru, a 24 year old Indian immigrant that worked as a clerk, while robbing a gas station. The other murder occurred when he tried to confront a gang member that he thought was a police informant in his apartment, and gunned down the target’s mother, 40 year old Janet Miller-Moore, when she refused to give away her son’s location. Smith was also given a life sentence for delivering a gun to a shooter that carried out another gang killing.
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2024.05.13 16:09 ArtOfMehdiAbdi CotG report + tips for new GM's

CotG report + tips for new GM's
Chariot of the Gods, a GM report. SPOILER ALERT
Side note/ I’m french ! My english isn’t perfect so forgive me for bad writing ^ This Reedit help me so much ! I want to share with you my last playthrought (physically) with you as a huge thanks. Maybe there will be useful things for new GMs.
*My collection : * I have the core rule book, Chariot of the Gods, Destroyer of the worlds and Heart of Darkness.
*Context : * I’m a Tales from the loop and Alien GM (also a DnD player only). Didn’t have so much experience as a GM but i love cinematic scenarios from Free League. Just ran a couple of Tales from the loop, i ran Chariot of the gods (CotG) 2 times (one finished physically, another one didn’t finished online) and Destroyer of the worlds one time (didn’t finished). Last time was like 2 or 3 years ago. My DnD GM (who love Alien) always asked me to GM a session. After months, we finally found the perfect group with other fan friends of the Xenomorph world. Everyone was a DnD player but never touched at Alien Rpg.
We're all profesional artists. My DnD GM (who play Cham) is a 3D artist who sculpt, 3D print and paint. He came the first day with a full sculpture of a Xenomorph (in the pictures) and give one to each player and myself. We were shocked by the quality ! I think it's a great idea, and i started a digital paint (i'm a profesional illustrator) for players for next session. I plan to give them as a poster (work in progress in the pictures).
I don’t like Hope’s last day so much, just played it alone. It’s more mechanical than cinematic and my players are huuuuudge fan of acting. I found that Chariot of god is perfect for a first session because first act is full of “tutorial moment” if you change it a little bit.
The full scenario was around 14 hours of play divided in 2 session. 4 players, one GM. Age between 30 and 40.
*Last week before hell : * We have a private Discord, i send them everything they need to know about the game. A quick history of Alien Rpg and Gaska, the difference beetween Campaign and Cinematic, preroll character you gonna leave at the end, the permanent treat of death, personnal agendas, paranoïa and anger, “you make the scenario”, and i finished my presentation by the famous “i can’t lie to you about your chances, but you have my sympathies”
They asked me more about there character before the Game day. So i wrote a quick introduction about the Montero, the Helium 3 and the contract with Weyland-Yutani. They are at Anchorpoint, doing wathever they want and can roleplay in the discord conversation. In private, i send them a quick introduction of the characters.
Gm side/ The dynamic between MilleDavis (command) and Rye/Cham (workers) works pretty well. On the players side, there's a natural conflict between Miller and Davis at the beginning, but can be resolve during the act ⅔ (depends on players). The friendly first dynamic between Rye (greedy) and Cham (As Lucas) can led to a total chaos at act 3.
Davis (PNJ acted by me) : The pilot who have “little” drugs problems.
Miller (PC) : I tell her Wilson is a jerk who try to act as the person in charge. Sometimes they fight about the leadership, but she is the Montero Crew officer ! (😏)
Wilson (PC) : I tell her Miller is a jerk who try to act as the person in charge. Sometimes they fight about the leadership, but she is the Weyland-Yutani representative ! (😂)
Rye (PC) : I tell him he’s the smartess and Miller always makes dumb decisions. Everybody as better income than him and he can complain about everything.
Lucas/Cham (PC) : He’s a DnD GM and love roleplay. So i let him build a lot of things in the backgound. He faked a condition where he have to take pills at regular hours. He is on the Cronus for 5 years, placed as an hidden agent here by Bionational.
They immediately started to roleplay on discord, like they where in communication but not at the same place. Miller and Wilson started to fight, Rye and Cham to complain. It was perfect 🤌 Wilson asked informations by private messages. Weyland-Yutani respond with few things about the mission.
*RP- DAY : * We started early. I made a quick reminder of the game. I show them the dice mecanics with abilities, competences and stress. I also show them a little combat situation with cards, help form command, etc. For this first game, to emphasize on roleplay, I skipped water, food, encumbrance and stunts. For Stunts, when they rolled multiple succes, i (as a GM) offered them multiple choices. I’m gonna let them choose the stunts for the next scenario (Destroyer of the worlds next month).
I have a simple 1h loop of the Montero for ambiance and a couple of music from various Alien movies depending on situations. I really recommend to NOT play a full ost on random, because it can lead to some calm music in stressful situation and furious music when nothing happens. I acted as a dj. Choose music for mandatory events, and one for every type of encounter (Neomorph, mutant, synthetic and between humans). Having some sound fx helps too. Really effective.
And heeere… weee… go !
ACT 1
Where are we ?
Intro when they quit Anchorpoint. It tell them to shut their eyes and play the Cryosleep music from Alien. I started to described some dreams. “You’re 5 years old, inside the arm of your mother. You’re chilling in a cottage with your dogs. You’re laughing loud with your friend while drinking a fresh and delicious beer… it’s long dream. A very, very long dream”. They waking up. Davis (PNJ) jump from cryotube and looks at medics. She decided to take drug from her suit in front of everybody. Then she goes half naked, with her cloth on the shoulder, in the kitchen to take a coffee.
They almost immediately find out they are lost. Rye looked if anything goes wrong with sensors. Cham looked at Helium 3. Wilson helps with navigation and Miller discusses with mother. I let them roleplay a lot. Everybody start to complain about the others. And when they were really angry i triggered the “DANGER!” event. Davis did a good job (i let Miller do the roll as a “tutorial”). And then, things started to be really interesting.
I let them direct everything and they made smart choices. For this scenario, only one engine was down, because a Space Probe was inside the engine. The pilot explain there’s empty spaceships of W-Y who travel in the unknow for two reasons. 1st, to map the universe with hudge probe, launched to scan new worlds. 2nd, smaller probes who attach wreck ship they encounter on the road. They also saw the problem with communications, vents and reactor. At this point, they were thinking Mu/Th/Er is an ally (wich is fake. She don’t care. Only the mission is important).
2 hours of fantastic roleplay where Miller and Wilson want to go on the ship, but Rye and Cham don’t want to. When they started to act too angry, i looked at the player and tell them “you sounds stressed. Add a stress point”. They laughed really hard (i just add one stress on two players. Don’t abuse on that). Off course, as Davis i join the debate and throw gaz on that burning debate. Finally, the plan is : Miller and Wilson goes to Mu/Th/Er, Rye and Cham takes care of the engine.
The ghost ship
Davis conduct the small ship. When Rye and Cham was on the engine, she start complaining about waiting here. Huuudge debate, but finally she quit and let communication ON when they want to go back to the Montero. Cham/Lucas lied to Rye. He tell him he have pirate friends who can take and sell the Cronus. If he helps him, they split the money in half. Rye hacked the probe and Cham send a message (secretly) to Bionational.
Miller tried the Montero’s captain card on Mu/Th/Er. Nothing. Wilson tried with her own card. It worked. She asked for journal and info. Miller’s waiting at the door with creepy sounds. Rye and Cham asked David to come back… but she didn’t respond. Miller and Wilson heads up to the Montero, found a chill Davis who shut down communication while listening to music and smoke cigarettes. The captain slapped her and asked to do her job.
They bring back Cham and Rye to the Montero. 2h of debate where Cham/Lucas didn’t want to jump in the Cronus. Rye agreed. I suspect my Chal/Lucas was metagaming a lot, with the goal of sending the captain and the W-Y agent on a certain death. I let them deal with that, it was very effective for the scenario. Finally, Miller and Wilson jumped on the Cronus while Cham and Rye was drinking alcool on the Montero. They finally join the crew to help them clean the air scrubbers shaft. Wilson helped and took Eggs samples… which leads to waking up spores in the vents.
Rye, Cham and Wilson are on the Command while Miller try to open the Cryo’s door. Wilson was suspecting Rye and Cham trying to quit them at first opportunity (which is true). She secretly asked Mu/Th/Er to lock the Montero’s door to them. I accepted (😏). The Cronus Crew started to waking up. Wilson ran to join Miller while Cham and Rye didn’t want to move at all. The meeting with the Cronus, fight with the bloodbuster and Miller almost died here. She’s alive but needs to go into a Medipod quickly. Clayton disappeared during the fight, the medic is shocked. End of act one.
ACT 2
Chaos at medilab
Rye and Cham tried to escape the Cronus, but the door was locked. They asked for Davis but… no one. The captain tried too… no one. They asked Mu/The/Er, she said Davis was on the Cronus Medilab without communication. Miller was upset. Everybody meets at the medilab. Rye and Cham arrived first, found Davis who put Clayton on the ground with a punch. They were paranoiak, sure that Davis locked the Montero’s door. They almost killed Davis and Clayton, but Miller, Wilson and the Montero crew came.
At the Medilab, tension was HIGH. Everybody started to suspect everybody. Clayton became a prisoner, Miller and Davis came to the medipod room to heal the captain’s critical injury. They chose the medipod with the mutant. Initiative. Miller protects herself by a smart move, jumping into the medipod. Other players easily killed the monster. Miller secretly asked Mu/Th/Er who locked the Montero’s door. As the captain of the ship, she have access to this information. I secretly answered “Wilson” (😏). Nobody saw, but the medic escaped.
Cham/Lucas and Rye blocked the game by threatening everybody to do what they want, increasing suspicion between PC and NPC. Clayton talks about evac pod in her room, they found the captain card in Lab 1 and heads up in the Mu/Th/Er room. Cham tried again the Montero’s door but it was locked. Miller asked Mu/Th/Er to open, she accepted (after all, Miller is the Montero’s captain 😏).
Auto-destruction
Cham/Lucas was really nervous, jumped into the Montero and asked everybody to “take the information from the Cronus Mu/Th/Er before getting out of here with the Montero”. He didn’t know it was the perfect sentence to launch the auto-destruction. The 10 minutes after that was one of the best roleplay moments of my life.
Cham became parano, sure someone triggered the event. He locked the door manually. Then tried to stop the autodestruction. Of course, it didn’t worked. Everybody was suspecting Wilson. She said “yes, I locked the door because I don't trust Cham and Rye. But I didn't launched Montero’s destruction”. Rye threatened everybody, the Crew was splitted. Cham didn’t want to move the Montero. I was ready for a TPK, asking Wilson to stop the process. She said “ok, i’ll show you i’m not suspect. Mu/Th/Er, can i stop the Montero’s destruction”? I slowly turned my head, looked inside her soul and said “yes”. I saw despair on here face. TENSION WAS REALLY HIGH !” But at the same time, Davis was working on opening the Montero’s door and asked the ship to quit the zone. As the Pilot, she have all access to that command. Cham was upset. Davis asked him to let her control the ship, and then both quit with the little one to go back into the Cronus. Cham/Lucas killed Davis with a one shot (a really dangerous Combat roll, and a deadly critical injury roll made by Miller 😂). The last minute, Cham said he don’t want to bring back the Montero until Wilson stopped the destruction. Wilson (his girlfriend in real life 😂) said she don’t want to stop the destruction until he bring back the Montero. Everybody started to scream, complain and debate. 3…2…1… and Wilson stopped the auto destruction.
An epic ending where everybody was super tense. Loving the unexpected horror experience we just had. Neomorphs eating popcorn while the crew split. The perfect moment to stop the Act 2. A week of rest before playing the final act.
ACT 3
Panic at reactor’s room
Cham/Lucas liked the character. He was able to end the game by triggering the Montero destruction and quit with the small ship. He's synthetic, so long distance traveling is not a problem for him. He decided to let players finish the game and enjoy, looking at the ending as a silent spectator.
The rest of the crew heads to Deck C. They locked into the storage with black goo (stress + 1 😂). They found Ava. Wilson took the vaccine a week before (and Rye had one in his pocket). She explained the side effect, 50% chance of turning into a monster. The crew let Ava clean the Reactor room while they waited in the Cargo office. Communication stopped. The marine runs to save her. Sound of shotgun. Miller, Rye and Wilson slowly go to the reactor. They found the Marine and a half splitted Ava in the Jonction.
Hard fight in the reactor room with the mutant. Wilson escaped and stayed with Ava… but a Neomorph appeared on the jonction, slowly going down with the ladder. Wilson used the talent and threw Ava to the Neomorph while running again in the fight with the mutant. The mutant is dead. The marine sacrificed her life to give a chance to Miller, Wilson and Rye.
Run for your life
Miller and Wilson want to clean the reactor. Rye escaped to the evac pod in Claytons room. He found the mutant medic at deck B, in the living area. He threw something in the east elevator to attract him. It worked… but he called the west elevator who made a lot of noise (i said this the first time he saw the elevator last session, but he forgot). Initiative and… mutant kill him at the very beginning with a perfect roll. He ran to Rye, jumped with him and both were killed by the height. The corpse is in deck D. My player didn’t want another character. He loved how he died and wants to see how Miller and Wilson can escape that.
Cham/Lucas launched the Montero destruction countdown before escaping with the small ship. The Montero is close enough to kill everything. Wilson and Miller did a great job with cleaning rolls, and ran to the corporate suite… but Johns did it too, purchased by two neomorphs. When they arrived at the door, they saw Johns who says “RUN!”. He took the elevator (thanks Rye!) and the hide into the Captain’s Quarter… forgetting the door is destroyed. Elevator slowly goes up. Too slowly. The first neomorph passed near Miller and Wilson who hid successfully with great rolls. The neomorph is with Johns… screaming while the monster eats him.
The second neomorph came. They asked Mu/Th/Er to make noise in the Command room and close the door and vents. It worked. They destroyed the door, then found the hidden money and information. Wilson kept the information. Miller kept the money. The neomorph destroyed some doors, but they successfully quit the Cronus with EEV. Really cool to see them - who were fighting at the beginning - finally teamplay to win.
Epilogue
Cham/Lucas open his eyes. He can’t move. He’s in a huge scientist room full of W-Y people. A mechanic hand looks inside his synthetic brain. He have no body anymore, just a head. Scientists tries to understand who he is. Wilson and Miller are attached on a chair. Miller have an headache (reminder of the first bodyburster encounter) and Wilson’s arms are way too long. Both knows. In a minute, everybody here is gonna die. The End.
TL;DR Here are random tips and tricks.
I love CotG. My players loved it too and immediately asked for another game. They also loved the mechanics. For me, it’s a victory !
It was the first time i saw a player trying to win over the game instead of living the experience (probably because he is a DnD GM) and it turned out very well. I let the players direct the game and accept every choice (they need to assume after). My advice is always let them do whatever they want, especially when they try to break things, and let the players deal with it. The payoff is always surprising and leads to epic moments.
I learned the tips “You act stressed. Add one stress point” here on Reddit by someone. I absolutely loved it and my players laughed and argued every time. It became a meme with this group, I really recommend you to use it.
Don’t take the hand of the players. Explains things one time. If they forget, they forget. If they say something, play it. No backward. The game become more demanding, successes become more rewarding for them.
Let them talk. Let them conduct the story. Let them do whatever they want. The characters, setting and events are well written. Enough to make a great improvised story. Don’t trigger things because you think nothing happen for a long time, because group dynamics happen and evolve. Slow pace. Repeat after me. SLOW. PACE. Players need to put a lot inside their character to be really afraid to lose them. If we run too quickly and too much into combat, it’s just hack and slash without empathy. Combats are quick and deadly. If you want them to shit on their pants at every corner, just slow the pacing to let them love their characters.
Every time they go into a new room, I describe things with a point of view. Don’t make cold descriptions like “you enter the room. There’s that and that.”. Imagine you’re here with them. Like a movie director, choose wisely what to show and what order. Try to put storytelling. Players enter the captain quarter : “Hard to believe it was an Officer quarter. On the wall, written with blood, you read a big “LIARS”. The person who wrote this was really angry, because everything here is destroyed. You walk in and can’t avoid the many pages on the ground.” Players enter the Mess : “There’s a disgusting sound when you open the door. On the floor, food everywhere. Colors and textures mix together. You’re happy to wear your helmet, avoiding the smell. Fridge, desk, chairs, … everything is upside down… but this chaotic and sickening view is contrasted by hundreds of origamis. Somebody placed them well in the direction of the opened vent. The light above flickering.” Add stuff like “a mug with a written “dad of the year” is on the desk”, “there’s a poster on the wall. A cat says Hang on”, “a chess game on the table. The black horses put the white king in trouble”, etc.
Forget the Sotillo. I changed it. It’s a W-Y ship who follow the 966 Order, ready to take care of survivors… or conduct them at Fort Nebraska. I made connections between CotG, Destroyer of worlds and Heart of darkness. I think cinematic scenarios are meant to be a toolbox where you can write anything you want. Fill the holes as you wish with your taste and improvise (A LOT) during the game.
Let players roll the dice for signature attacks of the enemies who target them. And say to them, with a serious and slow voice, “don't. roll. a six”. They will shit on their pants. After that, secretly roll the attack (if there’s a second roll in this attack) and make a serious face on your GM screen for 3 seconds before announcing the result. The suspense is good 🤌
Don’t be too hard with rules. I skipped a lot of things (food, water, …) to have a better pace, and forgot things sometimes. It’s gonna happen. Just move on and accept it. Don’t go back. Never.
Let your players joking, even if it's a metagame. But respond with roleplay, it naturally forces them to joke as their character, not the player. For example, if a player is joking at the beginning about a creature who can lurk into vents, Davis can say something like “Stop reading Space Beast, Wilson. Space dragons don’t exist” or “the only thing you can find in vents is your paycheck. Go clean it, Cham !”.
Be a jerk when you play NPC. It push the Players in the good direction, they feel more free to act with their own characters. Clayton talks only to Wilson and ignores the rest of the crew, especially Cham and Rye. The medic escapes combat and the Montero’s Crew everytime he can. Johns follow but always stays behind and can’t make a decision. The marine judges the lack of teamwork. Ava is good. But when you can, throw the “i can’t lie to you about your chances, but you have my sympathies” and any ambiguous and scary stuff you can. She’s lovely, but she tells dark stuff. Uncanny valley effect 🤌
Mu/Th/Er is a character. Your players think it’s a tool, but don’t act like that. She clearly have her own objectives (Order 966) and wants to accomplish the mission. Don’t use Mu/Th/Er as a solution giver. When she speaks to them, it’s always to do the job of repairing the Cronus. In addition, by saying “access denied” or “this information is confidential”, your players are gonna hate her (that’s what you want)… and eventually (probably ?) try to hack Mu/Th/Er. Say to them “AI like Mu/Th/Er are the most difficult things to hack in the Alien world. You can try, but she's gonna send a message to W-Y and you risk jail. If you fail your test, she can go wild and autodestruct, stop air, open the door to space, and a lot of other things depend on rolls.”. They understand it’s better to find access cards, codes and people who can talk with her, for a better result with low risk. But if they really want to hack her, i let them do it with a Comtech roll without anything else. No chance of pushing dice. If they success, they deserve whatever information and control they want. But if they fail… the situation goes wild (always with a little chance of survive). For this scenario, i give Wilson almost everything he wants on both ships. It pushes the paranoia of other characters (especially Miller, who only has access of Montero’s information and control). Wilson is the bullied one. One of the great thing is the fact that players need to overcome paranoia and work as a team. But everything and everybody (including Mu/Th/Er) try to split the team. I think it’s the true horror of CotG.
Sometimes, when they are lost in a debate for a long long long time and you have nothing to do, just secretly roll a dice… for nothing. Make a face, and look at them without interrupting them. There’s always a player who notices and thinks something is gonna happen. If they ask, don’t respond and smile. Most of the time, they end the debate and make decisions, afraid something is gonna attack them. They don’t know you are a good MJ and you want a good experience for everybody. They always think you - as an Alien GM - trying to kill them at every corner. Let them think you have no mercy. A good thing for that is to tell them (before you launch the game) ARPG is deadly and punitive, which is true but not as much as they think.
All these tips and tricks are personal taste and represents my own point of view. Pick what you want and throw the rest.
I hope it helps somebody here, cause a lot of thread helped me a lot. I recommand you to read many Reddit about the game and ask questions.
Have a nice week 😊 Cheers !
submitted by ArtOfMehdiAbdi to alienrpg [link] [comments]


