Does zwinky give you viruses

Custom Characters in Cutscenes

2017.12.14 03:41 KareemOWheat Custom Characters in Cutscenes

2013.12.11 17:52 self_defeating Oddly Arousing Stuff

Does it have luscious curves? Does it jiggle or move smoothly? Does it look like it might be bursting with pleasure? Does it give you that familiar tingling sensation of arousal, even though it isn't inherently sexual? Then this is where it belongs!

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2012.08.23 00:02 Polish, lacquer, & varnish galore!

A nail polish community for lacqueristas of all experience levels to share in our common hobby.

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2024.06.07 21:23 Yurii_S_Kh “The most powerful answer to the problem of evil in the world is Christ Himself.” - Bishop Job of Stuttgart on the path to Orthodoxy, Vladyka Mark and theodicy

Tatiana Veselkina
Named John at birth, he was baptized John in honor of the Baptist of the Lord. In monasticism he was named Joseph in honor of the Joseph the Betrothed, and in monasticism - Job in honor of St. Job of Pochaev, one of the saints especially revered by the Russian Church Abroad, who became the patron saint of publishing in the Russian dispersion. From the Slovakian town of Laromiroff came the printing house of St. Job of Pochaev, which still exists today. This is how the publishing business began, thanks to which for many years the Jordanville printing house supplied books and other printed products to the faithful in the historical homeland.
Bishop Job of Stuttgart (Bandmann)
We recorded this interview on the second day after the episcopal ordination of Vladyka Job (Bandmann).
“I am lucky to have bishop-colleagues,” I thought. And in general, this is the first bishop whom I interviewed just one day after his consecration, when he was not yet accustomed to the address “Vladyka” and remarked: “If someone from behind says: ‘Vladyka Job!’, I think: who is it? Who is it addressed to?”
In general, this chiarotony should have taken place two years ago in the monastery of St. Job of Pochaev in Munich, two years after the death of Archbishop Agapit (Horacek) of Stuttgart, also a hereditary journalist, who was dearly loved by his Russian flock in Germany. The meeting of the Council of Bishops of the Russian Church Abroad and the celebrations dedicated to the 100th anniversary of its foundation were also to be held there. But the virus closed the road. And so in the interval between virus waves, when it seemed that the virus had receded, the traditional crowded - except for last year - celebration in honor of the Kursk Root Icon of the Mother of God was timed to coincide with both the meeting of the Synod (no longer online, but “in-person”) and the hierarchal chastening, which in the presence of the Guide of the Russian Dispersion, as parishioners noted, was “solemn to the point of tears”.
https://preview.redd.it/qcu0gny0175d1.png?width=700&format=png&auto=webp&s=36faf9e87d2718eb0ab55357e4db59a37507eb04
“In what language shall we write the interview?” - I ask the Vladyka. His native language is German, his second language is English, and Russian is his third. We started in Russian, and if anything happened, we decided that we would switch to English. “If anything” did not happen. Vladyka Job answered wonderfully in Russian, with the familiar timbre and intonation of Metropolitan Mark of Berlin and Germany, next to whom, starting with his acquaintance as a teenager, he has been with for 24 years.

The only child of my parents, I was born in Berlin, where we lived for most of my life. My dad made reports and documentaries, mostly on automotive subjects. He was looking for interesting subjects for his films, and one day during summer vacation he took me on a shoot and we went to America. There we traveled 4,000 kilometers along the famous US 66 route.

Road 66 was opened back in 1926 and back then it started in Chicago, went through the states of Missouri, Kansas, Oklahoma, Texas, New Mexico, Arizona, and ended in Los Angeles, California. At that time, my dad was making a movie about the major shopping malls in the United States. Later, my mother started making movies too. Only already on religious themes.
About the apartment temple and baptism on the Jordan
John Bandmann with his parents

Was mom a person of faith?
My mom came from the former East Germany, where atheism was taught in schools. She recalled that as a child she believed in God, which is natural for children, until she was told that God was not to be believed in, just like Santa Claus. She was saddened, and already in the West it was important for her to find an answer to the question: where is God, where is the truth? And she actively searched for Him almost all her life.

We did not find the Truth and continued our search, and through trips to Greece and the Holy Land we came to Orthodoxy

When I was about 12-13 years old, I also took part in her search, and together with her we first converted to Catholicism, but noticing that we did not reach the roots of Christianity and did not find the Truth, we continued our search, and through trips to Greece and the Holy Land came to Orthodoxy.
I was very impressed by the trip to the Holy Land, I was about 14-15 years old at that time. We decided to go on a pilgrimage without a specific plan, with backpacks, and there to orient ourselves on the spot: how God will lead us. In the same way we traveled around Greece. It was an interesting form of travel, helping us to get to know the country and people well.
On Mount Sinai in Egypt, where we were going to meet the dawn, we slept in a tent we had brought with us. It was very cold, we got very cold and at night we got up and went to one of the houses on the top and asked the owners for blankets.
At Sinai in the Catherine Monastery we met one monk who was the keeper of the ossuary. He used to be a Catholic, then converted to Orthodoxy and for us in the monastery library he found books in German - the life of St. Sergius of Radonezh and two books on Orthodoxy - and made us photocopies.
He also gave us the address of the Monastery of St. Job of Pochaev in Munich, which he knew about because Vladyka Mark came every year with pilgrims to the Holy Land.
Monastery of St. Job of Pochaev in Munich
I was still a schoolboy, and my mother brought me to the monastery to get acquainted. For two weeks I helped there: I made incense, candles, and watched how the monks lived. After the monastery I decided to become Orthodox. My mother also decided to be baptized with me.

After the monastery I decided to become Orthodox.

Vladyka Mark told us about Orthodox parishes in Germany of different jurisdictions - Serbian, Romanian, Greek - and advised us to go to their services and choose one that would be to our liking, but did not force us to go to Russian parishes abroad. However, my mother and I decided to go where God had originally led us.
In Berlin, we began to go every Sunday to a small church that was located in an ordinary apartment. There was not even a regular choir. We immediately took everything seriously and it was already clear to us that we would not only pray, but also help at the parish.
The parish was Russian-speaking, and at first we did not understand anything, everything was difficult for us. We immediately began to learn Russian, and a parishioner helped us with Russian and Church Slavonic so that we could read on the choir. We learned singing, we learned the Typikon, and I also served in the altar, and then I began to sing on the choir. We understood that Orthodoxy can be learned through living tradition, not only through books.
Already after entering the monastery, I thanked God for bringing me to Orthodoxy, to which I decided to devote my life, because at that time nothing in the world attracted me.

When did the baptism itself take place?

My mother and I were baptized by Vladyka Mark at the Jordan River

In 1998 Vladyka Mark offered us to go on a pilgrimage trip to the Holy Land, and there on the Jordan the Vladyka baptized my mother and me. God arranged everything for us very simply. He pointed me to the monastery and to Vladyka Mark, who became my second - spiritual - father.

My own father was not particularly pleased, because he always hoped that I would be of “use” to society. But now, as it often happens, he has accepted it.

Finished school and went to a monastery?
After school we in Germany are obliged to serve in the army for six months or to pass social service, which I chose. I served in a home for the disabled not far from the monastery in Munich, not intending to enter it at that time. And I lived in the convent.

During the service I realized that I wanted to stay in the monastery. My decision was hard for my mother, but she accepted my choice, blessed me and decided to drive me from Berlin to Munich herself. It was the year 2003.
Kursk Root Icon of the Most Holy Mother of God
At that time, the Kursk Root Icon of the Blessed Virgin Mary was in Berlin, and when the local bishop heard that we were going to Munich, he asked us to take the icon with us. And so I went to the monastery in the car on my knees with the icon. Six hundred kilometers of the way, about 8 hours we drove. Then I realized that it was the Most Holy Mother of God who brought me to the monastery.
The next day I was sent to obedience in the candle workshop. There on the wall I also saw the Kursk-Korena icon. And years later, during the festive liturgy on the day of commemoration of the icon “The Sign”, when the icon itself was in the church, I was elevated to the episcopal dignity in Her house, in the Cathedral of the Sign in New York.

Let us return to your arrival at the monastery. How much time passed from the time of your arrival there to your tonsure?
Vladyka Mark immediately told me to enter the theological faculty at the University of Munich. I asked for six months to get used to monastic life, and then I went to study. Even though I had been and lived in the monastery, I still had to adjust to the monastery in my new capacity.

Monk Job (Bandmann)
In connection with my studies, I was a novice and then a monk for quite a long time. I was tonsured into monasticism in 2006 with the name Joseph in honor of Joseph the Betrothed, and ten years later I was tonsured into monasticism with the name Job in honor of St. Job of Pochaev. In the same year I was ordained a deacon, and almost two years later I became a hieromonk.

To what obedience were you assigned?
In our monastery it is customary to fulfill all obediences. I was regent of the monastery choir, editor of the Orthodox magazine “Der Bote” (“The Messenger”), did layout and preparation for printing of Orthodox literature, but in the end my main obedience was to work in the printing house as a printer. In our publishing house we have a full circle of preparation and printing of books, except for hard binding.

Our printing house publishes books in Russian, German and English. There was a period when we only republished books: we republished the textbook on dogmatic theology by Protopresbyter Michael Pomazansky, the book by Fr. Seraphim Rose's book “The Soul after Death,” and a collection of reports in German by the famous professor John Ponagopoulos.
We distribute our books at parishes in Germany, and in recent years through an online store, almost half of whose catalog is taken up by our books. Unfortunately, it is not a monastery store, because we don't even have a separate room for a bookstore. In fact, the monastery has long since become small for our needs.....
About asceticism and using the head for its intended purpose

Vladyka, tell us more about the monastery....
Now we have 8 monks and novices from different countries. There are Germans, Russians from Kazakhstan, Ukrainians. One of our fellow monks is currently living in a hermitage in France.

The monastery has existed since 1945, when after the war the brethren gathered from Russian refugees and rented a house in which we still ascend.

In 1980. Vladyka Mark introduced the Athonite statutes to the monastery

This is the only men's monastery in Western Europe where the liturgy is celebrated daily. Vladyka Mark, when he became bishop in 1980, brought his colleague - then a novice and later Archbishop Agapit - to the monastery and introduced the Athonite statutes.
Our main labor is in publishing. We also make candles, incense, we have a small jewelry workshop and apiary.
The motto of our monastery is the Latin phrase that was the motto and spiritual basis of the monastic statutes written by St. Benedict of Nursia - “Ora et labora” (“Pray and labor”). St. Benedict believed in the necessity of combining prayer and work in monastic conditions, that is, combining contemplation and action.
Brethen of St Job of Pochaev monastery in Munich
We get up at half past four in the morning, from 4 to 8 a.m. we serve midnight, Matins and Liturgy. After breakfast and obedience - at 12 noon - rest. After dinner - cell prayer. In the evening - at 18:00 - Vespers and at 20:00 - Vespers. Between the services - work. It is a very difficult rhythm, not everyone can withstand it. I think my brethren will agree that the most difficult thing is to get up early in the morning. But it is not difficult at all for Vladyka Mark, our most faithful monk.
Vladyka Mark used to be able to return from a trip at 1:00 a.m. and at 4:00 a.m. he was already serving. This is a role model for me. Asceticism helps in the kind of monastic life that Vladyka Mark has chosen for himself. He has practically no hobbies other than translations. He mainly translates the works of his spiritual father, St. Justin (Popovich), from Serbian into Russian and German at the same time. We have already published his translations.

If you were asked what kind of rector Vladyka Mark is, what traits of his character would you first of all note?

Vladyka Mark is an ascetic. Absolute. Very strict about himself

He is an ascetic. Absolute. Very strict with regard to himself and he strictly educates us, but he always does it with love.

Vladyka is a man of a different generation than the rest of the brethren. He is now in his 80s, he lived through World War II as a boy, saw socialism in East Germany, starved. He has been through terrible times, and all this has affected him. Sometimes we do not understand why he can react harshly if we throw something away, because he himself survived the famine. But Vladyka understands that we are different generations and he gives us leniency.
Mark, Metropolitan of Berlin and All Germany

Does he treat you as monks, children or... how?
From the very beginning Vladyka has perceived us all as responsible adults and always expects that we can take care of our own basic needs, that we as adults understand the responsibility for our souls and for our salvation. This may be unusual for monastic life. After all, there are spiritual fathers who determine everything for the novice and completely forbid him to think for himself.

Since Vladyka Mark deals with the diocese, parishes and cannot follow our every step, he always relies on us. In fact, this is very helpful. But it depends, of course, on what kind of novice is of character and disposition. Not everyone succeeds. There are people who need to be shown and pointed out, and we, brothers, help and support each other in everything.

Vladyka, can you call your monastery Russian Orthodox? Or how would you characterize it?
Exactly so: it is a Russian monastery. True, I don't know how many monasteries in Russia have such an Athonite charter as ours.

Job (Bandmann), bishop of Stuttgart

What worldly activities are allowed in your monastery?
As in all monasteries nowadays, it is difficult for us to define how and how much we can use the various possibilities of the Internet and social networks. At least we rely on the prudence of the brethren and do not forbid these things.
What social network can you be found on?
I have an open account on Instagram.
What are your hobbies?

I write music, mostly liturgical

I have many monastic obediences, which are my hobbies, you could say. Music, for example. In the monastery I was a regent and now I sometimes regent, I try to give a voice to future singers. I write music, mostly liturgical music. But I write such difficult things that we cannot sing in our monastery. I am waiting for a worthy choir! I also love photography.
What kind of secular music do you allow yourself to listen to?
I believe that one should not be limited by genres, but rather by the time of listening and the emotionality of the piece of music. There is music that disturbs the soul too much, excites its low feelings and even openly provokes evil, works against God and faith. Such music would not be recommended for anyone to listen to.
What do you read from secular literature?
I very rarely read, and if I do, I read science fiction, novels with philosophical or psychological overtones, for example, Dostoevsky, Herman Hesse.

About a worthy castle for a Russian monastery
Seifridsberg Castle

Vladyka, do pilgrims come to you for spiritual help?
Constantly, all the cells are occupied.
And specifically to you? Do you have spiritual children?
Not many. God has not sent me such people who would ask for spiritual children, and I do not consider myself an elder. I have some experience, but it is not for me to judge whether I can help a person as a real spiritual father. I am a little afraid of that. There are people who come and ask. I can give advice, but, of course, not in the way that Vladyka Mark does, for example.

In general, you need to be a saint, like John of Kronstadt or the elders of Optina, who could look into people's souls and see their past and future. But I cannot dispose of people's lives in this way.

Lately the monastery cannot accept all the pilgrims, but now you have found a place absolutely suitable for the monastery, where you can expand ...
We tried for a long time to agree with the Munich city administration to expand the monastery on our present site. But they did not want to understand us.

Originally the monastery was located in a relatively isolated area on rented land. As time went on, houses were built around it, and young people began to gather in the nearby parks at night and disturb the brethren, who already had only 10 p.m. to 3 a.m. to rest. Not only was garbage thrown onto the monastery grounds, but there were even a few arson attacks. As a result, our garage almost completely burned down.

We found a place that is perfect for a monastery. This is Seifriedsberg Castle

And finally we found a place that is perfect for a monastery because it is located in a secluded place and surrounded by nature. This is Seifridsberg Castle. Now we have to buy it. And then it will be monastery property.
The first mention of the castle dates back to 1251. It was built by Bishop Siegfried III, Count von Rehberg. The castle consists of a three-storey main building and a side wing. The main building and the entrance are connected by a wall with a tiled roof, forming an enclosed courtyard.
In 1851, a forest park was laid out in front of the palace, in which shrubs and trees from all over the world were planted, including a ginkgo tree known for its healing properties, sequoias, rhododendron bushes, which are now more than 100 years old and are a natural wonder when they bloom in May and June.
Seifridsberg Castle
The castle is conveniently located an hour's drive from Munich, and the number of brethren will hopefully increase. We will finally be able to build a real church instead of a house church, a monastic building for the brethren, a hotel for pilgrims, additional workshops, and further development of our production. We also plan to place there a diocesan center, a center for youth missionary work, an educational center for courses for clergy.
Both financially and in terms of the sheer size of the area and what needs to be done, neither our monastery nor our diocese has ever undertaken such a large project before.
The Russian Church Abroad is not a wealthy church at all, and we continue to bargain with the owners of the castle and the grounds. We have also established a fund through which we intend to raise money for the purchase and renovation, which will be expensive. To carry it out we will need volunteers in addition to specialists.

How much money will be needed to buy the castle?
Approximately 2.5 million euros, the renovation will cost at least 1.5 million or even more. And only then can we plan the move. It won't be easy for the monastery.

Vladyka Mark has entrusted me with this project, and I am working on it at the same time as I am completing my doctoral thesis.

On the topic?
“Theodicy in the New Testament” - why is there evil and suffering on earth?

On communicating “face to face” with God and the headship of men
Christ the Pantocrator. Mosaic

Remind me, what does the word “theodicy” mean?
It is a set of religious and philosophical doctrines designed to justify the governance of the universe by a good God, despite the presence of evil in the world: the so-called problem of evil.