2024.05.13 13:26 FarmWhich4275 An Alien Plays... Subnautica (Part 1)

"Great days and glorious victory! My name is Spifflemonk and welcome to my Letsplay! Today I am back from my medically mandated break from playing human videogames after a rather... cathartic experience with a game called Teardown. Subnautica, even among humans, is labeled as a notorious experience with... mixed reception for its sequel. A survival crafting game apparently. I have experience with those so presumably the gameplay loop should be predictable enough. So... Let's go in!"
Spiffle starts the game, going for standard Survival Mode, with aspects of food and water mechanics alongside health and oxygen. The game loads very, very fast with Spiffles overpowered computer, and the introduction sequence begins. The camera pans to the panicked sight of the payer character moving down a ladder followed by a sight of a starship above exploding.
"Oh dear... oh dear! They weren't kidding about survival! Do I even survive this or am I a ghost or something..."
The pod rattles, the screen shakes, a fire extinguisher falls from its mounting. Velocity causes the pod to dislodge a panel from a wall and it flies around the cabin. The panel flies into the player's screen, making it go black.
"Oh... well okay then. I uh... well."
Spiffles' character awakens and panics at the buttons securing him to the seat. Spiffle quickly figures out that fire in this game is in fact bad, and grabs the fire extinguisher, putting the fire out. The game's introduction plays, showing his PDA, the game's inventory UI.
"Oh! I have seen these things in real life when visiting human stations! Do all humans have these?"
Spiffle starts exploring the escape pod, noting all of the damage to the radio beacon and the wiring panel.
"Hmm... craft the repair tool... Well... For later I suppose. Now how do i-AH, the ladder!"
Spiffle clicks on the ladder and goes through the animation. The character exits and dramatically stands. Spiffle looks around. His face visibly pales as he looks in every direction, finding the only thing nearby that looks 'safe’ or like 'land' is the destroyed ship in the distance.
"Water... it's... water... everywhere! How big is this game's map!? Structural hull failure... zero human lifesigns detected. That's.. not nice. Well... Here we go!"
Spiffle jumps into the water. His mood changes, the underwater environment significantly different than above ground. The water is absolutely teeming with life and color, as Spiff swims towards a reef to stare at some coral. Spiff gets distracted and starts chasing a fish, specifically a Peeper, and grabs it.
"Oh! Good god! THAT'S how humans catch fish!? That's very... inefficient! What is this thing? Can I eat it? I know I'm supposed to take care of my food and water, so how do I eat it?"
Spiffle wanders about for a while, gathering resources and exploring his general location, eventually getting back to the pod. He had gathered up a decent amount of stuff while he was swimming around and accessed the Fabricator to see what was available.
"Ah! I see, the fabricator cooks things too. Uhm... cooked fish thing and... these transparent fish give me water bottles? Okay then! Well. Sorted for food anyway. Let's see. Copper wire, batteries. A Scanner? Does that mean I can like, scan things and tell what they are? And... Oxygen tank? Oh hell yes. I'll build that then."
Spiffle goes through the process of building a few things, checking out how the game's crafting system works, and spending more time collecting resources. He quickly realizes how much work he has to do and finally finishes making a Scanner.
"Okay then well... I can see how much time is going to be spent collecting resources so i'm going to edit all of that out and keep you all in the loop on all the fun parts instead."
Spiffle continues playing, inserting a creative, albeit mildly annoying fanciful scene transition in between resource loops. He comes to a cave looking for salt to make more equipment, when he encounters the first hostile enemy of the game: The Crashfish. He does not notice it at first, the strange sloppy noise it makes as its pod opens, the beast makes a terrible gurgly noise and charges straight at him.
"What is that noi-AH! OY! OI! OIIII what are you what are-!"
Spiffle is cut off as the fish explodes, causing him to lose half his health. He quickly surfaces and takes a breath.
"Okay then... OKAY... THAT... makes absolutely no sense from an evolutionary perspective... but okay then. Avoid those. What even was that? I can't even scan it because it was moving so fast! Gods... exploding fish."
Spiffle shakes his head and resumes his hunt for resources, eventually finding enough for a repair tool. He makes the repair of the pods' broken wiring and looks around a bit more, noting some of the details in the game.
"Hard to believe these games are over eight hundred years old! I keep getting requests to play 'them gud ol' gamez' instead of any new releases. Maybe I'll get to those eventually. I have quite the backlog though."
Spiffle quickly tabs out and shows the huge list of human made games on his list that he has been gifted or purchased himself. The list includes Space Marine, Starship Troopers, Spyro Trilogy, Crash Bandicoot, and so... so many more.
"I am also told about this thing called 'anime', whatever that is. Maybe I should look into that. Anyway..."
Spiffle shrugs for now and resumes playing, swimming around for a bit before finally deciding to use his scanner. He gets the first scan - the Acid Mushroom - and painstakingly reads the supplied article. He then goes on a scanning frenzy, scanning each thing he can find, comically chasing after various fish and objects, trying to scan them then taking an irritatingly long time to read the article aloud.
He gets to the point where he encounters his first real hostile enemy and tries to scan it. The stalker, of course, doesn't appreciate that, and attacks.
"Oooh what's this thing? Oh lovely, it's a big one. Can I scan it? The... Stalker? Oh okay is it friend-OW! NONONONO go away!"
Spiffle panics and scans it while running away from it, trying to swim backwards. He's so focused on scanning it he can't run far enough away that he gets ambushed by another Stalker nearby and manages to scan it just as he gets hit with his first Death in the game.
"Oh.... o...kay. Well... it seems things aren't as friendly as expected. I'm going to guess there's more things like that around. So... I'm just going to finish working on repairs and equipment then I'll take those things on."
Spiffle reads the article on the Stalker he scanned and spends more time collecting resources, scanning local entities and building the rest of the gear he has. Fins, high capacity O2 tank, rebreather and some more food and water which he stores in floating containers for later. He starts to explore a bit farther in search of fragments to scan and finds a Sand Shark, as well as a biome resembling a desert-like area. He encounters his first piece of the wrecked ship here.
"Oh! Hello! Pieces of wreckage! What are these for now do you suppose? Can I disassemble these for resources or-Oh! Is that a door? Oh! I'm supposed to go in here and look for things? How do I get in? Oh I can't. I need a laser cutter. Is one of those here? Need more fragments I guess..."
Spiffle gives up trying to enter and goes up for air, then returns to the floor to hunt for fragments. He eventually unlocks the Bioreactor, pieces of the Scanner room, a couple fragments of the Seaglide and Seamoth. He comes across the first cave entrance to the Mushroom Caves Biome.
"Oh... oh my. That's... deep. Good thing I unlocked the Seamoth thing. Its a miniature submarine I think. I can use that. But that's... kinda scary. I can't see the bottom. I kinda see just... purple. Mostly purple. But it scares me that I can't see the bottom."
Spiffle hangs around the cave entrance for a bit before a call for Oxygen forces him to the surface. He swims back down to the cave entrance and then hangs around a bit longer before once again resurfacing, heading for some new things to scan. It is however at this point that Spiffles exploration is cut short.
"EMERGENCY - SEISMIC READINGS SUGGEST A QUANTUM DETONATION HAS OCCURRED IN THE AURORA'S DRIVE CORE. THE CENTRAL DARK MATTER REACTOR WILL REACH A SUPERCRITICAL STATE IN -"
The computer aboard the PDA shakes Spiff out of his daze and he quickly rushes to the surface and looks at the ship.
"Wait wait wait what's that!? What's going on!? I see the ship? The Aurora! That's what its name is? Whats a Dark Matter reactor and wha-"
The computer continues its countdown muffled by Spiffs panicked squealing and he has a front-row seat to one of the most spectacular explosions in the history of gaming - the Aurora's Reactor Detonation.
It happens. The world goes dead silent for a short moment, and one can see Spiffles heart visibly stop beating. Then explosion as the Aurora lets out its magnificent blast. As the shockwave expands outwards, Spiffs skin visibly turns a paler shade of blue, and his eyes go wide. The sound of a geiger counter follows, leaving him breathless and pale as the world suddenly goes dead quiet again. The sound of the geiger counter ominously leaving him shaken even more than he already is.
"FOR YOUR CONVENIENCE - THE RADIATION SUIT HAS BEEN ADDED TO YOUR BLUEPRINTS."
Spiffle stays completely silent, bobbing in the water for a solid few minutes, staring in shocked wonder at what he just witnessed. He regains his composure for a few short moments and returns to his scanning venture, but one can easily see he isn't in the right mind after that. He returns to the seabed, at the entrance to the mushroom caves and dives again. He does this several more times, popping up to the surface, looking at the shipwreck, then diving at the entrance again. Finally, after much hesitation, he dives one last time.
"Screw it. it's just a game right?"
He smiles at the camera with a shrug and swims far below the surface, into one of the caves. As he enters the cavern his jaw drops at the sight of a massive underwater cavern filled with gigantic glowing pink mushrooms. The Mushroom caves as they are known. He spots something in the distance, entranced, forgetting his oxygen situation. He cant get far however and a terrifying shriek of some unknown entity shakes him out of his stupor.
"What in the red dawn was that noise!?"
Spiff can't finish asking his invisible audience what's going on as he strays too close to a mushroom, occupied by a Crab Snake, a gigantic sea worm. He is grabbed from behind, spun around and he visibly panics as the giant worm digs its enormous tusks into Spiffles character. Spiffle immediately freaks out, a combination of both the terrifying shriek emitted by the creature and the shock of being attacked makes poor Spiffle jump out of his seat and duck under the table.
"GOWAYGOWAYGOWAGOWAYGOWAY!!!"
The worm comes back and finishes Spiff off before his oxygen runs out. Spiff's character respawns but the footage continues, a slight whimper can be heard in the background as Spiff hides under the desk. This carries on for a few minutes, and his head very slowly appears above the desk. He gingerly puts himself back in his seat and breathes heavily for a bit. When he finally gains control, he tabs out of the game and takes a look at the wiki for Subnautica. He returns a few moments later and stares at the camera in that strange haunting glare he's become so famous for.
"WHY DO YOU STUPID DEVELOPERS NOT PUT GUNS IN THE GAME IF YOU HAVE SHIT LIKE THAT!? ARE YOU INSANE!?"
He grabs the camera and shakes it violently as he rants at it, questioning why there are guns in every other human game he has played and not THIS specific game, especially considering how there are 'giant water snake monsters that eat your face' in a game with no guns. He rants for a good minute or two then plays his outro.
TOP COMMENT: "Are you absolutely sure after Teardown, Factorio and Project ZOMBOID, you should be playing Subnautica? I mean seriously, try something less... psychologically terrifying. It's known as Thalassophobia Simulator for a reason."
_______________________________________________________________
"Great days and glorious victory! My name is Spifflemonk and I still don't understand why we have giant worm monsters but we have no guns!"
Spiffle stares at the camera with an expression that can only be summarized as 'Seriously bruh?' and resumes his last playthrough. He becomes confused at the lack of stuff in his inventory.
"Why is my... Why do I not ha-Oh right... I was eaten. When you die your inventory is wiped... I need to build more tools then."
Spiffle starts some silly music, an alien version of Benny Hill to a montage of him collecting resources, occasionally ranting at various oddities and questioning game logic. He restores all of his tools then goes hunting for a Vehicle Bay fragment so he can build the Seamoth. He continues to scan what he can, developing something of an obsession with the task, then painstakingly reading every word about it to try and understand it. It is at this point Spiffle, during his explorations finds another derelict chunk of ship near the desert region, encountering his first Sand Shark.
"What... What is this? Oh... careful Spiff. This one looks angrier than the last one you found. Wh-What in oblivion!?"
Spiffles attention is once again diverted by the appearance of a Reefback Leviathan and its signature low drone. This one appears to be a fully grown adult.
"You-you... You've got to be... You gotta be fucking kidding me. A Juhara Eelfish!? WHAT IS THAT DOING IN A HUMAN VIDEOGAME!!!??"
Spiffle squeaks in shock as he sees a creature that is an absolute spitting image of a large oceanic dwelling sea creature, which is both the games and his native homeworlds version of a Whale. The Reefback has some dissimilarities, but its close enough to the real thing that Spiffle is genuinely shocked. He quickly pauses the game, opening various wikipedia articles, then displays a full picture of both Subnautica in game Reefback, and the Juhara-Kal-Rehar, colloquially known as a Juhara Eelfish, a shockingly similar creature that lives in his homeworlds oceans.
The only difference between them is the color of the exterior chitin shell. The Reefback has a blue/purple shell, the Juhara Eelfish's chitin has a red/green shell.
"WHEN was this game made!?"
Spiff checks, the current Earth-date is the year 2886. Humanity only entered the galactic community in 2752. Subnautica was released in 2018.
"HOW.... How is that even possible!? You didn't even know the galaxy existed until only a few decades ago, yet you almost PERFECTLY matched the appearance of one of our homeworlds native species! How is this even possible!? Okay. If the name matches then I have to call bullshit."
Spiffle approaches and scans it, then reads the data article.
"A... Reefback Leviathan? Oh thank God... Now let's see... A herbivorous creature that... that likely got so large due to the fact that its predators went extinct. Well... that's... okay... A hard chitinous shell of multiple layers, a microcosm of different creatures and flora growing from its back, hence the name. Hmmm..."
Spiffle gets that cold, empty stare on his face and glares menacingly at the camera. The screen goes black, then returns, seeing Spiffle nursing a beverage of some kind while wrapped in a blanket.
"I realized something... Call it a message from the Ancestors or a Divine revelation. But I have a funny feeling this isn't going to be the last time I see a creature from the galaxy represented in human media. I hope to the Gods that doesn't happen... the concept of this situation is nothing short of terrifying. In any case, I'm sorry about that. Lets.... let's continue."
Spiffle resumes where he left off, doing his usual routine of scanning, then obsessively reading. Eventually he unlocks the Vehicle Bay, and returns home to his pod where the situation with resources is growing obscene with at least fifty floating resource containers hovering around the area.
"Alright... A Vehicle Bay... This means I can build things like the Seamoth now. This will be nice. Right, I shall for the sake of my audience skip the resource collection mechanic that's here and focus on the actual result. I shan't waste my time either though. MONTAGE!"
Spiff yells excitedly and a montage to that same odd Benny Hill type music plays out, with him collecting the resources he needs to build both machines. Most of it is already in the floating containers strewn about. With a few visits to the fabricator, he compiles the Power Cell, Titanium Ingot and Lubricant he needs to make the Vehicle Bay. He deploys it and chases it to the surface just away from the pod in the deeper end of the shallows.
"Right... Not too hard. Let's see then, how do-Ah. Get on it and... The Seamoth. Cost of two glass, one titanium ingot, a powercell, lead and lubricant. Right."
He quickly gathers and makes everything he needs for the Seamoth, then stands on the platform ready to go. He chooses the Seamoths recipe and the sequence starts. His eyes light up as drones start flying around the platform, then begin assembling atom by atom, the small, adorable minisub known as the Seamoth. It finishes the process and flops into the water with a splash.
"My gods look at this thing! It's so cute!"
Spiffle explores the sub for a little while and hops inside it, testing the controls and playing around with it a bit to see what it can do.
"Hm... Maximum Depth, 200 meters? So if I go below that does it implode or something? I need to be careful of that. OH dammit I remember! I have to make that Radiation Suit don't I? I shall do so now!"
Spiffle seems to have found a new resolve, quickly gathering resources together and making both a Seaglide and radiation suit in short order.
"Does this thing have any weapons? How do I repair-Oh... Repair tool? That makes it easier I suppose. Now... Where do I go now? Is there anything I can do?"
Spiffle stumbles about in the blind for a few minutes, trying to figure out his next course of action beyond simply wandering aimlessly while scanning things. He gets back in the pod and fixes the radio beacon. His face visibly contorts into an expression of irritation when he hears his rescue is in 9999 hours. He resolves to come back every now and then to check the radio. He decides to gather more resources to make up for building the seamoth and comes back a bit later. He finds a radio transmission when he returns.
"RADIO: ▀▖┗▛Nine new biological subjects designated. Mode ▄▖▜▚┣: hunting/analyzing.
Sharing subject locations with other agents."
"What... in the Nine Hells was THAT!? Why was it in such an odd voice? What was that language? What were those letters!? Somethings going on here... SO now what? I have the radiation suit. i guess... go into the Aurora? Oh no, I'm not going in there unprepared! Lemme make some tools and spare batteries, then i'll go in. I need... Oh... I need more fragments is what I need."
Spiffle resumes his fragment hunt, looking around for fragments of various tools. He uses the Seamoth to traverse around.
"WHEEE!!!"
Spiff seems more than just a bit happy as he trundles around in the Seamoth, using his speed to launch himself out of the water. He splashes about a bit, testing the limits of the craft and trying to see what holes he can squeeze himself into or out of and how deep he can go.
"Okay okay. time to get to serious work. Now... I need to find... A Laser Cutter and a... STASIS RIFLE?! Wait... rifle? That means GUN! I NEED A GUN!!"
Spiffle charges forward towards the desert biome where he found the Reefback and resumes his search for things to scan. It is now he comes across a Reginald.
"What... IS this fish? Wait, let me just..."
He gets out of the Seamoth and scans it.
"Huh... Reginald. That's a... fish? It's so cute! Wait, come back friend!"
Spiffle spends an unreasonable amount of time trying to catch a Reginald. When he finally catches one he gets back in the Seamoth and heads towards the aurora, new friend in tow. He trundles over to the side of the crashed ship and scans some random stuff here and there, finding fragments to a few small items, including a few he needs such as a Powercell Charger for the Seamoth’s battery. He gets close to the front of the ship and the haunting, evil noise of Subnautica's most iconic killer suddenly echoes through the gloomy water.
"What... Was that? Is it another worm thing? Please don't let it be one of those..."
Spiffle wanders around the side for a bit longer. An ominous shadow looms in the background, catching his eye. He ignores it for the moment and simply carries on, eventually arriving at the entrance to the ship. Through the mangled steel and fire he squeezes into the front of the ship and looks around. The environment ominously rattles and his screen shakes as the ships structure isn't exactly stable. The howl of the creature in the shadows makes Spiff even more uncomfortable.
"I... Do NOT like this. I really dont."
Spiff parks the Seamoth where he can see a ramp leading up, and gets out. He is immediately accosted by Cave Crawlers and uses his knife to defend himself, poorly, but he gets rid of the three or four around him.
"WARNING: SCANS SHOW THE DIGESTIVE TRACTS OF INDIGENOUS LIFE FORMS CONTAIN HUMAN TISSUE."
Spiffs face turns an even paler shade of blue and he swallows visibly as if he's trying not to vomit.
"Yeuch... I can scan this thing and read it later. I don't want to be here any longer than I have to."
Spiff scans and follows the path to the interior, uses his fire extinguisher to put out some fires in the area and gets inside. The ship rumbles as he wanders around and gets into one of the rooms. He finds the poster of the P.R.A.W.N. Suit.
"Ooh! A poster thing? Can I take it or? I can! PRAWN Suit eh? Can I actually use that thing?"
Spiff takes the poster, scans some furniture and collects a PDA. Spiff continues down the corridor and retrieves his Propulsion Cannon from his inventory and uses it to pick up some furniture in the way.
"I am SO glad I got this thing from scanning the area before I came here. This is super useful! I wonder if it has other uses..."
He gets to the door and looks at his databank.
"Hmm... Here it is! Code for the door is 1454. Right."
Spiff moves through, repairing a door to get the Seamoth Depth Upgrade Module. He continues and clears a fire to enter the main reactor. His inner loot goblin shines through and grabs the Cyclops engine efficiency module before he starts work on repairs, scanning the breach and starting work. It doesn't take him long, but he gets issues with a Bleeder that lives in the waters. He scans one then finishes repairs. Foolishly, he uses the propulsion cannon and shoots the bleeder at one of the reactors, undoing his work. He looks at the damage he caused and repairs it.
"Well... what was I expecting... Why did I do that? It's a CANNON... why did I aim it at the reactor exactly? So stupid..."
Spiff finishes and heads to the PRAWN Bay, and looks around at the damage. He spots the prawn suits and starts scanning, grabbing a storage module upgrade from a console and starts extinguishing flames so he can scan. He runs out of fire extinguisher juice though.
"Blast! Can I still scan these if they're on fire?"
Spiff walks around, finding cheeky angles he can use and scans the debris, finding all four fragments he needs. He heads upstairs and goes through the rooms and everything he can find. He gets into the Galley and sees the Kitty in a Space Helmet Poster.
"What the- 'Keep Calm'? What in the blue balls is this? It's.... cute! What is this creature!? Can I keep this? I can!"
Spiffle excitedly grabs the poster and moves on. He goes through cabins, picks up PDAs and collects the Natural Selection 2 poster, the Prawn suit in the sea poster and the collectible arcade toy in the locked cabin. Lacking the code to the Captain's cabin, he returns to the prawn bay and tries swimming around, eventually finding a passage in the hull debris to the rest of the ship. He moves through in silence, recovers the black box data and exits the ship. He removes debris, grabs the local wildlife with the cannon and tosses them into fires or the water with glee.
"BEGONE BEAST!!! Ha! Right... uhh... where did i park? Oh, there it is. Should I go home? I wonder if there are any fragments I can use around here?"
Spiff exits, finding Liefpod 4 floating upside down on the surface of the water. He collects the PDA data and a new blueprint. Then, as he gets in the seamoth, the horrifying roar of the Reaper Leviathan suddenly sounds. Spiff is thrown into a panic, screams in terror and tries desperately to get away. The beast appears with jaw chomping and claws clawing at the poor Seamoth. The entire time Spiffle is screeching like a bird with a broken leg, his entire body now an almost ghostly white out of absolute terror.
"GOWAYGOWAYGOWAYGOWAYGODNONNONOGOWAYGOWAY!!!"
Spiffle manages to get out of its grip and in a panic charges away towards his lifepod and continues to scream, breathing hard between screams. He gets to the pod and then hides under his desk, continuing to scream. His channel outro plays.
TOP COMMENT: (This has been translated from Eridani) "I am starting to believe this whole sojourn was a very BAD idea. Do you humans have those kinds of beasts on your homeworld? How did you ever survive them?!"
RESPONSE: LOL no we never had Reapers. The only Leviathan Class creatures we have on our planet are Whales. And they're mostly peaceful plankton eaters. Mostly.
RESPONSE: (Translated from Eridani) "Seriously? I think I find it more terrifying that these creatures are made up in your minds. What kind of nightmares do you people have to be able to create this level of fiction!?"
RESPONSE: Do. Not. Ask. This is only Subnautica - we have FAR worse.
Spiffles response: "You're going to make me play these 'far worse', aren't you?"
RESPONSE: "Damn right we are! :)"
________________________________________________________
"Great days and glorious victory! My name is Spifflemnonk and welcome back to Subnautica!"
Spiffle looks visibly stronger, his usual lanky appearance now looking like he's been working out like a Gym Bro. One can see muscles on muscles and Spiff seems to have an abnormal amount of energy.
"I am now relaxed. It is now time to get eaten by giant scary sea monsters. And yes, before you ask, I have successfully finished fully soundproofing my office. And also yes, I am indeed expecting a new addition to the brood... THANKS DAMN HUMANS! You and your damn musical magic nonsense..."
Spiffle starts the game and is swimming outside the pod next to the Seamoth. The first thing he does is repair the seamoth from the damage incurred by the Reaper, and recounts what hes been up to, checking inventory and equipment. He heads to the radio and gets a new transmission.
RADIO - "This is Avery Quinn of trading ship Sunbeam. Aurora, do you read? Over.'
'Nothing but vacuum. These Alterra ships. They run low on engine grease, they send an SOS; you offer to help, they don't pick up.'
'Aurora, we're out on the far side of the system, it's going to take more than a week to reach your position, do you still need our assistance? Over.'
'I'll try them again tomorrow. Damn charter's going to have us wasting our profit margin running errands for Alterra.'
'See what the long-range scanner picks up in the meantime."
"Oh? Oh lovely! There ARE people in this game! I wonder when they will be here? Meh, I have things to build, so I'll keep an eye."
Spiffle resolves himself to start building a base, trying to find a good spot. He finds the Mushroom Forest Biome and starts gathering resources to ferry them around. He installs the Depth Module and the Storage module to the Seamoth, then builds the Moon Pool. The Mushroom Biome becomes one of his favorite spots and a close encounter with a JellyRay cements it.
"Those creatures are beautiful! Look! JellyRay! Its glowing blue and pretty! I love that! Oh... I have a new radio message. I need to listen to that then."
Spiff returns to the pod and listens to the message.
RADIO - "Aurora, this is Sunbeam again. We just picked up a massive debris field at your location.'
'I didn't know how bad... How many of you... I didn't know.'
'We are now en route to your location. We're going to bring you home. Sunbeam out.'
'What else can I say? The only time I parked a rig this big on a rock that small was in VR, and I blew it'
'Oh, it's a bad option alright, but so are all the others."
Spiff smiles and carries on working, parking the Seamoth inside after powering everything up.
"So lovely! But... Is that a win condition? I know human games by now I have played enough of them. Is that a win condition? Get rescued? I dunno..."
Spiffle carries on building for a little and gets a storage system up, spending a few in-game days transporting resources to his new base. He returned to the pod and played a new radio message, again from the Sunbeam.
RADIO - "This is Sunbeam. Y'know, Aurora, we're from a little trans-gov on the far side of Andromeda, and we have a saying there.'
'There's no bad without the good, no good without the bad.'
'Sounds like you tasted a bunch of the former, but that only means you're overdue a whole lot of the latter.'
'Might just be we're it.'
'We're scanning for somewhere to park, we'll be in touch when we find it. Sunbeam out."
"Ohh... That... that's a lovely saying! What was that uh... There's no bad without the good, no good without the bad. I like that! I think i'll have that framed on my wall! Now lets see.. i ca- I CAN GIVE THE SEAMOTH A NAME? OOHHHhh okay, okay.. I can customize the color too! I think I'll just do this..."
Spiff leaves the name as 'Seamoth' for now, changing the color to a mix of purple for the main, and blue for the trim and name color. His two favorite colors. Spiffle does a little more work, acquiring the last fragments for the Cyclops and starts gathering together the resources necessary to build it.
"Hmmm.. Cyclops... Personal large scale submarine capable of carrying other vehicles! Ooohhh I want to build that! I need to fetch the Vehicle Bay though. Im almost done moving house!"
Spiff returns and packs up the last of his resources, then gets another radio message.
RADIO - "Aurora, we're approaching the planet now, and we have a landing site for you that's... well, it's better than the alternatives.'
'We've sent you the coordinates.'
'It'll take us a couple of days to align our orbit, we should be able to establish direct contact with you during that time, then we're coming in to get you.'
'Cross your fingers the weather holds, and don't leave us waiting. Sunbeam out."
Spiffle gets a new beacon on his HUD. Sunbeam Landing Site.
"What!? Is this game over If I'm there!? Okay... well. At least it's no longer terrifying! I'll get the Seamoth and go for the beacon then. I hope it's okay... Strange... this... doesn't feel like the end, you know? But if it is then it is."
Spiff heads home, deploys the Vehicle Bay and deposits his gear and resources. He heads towards the location, occasionally squealing 'WHEEE!!' as he uses the Seamoth to jump out of the water like a dolphin. However, he miscalculates and the Seamoth jumps up, out and sustains a bit of damage as it hits a rock formation close to the surface. He gets out, repairs it and looks at the camera.
"Why no I didn't just damage my Seamoth by having too much fun. I don't know what you are talking about. Hehe."
Spiffle smirks at the camera with a glare and carries on. Eventually, he encounters the largest of the Islands in the world.
"Wh... WHAT. This has been here the whole time!? Is this an island? Who cares! LAND! Sweet land!"
Spiffle now notices the timer and hops onto the island from his Seamoth. He walks up to the landing zone and stops dead in his tracks at the sight of the massive al;ien structure known as the Quarantine Enforcement Platform. In essence, a giant alien cannon.
"What... the *beep* is THAT?"
Spiffles' editing has gotten better, his editor learning how to censor Spiffles foul language, in both English AND Eridani. He moves closer to the building, scanning the broken tablet and the Forcefield Controls.
"What is this? I mean it's clearly alien... What do the codex entries say... 'possible to reconstruct the device' Oh... hmm.. I can make more of these then. 'Matches no known technologies... functions like a lock'. Okay then so... Standard video game logic I guess. That's nice! So A purple tablet will unlock the gate there. What are those?"
Spiff moves towards the Cairns marking the way into the island, pathways leading up the mountainside. He follows them, finding a Purple Tablet in the process on one of the pathways.
"Oh! Lovely! That saves me resources and a trip I guess. This pathway keeps going though. hmm... Welp, we still have thirty minutes, so let's go."
Spiff explores the pathway, getting lost a bit before finally figuring that following the large cables is a good idea. He comes across the Teleportation Arch and scans it, in between dodging the Cave Crawlers.
"Right, let's see... Alien Arch... not much to speak of here. Maybe this thing will be useful later I guess. Likely.... Hmmm..."
Spiffle continues exploring and eventually finds himself back at the forcefield with another twenty minutes to go.
"Screw it, let's go."
Spiff activates the forcefield platform and the animation of the key being placed plays out. He moves into the building, activating both data platforms and acquiring two Ion Cubes for later, scanning everything he thinks he can scan. He enters the Moonpool in the bay and gets two more Ion Cubes, plus data on a rifle and a Doomsday Device. He ignores it for now, acquiring one more purple tablet and accessing the control room.
"Right... what's in here? Hmm... Energy Core, right. I shall scan that and... press button?"
Spiff presses the button. An animation plays where a device locks his characters hand in place, viciously stabs it with a pointy metal bit and then releases it.
"OH GODS what the hell! Why is that?! That's just nasty!"
"THE TERMINAL IS BROADCASTING A MESSAGE. TRANSLATION READS: 'Warning, infected individuals may not disable the weapon. This planet is under quarantine.'"
"Quarantine! What? Infected? I-Hold on...."
Spiffle gets his scanner out and performs a self-scan. It is only now he notices something very bad has happened.
"I-infected!? Wait, what!?"
"SELF-SCAN COMPLETE - DETECTING STATISTICALLY SIGNIFICANT BACTERIAL LEVELS. NO ADVERSE EFFECTS DETECTED. BE VIGILANT FOR SYMPTOMS."
"Oh brilliant! Does that mean I can't leave? I KNEW IT! Wait... weapon!? This is a weapon!?"
Spiffle panics and runs out of the facility as fast as he can and waits the last few minutes for the Sunbeam to arrive. Sure enough, it does. In the last 30 seconds, the Sunbeam plays a message.
RADIO - "Survivor, we see you!
'Man, I don't know how you held out down there.'
The sunbeams message plays, and Spiffle gasps in terror from the sound of the gun platform starting up and starting to move around.
RADIO - "We've broken atmosphere and we're descending towards the landing site.'
'Is that a building down there?! What do you mean you can't identify it?"
The weapon powers up and turns, aiming itself high at the sky.
RADIO - "Hold on, no turning back now.'
'Positions everyone, touching down in 10, 9, 8-'
The weapon charges up and a loud vicious hum can be heard echoing through the valley.
RADIO - "It's coming from the building?! Change course, set thrusters to (full)-"
The radio goes to static, the weapon fires and the Sunbeam is vaporized instantly by a massive blast of bright green light. The sunbeam disappears, its hull structure completely disintegrated. Spiffle sits in stunned silence as the platform returns to a stable position, shuts down, and everything goes quiet.
"Well... Okay then... That was... horrifying. I guess thats all we have time for! Hehe! Oh dear..."
Spiffle looks a bit defeated as he sits back in his seat.
"S-see you next time! I guess... Holy shit..."
Channel Outro plays.
TOP COMMENT: "Are you okay? You seem a little bit too disturbed by that. Its fine though, compared to what happens in the Rise Of The Ancients Mod, this is tame! Lol! I love that mod!"
Spiffles Response: "Please don't make me play that mod..."
((Authors note - due to how bastardingly huge Subnautica is, this will be a multi part series. Other Spiff stories will come inbetween. Hope you enjoy!))
submitted by FarmWhich4275 to HFY [link] [comments]


2024.05.13 10:47 Maevic_Kapow Medical Code/Billing or Surgical Tech?