I wanted to find an answer to this question in the New Testament, because I have been familiar with this subject since childhood, because it is a favorite question of people who do not believe. I came to faith and had many conversations and debates with my unbelieving friends on this subject. It was important for me to find the answer myself and explain it to them.
During my studies, I realized that while the Old Testament is present on this subject and even attempts to give answers, it does not solve the problem as a whole. But in the holy fathers and in Christian literature this subject is not so much covered. This means that the problem is solved through the New Testament, through Christ.
I think that the strongest answer that God has given us is Christ. He not only suffered, but overcame both suffering and death. The apostle Paul writes very well about this in his letter to the Romans: “Christ Jesus died, but He also rose again: He is at the right hand of God, He also makes intercession for us” (Romans 8:34).

After the resurrection of Christ, everything is defeated: suffering, the devil, death, and human corruption

In his epistle he addresses the Christians of Rome, who were mostly Gentiles, and speaks a lot about the “truth of God” which is received by faith. This truth is inherent in God and is manifested in all His actions. God reaches out His divine hand to man and gives this truth, this answer, through faith. He shows that after the resurrection of Christ all things are conquered: suffering, the devil, death, and human corruption.
This may not be clear to us now, but gradually we begin to feel the grace that draws us into a new world where evil, suffering, and death themselves will be absent. “If with your mouth you confess Jesus as Lord and believe in your heart that God raised Him from the dead, you will be saved, for with the heart you believe unto righteousness, and with the mouth you confess unto salvation” (Rom. 10: 9-10).

So man can only get the answer to this question after he comes to the true God, as he meets Him personally?
Yes. God did not just give the answer as a written explanation, He gave us Christ. That is the answer. God has shown that every person can personally meet Christ the Savior and personally receive Him into his life and into his heart. And the more sincerely we do this, the more the question of the presence of evil and suffering in the world will no longer exist for us.

Bishop Job (Bandmann) of Stuttgart

What are the paths that lead a person to a personal encounter with God? Or are these paths inscrutable and the way to a personal encounter is the whole life of a believer? Can God come into a person's heart unexpectedly?

If you are not interested in God, what kind of personal meeting can we talk about?

There is one way, and that is prayer. Prayer is communication with God. If you are not interested in God, what personal meeting can we talk about? And this prayerful fellowship is higher than thinking or talking about God, that is, “theologizing.” That's why we must set our whole life on prayer and build our life around it. Although any child can pray, perfect unceasing prayer, which no longer needs words, no longer needs ideas, is a “face-to-face” communication with God, and is the result of a person's great feat and endeavor.
A person goes to church, reads spiritual books, confesses and receives communion regularly, and even teaches others. Is it possible to determine whether this person lives with God? What, in your opinion, are the signs of a “man of God”?
Hardly anyone dares to evaluate a person's spirituality from the outside. Even in confession one cannot always see what is really going on in the soul. Some may show, of course, obvious holiness, which cannot be hidden from the one who knows how to recognize it, but this is an exception. And a rare one at that.
Do you teach the Law of God to young people?

I teach Orthodoxy to high school children

In some schools in Germany, where there are many Orthodox children, they hire a special teacher. I teach Orthodoxy to high school children in different schools. Now I have 13 people in my class - these are children of parishioners, but in the current conditions of coronavirus and restrictions, of course, this is not all who could and wanted to go to class.
And how is the monastery itself living during the pandemic?
One of the temptations of Jesus Christ in the desert was to use spiritual power and neglect danger: “Throw yourself down and the angels will catch you.” But that's not about us. We try to live peacefully and without unnecessary fear. But it is easier for us than it is for the laity to cope with this situation. Before the quarantine, it was as if we were living in quarantine: our temple and workplace are located where our cells are.
Vladyka, what, in your opinion, will be the most difficult for you as a bishop at first?
I think everything at the beginning will not be easy. Everything is new, even though I have lived close to the bishop for a long time and theoretically understand what the bishop does. They say that traveling to parishes is exhausting and draining, but I think it also gives a lot of grace and strength. At least for me, it won't be the worst thing.
Now I will list several qualities of human character: education, humility, asceticism, wisdom, kindness, sense of humor. In what order do you think they are important for a bishop?
Wisdom, prudence are the main helpers in everything. Then, in my opinion, humility and asceticism. A bishop cannot do without education. And the final place is shared, I think, by kindness and a sense of humor.

And the main thing for a bishop, despite the fact that he has to deal with paperwork, real estate and money, is that he is in direct contact with people. And first of all, he must see what kind of person is in front of him, what this person is capable of, how he can be led and how not; what to entrust, what obedience to direct him to, how to behave towards him and how not to behave. This, I think, is the most important and the most difficult.
Bishop Job (Bandmann) of Stuttgart
spoke with Tatiana Veselkina

submitted by Yurii_S_Kh to SophiaWisdomOfGod [link] [comments]

2024.06.07 21:22 GreninjaDeter I am really bored, so, I put Pokemon Reborn characters and Pokemon Insurgence characters together to see who would become friends.

Originally I wanted to do a VS fight inbetween characters, but then I realized powerscaling sucks, and putting characters from different fangames against one another in fights might be either really one sided or boring to figure out.
So I decided to see who would become friends if the cast of Pokemon Insurgence interacted with the cast of Pokemon Reborn.
I love both of these games and I did this only because I have kept combining both of these games together in my mind ever since I've first finished Reborn, I basically love these games too much for me to ever let go of them and I will forever find ways of combining the games together whenever I can.
I also did this post just for the fun of it so please don't try to chop my head off with an axe if you dislike some of the things I said here.
Of course I'll give some much needed context and background to each character in Insurgence so you guys can understand how I thought this out.

Orion

Orion is the first gym leader of the torren region, the fire/grass gym leader who specializes in a sun team, who was often bullied for being friends with a seemingly inanimate white rock, which later turned out to be Reshiram.
Orion here, I would imagine would get particularly well with Anna, due to the fact they are both rather young, and both have been rather made fun of or not be taken seriously in what they see or say.
Anna with her whole...............whole character and Orion with his rock. Due to these same reasons, I'd think he'd also get along with Luna.

Xavier

Xavier is the second gym leader of pokemon Insurgence, a master in bug and poison types, with a mega beedrill as his ace, he doesn't really do a lot, he mostly just hangs around, and isn't really important to the plot, he is mostly just a layed back dude who loves nature and smokes marijuana, and was actually once a pokemon ranger before being a gym leader.
I'd think he'd get along well with Blake, maybe the 2 go for a smoke or 2, chill out, play some call of duty or something.
I'd also think he would get along with Laura due to both of them being rather big fans of nature.

East

Uhhhhhhh, East...is a meat rider......ok East is the third gym leader in the game, and his only purpose, is to be loyal to a cult leader....and die after losing against the player character.....I'd think he'd get along well with El and that's about it.
Look, I'm one of the biggest pokemon insurgence fans, I played this game a minimum of 20 times, but this character gets 1 scene in the whole game before they die.

Harmony

Harmony is the 4th gym leader of the game, a polite madam that specializes in Normal and Fairy types, in the game she appear to warn Orion before a cult tries to steal his white rock, and she herself is traumatized at seeing her father get turned into a deoxys hybrid by her previous friend who became a cult leader......Insurgence.
I would find her easily able to get along with Laura, due to both of them really matching in personalities, as well as her getting along well with Julia, Florinia, Amaria and Titania, since I do think she could REALLY get along just fine with all 4 of them.
I would also think she would get along with Adrienn due to both of them being fairy type leaders as well as.....genuinely nice people trying to do better.

Anastasia

Anastasia is the 5th gym leader of the torren region, specializing in steel and electric types, she is also known to do shady deals for MONEY!!!!! Yeah she made a Zekrom armor for a cult member to make his Zekrom stronger......yeah that's something that happens.
I'd honestly find her being able to get along well with Evelynn due to both of them being mechanics and both of them helping terrorists :DDDD (Although ones motive was way better than the others)

Diana

Diana is the 6th gym leader of torren, specializing in Ghost and Psychic types, being a lover to the 7th gym leader Calreath (before he dies). has a Cresselia, and is a sibling to the Cult leader Persephone, once you finish her quest in the post game, she stops being a gym leader and becomes a pokemon researcher alongside the regions professor.
Diana would most likely get along well with Shelly, due to the fact both took up pokemon studying in the future and both of them having rather shaky relationships with their Siblings.
Whilst I also see her befriending potentially Julia due to her personality wise not being too different from her dead lover.
I'd also think she might get along with Serra and Radomus....no reason it's just a gut feeling on this one.