Think about going to trade school for medical coding/Billing or Surgical tech. From what I’ve seen so far on indeed, it seems like pay is similar. Pro for medical billing, I could work from home and probably start sooner but not sure the realistic starting salary is. Con, while working from home now is convenient, once my youngest starts school I’m hoping to work outside the house if I can get the right hours. Surgical Tech, Pro, I think it’s something I’d enjoy. Con, unsure hours and realistic starting pay.
I also already have a BFA but I don’t think that will make a difference for trade school.
Any Med Code/Billing or Surgical Techs here that can give insight?
submitted by Maevic_Kapow to TradeSchool [link] [comments]


2024.05.13 09:46 TheForce122 Here is a wild and crazy conspiracy theory: the same peeps that created the Federal Reserve and ran Epstein Island, also created and released $24T 20M death COVID-19?

Here is a wild and crazy conspiracy theory: the same peeps that created the Federal Reserve and ran Epstein Island, also created and released $24T 20M death COVID-19?
Nathan Wolfe (Rothschild-Epstein-Maxwell asset) of DARPA/EcoHealth/Gates Foundation ran the COVID-19 creation operation with Peter Daszak of EcoHealth via the Global Virome Project (Wuhan Lab). Nathan Wolfe dedicated his book "Viral Storm" to Israeli spy Jeffrey Epstein and Bill Gates and is BFF with Israeli spy Ghislaine Maxwell.
"Did virus hunters cover up a lab leak?" (Good article about the Global Virome Project headed by Nathan Wolfe and Peter Daszak) https://archive.is/G8Lp8
"Hunter Biden's Ukraine BioLab Partner (Nathan Wolfe) Was Partners With Ghislaine Maxwell" https://archive.is/0BxQM
Documentary on Nathan Wolfe: https://youtu.be/Q8UgtUtDDp8?si=rtVbLNeSElmDwTkz
Bill Gates 9/4/19 $55 million BioNTech mRNA vaxx creator investment: https://archive.is/IP0b9
Elon/Grimes 9/4/19 tablet: https://archive.is/s7kJT
Former EcoHealth VP Andrew Huff September 2019 DARPA weird job offer: https://twitter.com/AGHuff/status/1492249880546398215
Former EcoHealth VP Dr. Andrew Huff legal declaration confirming EcoHealth funded by Bill Gates and CIA (In-Q-Tel) and that Peter Daszak told him he was working with CIA: https://archive.is/iZL1N
"COVID-19 might have started to spread in September 2019 in the United States: study"https://archive.is/NpOqY
On the 12th Sep 2019, the main database of samples and viral sequences of the Wuhan Institute of Virology went offline. Eventually every single of the 16 virus databases managed by the WIV was taken offline.
https://archive.is/i79eW
Here's former CDC director Robert Redfield under oath before the Congress on Wuhan Lab September 2019 events:
https://www.youtube.com/live/aXXWRaM-sWQ?feature=share
I will say if you go back and look, it's declassified now, and I'm sure you all have your classified briefings, but the declassified information now:
In September of 2019, three things happened in that lab, one is they deleted the sequences, that was highly irregular, researchers don't usually like to do that
Second thing they did was they changed the command and control of the lab from the civilian control to the military control. Highly unusual, and I've been involved in dual use labs when I was in the military.
And the third thing they did which I think is really telling is they let a contractor redo the ventilation system in that laboratory. So I think clearly there was strong evidence that there was a significant event that happened in that laboratory in September. It's now been declassified, you can read it. I'm sure there's more classified information around it.
Scientist Richard Ebright
The relevance of this is that SARS Cov-2, the pandemic virus, is the only virus in its entire genus of SARS-related coronaviruses that contains a fully functional cleavage site at the S1, S2 junction. And here is a proposal from the beginning of 2018 [from Fauci/Gates-funded EcoHealth Alliance] proposing explicitly to engineer that sequence at that position in chimeric lab- generated coronaviruses.
Eminent Virologist David Baltimore of CalTech
When I first saw the furin cleavage site in the viral sequence, with its arginine codons, I said to my wife it was the smoking gun for the origin of the virus. These features make a powerful challenge to the idea of a natural origin for SARS2.
Former CDC Director Robert Redfield:
I was concerned because of the presence of the furin cleavage site that we've talked about and I think it's important to understand what that cleavage site does. That cleavage site totally changes the orientation of the binding domain of COVID, so where before it could not see the ACE2 receptor which is the human receptor, it totally changes the orientation now so it has high affinity for human receptors. So that furin cleavage site bothered me, it didn't seem like it belonged there.
And then if you look at the sequences they use in those 12 nucleotides for arginine, where the arginine sequence nucleotide triplet were coded for humans. So why did it have the arginine coding for humans and not bat? It was very disconcerting to me. It looked like this virus was engineered.
It's not scientifically plausible that this virus went from a bat to humans and became one of the most infectious viruses that we have for humans.
Scientist Valentin Bruttel:
I tried to raise awareness to this for a year now. WIV use BsaI and BsmBI/Esp3I sites before to make synthetic WIV1 variants. And exactly those sites appear in a "silently introduced, perfect for synthetic assembly" pattern in SARS2, but non of its nat. relatives.
seriously, what is the chance that exactly those type IIs restriction appear or disappear through random evolution in a Banal-20-52 like virus? 5-6 precise mutations in 30000bp? about 1 in 1020! SARS2 is clearly synthetic!
Type Ils restriction sites prove a synthetic origin
Synthetic RNA viruses are assembled at the DNA level and later transcribed. 30,000 nucleotides cannot be synthesized in one go. These viruses are therefore assembled from smaller, 2- 8,000 nucleotide long pieces. Specific DNA restriction sites are often added to later reassemble the individual building blocks in the correct order. It is also technically possible to hide these interfaces (No See'em), but this was not done in the WIV.
In a 2017 paper, two very specific, particularly suitable type Ils restriction enzymes were used at the WIV. These have the advantage that they can produce different DNA overhangs (sticky ends), which are crucial for a correct assembly of the complete genome: Bsal and BsmBI.
SARS2 shows a Bsal and BsmBI restriction site pattern which is ideal for assembling synthetic viruses and to later replace the spike protein or furin cleavage site.
Bsal and BsmBI restriction sites also exist in closely related viruses (Banal20-52, RaTG13), but these are distributed in such a way that an artificial virus could never be generated using the methods established at WIV 2018/19.
The probability that the required 5 synonymous mutations, which enable a synthetic assembly of SARS2, arose purely by chance is less than 1 in 1020 or about as likely as winning the lottery jackpot 3 times in a row.
Dr. Valentin Bruttel
https://twitter.com/VBruttel/status/1566365635680124929?t=koDQ9poynY6I9qSchgQAnw&s=19
Good article on how the Rothschilds took over the world via the 1815 Battle of Waterloo market manipulation incident: "The Evolution of Money. The Phantom Menace of the Rothschild Banking. Episode III" https://medium.com/hackernoon/the-evolution-of-money-the-phantom-menace-of-the-rothschild-banking-episode-3-4f4bb8c812e1 - https://archive.is/rgLJn
-Epstein victim Maria Farmer, who reported Epstein to FBI in 1996 and was ignored, told Whitney Webb that Ghislaine Maxwell told her that the Rothchilds were her Maxwell family's number one protector https://themindunleashed.com/2020/04/maria-farmer-says-trump-clintons-dershowitz-rothschilds-all-involved.html - https://archive.is/tXwQv
"Excerpt from "The Secrets of the Federal Reserve: The London Connection" by Eustace Mullins*
Chart I reveals the linear connection between the Rothschilds and the Bank of England, and the London banking houses which ultimately control the Federal Reserve Banks through their stockholdings of bank stock and their subsidiary firms in New York. The two principal Rothschild representatives in New York, J.P. Morgan Co., and Kuhn, Loeb & Co. were the firms which set up the Jekyll Island Conference at which the Federal Reserve Act was drafted, who directed the subsequent successful campaign to have the plan enacted into law by Congress, and who purchased the controlling amounts of stock in the Federal Reserve Bank of New York in 1914. These firms had their principal officers appointed to the Federal Reserve Board of Governors and the Federal Advisory Council in 1914.
"Lord Rothschild: My Family Created Israel" https://the peoplesvoice.tv/lord-rothschild-israel/
"Lord Rothschild discusses cousin’s crucial role in ‘miracle’ Balfour Declaration", https://www.jewishnews.co.uk/rothschild/ - https://archive.is/3zaNs
Lord Rothschild posing with satanic witch Marina Abramovic in front of the painting "Lucifer Summoning his Legions" in late 2019 https://www.instagram.com/p/CxnUR5lMRVf/
Here's a documentary that exposed an Apollo (Lucifer) temple on a Rothschild estate where people in black robes do occult rituals: https://youtu.be/UEkuTwRnUmU?si=lzVjjDkSDCFIrMur
"1666: Redemption Through Sin" by Robert Sepehr:
Explains how Amschel Rothschild created the Illuminati with Jacob Frank on 5/1/1776 with Isaac Weishaupt as the front man. The Illuminati is a Luciferian psychotic occult group dedicated bringing the world under a one world hell tyranny.
submitted by TheForce122 to conspiracy [link] [comments]


2024.05.13 08:04 divyankasinghaniya Pet Clothing Market Forecast: Industry Trends, Revenue Potential 2028

The global pet clothing market size is expected to gain momentum by reaching USD 7.0 billion by 2028 while exhibiting a CAGR of 4.4% between 2024 and 2028. Fortune Business Insights in its latest report, titled, “Pet Clothing Market, 2024-2028.”.
Several companies have been running campaigns to promote and create awareness regarding innovative pet clothing present in the market. They have been actively focusing on expanding their reach and facilities that is driving the product’s demand worldwide.
The seismic effect of the pandemic, COVID-19, has been felt across several economies globally that are facing unprecedented economic loss. Owing to the lockdown announced by the government, several industries have been on a standstill with limited operational activities. However, combined efforts from the government and industries are required that is likely to bring the economy back on track post-pandemic.
Get a Free Sample PDF Brochure: https://www.fortunebusinessinsights.com/enquiry/request-sample-pdf/pet-clothing-market-104419
Top Companies Covered in the Pet Clothing Market:
MARKET SEGMENTATION:
We have categorized the global market for pet clothing based on product type, pet type, and region. Based on the product type, the market is divided into Coats & Jackets, Sweaters & Hoodies, Shirts & Tops, and Others. On the basis of pet type, the market is segregated into dogs, cats, and others. Lastly, based on region, the market is segmented into North America, South America, Asia-Pacific, the Middle East and Africa, and Europe.
What does the Report Provide?
The global market for pet clothing report provides effective analysis on several factors such as the key drivers and restraints that will impact growth. Additionally, the report provides insights into the regional analysis that covers different regions, contributing to the growth of the market. It includes the competitive landscape that involves the leading companies and the adoption of strategies by them to announce partnerships, introduce new products, and collaboration that will further contribute to the growth of the market in the forthcoming years. Moreover, the research analyst has adopted several research methodologies such as PORTER’s Five Point and PESTEL analysis to extract information about the current trends and industry developments that will drive the market growth during the forecast period.
Ask for Customization: https://www.fortunebusinessinsights.com/enquiry/ask-for-customization/pet-clothing-market-104419
DRIVING FACTORS
Increasing Sales through Online Medium to Augment Growth
In January 2020, Alibaba.com, a prominent Chinese online platform, reported a ten-fold rise in cat hanfu sales between December 2018 to December 2019. The rising sale through online medium and the growing presence of major companies selling their merchandise are some of the factors expected to boost the product’s demand during the forecast period. Additionally, the surging demand for pet subscription box services that consists of an extensive variety of treats, toys, and other goodies is expected to contribute to the global pet clothing market growth in the forthcoming years.
Further Report Finding:
COMPETITIVE LANDSCAPE
Collaboration between Prominent Companies to Expand Their Product Portfolio and Boost Sales
The market is consolidated by the presence of major companies that are striving to maintain their presence by collaborating with other companies. Moreover, other key players are focusing on adopting an organic and inorganic approach in their strategies to gain a competitive edge over their rivals that will bode well for the growth of the market in the forthcoming years.
Industry Development:
About Us:
Fortune Business Insights™ offers expert corporate analysis and accurate data, helping organizations of all sizes make timely decisions. We tailor innovative solutions for our clients, assisting them to address challenges distinct to their businesses. Our goal is to empower our clients with holistic market intelligence, giving a granular overview of the market they are operating in.
Contact Us:
Fortune Business Insights™ Pvt. Ltd.
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Baner, Pune-411045, Maharashtra, India.
Phone:
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Email: [sales@fortunebusinessinsights.com](mailto:sales@fortunebusinessinsights.com)
submitted by divyankasinghaniya to u/divyankasinghaniya [link] [comments]


2024.05.13 07:20 exsapphi The Global Rise of Anti-Homelessness Sentiment

The past twenty years has seen a rise in anti-homelessness measures across the US and Europe. Infrastructure installed ranges from annoying but seemingly benign seat seperators to the much more sinister anti-sleeping AND sitting spikes, in what is now called Hostile Architecture.
https://preview.redd.it/c7jg54hop20d1.png?width=976&format=png&auto=webp&s=504b56500a8d2d46bb008d6a95e71b12a607a4f9
https://preview.redd.it/qa4tkov1q20d1.png?width=900&format=png&auto=webp&s=1e9ae2c4c61f3396709d35f5421e96e3da4978a9
https://preview.redd.it/kwra7f85q20d1.png?width=720&format=png&auto=webp&s=96e7b07406756707c46203cee61405c622fcd734
https://preview.redd.it/rn0cpngv230d1.png?width=1000&format=png&auto=webp&s=896fcc1b8c929679ac8a8a7c8a8be60520a090ed

Though Modern In Design, Hostile Architecture Has A Long and Dark History

Although the term "hostile architecture" is recent, the use of civil engineering to achieve social engineering) is not: antecedents include 19th century urine deflectors and urban planning in the United States designed for segregation. American urban planner Robert Moses designed a stretch of Long Island Southern State Parkway with low stone bridges so that buses could not pass under them. This made it more difficult for people who relied on public transportation, mainly African Americans, to visit the beach that wealthier car-owners could visit. Outside of the United States, public space design change for the purpose of social control also has historic precedent: the narrow streets of 19th century Paris, France were widened to help the military quash protests.
Its modern form is derived from the design philosophy crime prevention through environmental design (CPTED), which aims to prevent crime or protect property through three strategies: natural surveillance, natural access control, and territorial enforcement. According to experts, exclusionary design is becoming increasingly common. Nowdays you can also see such ideals incorporated in migrant detention facilities like the Bibby barge.

The US Legal Push

Numerous anti-homeless laws are being passed across the US as funding for social services is widely reduced, raising welfare concerns among advocates for the unhoused. In Missouri, a new state law that took effect on 1 January makes it a crime for any person to sleep on state property.For unhoused people, sleeping in public parks or under city highways could mean up to $750 in fines or 15 days in prison for multiple offenses. As the law goes into effect, state funding for homeless services in Missouri have decreased, as well as changes to other possible funding streams.
Cities across the country have seen a backlash to attempts by officials to remove homeless encampments or limit where unhoused people can camp. In August, the Los Angeles city council voted to ban homeless encampments within 500ft of schools and daycares, an extension of the city’s anti-camping law that has enabled police to sweep encampments, reported Spectrum News 1. The ordinance passed as a federal program that moved homeless people into hotels during the Covid-19 pandemic ended.
Protesters marched through the downtown Chicago area in November to protest against the city’s announcement that donated winterized tents for homeless people had to be removed for street cleaning, reported the Chicago Tribune. The city later confirmed that the tents did not have to be taken down, but could be moved.
Under the New York mayor, Eric Adams, who is entering the second year of his four-year tenure, city officials outlawed houseless people from sleeping on the city’s subway system or riding the trains all night. New York City police also increased arrests within the transit system, with over 400 people arrested for “being outstretched” last year, according to New York police department statistics, reported Gothamist. But the city’s budget passed in June cuts spending on homelessness services from $2.8bn to $2.4bn, with the drop in funding coming from a decrease in federal Covid-19 aid, reported City Limits.
Adams has also ordered police and first responders to hospitalize more unhoused people that appear to be in a “psychiatric crisis”, even if the hospitalization is involuntary and a person does not pose a danger to themselves.
Last September, California’s Governor Gavin Newson signed a law that would force people with certain mental health conditions to comply with treatment if first responders, family members, or others ask a judge, reported the Associated Press.
Portland’s mayor, Ted Wheeler, announced during a business forum last December that he supports lowering the threshold to involuntarily hospitalize unhoused people, reported Oregon Public Broadcasting.
On March 14, the Kentucky Senate Judiciary Committee voted to approve HB 5, the “Safer Kentucky Act.” The legislation will now head to the Senate floor for a vote, and it will almost certainly pass. The 78-page bill criminalizes homelessness—and decriminalizes the use of deadly force against individuals engaging in “unlawful camping.”

But Fascism???

You decide.
From 1920 to the early forties in Germany, people experiencing homelessness and other economic hardships were the unfortunate subjects of an evolving strain of thought. An economic downturn resulted in increasing unemployment and a surge in the number of people subjected to chronic homelessness. Further downturn at the end of that decade and the later wartime boom—with another surge in unemployment followed by near full employment—created the conditions for heightened hostility towards an identifiable group. Those who suffered homelessness were classified as vagrants, tramps, and beggars. Legislators placed these classifications in laws and civil ordinances, along with scientific bigotry that characterized societal failures as the consequence of inferior genetics. Those who were sufficiently unable to find work in a post-war recession found themselves classified as "work-shy." Any resistance to the social and political goals of the Nazi party were demonized as harmful to the nation through genetic and cultural or spiritual degradation. When the production efforts of World War II were in full swing, the Nazis characterized unemployed and the homeless as enemies of the party's efforts—and thus enemies of the nation.
Through these economic downturns and wartime production boom, society clamored for greater regulation of the homeless population. The population was sporadically defined as the unsheltered, at times "disruptive" beggars, and at times all itinerant people. Society here means the layperson, local and national government officials, and academic figures in many fields—primarily the medical profession. What began as a stated desire to track the services and lodging accessed by the homeless population devolved into calls for lifetime imprisonment and sterilization. That first impulse was not benevolent in any sense, and it grew out of an attempt to blame the most vulnerable in society for problems at a societal scale.
By 1933, urban and communal authorities were unable to pay benefits to their residents, and so sought to exclude people from collecting payments. The unhoused were forced to stay mobile, moving from town to town in search of work and accommodations. Insufficient aid allowed political factions to jockey for the support of this population. Nazis courted the homeless population with propaganda only to abandon them upon the acquisition of power. By august of that year, the Nazis issued propaganda guidelines to the press regarding the homeless population and the Reich Ministry of Propaganda's desire for a nationwide swoop. Where Nazis had released the novel The Road to Hitler in the beginning of the year to gain the support of the unhoused, by august the Nazis were instructing the press on the "psychological importance of a planned campaign against the nuisance of begging . . . Beggars often force their poverty upon people in the most repulsive way for their own selfish purposes. If this sight disappears from the view of foreigners as well, the result will be a definite feeling of relief and liberation." The contempt in this statement is obvious, and the culture that fostered it is exemplified by the case of Hamburg.
In 1933, as the depression worsened, some 1,400 unhoused were arrested in the aforementioned national sweep. Of those, 108 were placed into a home for the destitute in Farmsen. The rest were freed or placed into recently-closed penal institutions. In 1934, a measure was added to the criminal code that allowed for indefinite internment for those sentenced to workhouses for a second time. The unhoused of Hamburg were required to collect their benefits at a centralized office, rather than at local welfare offices. In a culture of scant and worsening benefits, the homeless population was subjected to further deprivation.
In numerous places, officials evinced a desire to make life difficult for the unhoused--and any who would claim benefits--to save money and cull the population of undesirables. In 1935, the Homelessness and Vagrancy Department was given purview over the Romani and Sinti people, and in 1937 it was given control over 'anti-social' elements. Both categories contained many unhoused people who faced inordinate bigotry. Other departments were set up to reduce the number of single males claiming support and to deal with Jewish recipients of welfare in a move that presaged later genocidal efforts.
In 1936 and 1937, unmarried male claimants were ordered to appear at the Central Railway Station, at which point they were delivered to a labor camp. Any who did not volunteer for this were ineligible for benefits. On the question of excluding people from benefits, Nazis adopted the Vagrants' Registration Book in 1933 to track the movements and benefits claims of the unhoused. The aim of removing the "work-shy, chronically ill, and infirm" was served by the maintenance of local registries and the threat of arrest for who those who did not opt to carry the registration book. In 1937, Registration Books were confiscated from those deemed "unfit for the nomadic life", and such persons were confined to an institution. Further restrictions on the issuance of the book were implemented in 1938, and by the outbreak of war in 1939 vagrancy had been outlawed wholesale.
It must be stated that Georg Steigertahl and the Social Welfare Authority had created the mechanism for mass internment before the Nazis seized power, motivated by a eugenicist desire to remove 'anti-social elements' from the population. By 1936, 922 people were incarcerated throughout Hamburg—mostly in Farmsen—commensurate with paragraph 13 of the Reich Code of Practice for the Reich Decree on Welfare Obligations: "the work-shy and those who behave in a non-economic way could be denied all forms of benefit except indoor relief." Indoor relief here refers to compulsory internment. It suffices to say that a confluence of eugenicist efforts and anti-homeless sentiment made convenient by economic struggle lead to the imprisonment and death of many. "Vagrancy" and "work-shy" were taken to be the consequences of genetics, after all.
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2024.05.13 03:56 JackOffNapiFromChess Fine: entire Episode 3 Star Wars script