Calreath

Calreath is the 7th gym leader of the torren region, lover of Diana, being chosen by Manaphy, and specializing in electric, water and dragon types, dying only because the cult leader Zenith made him fall into the depths of the infernal base when he could.
Calreath as a personality is very joyful, very happy, i'd think he'd honestly get along well with a lot of people, I think Hardy, Julia, Terra, Lin, Blake and Cain might be some of the first characters I think off in this matter.....that would have been if he was ALIVE but woopsie daisies.

Adam

Adam is the final gym leader of insurgence, the dark type specialist, the prior augur (which meant the protector of the region, strongest trainer in the region, and chosen by Arceus to guide a crystal holding his power), he was also chosen by Hoopa and is the protagonists father.
Before the story starts, Adam was forced into a corner by The second augur, Jaern and Persephone into a dream realm, made up in his sons mind to keep him locked there, after which he almost died via having a Gengar use dream eater on his child to make them forget completely about him.
I'd think Adam would get along pretty well with Amethyst, for the reason that they are both the previous strongest trainer in their region.
I would also think he would get along well with Noel and Anastasia, probably seeing a bit of his own child within them, on that note I think he would also get along well with Radomus, probably being able to share the pain he had when his whole life fell apart together with Radomus.
I'd also think he might get along well with Lin! Both of them are fans of hydreigon (He has a mega Hydreigon on him), and Adam might be a good father figure for Lin!

Damian

Damian is the first rival in pokemon insurgence, starting out together with you as someone who was adopted, later in the game he gets chosen by Shaymin, helps defeat the second augur, gaining at least a bit of a backbone before losing it to his friend telling him his step mother was right about him (when she said he was just a child and he wasn't ready for a pokemon yet), gets abducted by the deoxys man previously mentioned, finds out his mother is Audrey, leader of the abyssal cult, sees his mother potentially die infront of his eyes, only to get told he's gonna make the world better, gets healed in the postgame, helps save his mother and finally decides he wants to help people.
Alright, first things first, I find him to be likely to become really good friends with Taka, not only due to the similarities, Taka being the son of Sol and Damian the son of Audrey, but also because they would just make good friends.
Other than that, I find him likely able to befriend Lumi and Evelynn, not through any particular reason I just really think he would, and perhaps he could also befriend Amaria, I feel like he would really be able to do that.

Nora

Nora is the second rival of the game, chosen by celebi at the start of her journey, going off on her friend telling him his step mother was right about him then immediately feeling remorse upon her actions, trying the whole game to fix this only to see her friend get infected with a Deoxys virus and disappear from her life, then proceed to become seemingly irrelevant for the rest of the game..........yup....she does nothing else........she's just there....
As a person she's likely to become friends with quite a lot of the characters in reborn, Anna, Noel, Shelly, Cain, Victoria, Luna, Sera, Heather (although that is debatable), since she really is quite friendly in the game just.,...kinda pushed aside after the 6th badge.

Jaern

Jaern is the second augur, in the story he uses his reputation and political power as the second augur to make himself seem like an unkillable god when in reality he's weaker than Fern, he sacrifices the 3rd gym leader to summon rayquaza, only for him to suck ass at using the most broken pokemon in existence.
Honestly the only person that he might get along with would be Fern, but only to annoy one another.

Audrey

Audrey is the leader of the abyssal cult, mother of Damian, and is obsessed with raising the ocean levels due to a Tentacruel evolution that occured a long time ago when Kyogre was rampaging through hoenn.
As a character she might get along with possibly Serra due to both of them being parents (although one better than the other)
And Amaria only and only because she is a water type specialist

Zenith

So on short, he's a cocky cult leader that worships groudon, that almost succeeded at taking over the region after selling people fake vaccine shots.....look the game finished in 2016-2017-2018, it was before covid, the developer is pro Vaccination ok? This was just an unfortunate plotline he wrote into the game.
But nah, I don't think anyone would be a fan of Zenith, like literally no one, this guy just sucks.

Persephone

Persephone is the leader of the darkrai cult, she's responsible for the player losing their memory, she's the sister of Diana and is a bit insane in trying to catch Darkrai, and hating her sister due to the fact that Diana and Persephone, when they were young they were under the influence of Zenith, and were part of the Infernal cult, Diana leaving Persephone alone under Zenith's control and leaving Persephone to lose her mind and dying for revenge both on her sister and Zenith.
I feel like she might not be able to befriend...anyone, maybe just Sapphira because both of them are striven by the need to get back at those who hurt them, but nothing more.

Taen

Taen is the underling of Reukra, the leader of the perfection cult, he spent the majority of this game trying to make the original dragon and failed.
He might only and only be able to get along semi well with Sigmund, maybe finding respect in his experiments....which....if you were to get along with Sigmund, there might be something wrong with you.
Someone else he might find appreciation for is Evelynn, due to the fact she created the pulse machine, and so he would probably be very interested in how the machines work and how Evelynn made them, basically a worse Florina.

Reukra

Reukra is the champion and leader of the perfection cult, he has only 1 thing keeping him forward in life, the search for perfection, he made delta pokemon (which in Insurgence are mostly man made variations of already existing pokemon, ex: a grimer made out of sand), he made mega evolutions, armors, tried with the original dragon, remade mewtwo, and almost succeded in finding the Perfect team.
As for who he would get along with, I think he might forge a friendship with Sol, Sol wanting a perfect world and him striving for perfection, it goes hand in hand.
Another one he might find enjoyment for is Lyn, not Lyn as in Lyn, but in Lyn the doll, most likely being fascinated by how she's able to win fights like that, studying her matches and seeing what he can try to do to have that synergy, that perfect team he's striving for.......when he doesn't know her matches are already decided to be won.

The Player

The player is the player..........they are likely to become good friends with everyone from reborn, most likely the doll as well

Quick Mentions

Gail - He is a protestor...he has a zygarde...he might get along with Sandy
Nyx - She is someone that tried to bring Giratina back to power (long story short instead of Arceus creating the universe, Giratina created it, Arceus overthrow them, took their power and Giratina was seen as the devil). she might be able to befriend Lyn...or maybe not since Giratina is pretty anti Arceus.
The E4 - They have no appearences in the game nor any major personalities to speak off, they...they are nothing, really.
King Vesryn - He's one of the first ever pokemon trainers, king of the Vesryn and Aroma regions, both of which are regions from pokemon Omicron and Zeta, another game that the developer, Suzerain, worked on, and he might get along with possibly Elias.
TheSuzerain - Ok this is technically cheating, but the developer suzerain, inserted himself within Insurgence as the character Suzerain, being one of the 8 timeless, which are really strong trainers across the pokemon verse (Cynthia, Steven stone, Red, Dawn, N, Alain, King Vesryn and Suzerain), but...due to both of them being technically self inserts...I would like to think Amethyst would get along with him :DDDD

Conclusion:

Boredom does something to humans...I am one of them, this was done because for one...I just wanted to put my thoughts on this out in the open.
And second I was really bored, and thought this will be a fun time waster, and it was, be sure to tell me what you guys think, and enjoy your day.

submitted by GreninjaDeter to PokemonReborn [link] [comments]

2024.06.07 20:29 Wide_Entrepreneur928 Health & Happiness - My Journey With A Glioblastoma Diagnosis