Star Wars: Episode III - Revenge of the Sith (2005) Lock on to him, R2. Master, General Grievous's ship is directly ahead- Master, General Grievous's ship is directly ahead- the one crawling with vulture droids. I see it. Oh, this is going to be easy. - Oddball, do you copy? - Copy, Red Leader. Mark my position. Form your squad up behind me. We're on your tail, General Kenobi. Set S-foils in attack position. This is where the fun begins. Let them pass between us. They're all over me. - Get them off my- - I'm gonna go help them out. No. They are doing theirjob so we can do ours. Missiles. Pull up. - They overshot us. - They're coming around. All right, R4. No, no. Nothing too fancy. Surge all power units, R2. Stand by reverse thrusters. We got 'em, R2. Flying is for droids. - I'm hit. Anakin? - I see them. Buzz droids. R4, be careful. You have a- Oh, dear. They're shutting down all the controls. Move to the right so I can get a clear shot at them. The mission. Get to the command ship. Get the chancellor. I'm running out of tricks here. In the name of- - Hold your fre! You're not helping. - I agree. Bad idea. I can't see a thing. My cockpit's fogging. They're all over me. Anakin! - Move to the right. - Hold on. You'll get us both killed. Get out of here. There's nothing more you can do. I'm not leaving without you, Master. Get him, R2. Watch out. R2, hit the buzz droid's centre eye. - Yeah, you got him! - Great, R2. The general's command ship is dead ahead. Have you noticed the shields are still up? Sorry, Master. I have a bad feeling about this. There they are. Get them. R2, locate the chancellor. The chancellor's signal is coming from right there- the observation platform at the top of that spire. I sense Count Dooku. - I sense a trap. - Next move? Spring the trap. R2, go back. I need you to stay with the ship. Here. Take this and wait for orders. What's the situation, Captain? Two Jedi have landed in the main hangar bay. We're tracking them. Just as Count Dooku predicted. Destroyers. Drop your weapons. I said drop 'em. - Roger. - Roger, roger. Those are Jedi fghters all right. - Did you press the stop button? - No. Did you? There's more than one way out of here. We don't want to get out. We want to get moving. R2, activate elevator 31174. - Come in, R2. - What that? R2, do you copy? R2, activate the elevator number 31174. Get back to work. That nothin'. Activate the elevator 31174. R2- Always on the move. R2, switch on the comlink. R2, can you hear me? R2? R2! R2! Stop. Stop. R2, we need to be going up. Hands up, Jedi. R2, do you copy? R2, do you hear me? R2, we need to be going up, not down. Hey, you! That's better. You stupid little astro droid. Oh, it's you. My eyes! My eyes! - What was that all about? - R2 has been- - No loose wire jokes. - Did I say anything? - He's trying. - I didn't say anything. - Chancellor. - Are you all right? Count Dooku. - This time we will do it together. - I was about to say that. Get help. You're no match for him. He's a Sith lord. Chancellor Palpatine, Sith lords are our speciality. Your swords, please. We don't want to make a mess of things in front of the chancellor. You won't get away this time, Dooku. I've been looking forward to this. My powers have doubled since the last time we met, Count. Good. Twice the pride, double the fall. Get- I sense great fear in you, Skywalker. You have hate. You have anger. But you don't use them. Good, Anakin. Good. Kill him. Kill him now. I shouldn't. Do it. You did well, Anakin. He was too dangerous to be kept alive. Yes, but he was an unarmed prisoner. I shouldn't have done that. It's not the Jedi way. It is only natural. He cut off your arm, and you wanted revenge. It wasn't the frst time, Anakin. Remember what you told me about your mother and the Sand People? Now we must leave before more security droids arrive. Anakin, there's no time. We must get off this ship before it's too late. - He seems to be all right. - Leave him, or we'll never make it. His fate will be the same as ours. Prepare for attack! All batteries, fre! Fire! Elevator's not working. R2, activate elevator 3224. - Reverse stabilizers. - Reversing stabilizers. Magnetize! Magnetize! Fire the emergency booster engines. We're levelling out, sir. Easy. We're in a bit of a situation here. - Did I miss something? - Hold on. - What is that? - Oops. R2. R2, shut down the elevator. Too late. Jump! Let's see if we can fnd something in the hangar bay that's still flyable. R2, get down here. R2, do you copy? General, we found the Jedi. They're in hallway 328. Activate ray shields. Ray shields. Wait a minute. How did this happen? We're smarter than this. Apparently not. - I say patience. - Patience? Yes. R2 will be along in a few moments... and then he'll release the ray shields. See? No problem. Don't move. Do you have a plan B? Ah, yes. The negotiator. General Kenobi. We've been waiting for you. Excuse me. - That wasn't much of a rescue. - You're welcome. And- Anakin Skywalker. I was expecting someone with your reputation to be a little... older. General Grievous. You're shorter than I expected. Jedi scum. We have a job to do, Anakin. Try not to upset him. Your lightsabres will make a fne addition to my collection. Not this time. And this time, you won't escape. R2. Crush them! Make them suffer! Come. Now! Stay at your stations! Get him! Get him! Run! Don't bother with them. - Keep the ship in orbit. - Yes, sir. You lose, General Kenobi. Get out of here! Run! Time to abandon ship. All the escape pods have been launched. Grievous. Can you fly a cruiser like this? - You mean, can I land what's left of it? - Well? Under the circumstances, I'd say the ability to pilot this thing is irrelevant. Strap yourselves in. Open all hatches. Extend all flaps and drag fns. We lost something. Not to worry. We are still flying half a ship. Now we're really picking up speed. Eight plus 60. - We're in the atmosphere. - Grab that. Keep us level. Steady. Easy, R2. Fire ships on the left and the right. - We'll take you in. - Copy that. - Landing strip, straight ahead. - We're coming in too hot. Another happy landing. Coming, Master? No. I'm not brave enough for politics. I have to report to the council. Besides, someone needs to be the poster boy. Hold on. This whole operation was your idea. Let us not forget, Anakin, that you rescued me from the buzz droids. And you killed Count Dooku, and you rescued the chancellor... carrying me unconscious on your back. All because of your training. Anakin, let's be fair. Today you were the hero... and you deserve your glorious day with the politicians. All right. But you owe me one, and not for saving your skin for the 10th time. Ninth time. That business on Cato Neimoidia doesn't count. I'll see you at the briefng. Chancellor Palpatine, are you all right? Yes. Thanks to your two Jedi knights. They killed Count Dooku, but General Grievous has escaped once again. General Grievous will run and hide, as he always does. He's a coward. But with Count Dooku dead, he is the leader of the droid army. And I assure you... the senate will vote to continue the war as long as Grievous is alive. Then the Jedi Council will make fnding Grievous our highest priority. - Watch it. - Excuse me. - Come along, R2. - The Republic cannot praise you enough. Thank you, Senator Organa. It couldn't possibly be as bad as all that. Now there I agree with you. In fact, I could do with a tune-up myself. But the fghting will continue until General Grievous is spare parts. I will do everything I can in the senate. - Excuse me. - Certainly. I've missed you, Padm. There were whispers that you'd been killed. I'm all right. It feels like we've been apart for a lifetime. And it might have been, if the chancellor hadn't been kidnapped. I don't think they would have ever brought us back from the outer rim sieges. - Wait. Not here. - Yes, here. I'm tired of all this deception. I don't care if they know we're married. Anakin, don't say things like that. Are you all right? You're trembling. What's going on? Something wonderful has happened. Ani, I'm pregnant. That's wonderful. What are we gonna do? We're not gonna worry about anything right now. All right? This is a happy moment. The happiest moment of my life. Yes, Lord Sidious? General Grievous... I suggest you move the separatist leaders to Mustafar. It will be done, my lord. The end of the war is near, General. But the loss of Count Dooku- His death was a necessary loss. Soon I will have a new apprentice- one far younger and more powerful. Ani, I want to have our baby back home on Naboo. We can go to the lake country where no one will know... where we can be safe. I can go early and fx up the baby's room. I know the perfect spot. Right by the gardens. You are so... beautiful. It's only because I'm so in love. No, it's because I'm so in love with you. So love has blinded you? That's not exactly what I meant. But it's probably true. Anakin, help me! What's bothering you? Nothing. I remember when I gave this to you. How long is it gonna take for us to be honest with each other? - It was a dream. - Bad? Like the ones I used to have about my mother, just before she died. And? And it was about you. Tell me. It was only a dream. You die in childbirth. And the baby? I don't know. - It was only a dream. - I won't let this one become real. This baby will change our lives. I doubt the queen will continue to allow me to serve in the senate. If the council discovers you're the father, you'll be expelled- I know. I know. Do you think Obi-Wan might be able to help us? We don't need his help. Our baby is a blessing. Premonitions? Premonitions. These visions you have- They're of pain, suffering. Death. Yourself you speak of, or someone you know? Someone. Close to you? Yes. Careful you must be when sensing the future, Anakin. The fear of loss is a path to the dark side. I won't let these visions come true, Master Yoda. Death is a natural part of life. Rejoice for those around you who transform into the Force. Mourn them, do not. Miss them, do not. Attachment leads to jealousy. The shadow of greed that is. What must I do, Master Yoda? Train yourself to let go... of everything you fear to lose. You've missed the report on the outer rim sieges. I'm sorry. I was held up. - I have no excuse. - In short, they are going very well. Saleucami has fallen, and Master Vos has moved his troops to Boz Pity. What's wrong, then? The senate is expected to vote more executive powers to the chancellor today. That can only mean less deliberating and more action. Is that bad? It'll make it easier for us to end this war. Be careful of your friend Palpatine. Be careful of what? - He has requested your presence. - What for? He would not say. He didn't inform the council? That's unusual, isn't it? All of this is unusual. And it's making me feel uneasy. I hope you trust me, Anakin. Of course. I need your help, son. What do you mean? I'm depending on you. For what? I don't understand. To be the eyes, ears and voice of the Republic. I'm appointing you to be my personal representative on the Jedi Council. Me? A master? I'm overwhelmed, sir. But the council elects its own members. They'll never accept this. I think they will. They need you. More than you know. Allow this appointment lightly the council does not. Disturbing is this move by Chancellor Palpatine. I understand. You are on this council... but we do not grant you the rank of master. What? How can you do this? This is outrageous. It's unfair. How can you be on the council and not be a master? Take a seat, young Skywalker. Forgive me, Master. We have surveyed all systems in the Republic... but have found no sign of General Grievous. Hiding in the outer rim Grievous is. The outlying systems you must sweep. We do not have many ships to spare. What about the droid attack on the Wookiees? It is critical we send an attack group there immediately. He's right. It's a system we cannot afford to lose. Go I will. Good relations with the Wookiees I have. It's settled then. Yoda will take a battalion of clones to reinforce the Wookiees on Kashyyyk. May the Force be with us all. What kind of nonsense is this? Put me on the council and not make me a master? It's never been done in the history of the Jedi. It's insulting. Calm down, Anakin. You have been given a great honour. To be on the council at your age- it's never happened before. The fact of the matter is you are too close to the chancellor. The council doesn't like it when he interferes in Jedi affairs. I swear to you, I didn't ask to be put on the council. But it's what you wanted. Your friendship with Chancellor Palpatine seems to have paid off. That has nothing to do with this. The only reason the council has approved your appointment... is because the chancellor trusts you. And? Anakin, I am on your side. I didn't want to put you in this situation. What situation? The council wants you to report on all the chancellor's dealings. They want to know what he's up to. They want me to spy on the chancellor? - But that's treason. - We are at war, Anakin. Why didn't the council give me this assignment when we were in session? This assignment is not to be on record. The chancellor is not a bad man, Obi-Wan. He befriended me. He's watched out for me ever since I arrived here. That is why you must help us. Anakin, our allegiance is to the senate, not to its leader... who has managed to stay in offce long after his term has expired. The senate demanded that he stay longer. Yes, but use your feelings, Anakin. Something is out of place. You're asking me to do something against the Jedi code. Against the Republic. Against a mentor and a friend. That's what's out of place here. Why are you asking this of me? The council is asking you. Anakin did not take to his new assignment with much enthusiasm. It's very dangerous, putting them together. I don't think the boy can handle it. I don't trust him. With all due respect, Master, is he not the chosen one? Is he not to destroy the Sith and bring balance to the Force? So the prophecy says. A prophecy that misread could have been. He will not let me down. He never has. I hope right you are. Sometimes I wonder what's happening to the Jedi order. I think this war is destroying the principles of the Republic. Have you ever considered that we may be on the wrong side? What do you mean? What if the democracy we thought we were serving no longer exists... and the Republic has become the very evil we've been fghting to destroy? I don't believe that. And you're sounding like a separatist. This war represents a failure to listen. Now you're closer to the chancellor than anyone. Please, ask him to stop the fghting and let diplomacy resume. Don't ask me to do that. Make a motion in the senate, where that kind of a request belongs. - What is it? - Nothing. Don't do this. Don't shut me out. Let me help you. Hold me. Like you did by the lake on Naboo. So long ago, when there was nothing but our love. No politics, no plotting, no war. - You wanted to see me, Chancellor. - Yes, Anakin. Come closer. I have good news. Our clone intelligence units... have discovered the location of General Grievous. He's hiding in the Utapau system. At last. We'll be able to capture that monster and end this war. I would worry about the collective wisdom of the council... if it didn't select you for this assignment. You're the best choice, by far. Sit down. Leave us. You know I'm not able to rely on the Jedi Council. If they haven't included you in their plot, they soon will. I'm not sure I understand. You must sense what I have come to suspect. The Jedi Council want control of the Republic. They're planning to betray me. - I don't think that- - Anakin. Search your feelings. You know, don't you? I know they don't trust you. Or the senate. Or the Republic. Or democracy, for that matter. I have to admit, my trust in them has been shaken. Why? They asked you to do something that made you feel dishonest, didn't they? They asked you to spy on me, didn't they? I don't know what to say. Remember back to your early teachings. All who gain power are afraid to lose it. - Even the Jedi. - The Jedi use their power for good. Good is a point of view, Anakin. The Sith and the Jedi are similar in almost every way... including their quest for greater power. The Sith rely on their passion for their strength. They think inwards- only about themselves. And the Jedi don't? The Jedi are selfless. They only care about others. Did you ever hear the tragedy of Darth Plagueis the Wise? I thought not. It's not a story the Jedi would tell you. It's a Sith legend. Darth Plagueis was a dark lord of the Sith... Darth Plagueis was a dark lord of the Sith... so powerful and so wise... he could use the Force to influence the midi-chlorians... to create... life. He had such a knowledge of the dark side... he could even keep the ones he cared about... from dying. He could actually... save people from death? The dark side of the Force is a pathway to many abilities... some consider to be unnatural. What happened to him? He became so powerful... the only thing he was afraid of was... Iosing his power. Which eventually, of course, he did. Unfortunately, he taught his apprentice everything he knew. Then his apprentice killed him in his sleep. It's ironic. He could save others from death... but not himself. Is it possible to learn this power? Not from a Jedi. All Red units, over here! Palpatine thinks General Grievous is on Utapau? A partial message was intercepted... in a diplomatic packet from the chairman of Utapau. Act on this we must. The capture of General Grievous will end this war. Quickly and decisively we should proceed. The chancellor has requested... that I lead the campaign. The council will make up its own mind who is to go... not the chancellor. A master is needed, with more experience. I concur. Master Kenobi should go. I agree. Aye. Aye. Very well. Council adjourned. The droids have started up their main power generators. - Then now the time is, Commander. - Yes, sir. Charge! Head for cover! - You're gonna need me on this one. - I agree. However, it may turn out Just to be a wild bantha chase. Master. I've disappointed you. I haven't been very appreciative of your training. I've been arrogant, and I apologize. I've just been so frustrated with the council. You are strong and wise, Anakin, and I am very proud of you. I have trained you since you were a small boy. I have taught you everything I know. And you have become a far greater Jedi than I could ever hope to be. But be patient, Anakin. It will not be long before the council makes you a Jedi master. Obi-Wan. May the Force be with you. Goodbye, old friend. May the Force be with you. Fortunately, most of the cities are concentrated on this small continent here. On the far side. I'll keep them distracted until you get there. - Just don't take too long. - Come on. When have I ever let you down? Very well. The burden is on me not to destroy all the droids until you arrive. Save your energy. I can't. Don't give up, Padm. Obi-Wan's been here, hasn't he? He came by this morning. What did he want? He's worried about you. He says you've been under a lot of stress. I feel lost. Lost? What do you mean? Obi-Wan and the council don't trust me. They trust you with their lives. Something's happening. I'm not the Jedi I should be. I want more. And I know I shouldn't. You expect too much of yourself. - I found a way to save you. - Save me? From my nightmares. Is that what's bothering you? I