Hi Everyone, later this month I will be 7 years out of my Glioblastoma diagnosis. I was 30 years old when I was diagnosed and am 37 years old now. Over the last 6+ years, I have been put in contact with many people battling the same diagnosis and decided to create a Word document titled "Health & Happiness", which details all of the things I have incorporated into my healing journey. Everyone is different and I am simply sharing what has worked for me. Neither me or my wife are in the medical field however we have spent a lot of time researching things to integrate into my day-to-day life which we believe are keeping me healthy. For the first 5 years of my journey I received MRI's every 8 weeks; now that I am more than 5 years out I get MRI's every 12 weeks. Below is a copy and paste of the document:
*Below there are some discount codes that I have not affiliation with and found them through IG or marketing emails and they might be outdated*
My Neurosurgeon:
Dr. Mitchel Berger - UCSF
My Neuro Oncologist:
Dr. Timothy Cloughesy - UCLA
My Naturopathic Doctor:
· Christian Gonzalez, ND
o Check out his podcast, “Heal Thy Self” – This podcast has been life-changing for my wife and I. It has provided us with assurance about the path that we have been on to keep me healthy and has opened our eyes to so many things that we thought were “good” and “healthy” when in fact we were grossly misled to a technique called “Green Washing” that a lot of companies and products use in their marketing efforts.
· Below are two links where you can find a ND in your area.
o Naturopath Oncologist Database - https://oncanp.org/directory/
o General Naturopath Doctor Database - https://www.naturopathic.org/AF_MemberDirectory.asp?version=2
CBD/THC Extracts - Cancer Protocols:
· I went through CT's full 90 day protocol back in 2017 in conjunction with radiation and chemo (Temodar). I am on CT's "maintenance" program and have been since I finished the 90 day protocol.
o https://www.constancetherapeutics.com/
o https://www.forbes.com/sites/abbierosne2019/01/24/constance-finleys-midlife-detour-to-cannabis-extraction-connoisseu#456c41bc35c6
§ The article above is from Forbes magazine on Constance and how she got started.
Books and Documentaries:
· Radical Remission. This book was the first book I read when I was diagnosed and gave me knowledge and motivation to not look at my diagnosis as a death sentence. One of the most powerful cancer books I have read and I highly recommend it for anyone that has cancer or knows someone that has cancer. 😊
· What the Health: Netflix
· Heal: Netflix
o Here are a couple ‘extras’ from “Heal” that we found very powerful and inspiring.
§ https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7sxmK8A-Kco&list=PLmcZvnvGDkToo9nYIX3ugcgyLCll0NLLc&utm_content=b080891cf2ccb1c272c432873d52f9cd&utm_campaign=Don%27t+believe+you+can+change+your+destiny%3F+This+video+could+help+you+change+your+mind.&utm_source=Robly.com&utm_medium=email

§ https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EeQjNRahxrw&feature=youtu.be&utm_content=eadbd6e0e0dff2d44d28e6515fa4c2a1&utm_campaign=Rob+Wergin+use+his+incredible+and+unique+gifts&utm_source=Robly.com&utm_medium=email

o The Documentary “Heal”, did so well they wrote a book as well.
· The Game Changers – A documentary on Netflix.
· Forks Over Knives - Netflix
· Cowspiracy – Netflix
· The China Study – Book outlining the most comprehensive study done on nutrition, and the links the standard American diet has to all types of diseases including cancer.
· Being In Balance - Book
· You The Healer – Book
· The Power of Now – Book
· The Celestine Prophecy – Book
· How Not To Die – Book
· The Truth About Cancer – Documentary

Supplements I am taking:
· Maca Root
· Vitamin B12
· Gaia – “Liver Health”
· Bladderwrack & Sea Moss
o We purchase these from- https://alkalineveganshop.com/
· Mushroom Supplements: Chaga, Turkey Tail, Maitake, Reishi, Cordyceps & Lion’s Mane (Real Mushrooms is the company we use.) See video and article below about the health benefits of mushrooms.
o https://www.realmushrooms.com/
o https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uuL_faveAnw
o https://www.drweil.com/health-wellness/body-mind-spirit/canceturkey-tail-mushrooms-for-cancer-treatment/
o Paul Stamets is the CEO of Host Defense and his mother was diagnosed with Stage Four Breast Cancer. He gives a lot of credit to her remission from the mushroom supplements. https://hostdefense.com/also has a 10% off first time order. We order from Vitacost.com though due to their sales and free shipping.
· Agaricus Mushroom – I take it at night with my Essiac Tea (See Below)
· Kelp
· Vitamin D3
· Graviola/Soursop – (can be taken as a supplement or in Tea form)
· Ashwagandha –Benefits and study links below. In the first link below, each number found in the article is a hyper link showcasing different studies that have been conducted proving the benefits listed.
o https://www.healthline.com/nutrition/12-proven-ashwagandha-benefits#section3
o https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/26650066
· Vitamin B2
· Boswellia (Frankincense)
· Melatonin
· CoQ10
[· X-R Shield by LifeExtension – My ND prescribed me to take these 5 days prior to air travel, during travel and 5 days after air travel. When flying, you’re exposed to high amounts of radiation and this supplement helps to protect cell DNA damage]()
· Chaparral
o We purchase these from- https://alkalineveganshop.com/
· Liposomal Glutathione – Quicksilver Scientific
· NAC (N-Acetyl-L-Cysteine, Free-Form)
· Co-E1 NADH
· Probiotic – Klaire Labs, Ther-Biotic Complete
· Life Cykel Mushroom Tinctures
o https://us.lifecykel.com/?rfsn=3953957.f0c203&utm_source=refersion&utm_medium=affiliate&utm_campaign=3953957.f0c203
o Discount code: 0DCB4626
o Chaga, Turkey Tail, Reishi, Lions Maine, Cordyceps, Shitake
o All of the above mushrooms are harnessed in Kakadu Plum juice which is the most Vitamin C dense fruit in the world.
· We get most of our supplements from http://www.vitacost.com . They have sales all the time and free 2-day shipping.

Teas:
· Senna Tea - I drank this on the nights I took Temodar (Chemo) to prevent constipation, it's a lot easier on your body than any OTC medication.
· Essiac Tea - I drink 4 oz. of this every night before bed. People who have defeated cancer give a lot of credit to Essiac Tea.
o We purchase it in loose leaf form from https://www.starwest-botanicals.com/
· Moringa
· Dandelion
· Teas with Turmeric
[· Pique Tea – Organic, ceremonial grade, triple screened for heavy metals, mold toxins and pesticides. This is the only tea that we have been able to find that has a triple screening process for heavy metals. “Organic” does not mean free of heavy metals.]()
o Discount Code: GREENFIELD 15% off!

Other things I do:
· Meditation – Every day for 20 minute – I started off with the app called “Headspace” other people use “Calm”. Its personal preference.
o I am looking into taking a TM class (Transcendental Meditation) and will let you know once I do.
[· Minimizing EMF exposure as much as possible]()
o Sleeping with our phones in airplane mode and away from us, ideally in another room
o Turning off Wi-Fi at night, and even when not in use
o Covering Wi-Fi router and Digital Electricity Meter (outside of house) with EMF guards
§ These can be found here: https://smartmeterguard.com/
o Keeping cell phones away from our bodies as much as possible
o Not using anything wireless near our heads. This includes cell phones (always talk on speaker phone or a wired ear pod connection), air pods or any type of Bluetooth headphones, this includes Bluetooth in the car.
o Hardwiring my office so there is no need for Wi-Fi.
· When we fly, we have these blankets that we wrap around our body. This company has a lot of great products that protect you from EMF exposure.
o https://www.defendershield.com/emf-radiation-protection-blanket
· We also wear these when we fly, they are a company out of Australia
o https://radiasmart.com/emf-hat-hood/
o This is what we have: RS EMF radiation protection hood, blocking RF, EMF- Brian Coat
· Here is another company that is popular, we were not aware of it at the time of buying the other products above.
o https://getlambs.com/products/emf-proof-beanie
· Positive attitude and mindset in everything I do- link below to article explaining how thoughts can benefit or hinder your body
o https://www.huffpost.com/entry/how-your-thoughts-change-your-brain-cells-and-genes_b_9516176
· Eliminate as much stress as I possibly can from my everyday life
· Be present in my mind
· Yoga
· Spin
· Writing down 3 things that I am grateful for each night before bed
· Using Frankincense oil on my feet and pillow, every night, before bed
· Morning Routine: Body Scan Meditation, Drink a liter of water when you wake up (Your body is most dehydrated after a full night’s sleep), stretch or some type of quick 10 minute workout to get your body moving in the morning, “I Am” affirmations (I will usually do this right after I finish my morning stretching, I will typically say 5-10 things out loud to myself, for example (I am healthy, I am a loving husband, I am kind, etc…), statements of gratitude (I will mix this in with my “I Am” affirmations, for example, I am grateful for my bed, I am grateful for my home, I am grateful to have access to organic produce, etc…) I try to focus on this that I have in my life instead of things that I want, rubbing a 1-2 drops of any organic essential oil that you like in your hands in the morning and taking 4-5 deep breaths with your hands over your mouth and nose (this is very helpful in awakening your sensory functions), lastly, I listen to music when getting ready for work in the morning. Soft music in the morning taps into the creative side of your brain and research has shown that individuals that listen to soft music in the morning are more creative and productive throughout the day than those who don’t.
· Taking a walk every day to get fresh air and disconnect, normally with the dogs J
· Circuit Training
· Acupuncture / Energy Healing
· Energy Healer – Steve Montoya – Let me know if you would like his contact info. He travels all over the world healing people. He is in the LA/OC area once a quarter or so.
o https://ramonashealingjourney.wordpress.com/2015/11/04/you-shall-know-them-by-their-love/
· Keeping my body warm at all times. We learned from Traditional Chinese Medicine, that keeping the body warm protects the kidneys, which means all of the other organs can do their job and the body can heal. Also, just for example, when you have a fever, it’s your body’s way of protecting all of your vital organs so that they can do their job, as well as preventing any proliferation of bacteria and viruses.
o http://aprilcrowell.com/asian-medicine/warm-to-the-core/
· John of God – Brazil. Lauren’s cousin went down to visit him during the 4th quarter of 2018 and took a head shot of myself as well as a two-page letter sharing my story. He is a spiritual healer that helped a young man get to a state of meditation where his brain tumor shrunk to nothing. He sent back two bottles of Herbs (Ground Up Passion Flower Leaves – Actual Name: Passiflora) for me to take. There is a large portion about him in the book “Radical Remission” and he is featured in “Heal” as well.
· I brush my teeth with my less dominant hand once a day and then with my dominant hand the other two times.
o This helps stimulate parts of the brain that are not in use often. You can do this with many things, brushing your hair, using your less dominant foot in sports, washing your body with soap while showering.
· Drinking and eating out of glass vs. plastic. It’s having an effect on both men and women’s endocrine systems (hormones, fertility, etc…)
o https://www.plasticpollutioncoalition.org/pft/2017/7/26/new-endocrine-disrupting-chemicals-are-undermining-male-fertility
· This may sound like something so simple but it’s quite challenging: When moving/changing physical positions I am always present. For example, every time I sit, I tell myself I am sitting, every time I stand to walk, I tell myself I am standing. This helps me to bring my mind into a present state and focus less on the future or past.
o This was a recommendation during one of my guided meditations.
· Laughing, loving and hugging every day. This was a big take away for Lauren and I from reading the book Radical Remission. It’s important to laugh every day, love every day and receive and give hugs to people every day. I know, I know, it sounds crazy but it has worked on other folks, we practice it every day. We try to watch more comedies if we are going to watch a movie on the weekend, an easy way to incorporate laughter into your life.
· We recently added air purifiers into our home. I also have one in my office. We purchased the Molekule, but through research we found that the Air Doctor is another good option (and I believe also a little less expensive). Here is a discount code for $100 off a Molekule: MetroMD100
· IR Sauna (Infrared Saunas)
o These are great for detoxifying the body, especially after air travel. I go to Perspire (https://perspiresaunastudio.com/) here in Orange County.
· Epsom Salt Baths – Especially after air or any long car travel as well.
· Grounding/Earthing – Walk around barefoot on your backyard grass or anywhere there is a plot of “Earth”. Feel the grass between your toes or if you are at the beach, be aware of the sand between your toes. We are all energy and Earth contains energy, manifest the energy from the Earth into your body for increased healing, awareness, presence and mindfulness. I do this for about 10-15 minutes.
· Cold Showers (as cold as the shower can get) every morning and Ice Plunges. Look up the “Wim Hof Method”
o https://www.wimhofmethod.com/

Diet:
· For the past 6+ years we have followed a whole food plant-based diet (vegan without the junk food). Cancer cells feed off of Glucose (Sugar) firstly, but can also utilize glutamate as a second source of fuel (which is in all animal protein, land and sea). I have also cut out all artificial sugars from my diet. Dairy is also extremely inflammatory for your body and has been linked to cancer in many research studies.
· White Carbs and Gluten - We have eliminated these from our diet as much as we possibly can. Even for people who do not have a ‘gluten intolerance,’ gluten is very hard on the body’s digestive system. Excessive consumption can lead to a leaky gut, which causes toxins to seep out of the digestive tract into the body/blood making it hard for your immune system to work at its peak. Also, most gluten products have high levels of glyphosate, which they’ve linked to cancer. Glyphosate acts like an antibiotic to your gut (not in a good way), wiping out all of the beneficial gut flora which are there to keep your immune system working efficiently.
· Alkaline Foods and Water - Cancer cells cannot grow in an alkaline environment; we drink water with a PH level of 9.5. We recently invested in a Kangen water machine for our home. A level of 7 PH is balanced and anything below 7 is acidic. Cancer cells thrive in an acidic environment. Things that make your body acidic are alcohol, dairy, meat, processed and artificial sugars and gluten.
· I drink warm lemon water with apple cider vinegar every morning, which also helps alkalize the body and keep stomach acid levels at a great pH for food absorption.
· We practice intermittent fasting, which allows the body to not worry about processing food for a large portion of the day but rather allow its immune system to be working at its peak ability. We started out by only eating from 12 PM - 8 PM and are working toward 12 PM - 6 PM. Intermittent fasting is really important when taking Temodar (or any chemotherapy). It allows the body to protect the healthy cells while targeting cancer cells. There is so much research showing the benefits of intermittent fasting for cancer patients.
· This is a really interesting article citing a lot of different sources regarding a plant-based diet and fighting/preventing cancer:
o https://www.vivahealth.org.uk/veganhealth/dont-feed-cancer

Other Things to Research:
· Dr. Sebi – He is the doctor who put a full-page ad in the NY Post and was sued to take it down. When he went to his court hearing the judge asked him if he could prove that he healed anyone, and he furnished 70 patients of his that were healed by his treatment and the Judge declared “not guilty” on all the charges that were brought against him by the State of New York.
o The link below is a quick rundown of his life. I believe the pharmaceutical companies were heavily involved with his death in while he was imprisoned in Honduras.
o https://wakeup-world.com/2015/08/28/dr-sebi-the-man-who-cures-aids-cancer-diabetes-and-more/
· Radiation Stickers for your cell phone and laptop:
o https://www.amazon.com/Radiation-Protection-Labobbon-Household-Appliances/dp/B078SSD6QC
· We also try to use the ‘cleanest’ hygiene products we can find. There are many harmful chemicals in our everyday toothpastes, shampoos, deodorants, etc. Chemicals to avoid in hygiene products below:
o Shampoo – Sodium Lauryl Sulfate, Sodium Laureth Sulfate, basically any ‘sulfate,’ Parabens, Sodium Benzoate. Brands that we like are: 100% Pure, Acure, Alaffia
o Toothpaste – Sodium Lauryl Sulfate, Sodium Laureth Sulfate, basically any ‘sulfate’, fluoride, triclosan, DEA, Propylene Glycol, Microbeads. One of the worst toothpaste brands out there is Colgate. We use Himalaya Botanique & Nature’s Gate as well as Dr. Bronner’s All-In-One toothpaste.
o Deodorant – Aluminum, Parabens, Triclosan, DEA, Propylene Glycol. We have been testing out natural deodorants for years and our favorite (although not vegan) is from a company called Primally Pure. We’ve also started to use a brand called Joyous Organics with clean (and minimal) ingredients.
o A great website to reference for beauty product ingredients and their safety is https://www.ewg.org/
§ Skin Deep Database – This is where you will find clean products to put on your body.
· https://www.ewg.org/skindeep/

· The Clean Fifteen and Dirty Dozen
o The EWG, each year, comes out with an updated list of produce that we should be buying organic 100% of the time (Dirty Dozen), especially people like you and I who have had cancer. The Clean fifteen can be purchased conventionally if you can’t find them in an organic form and conventional is the only option
o https://www.ewg.org/foodnews/clean-fifteen.php
o https://www.ewg.org/foodnews/dirty-dozen.php

· The link below is a good read on Monsanto’s Glyphosate and the timeline for removal in home use:
o https://www.ewg.org/news-insights/news-release/2021/07/bayer-end-residential-sales-cancer-causing-weedkiller-glyphosate?utm_source=newsletter&utm_campaign=202108News&utm_medium=email&emci=9a939839-bef6-eb11-b563-501ac57b8fa7&emdi=4d3bfe91-dbf7-eb11-b563-501ac57b8fa7&ceid=2210188
These are things that we have done and have found to be successful so far with my body, and hopefully, they are helpful for you as well. I have also included some images below that show how damaging the effects of Wi-Fi radiation (and all of the radiation coming from electronics) can be.

submitted by Wide_Entrepreneur928 to glioblastoma [link] [comments]

2024.06.07 19:43 pudgepwincess WIBTA if I cut my dad out of my life completely?