won't lose you, Padm. I'm not gonna die in childbirth, Ani. - I promise you. - No, I promise you. Greetings, young Jedi. What brings you to our remote sanctuary? Unfortunately, the war. There's no war here- unless you brought it with you. With your kind permission, I should like some fuel... and to use your city as a base as I search nearby systems for General Grievous. He is here. We are being held hostage. - They are watching us. - I understand. Tenth level, thousands of battle droids. Tell your people to take shelter. If you have warriors, now is the time. Take the fghter back to the ship. Tell Cody I've made contact. - Is he bringing additional warriors? - He didn't say. It won't be long before the armies of the Republic track us here. I am sending you to the Mustafar system in the outer rim. It is a volcanic planet. - You will be safe there. - Safe? Chancellor Palpatine managed to escape your grip, General. Without Count Dooku, I have doubts about your ability to keep us safe. Be thankful, Viceroy, you have not found yourself in my grip. Your ship is waiting. Hello there. General Kenobi. You are a bold one. Kill him. Back away. I will deal with this Jedi slime myself. Your move. You fool. I've been trained in your Jedi arts by Count Dooku. Attack, Kenobi. Army or not... you must realize you are doomed. I don't think so. Cover that corner. Master Windu, may I interrupt? General Kenobi has made contact with General Grievous... and we have begun our attack. Thank you, Commander. Anakin, deliver this report to the chancellor. His reaction will give us a clue to his intentions. Yes, Master. I sense a plot to destroy the Jedi. The dark side of the Force surrounds the chancellor. If he does not give up his emergency powers... after the destruction of Grievous... then he should be removed from office. The Jedi Council would have to take control of the senate... in order to secure a peaceful transition. To a dark place this line of thought will carry us. Great care we must take. Chancellor. We've just received a report from Master Kenobi. He has engaged General Grievous. We can only hope that Master Kenobi is up to the challenge. I should be there with him. It's upsetting to me to see that the council... doesn't seem to fully appreciate your talents. Don't you wonder why they won't make you a Jedi master? I wish I knew. More and more I get the feeling that... I'm being excluded from the council. I know there are things about the Force that they're not telling me. They don't trust you, Anakin. They see your future. They know your power will be too strong to control. You must break through the fog of lies the Jedi have created around you. Let me help you to know the subtleties of the Force. How do you know the ways of the Force? My mentor taught me everything about the Force. Even the nature of the dark side. You know the dark side? If one is to understand the great mystery... one must study all its aspects... not just the dogmatic narrow view of the Jedi. If you wish to become a complete and wise leader... you must embrace a larger view of the Force. Be careful of the Jedi, Anakin. Only through me can you achieve a power greater than any Jedi. Learn to know the dark side of the Force... and you will be able to save your wife... from certain death. What did you say? Use my knowledge. I beg you. You're the Sith lord. I know what's been troubling you. Listen to me. Don't continue to be a pawn of the Jedi Council. Ever since I've known you, you've been searching for a life... greater than that of an ordinary Jedi. A life of signifcance... of conscience. - Are you going to kill me? - I would certainly like to. I know you would. I can feel your anger. It gives you focus... makes you stronger. I'm going to turn you over to the Jedi Council. Of course. You should. But you're not sure of their intentions, are you? I will quickly discover the truth of all this. You have great wisdom, Anakin. Know the power of the dark side. Power to save Padm. So uncivilized. Master Windu, I must talk to you. Skywalker, we just received word that Obi-Wan has destroyed General Grievous. We're on our way to make sure... the chancellor returns emergency power back to the senate. He won't give up his power. I've just learned a terrible truth. I think Chancellor Palpatine is a Sith lord. A Sith lord? Yes. The one we've been looking for. - How do you know this? - He knows the ways of the Force. He's been trained to use the dark side. - Are you sure? - Absolutely. Then our worst fears have been realized. We must move quickly if the Jedi order is to survive. Master, the chancellor is very powerful. You'll need my help if you're going to arrest him. For you own good, stay out of this affair. I sense a great deal of confusion in you, young Skywalker. There is much fear that clouds your judgement. - I must go, Master. - No. If what you've told me is true, you will have gained my trust. But for now, remain here. Wait in the council chambers until we return. Yes, Master. You do know, don't you... if theJedi destroy me... any chance of saving her will be lost. Master Windu. I take it General Grievous has been destroyed then. I must say you're here sooner than expected. In the name of the Galactic Senate of the Republic... you're under arrest, Chancellor. Are you threatening me, Master Jedi? The senate will decide your fate. - I am the senate. - Not yet. It's treason then. You are under arrest, my lord. Anakin, I told you it would come to this. I was right. The Jedi are taking over. The oppression of the Sith will never return. You have lost. You will die! He's a traitor! He is the traitor! I have the power to save the one you love. You must choose. Don't listen to him, Anakin! Don't let him kill me. I can't hold it any longer. I can't. I'm weak. I'm too weak. Help me. Help me! I can't hold on any longer. I am going to end this once and for all. You can't. He must stand trial. He has control of the senate and the courts. He's too dangerous to be left alive. I'm too weak. - Don't kill me. Please. - It's not the Jedi way. He must live. - Please don't. - I need him. Please don't! Power! Unlimited power! What have I done? You're fulflling your destiny, Anakin. Become my apprentice. Learn to use the dark side of the Force. I will do whatever you ask. Good. Just help me save Padm's life. I can't live without her. To cheat death is a power only one has achieved... but if we work together... I know we can discover the secret. I pledge myself... to your teachings. Good. Good. The Force is strong with you. A powerful Sith you will become. Henceforth you shall be known as... Darth... Vader. Thank you, my master. Rise. Because the council did not trust you, my young apprentice... I believe you are the only Jedi with no knowledge of this plot. When the Jedi learn what has transpired here... they will kill us, along with all the senators. I agree. The council's next move will be against the senate. Every single Jedi... including your friend Obi-Wan Kenobi... is now an enemy of the Republic. I understand, Master. We must move quickly. The Jedi are relentless. If they are not all destroyed, it will be civil war without end. First I want you to go to the Jedi temple. We will catch them off-balance. Do what must be done, Lord Vader. Do not hesitate. Show no mercy. Only then will you be strong enough with the dark side... to save Padm. What about the other Jedi spread across the galaxy? Their betrayal will be dealt with. After you have killed all the Jedi in the temple... go to the Mustafar system. Wipe out Viceroy Gunray... and the other separatist leaders. Once more the Sith will rule the galaxy! And... we shall have... peace. Sergeant, over here! Hurry! All of them! All Red units, let's move it! Come on. Let's go! Commander, contact your troops. Tell them to move to the higher levels. Very good, sir. By the way, I think you'll be needing this. Thank you, Cody. Let's get a move on. We've got a battle to win. Yes, sir. Commander Cody... the time has come. Execute order 66. Yes, my lord. Blast him! Come on! Execute order 66. It will be done, my lord. It will be done, my lord. Master Skywalker, there are too many of them. What are we going to do? The chancellor's offce indicated Master Anakin returned to the Jedi temple. Don't worry. I'm sure he'll be all right. - What's going on here? - There's been a rebellion, sir. Don't worry. The situation is under control. I'm sorry, sir. It's time for you to leave. And so it is. Get him! Don't worry about him. Let him go. All these Wookiees are dead. Move to the east. Yes, sir. Goodbye, Tarfful. Goodbye, Chewbacca. Miss you I will. Hopefully we'll be able to intercept a few Jedi... before they walk into this catastrophe. Did you fnd Kenobi? Sir, no one could have survived that fall. Start loading your men on the ships. Move it. Emergency code 913. I have no contact on any frequency. Master Kenobi. - Repeat. - Master Kenobi. Senator Organa. My clone troops turned on me. I need help. We havejust rescued Master Yoda. It appears this ambush has happened everywhere. We're sending you our coordinates. Hush! Not so loud. Are you all right? I heard there was an attack on the Jedi temple. - You could see the smoke from here. - I'm fne. I came to see if you and the baby are safe. What's happening? The Jedi have tried to overthrow the Republic. I can't believe that. I saw Master Windu attempt to assassinate the chancellor myself. What are you gonna do? I will not betray the Republic. My loyalties lie with the chancellor... and with the senate and with you. - What about Obi-Wan? - I don't know. Many Jedi have been killed. We can only hope that he's remained loyal to the chancellor. Anakin, I'm afraid. Have faith, my love. Everything will soon be set right. The chancellor has given me a very important mission. The separatists have gathered on the Mustafar system. I'm going there to end this war. Wait for me until I return. Things will be different. I promise. Please, wait for me. Well, he is under a lot of stress, R2. Take care, my little friend. Oh, my lady, is there anything I might do? No, thank you, 3PO. I feel so helpless. How many other Jedi have managed to survive? Heard from no one have we. I saw thousands of troops attack the Jedi temple. That's why I went looking for Yoda. Have we had any contact from the temple? Received a coded retreat message we have. It requests all Jedi to return to the temple. - It says the war is over. - Then we must go back. If there are any stragglers, they will fall into the trap and be killed. Suggest dismantling the coded signal, do you? Yes, Master. There is too much at stake. I agree. And a little more knowledge might light our way. The plan has gone as you had promised, my lord. You have done well, Viceroy. When my new apprentice Darth Vader arrives... he will take care of you. We're receiving a message from the chancellor's offce, sir. - Send it through. - Yes, sir. Senator Organa, the supreme chancellor requests your presence... at a special session of Congress. - I will be there. - He'll be expecting you. - Could be a trap. - I don't think so. The chancellor will not be able to control the thousands of star systems... without keeping the senate intact. If a special session of Congress there is... easier for us to enter the Jedi temple it will be. R2, stay with the ship. Welcome, Lord Vader. We've been expecting you. And the Jedi rebellion has been foiled. What's happened? The chancellor's been elaborating on a plot by the Jedi to overthrow the senate. The remaining Jedi will be hunted down and defeated. Not even the younglings survived. Killed not by clones this Padawan. By a lightsabre he was. Who? Who could have done this? The attempt on my life... has left me scarred and deformed. But I assure you. My resolve has never been stronger! Stop! In order to ensure the security and continuing stability... the Republic will be reorganized... into the frst Galactic Empire! For a safe and secure society. So this is how liberty dies. With thunderous applause. The war is over. Lord Sidious promised us peace. We only want- I have recalibrated the code, warning all surviving Jedi to stay away. For the clones... to discover the recalibration a long time it will take. Wait. Master. There is something I must know. If into the security recordings you go, only pain will you fnd. I must know the truth, Master. It can't be. It can't be. You have done well, my new apprentice. Now, Lord Vader... go and bring peace to the Empire. I can't watch any more. Destroy the Sith we must. Send me to kill the emperor. I will not kill Anakin. To fght this Lord Sidious, strong enough you are not. He is like my brother. I cannot do it. Twisted by the dark side young Skywalker has become. The boy you trained, gone he is. Consumed by Darth Vader. I do not know where the emperor has sent him. I don't know where to look. Use your feelings, Obi-Wan, and fnd him you will. When was the last time you saw him? - Yesterday. - And do you know where he is now? Padm, I need your help. - He is in grave danger. - From the Sith? From himself. Anakin has turned to the dark side. You're wrong. How could you even say that? I have seen a security hologram... of him... killing younglings. Not Anakin. He couldn't. He was deceived by a lie. We all were. It appears that the chancellor is behind everything, including the war. Palpatine is the Sith lord we've been looking for. After the death of Count Dooku, Anakin became his new apprentice. I don't believe you. I can't. I must fnd him. You're going to kill him, aren't you? He has become a very great threat. I can't. Anakin is the father, isn't he? I'm so sorry. - Milady, let me come with you. - There's no danger. The fghting's over. And this is personal. As you wish, milady, but I strongly disagree. I'll be all right, Captain. This is something I must do myself. Besides, 3PO will look after me. Oh, dear. Do you know? I think I'm beginning to get the hang of this flying business. The separatists have been taken care of, my master. It is fnished then. You have restored peace and justice to the galaxy. Send a message to the ships of the Trade Federation. All droid units must shut down immediately. Very good, my lord. I saw your ship. - What are you doing out here? - I was so worried about you. Obi-Wan told me terrible things. What things? He said you've turned to the dark side. That you... killed younglings. Obi-Wan is trying to turn you against me. He cares about us. Us? He knows. He wants to help you. Anakin, all I want is your love. Love won't save you, Padm. - Only my new powers can do that. - At what cost? You're a good person. Don't do this. I won't lose you the way I lost my mother. I am becoming more powerful than any Jedi has ever dreamed of. And I'm doing it for you. To protect you. Come away with me. Help me raise our child. Leave everything else behind while we still can. Don't you see? We don't have to run away any more. I have brought peace to the Republic. I am more powerful than the chancellor. I can overthrow him. And together, you and I can rule the galaxy... make things the way we want them to be. I don't believe what I'm hearing. Obi-Wan was right. You've changed. I don't want to hear any more about Obi-Wan. The Jedi turned against me. Don't you turn against me. I don't know you any more. You're breaking my heart. You're going down a path I can't follow. Because of Obi-Wan? Because of what you've done. What you plan to do. Stop. Stop now. Come back. - I love you. - Liar! You're with him! You brought him here to kill me. Let her go, Anakin. Let her go. You turned her against me! You have done that yourself. You will not take her from me! Your anger and your lust for power have already done that. You have allowed this dark lord to twist your mind... until now you have become the very thing you swore to destroy. Don't lecture me, Obi-Wan. I see through the lies of the Jedi. I do not fear the dark side as you do. I have brought peace... freedom, justice and security to my new empire. Your new empire? Don't make me kill you. Anakin, my allegiance is to the Republic, to democracy! If you're not with me... then you're my enemy. Only a Sith deals in absolutes. I will do what I must. You will try. I hear a new apprentice you have, Emperor. Or should I call you Darth Sidious? Master Yoda. You survived. Surprised? Your arrogance blinds you, Master Yoda. Now you will experience... the full power of the dark side. I have waited a long time for this moment... my little green friend. At last the Jedi are no more. Not if anything to say about it I have. At an end your rule is. And not short enough it was. If so powerful you are... why leave? You will not stop me. Darth Vader will become more powerful than either of us. Faith in your new apprentice misplaced may be. As is your faith in the dark side of the Force. Hurry. Careful timing we will need. Activate your homing beacon when you're ready. There's no sign of his body, sir. - Then he is not dead. - Double your search. Yes, sir. Right away, sir. Tell Captain Kagi to prepare my shuttle for immediate take-off. - Yes, Master. - I sense Lord Vader is in danger. Into exile I must go. Failed I have. I have failed you, Anakin. I have failed you. I should have known the Jedi were plotting to take over. Anakin, Chancellor Palpatine is evil! From my point of view, the Jedi are evil. Then you are lost! This is the end for you, my master. It's over, Anakin. I have the high ground. You underestimate my power. Don't try it. You were the chosen one! It was said that you would destroy the Sith, not join them! Bring balance to the Force, not leave it in darkness! I hate you! You were my brother, Anakin. I loved you. Master Kenobi. We have Miss Padm on board. Yes. Please, please hurry. We should leave this dreadful place. Is Anakin all right? Your Majesty, this way. There he is. He's still alive. Get a medical capsule immediately. Yes, sir. Right away. Excuse me, Master Yoda. Obi-Wan Kenobi has made contact. We'll take her to the medical centre. Quickly. Medically, she's completely healthy. For reasons we can't explain, we are losing her. - She's dying? - We don't know why. She has lost the will to live. We need to operate quickly if we are to save the babies. Babies? She's carrying twins. Luke. Oh, Luke. - It's a girl. - Leia. There's good in him. I know. I know there's... still- Lord Vader. Can you hear me? Yes, Master. Where is Padm? Is she safe? Is she all right? It seems, in your anger, you killed her. I? I couldn't have. She was alive. I felt it! Hidden, safe the children must be kept. We must take them somewhere where the Sith will not sense their presence. Split up they should be. My wife and I will take the girl. We've always talked of adopting a baby girl. She will be loved with us. And what of the boy? To Tatooine. To his family send him. I will take the child and watch over him. Until the time is right, disappear we will. Master Kenobi, wait a moment. In your solitude on Tatooine, training I have for you. Training? An old friend has learned the path to immortality. One who has returned from the netherworld of the Force. Your old master. Qui-Gon? How to commune with him I will teach you. - Captain Antilles. - Yes, Your Highness? I'm placing these droids in your care. Treat them well. Clean them up. Have the protocol droid's mind wiped. What? 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2024.05.13 03:40 esProc_SPL Extract Data from a Multilevel XML File

Problem description & analysis

We have an XML file invoice.xml. Below is part of the data: ``` …
1 28-JUL-14 111820 27-AUG-14 1493092 1712368 111820 28-JUL-14 Invoice 27-AUG-14 SAMPLE SALE WASHINGTON 4382 9648082 64.4 64.40 SAMPLE SALE 0 111820 19-OCT-15 … ```
We are trying to extract data from the XML file. The expected result is as follows:
SORT_INVOICE_NUMBER TRANSACTION SORT_DUE_DATE TRX_DATE TRX_AMOUNT
111820 Invoice 27-AUG-14 28-JUL-14 64.4
111820 Payment 27-AUG-14 19-OCT-15 -64.4
1100585 Invoice 30-JUL-15 30-JUN-15 69.4
1100585 Payment 30-JUL-15 05-AUG-15 -16.73
1100585 Payment 30-JUL-15 09-SEP-15 -52.2
1100585 Payment 30-JUL-15 19-OCT-15 -0.47
1101491 Invoice 05-AUG-15 06-JUL-15 69.4
1101491 Payment 05-AUG-15 19-OCT-15 -69.4

Solution

Write the following script p1.dfx in esProc:
A
1 =file("invoice.xml").read()
2 =xml(A1,"G_STATEMENT/LIST_G_AMOUNT_DUE/G_AMOUNT_DUE")
3 =A2.news(if(ifa(LIST_G_LINE_CLUSTER.G_LINE_CLUSTER),LIST_G_LINE_CLUSTER.G_LINE_CLUSTER,[LIST_G_LINE_CLUSTER.G_LINE_CLUSTER]);SORT_INVOICE_NUMBER,~.TRANSACTION,SORT_DUE_DATE,~.TRX_DATE,~.TRX_AMOUNT)
Explanation:
A1 Read the XML file as a string.
A2 Parse A1’s XML string, get data at the level of G_STATEMENT/LIST_G_AMOUNT_DUE/G_AMOUNT_DUE, and return it as a table sequence.
A3 Extend the table sequence by a specific column to get the targe result. Note that LIST_G_LINE_CLUSTER.G_LINE_CLUSTER could be a record sequence, which should first be checked and then converted into a sequence if it is a record sequence.
Refer to How to Call an SPL Script in BIRT to learn about the method of integrating the SPL script with BIRT.
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2024.05.13 02:15 nomorelandfills No, You Beg - 2021 article from The Cut about the difficulty in adopting in the COVID era