I’m at my wits end. I feel so trapped in my own life. This man is a toxic, psychologically manipulative narcissist. We used to be so close, my dad(52), and I(23F). Our daddy, daughter relationship was unmatched. I put him on a pedestal and I shouldn’t have. Our relationship took a downward turn during COVID and after I graduated high school(2019). We have been sharing a room together for the past 11 years. We sleep on the floor about 3ft apart from each other. I’m just tired of being so close to him 24/7. It’s driving me crazy. How did we end up in that situation? Very long story. I’ll try to keep it short, when I was 12 my birth giver was diagnosed with Bipolar Disorder. After that, she made the conscious decision that she didn’t want the responsibility of raising 2 kids anymore. So she packed up her life and moved from California to Atlanta, leaving us behind. We didn’t want to live with her and she didn’t want to wait for my dad to get his own place and take us in. So she manically left. My older brother went to live with my grandmother and I was forced to move 3 hours away from the city I grew up in. I had to move in with my aunt, her son, and her granddaughter(my cousin). After a year spent with them, my dad came to get me so that I could live with him. But when he got me, he was homeless. He was living in a motel six. No car. $2000 to his name. I didn’t care though. I was just happy to be with him. Something familiar and comforting. The year I spent with my aunt was rough. I was raised completely different from the way she was raising her granddaughter. I couldn’t identify with them. I was raised in the suburbs. My parents had good jobs. They’ve lived in apartment complexes in bad neighborhoods all their lives. My cousin had a teenage mom and a dad in prison. She fights in school. She’s fast with boys. She wears booty shorts with pride and watches Bad Girls Club. I liked Bratz dolls and twinkle toes and iCarly. We bickered often. I was expected to fight her battles when she would pick fights with girls bigger and uglier than her. Because “you the oldest cousin”. I got called a pusy often for not wanting to fight. I would complain to my birth giver but she’d just say “yeah beat her a”. Knowing damn well she’s ran from every physical altercation brought to her. I just didn’t feel comfortable around them. I felt unheard and unwanted. I felt like I didn’t belong to anyone. I wanted to die. I ended up being pulled out of school and I was sent to a mental health facility for suicidal teens. I was placed on suicide watch for a week. I was having a lot of self-conscious issues and insecurities. The normal teenage girls stuff. but my cousin,(miss I’m that btch) was fortunate enough to not have the same problems as I, so my issues were looked at as “abnormal”. So I was labeled as mentally unstable. I was treated like I had a virus My dad still had a job. But it was an hour away from my aunts city. He had no car so he had to take public transportation. While he worked, I stayed in the motel room alone. Eventually my godmothers best friend took us into her home. And we’ve been here ever since. Yes, I’m in my dad’s custody. Yes, that’s what I wanted. Yes, I am grateful that he came to get me (even though he wasn’t financially ready). But my internal issues aren’t just going to go away because I got my daddy. My Borderline Personality Disorder isn’t going to disappear just because daddy’s home. My insecurities, my sense of self. He tells me that all of that should’ve went away the moment he came and got me. “You should’ve been good. But you just HAVE to dwell. Oh, my mom abandoned me so I’m gonna cut my wrist.” He said that. I still remember that day. I remember everything violating that he says to me. Problem is he doesn’t. I’ve made a lot of silly kitty mistakes in my life. And I’ve had to deal with all his “life lessons“. He used to tell me all the time that if he died tomorrow, I wouldn’t know what to do in this world without him. I’ve learned to handle his verbal blows silently. I used to cry when I was a kid. But then he would demand that I tell him why I was crying, then another argument ensues. So after a while I learned to block him out when he starts. I just blank out and go into a different headspace. I pretend that I’m not present. I choose not to listen when he’s being negative. When he talks about my hair, my weight ,the things I eat, my career choices, the type men I like, my sexuality. At this point, there is nothing that he can say to me that will hurt my feelings. Because I feel like he is deflecting his insecurities. It is his actions that are literally digging me into a deeper hole. He is using me for his own personal gain and financial support because he feels like I owe him. I owe him because “he’s busted his ass raising me and he’s done everything for me since I was born”. I hear that a lot. I heard that when he took half of my paycheck for himself because he didn’t get paid while he had COVID. I heard that when he took my debit card while I was sleeping and put bills on it without telling me. I hear it every time I have to pay for his alcohol and his marijuana because he refuses to go to the DMV because he doesn’t want to stand in line. My dad is a functioning alcoholic. I mean, highly functional. I have witnessed him chug, a full bottle of wine and then drive me to work. I am feeding this man’s addiction against my will. I can’t even come home after work and take a nap because I have to stay awake for his weed delivery. Like come on now you’re 50+ years old why am I paying for your alcohol like you’re under age? I try to find the nicest way possible to tell him things like this are not normal nor fair to me. He gets extremely defensive. “I’ve done everything for you. I raised you since you were two years old and you can’t even pay for my weed.” those were his exact words. Am I crazy or does that not sound crazy? He guilt trips me and I’m forced to give in. He does all these things to me on a daily basis and when I ignore him or give him the cold shoulder, it’s “what have I done to you to make you treat me this way?” You’re probably asking why don’t I just move out? To make it simple, I don’t make enough money. When I was 21 I became a CNA and stayed in that field for 2 1/2 years. I formed a really good relationship with my classmates. We would help each other study and supported each other through training. We all wanted to become LVN eventually. In the state of California, you have to had worked as a CNA for at least six months before you can become an LVN. we all made a pact that we would work our one year at the same facility and then go to the same medical school together. Just to get our experience in. LVN school is 18 months long. And from what I was told a great majority of your hours should be spent studying. LVN students still work but not that much. maybe part-time or under a contract. But my dad didn’t want me to stop working for 18 months. He wanted me to keep working so that I can help him pay off his debts and bills so that we can move. He was afraid that our landlord was gonna kick us out while I was in the middle of my school semester. (She wasn’t. We’re helping her pay off her mortgage by renting this room.) Ever since we’ve moved into this room consecutively year after year, he has promised me that we would move out and get our own place. My dad is not very good with spending and saving money. The reason why he doesn’t have a car now is because he can’t afford to buy nor keep the car. He has so much debt from unpaid rent , unpaid card notes, phone bills, and other IRS stuff. His credit score is currently under 215. Meaning it is absolutely IMPOSSIBLE for him to qualify to live anywhere. He is delusional to the fact that he cannot fix this himself. So he just gives me false hope year after year. I genuinely believe that he thinks he’s God. I hated being a CNA and wanted out as soon as I could. I just wanted to do my one year and then start nursing school. He says to my brother, “she wants to go back to school, but she can’t until we get out of here”. After I heard that I pretty much gave up on my nursing career. Because I knew that if that was the case, I would never be able to go back to school. So I gave up. I continue to work as a CNA until my certification expired. He got pissed at me because I told him that I wasn’t going to renew it. Why do I have to work a job that I hate for you? Someone who won’t allow me to elevate? If I can’t be an LVN the next best thing that’s gonna get me away from wiping old peoples butts is medical assisting with phlebotomy. The school that I got my CNA certification from was offering a medical assisting course with no tuition. That was the route that I was going to take, but they told me that I didn’t qualify to be in the program because I am alumni. There’s another medical school close to where I live, but it’s private. And I wanted to avoid having student debt because tuition is 10k. They offer financial aid, but I feel like even if I do apply, I’m gonna get the minimum amount or nothing at all. I don’t have any debt currently. Hell, I don’t even have credit. And I wanted to avoid that, but I’m desperate at this point. The next course is July of next year. That leaves plenty of time to apply for financial aid and grants. But the debt after completion is what’s nerve-racking to me. My dad tells me that I can’t handle any stress of any kind so I HAVE to make as much money as possible and avoid debt to avoid stress. Whether what I do makes me happy or not. But I’ve made plans of my own that will NOT include him. My grandmother (dad’s mom) passed away about 15+ years ago. She left her life insurance to myself my dad and my brother. 20K each. But my brother and I couldn’t get access to it until we turned 25. I turn 24 in two weeks and 25 next year. My plan was to take that money by myself a car and move TF out. As far away as possible from him. Cut off contact and all. Then I would start school a month later. I just don’t want him interfering with my plans. He still likes to hold some type of control over me. And if my plans don’t include him, he will force himself in. He wants to go to family therapy with me. But honestly, I’m not interested. I’m so drained, I don’t want to talk anymore. The only way that our problems will stop is if we don’t live together. I have tried to walk out and just leave multiple times. and each time he has physically stopped me from walking out the door. he tells me I can leave and find my own place but when I try to, he stops me. When I was 19 he called me an ungrateful piece of shit because I told him I didn’t want to live with him anymore. I’ve suffered at the hands of his verbal abuse and being his scapegoat and his last resort for too long. I am beyond done. You can’t treat me this way just because you raised me. When he talks to me the way that he does he tells me that I’m too sensitive and that I shouldn’t take it that way because he’s my dad. He tells me that I should be able to separate him from everybody else. That is his golden excuse. “I’m your parent“. being my parent DOES NOT give you the excuse to disrespect me. I would never do that to him because he has violent tendencies. and I am not one to hesitate to call the police when I feel threatened. he has threatened to put hands on me multiple times. if he touches me, I’m calling the police. Simple. I don’t ever want it to get to that point because he has a good job. In the moment that he gets put into handcuffs that shit is over with, and he’s back at square one trying to figure out his retirement. Now, what did he do that made me type all this out? I had to pay for his weed again, using my ID card. I currently have a job position pending due to background checks and I work but only two days a week. I don’t have a car so I use Uber and Lyft to get myself to work. I make $18 an hour and the Uber rides are $60 combined. whenever he places in order, he sends me the amount of money to pay for it. but there’s an ATM fee each time. and guess who had to pay the fee with the rest of everything that was in her account? I have nine cents in my checking account as we speak. and he doesn’t care since it’s not him. he offered to pay me back the difference, but it’s the principle of the whole thing. Why do I have to do this to myself FOR you? And because he’s an alcoholic with no car, I have to use DoorDash to buy his 20 liter of wine. I live in a small area so a lot of the times we get the same Dasher over and over. I get so embarrassed when I answer the door and give them my ID. I feel like they think it’s me ordering alcohol every single day. but my dad tells me I can’t care what people think. I just feel trapped under this man’s hold. I have no friends. i’ve never had a boyfriend. i’ve never had sex. I don’t have a drivers license because I don’t know how to drive. because I don’t have anyone around me that owns a car to teach me how to drive. I already cut my birth giver out of my life. that’s another long story, but basically my brother was homeless for six months as a result of something she did. so I don’t have a mom and I’m about to not have a dad. this man disgusts me. He makes me feel like I’m crazy for feeling this way. Am I crazy? AITA for filling this way. WIBTA if I cut him out my life? or am I being dramatic?