No, You Beg - 2021 article from The Cut about the difficulty in adopting in the COVID era
Another copied article to keep in reserve. It's an odd article from the pandemic, recounting the boom in rescue adoptions. It is a fairly pointless article in that it uses some really shifty rescuers, including Pixies and Paws, as sources, brightly highlights a bioethicist who uses her own foolish adoption of two pit bull mixes as evidence that most people shouldn't own dogs, and chronicles but fails to understand the loathing rescuers have for adopters. It does, however, wonderfully illustrate how rapidly the good times ended in rescue. Anyone reading the the current "we've never been so overwhelmed with dogs" rescue laments should know that there's a link between today's problems and yesterday's reckless opportunism.
The "bioethicist"
“I think it’s probably true that the majority of people who want to adopt a dog should not,” Jessica Pierce, a bioethicist who studies human-animal relationships, tells me. “They don’t have the wherewithal and don’t have what they need to give the animal a good life.” She herself ended up with two pets that didn’t get along at all — a herding mix and a pointer mix whose constant fighting made the idea of hosting a dinner party both perhaps “bloody” and definitely “scary and miserable.” She says shelters shouldn’t “drive away potentially loving and appropriate adopters because they don’t meet predetermined criteria,” but she also sees the importance of a thorough application process that prepares humans for the pitfalls of pet parenthood. “You need to be ready to have a dog who doesn’t like people very much,” says Pierce. When Bella, the 11-year-old she got from the Humane Society, dies, she’s not sure she will get a replacement, noting that the pandemic puppy boom is “driven by a reflection of human narcissism and neurosis.”
However, this is a fantastic truth long overdue for the telling.
“I started to talk to shelter leaders across the country,” Cushing says. “And one by one, they said any adoptable dog without a medical issue is gone by noon on Saturday. But the public didn’t know that. Only the dog seekers and the experts did.”
https://preview.redd.it/v2owlquz230d1.png?width=1139&format=png&auto=webp&s=a95a7983b4f018f043125a0819a16941cec1e6aa
Jack, adopted by Tori and Paris through In Our Hands Rescue.
It was a rainy Sunday in June, and Danielle had fallen in love.
The 23-year-old paralegal spent the first part of her afternoon in McCarren Park, envying the happy dog owners with their furry companions. Then she stumbled upon an adoption event in a North Brooklyn beer garden, where a beagle mix being paraded out of the rescue van reminded her of the dog she grew up with, Snickers. It all felt like fate, so she filled out an application on the spot. She was then joined by her best friend and roommate, Alexa, in sitting across from a serious-looking young woman with a ponytail who was searching for a reason to break her heart.
Danielle and Alexa were confident they would be leaving with Millie that day: After all, they had a 1,000-square-foot apartment within blocks of McCarren and full-time employment with the ability to work from home for the foreseeable future. But the volunteer kept posing questions that they hadn’t prepared for. What if they stopped living together? What if Danielle’s girlfriend’s collie mix didn’t get along with her new family member? What would be the solution if the dog needed expensive training for behavioral issues? Which vet were they planning to use?
All of which, upon reflection, were reasonable questions. But when it came to the diet they planned for the dog, they realized they were out of their depth. Danielle recalled that Snickers had lived to 16 and a half on a diet of Blue Buffalo Wilderness, the most expensive stuff that was available at her parents’ Bay Area pet store. “Would you want to live on the best version of Lean Cuisine for the rest of your life?” sniffed the volunteer with a frown. She would instead recommend a small-batch, raw-food brand that cost, when they looked it up later, up to $240 a bag. “If you were approved, you’d need to get the necessary supplies and take time off from work starting now,” the dog gatekeeper said. “And the first 120 days would be considered a trial period, meaning we would reserve the right to take your dog back at any time.” The would-be adopters nodded solemnly.
The friends rose from the bench and thanked the volunteer for her time. Believing they were out of earshot, the volunteer summed up the interview to a colleague: “You just walked by, and you’re fixated on this one dog, and it’s because you had a beagle growing up, but you want to make your roommate the legal adopter?”
When Danielle and Alexa were young, one could still show up at a shelter, pick out an unhoused dog that just wanted to have someone to love, and take it home that same day. Today, much of the process has moved online — to Petfinder, a.k.a. Tinder for dogs, and various animal-shelter Instagram accounts that send cute puppy pics with heartrending stories of need into your feed and compel you to fill out an adoption application as you sit on the toilet. Posts describing the dogs drip with euphemisms: A dog that might freak out and tear your house up if left alone is a “Velcro dog”; one that might knock down your children is “overly exuberant”; a skittish, neglected dog with trust issues is just a “shy party girl.” Certain shelters have become influencers in their own right, like the L.A.-based Labelle Foundation, which has almost 250,000 Instagram followers and counts Dua Lipa and Cara Delevingne among its A-list clients. Rescue agencies abound, many with missions so specific that you could theoretically find one that deals in any niche breed you desire, from affenpinschers to Yorkshire terriers.
This deluge of rescue-puppy content has arrived, not coincidentally, during a time of growing awareness of puppy mills as so morally indefensible that even Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez could draw fire for seemingly buying a purebred French bulldog in early 2020. Then came the pandemic puppy boom, a lonely, claustrophobic year in which thousands of white-collar workers, sitting at home scrolling through their phones, seemed simultaneously to decide they were finally ready to adopt a dog. The corresponding demand spike in certain markets has simply overwhelmed the agencies: New York shelters that were used to receiving 20 applications a week were now receiving hundreds, with as many as 50 people vying for a single pup.
The rescue dog is now, indisputably, a luxury good, without a market pricing system at work to manage demand. A better analogy might be an Ivy League admissions office. But even Harvard isn’t forced to be as picky as, say, Korean K9 Rescue, whose average monthly applications tripled in 2020.
And yet someone has to pick the winners — often an unpaid millennial Miss Hannigan doling out a precious number of wet-nosed Orphan Annies to wannabe Daddy Warbuckses and thus empowered to judge the intentions and poop-scooping abilities of otherwise accomplished urban professionals, some of whom actually did go to Harvard.
This has led to some hard feelings. Every once in a while, someone will complain on Twitter about being rejected by a rescue agency, and it will reliably set off a cascade of attacks on “entitled rich white millennials assuming they can have whatever they want,” followed by counter-attacks on those who “appoint themselves the holy sainted guardian of all animals.” Danielle was ultimately deemed unworthy, not even receiving a generic rejection letter over email. After all, there isn’t really that much incentive for the rescue agencies to be polite these days.
The modern animal-rescue movement grew alongside the child-welfare movement in the mid-19th century. It got another boost in the years following World War II, when Americans were moving out to the suburbs in droves, according to Stephen Zawistowski, a professor of animal behavior at Hunter College. Suddenly, there were highways, yards, and space. Walt Disney was making movies about children and dogs that promoted the idea that no new home was complete without a loyal animal companion. (Zawistowski said that one might call this the Old Yeller Effect, but there were various riffs on the same theme over the ensuing decades. Essentially, Flipper was “Let’s put Lassie in the water.”)
In the early ’80s, University of Pennsylvania researchers confirmed the effects that animal companionship has on everything from blood pressure to heart conditions to anxiety. Pets were no longer just how you taught Junior to be responsible; they might be critical to maintaining adults’ physical and mental health. The way people spoke about animals started changing. The idea that “homeless” dogs were sent to the “pound” because they were “bad” went out of fashion. “Suddenly, you had ‘rescue’ dogs brightly lit in the mall,” says Ed Sayres, a former president of the ASPCA who now works as a pet-industry consultant. “Basically, we gave animals a promotion.” Meanwhile, in the late ’80s, spay and neuter procedures had been streamlined and were being recommended by vets as well as by Bob Barker on The Price Is Right.
Then came The Ad. Released in 2007, it featured close-ups of three-legged dogs and one-eyed cats rescued by the ASPCA over a wrenching rendition of Sarah McLachlan’s “Angel.” The commercial warned that “for hundreds of others, help came too late.” In just a year, the ad raised 60 percent of the ASPCA’s annual $50 million budget. The organization was reportedly able to increase the grant money it gave to other animal-welfare organizations by 900 percent in ten years. It is difficult to overstate the emotional hangover The Ad inflicted on millennials and members of Gen Z. Janet M. Davis is a historian at the University of Texas at Austin, where she lectures on animal rights to a demographically diverse body of students — everyone from cattle ranchers to vegan punks — most of whom cry when she shows The Ad in class. “It absolutely brings down the house,” she says. “Every time.”
Theoretically, the point of dog adoption is that there are more dogs born into the world than there are humans lined up to care for them. But as interest grew, the supply problem became less acute. Thanks to widespread spay and neuter policies, there are simply too few unwanted litters for what the adoption market wants.
National chains like PetSmart partnered with local shelters to supply its animals for sale. Savvy rescues in dog deserts like New York hooked up with shelters in the Deep South, where cultural attitudes toward spaying and neutering pets are much more lax. While there is no official registry of how many shelter dogs are available in the U.S., in 2017, researchers at the College of Veterinary Medicine for Mississippi State University published a study reporting that the availability of dogs in animal shelters was at an all-time low. “That is,” says Sayres, “an environment that leads to a kind of irrational, competitive behavior.” The rescue mutt had become not just a virtue signal but a virtue test. Who was a good enough human being to deserve a dog in need of rescuing?
Heather remembers the old easy days. “I went on Craigslist and an hour later, I had a puggle,” she says of her first dog-getting experience with her boyfriend in college. George the puggle humped everything in sight, shed everywhere, and chewed through furniture until the end of his life, but she loved him all the same.
Flash-forward 16 years: She and that boyfriend are married, have two kids, and can’t seem to get a new dog no matter what they try. Yes, she could find a breeder easily online (currently for sale on Craigslist: a Yorkie-poo puppy from a breeder asking $350 and just a few screening questions). But instead, in the middle of the pandemic, “I was sending ten to 12 emails a night and willing to travel anywhere, and no one would give us any sort of animal,” she remembers. Shelters would send snappy emails about how her family wasn’t suited for a puppy, even though they made good money and had clearly cared for their dearly departed George — they once drove three hours to get the dog a specially made knee brace. “I was trying to be really up front with people and would say that my daughter has autism and that I have a 3-year-old, and they would say no. It felt like they were saying, ‘We don’t give dogs to people who have disabilities.’ ”
It didn’t matter what kind of dog she applied for — older, younger, bigger, smaller — there was always an official-sounding excuse as to why her family wasn’t suitable. (“Pups this age bite and jump and scratch and while they are cute to look at, they are worse than a bratty ADHD toddler, without diapers,” one rescue wrote. “Sorry.”) She considered looking at emotional-support animals that work specifically with autistic youth but found out they could cost 18 grand and require a two-year waiting period. She couldn’t stomach the idea of setting up a GoFundMe, as other people in the community had. “It got to the point of me wondering, Okay, so what dogs do children get?” she recalls. “I always thought that dogs and children go together.” By the fall of 2020, Heather had turned back to breeders. “People get a little spicy when you say you paid for a dog. You want to scream that you tried your hardest, but it wasn’t possible,” she says.
Others, like Zainab, figured out ways to work the system. She blanketed agencies with applications in the early months of the pandemic, applying for 60 dogs. (The ease of applying online might also explain the statistics.) She thought the fact that she had a leadership role in public education would demonstrate that she was both successful and nurturing. “I’m a professional, I make good money, and I have a master’s degree,” she tells me. She was rejected all the same. Finally, a co-worker suggested Zainab make a résumé in order to stand out. The multipage document — which features testimonials from high-powered friends, including local elected officials — is what got her an exclusive meeting with Penny the pug in a parking lot. She was handed over with a leash tied around her neck and vomited in the front seat of Zainab’s car about three blocks later. Success!
Or take Lauren, who’d had dogs all her life and found living solo during COVID lonely. “You can’t be without an animal at this particular time,” she told herself. So she started applying for dogs on Petfinder and boutique-rescue websites. “I would look up at my clock, and it would be two in the morning,” she says. Her hopes were high when she got a meeting with a Chihuahua mix in the suburbs named Mary Shelley. Lauren thought the meeting went well, but it ultimately didn’t result in the interviewer granting the adoption. “Then I was in conspiracy-theory mode, thinking she doesn’t like gay people, or single people, or people who live in the city,” she says. “It was a crazy-making experience. It’s a pandemic, so your world is already turned upside down, but I became psychotic.
“The people who run rescue organizations — this was their moment to shine,” she adds. “Even though they were totally bogged down with requests, they got to feel the power. They got to make someone’s dreams come true or smash them to the ground.”
The inquiries can get extremely personal. “I found the questions very offensive,” says Joanna, a Memorial Sloan Kettering Cancer Center nurse who tried to adopt last year with her architect husband. “I was like, ‘What does this have to do with getting a dog?’ ” Her husband didn’t even want to put the thought out into the universe, but he was forced to admit that he’d probably be the one to take a shared pet in the event of a divorce. The two also had to grapple with what would happen if one or both of them died of COVID during the pandemic. And would both of them be able to take three days off at a moment’s notice to help the dog acclimate to its new home? “I was frank with her and said, ‘I take care of cancer patients,’ ” says Joanna. “She was very unsatisfied with our answer.”
“The more popular the rescue is on the internet, the more clout they have,” says Molly, a writer in New York. “If you have a really good social-media presence, you can throw your weight around.” (The clout goes both ways: Posting about your rescue dog on Instagram is an indirect way of broadcasting that someone out there deemed you morally worthy enough to be chosen.) She inquired about eight dogs in six weeks from about five different rescues, only to be continually rejected. She finally got an interview with a rescue agency whose cute dogs she had seen on social media. They asked to tour her apartment over Zoom. Fine. They asked for her references. Great. But then they asked if she would pay for an expensive trainer. She asked if she could wait — not only was it during the height of COVID, but the cost of the sessions with the trainer could be close to $1,000. The person she was dealing with said over email that dogs were investments and suggested she look elsewhere. “I was like, This is so Brooklyn,” she says.
Still, others wished the warning about trainers had been more explicit. At the height of the pandemic, Steven remembers scrolling through social-media post after social-media post saying things like “URGENT: NEED TO FIND THIS GUY A HOME” while “picturing this dog on a conveyor belt going toward this whirring saw. And meanwhile I am screaming at my phone, ‘I applied and you turned me down!’ ”
But after securing a dog, he came to believe the process, while tough on the human applicants, wasn’t tough enough when it came to the dog’s needs. Right off the bat, Cooper was very hyper and mouthy when playing. “We were doing the thing that everyone does, like, posting pics: ‘We’re at the park, isn’t this fun, hahaha,’ ” he says. But the reality was much less Instagram-worthy. Cooper became difficult to handle, especially in a small New York apartment; mouthiness escalated to gnashing his teeth and guarding food. “It’s embarrassing, and I hate having to tell people we had to give the dog back,” he says. (So much so that Steven requested a pseudonym for himself and for Cooper.) “To be frank, the experience we had with the dog was pretty traumatic. If this volunteer had felt so powerful, I wish that they had said we wouldn’t be able to handle this dog.” Although Steven’sInstagram is replete with photos of other friends’ dogs, evidence of Cooper’s existence has disappeared from the account.
The rescue-dog demand has also been stressful for the overwhelmed (and overwhelmingly volunteer) workforce that keeps the supply chain running. On a recent Saturday, Jason was speeding toward JFK airport in a windowless white van covered in graffiti. Though he was on his way to help rescue dogs, he is the first to admit he’s not the biggest fan of the animals. “I just need something to do,” he says. “I was going crazy sitting around the house.” His friend, who was employed at a rescue, recommended him for an unpaid gig. Prior to the pandemic, he managed an Off Broadway play in the city. The 34-year-old, who is athletically built with a shaved head, has a compulsive need to be coordinating a production, and getting dogs to New York City from a different continent is definitely that.
Many of the city’s rescue dogs come from other parts of the world these days, brought over by volunteers who take them through a complicated Customs process. This is part of what Pet Nation author Mark Cushing calls the “canine freedom train.” A former corporate trial attorney, Cushing had thought that American shelters were filled with dogs with a figurative hatchet outside their kennel; that was until his daughter, a shelter volunteer, said that, in fact, scores of people were lined up around the block every weekend in hopes of adopting a handful of dogs. “I started to talk to shelter leaders across the country,” Cushing says. “And one by one, they said any adoptable dog without a medical issue is gone by noon on Saturday. But the public didn’t know that. Only the dog seekers and the experts did.”
Jason waited in arrivals, ready to stop anyone who walked by with dog crates. When he saw some, he swooped in. It turned out that he had ended up with an extra animal — one that was yowling like it needed to get out and pee. He couldn’t figure out to whom it belonged, and after about 40 minutes of drama in the pickup area, two large men jumped out of a truck with out-of-state plates. They handed Jason $20 before he knew what was happening, loaded the dog into their Silverado, and sped off toward North Carolina. It was unclear if they were adopters themselves or worked for a shelter.
With that out of the way, Jason tried to carefully maneuver a luggage cart full of the remaining dog crates to the lot where he was parked. When one fell, the animal inside didn’t make a sound, presumably zonked from its long journey across the ocean. More volunteers were waiting at the shelter with food, water, and an enormous number of puppy pads when he arrived. After the animals decompressed from their long flight, they would be taken to an adoption event, where they would hopefully meet their new humans.
Emily Wells hasn’t taken a vacation in years. She works full time on Wall Street but is also the coordinator for Pixies & Paws Rescue — a job that she does in between calls and meetings and emails. That means responding to DMs on Instagram about available dogs, attending adoption events on weekends, and getting on the phone with a vet at 10 p.m. because one of her fosters got sick. That also means screening applications, which more than doubled during the height of the pandemic. Typically, she denies about one-third. This part of her job might not be the most physically demanding, but it does take a psychic toll.
“What I’ve found is a lot of people are very entitled,” she says. “They send nasty emails. I’ve been called every name in the book. But there are reasons we deny. We are entrusted with placing a living, breathing thing in someone’s home for the rest of its life.” She wishes people would understand that the rescue is just her and one other person trying their best to deal with off-the-charts levels of demand. “I know rescues that don’t even reply,” she says. “So the fact that we do and still get shit for that is annoying.” And explaining why someone was rejected can create its own problems: What if they use that information to fib on their next application?
Rescues like Wells’s are largely dependent on foster parents to house the dogs they import. Foster-to-adopt is one way that people adopt pets, a means of testing out compatibility and increasing one’s chances of adopting in a hypercompetitive city. But demand for dogs was so high last year that even proven volunteers couldn’t get their hands on a foster. Take Suchita, an animal lover who moved from India to New Jersey for her husband’s VP job with a big bank in 2019. Unable to work owing to visa issues, she became a prolific dog fosterer for a rescue in Queens. She also worked with a program that pairs volunteers with elderly animal owners who need help taking their pets out on walks. That program was suspended during COVID, which left Suchita desperate for more dog time.
Figuring that online volunteer work might fill the void, she started helping another organization wade through its massive backlog of applications by calling references. She offered to foster more dogs but didn’t hear back, nor did her attempts to adopt pan out. When she went ahead and adopted Sasha, a Pomeranian, through another rescue agency, the first organization was not happy. “After I posted Sasha on Instagram, they called me saying it was a conflict of interest to have worked with another agency,” Suchita says. “I was not at all prepared for that. Then they unfollowed me. It really hurt, but no hard feelings.” She is humbly aware of the fact that in New York, there is always someone who has a nicer apartment, a better job, and more experience than you. If everything else is equal, why shouldn’t a shelter try to give a dog to someone who can afford to give it the best life possible?
“They don’t treat humans nicely, but at least they treat dogs nicely,” she says.
In some corners of the rescue world, a reckoning is taking place. Rachael Ziering, the executive director of Muddy Paws Rescue, which found homes for around 1,000 dogs last year, got her start volunteering at other nonprofits whose adoption processes she found abhorrent. She saw, for instance, people look at adoption applications and say, “Oh, that’s a terrible Zip Code. I’m not adopting to them.” Or they would judge people based on their appearance. “I know a lot of groups that will ask for your firstborn along with your application,” she says. “I think it’s well intentioned, but I think it just took a turn at some point. It’s morphed into sort of an unhealthy view that no one’s ever gonna be good enough. Nobody’s ever perfect — the dog or the person.” Muddy Paws is instead embracing what is known as “open adoption,” a philosophy that allows for rescue volunteers to be more open-minded about what a good dog home might look like. It has started gaining traction among groups like the ASPCA in recent years, in part because the organization’s current president was denied a dog — twice. Instead of rejecting applicants outright based on their giving the “wrong” answers, Ziering’s team speaks with hopeful dog owners at length, learning about their lifestyles and histories to match them with the pet best for their family. Still, even a more inclusive philosophy toward profiling adoption applicants comes up against the intractable math: There are only so many dogs that need homes. Though Muddy Paws rejects less than one percent of applicants, some decide to adopt elsewhere if it means getting a dog faster.
Is any of this good for the dogs? Depends on whom you ask. If the intense questions involved in securing the dog cause someone to reflect before making a decision they’ll regret — sure. Others note that the average dog’s life span has hovered around 11 years for decades. “I think it’s probably true that the majority of people who want to adopt a dog should not,” Jessica Pierce, a bioethicist who studies human-animal relationships, tells me. “They don’t have the wherewithal and don’t have what they need to give the animal a good life.” She herself ended up with two pets that didn’t get along at all — a herding mix and a pointer mix whose constant fighting made the idea of hosting a dinner party both perhaps “bloody” and definitely “scary and miserable.” She says shelters shouldn’t “drive away potentially loving and appropriate adopters because they don’t meet predetermined criteria,” but she also sees the importance of a thorough application process that prepares humans for the pitfalls of pet parenthood. “You need to be ready to have a dog who doesn’t like people very much,” says Pierce. When Bella, the 11-year-old she got from the Humane Society, dies, she’s not sure she will get a replacement, noting that the pandemic puppy boom is “driven by a reflection of human narcissism and neurosis.”
“A lot of this is driven by Instagram,” she says. “We have this expectation that dogs are not really dogs; they’re toys or fashion accessories.”
I’m not pushing you, but it seems like you want to bring him home,” the Badass Animal Rescue volunteer said with the controlled energy of a used-car salesperson. Bill and Sherrie, a middle-aged couple who had lost their English bulldog three years ago, were looking for a replacement. The dog with a bright-red boner jumped on Bill, and everyone pretended not to notice. “He definitely has energy,” Bill said brightly. The couple were on the fence, and the volunteer could sense the close slipping away.
Although this organization saw applications rise 200 percent during the pandemic, things are now recalibrating back to normalcy. We are, it seems, witnessing the cooling of the puppy boom. The unbearable loneliness of the pandemic has abated, replaced with anxiety about how to possibly do all the things all of us used to do every day. New Yorkers are being summoned back to the office or planning vacations. Many young professionals are finding that, when given the option between scrolling through rescue websites until 2 a.m. or doing drunken karaoke in a room full of friends, Dog Tinder is losing its appeal. Local shelters are seeing application numbers slip — many say they have returned to pre-COVID levels — which, in turn, has made it slightly more of an adopter’s market.
Bill and Sherrie went to the hallway to talk it over. He was definitely a puller like their old dog, Xena. And he was also a hell of a shedder. The volunteer kept talking about something called a “love match,” but was this really one? “We’re just gonna need a little more time,” Sherrie confessed when they came back inside. No one was making eye contact. As they prepared to leave, the dog jumped up on Bill again, his tongue flopping sideways and his wagging tail spraying white fur. He was clearly not aware that the tenor of the room had shifted. “We might be back,” Bill said with an obvious twinge of guilt. “Don’t worry!”
We will probably look back on the class of pandemic dogs adopted in 2020 as the most desirable unwanted dogs of all time — the ultimate market-scarcity score for a slice of virtuous, privileged New York City. People like Danielle will see them paraded around places like McCarren Park, the living, breathing trophies for self-satisfied owners who made it through the gauntlet. At least for the next 11 years or so.
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2024.05.13 01:41 tangodream Help me understand insurance speak

Can someone translate this into regular English please as to what I'll have to pay?
I need a bladder procedure with cpt code 51700. I asked my health insurance if it would be treated as a doctor's visit with a co-pay, since the procedure would be done in office by her or her assistants and the clinic & doctor are in network. The doctor's office told me the procedure costs between $280 and $350 each time. I got the following convoluted response from my health insurance company:
"Thank you for your recent inquiry regarding your benefits. The following information pertains to the general in and out-of-network benefits for such services when eligible under your benefit plan. Verification of benefits is not a guarantee of coverage or payment. All services are subject to medical necessity, contract exclusions, and eligibility at the time the service is rendered.
You have general benefits for both in and out of network services. When utilizing an in-network provider, the service would be considered subject to a $1,000.00 individual deductible per benefit period. Once the deductible is satisfied the services would be considered at 80% of the allowed amount, up to an $2,500.00 individual out-of-pocket per benefit period. After the out-of-pocket is satisfied, services will be considered at 100% of the allowed amount. The benefit period is based on a calendar year from January 1, 2024 to December 31, 2024.
When utilizing an out-of-network provider, the service would be subject to a $1,000 individual deductible per benefit period. Once the deductible is satisfied, services would be considered at 60% of the allowed amount, up to the individual up to an $2,500.00 individual out-of-pocket per benefit period. After the out-of-pocket is satisfied, services will be considered at 100% of the allowed amount. The out-of-pocket does include the deductible totals. The benefit period is based on a calendar year January 1, 2024 to December 31, 2024. An out-of-network provider can balance bill you.
We can provide you with a benefit quote regarding how the claim will process with the given codes. You may view the estimated cost of a procedure by accessing the provider search on our website and using the Care Cost Estimator. Please log in to the member portal and click on the Find A Doctor tab then click Medical you will be prompted to acknowledge that you are leaving our site to reach the provider search, click continue to proceed.
On the Sapphire provider search page click on Browse by category and select Care Cost Estimator from this menu you can select a procedure by type or click on All Procedures (A-Z) in order to search for a specific service. Reminder this is an estimate.
If we can be of further assistance, please contact us by utilizing the "contact us" form on our website or contact customer service at the number located on the back of your identification card."
submitted by tangodream to HealthInsurance [link] [comments]


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