submitted by pudgepwincess to AITAH [link] [comments]

2024.06.07 19:16 JayFixesIT My experience as a NEW PRO - Computer Technician

Hello,
I wanted to share my recent experience as a NEW PRO who joined Thumbtack last week. My fiance sent me a reddit post about shady business practices she came across when looking for peoples experiences that same day. I decided to still give it a try and now I have decided that it was probably a mistake. FYI - I joined as a Computer Technician.
They send multiple Pros the same exact lead and instantly charge you for the lead. The leads range in price - you set your maximum weekly allowance on lead and how much you want to pay for a lead. There is no guarantee you will be hired and at the end of the day someone gets charged and ends up with no job.
My 1st lead was $9 for remote job (Instantly charged). I completed the job the first day with the customer. Customer gave me a great review... It's been 10 days and I have not received payment. I opened up a ticket with their support for no payment. It has been 5 days and no resolution so far....
I got sent a $10 lead for someone in California that had a hardware issue that was not a remote job (I'm in Florida). The customer selected that the job could be done remotely but it couldn't. I requested a refund via the platform an it was denied. I contact their text support. The agent agreed with me that it was not a lead that I should of gotten but could not "refund" me. He gave me a credit. (I still had to pay the $10 to them.)
I got sent another $10 lead (instantly charged) for a local virus clean job. Received SMS that there was a job at 12:20 PM. I reached out to the customer at 12:22 on the platform - no response. I also called and the customer said oh I figured it out and I don't need assistance. I then applied for a refund under "Job significantly changed - No job) and was denied due to could not determine of the job significantly changed but credited $5 as a courtesy. I reached out to support and explained the situation and they told me that their service is to allow customers to contact you and that their job was done. I explained that it was an accident on the customers end and they didn't really need someone. The rep showed 0 empathy and pretty much told me to go pound sand. Again was charged the $10.
From my experience, Thumbtack business practices is purely around them making money with no empathy around their clients (pros). I understand that leads can cost a lot more than what I Incurred and that my limit for leads may need to be raised to be more successful on the platform. What I wanted to share though is the experience. The constant need for having to reach out to their support and the lack of empathy they show when explaining situations. They have yet to refund anything I've paid... just want to give future credits...
I also understand that people are successful using this platform and it does allow them to make money. All the successful posts I am seeing is from people who have been on the platform for years and they all say you need to bump your price up for leads...

submitted by JayFixesIT to Thumbtack [link] [comments]

2024.06.07 19:14 DryClothes2894 If your FPS is bad, this *should* help you a fair bit

Alright so Ive started to get sick of seeing every single day like 5 or 6 new posts about FPS drops and overall performance losses, and a lot of comments about "The game is poorly oPtiMiZeD" and so forth. Half the folks don't even bother listing their specs, very helpful (not)
The truth is a double edged sword here.
One being that, it really isnt as bad as people think (read why later), and two, people forget all the time that this is THE Unreal Engine demo-game, that all the new features of UE are tested on before getting put out for use in other new game releases that use the engine. This game is always going to be on the bleeding edge as they rapidly advance game technology and innovate. All things considered, it really is pretty impressive it still even runs on the decade old PS4 and similar devices.
Now there are a few specific folks on here who CONSTANTLY are complaining about "game optimization" and yet they are on ancient hardware that was low end when Fortnite came out 7 years ago, one guy literally has a GTX 870 that predates this game by a good 3 years (March 2014 release date), over a decade old now. People, you know who you are, stop complaining.
Now onto the next points, addressing both why people think its worse than it is (and what created this problem) and then how to fix things for the most part on your system, aside from external variables out of my control such as crap software like antivirus RGB perhipheral software game launchers etc.
The first problem of how we got here, is mostly due to the lack of good information, and the spread of information that is just wrong. Most of this is top down in a viscous cycle as follows:
Pro playestreameetc doesnt know much about hardware, just plays the game, thats why they're good.
Said player starts to have problems with FPS etc
They then reach out to a "tweaker" on like Twitter to get their PC "optimized"
This is because player has money and can pay for services rather than learn this stuff himself.
Tweaker doesnt really know what he's doing or what impact certain settings have
Tweaker changes a bunch of stuff that he probably shouldn't, stuff that hes copying from other "tweakers"
System seems better to placebo affect, player promotes tweaker on socials, "Thanks to X for fixing my FPS!"
FPS boost YT kids scavenge and investigate thru like stream vods to see what changes were made
FPS boost YT kids then, also not knowing what these settings do, turn this into content
Content, that makes them money, regardless of whether it actually does anything meaningful
This information of supposed "fixes" then gets circulated around, via other YT kids or Reddit or etc
These "fixes" really just make things worse overall because they disable proper functionality of the OS
Now you have lots of players all doing the same "fixes" by their favorite FPS boosters
They all do these tweaks because they trust the person with a microphone
And now you have a bunch of people running settings and tweaks that are overall detrimental to performance
And then everyone, including the FPS YT kids (who dont know anything) all say "The game is poorly optimized"
This goes for people even like Jerian, Codelife, Marrentm, Lestripez (his site is straight up malware, avoid) etc
You know these guys dont know anything when they say that free space on your disk equates to more FPS, which is why they always tell you to delete temp files and stuff, it doesnt matter unless the disk is full.
If you watch these guys streams too, you can see their FPS is usually all over the place, because their "fixes" dont actually do anything beneficial.
I see a lot of times too where someone gets their PC "optimized" and then weeks later is getting BSODs, because the tweakers messed with a lot of stuff that they didn't know how it works, but saw from someone else, such as changing lots of registry values, dangerously unstable overclocks, and so forth.
I can stand behind my work because I have a youtube channel for gameplay, and my FPS is at a LOCKED 240 the entire time in 1440p DX12 on high settings, its linked in my reddit profile if you care to see for yourself any of my recent videos.
The "oPtiMiZaShUn" of Fortnite is relatively fine, and Epic certainly can't fix a problem they didn't create, a problem that has been created by these FPS boosters.
ANYWAYS now that we have the backstory for the major half of the problem, lets tackle the other side in regards to the hardware itself, assuming the configuration of the game is fine, Ill address configuration next.
Now I have spent quite a long amount of time the past few years deep diving into what really makes this game run well and what holds it back in regards to performance, and when it comes down to just raw hardware, assuming the configuration is fine and not full of snake oil, the game, like other Unreal Engine titles and multiplayer games in general, is very memory bottleknecked. That is the throughput and bandwidth of your RAM affects the games overall performance significantly.
This is why you can get low CPU and GPU utilization, and the game still runs poorly, aside from the utilization metrics being very skewed with how modern hardware works, its not perfect measurement, but still illustrates a point for the most part, but essentially your ram bandwidth is saturated or the ram latency is high and holding reduntant tasks up because it takes longer than it needs.
The reason for this is that in a BR type multiplayer game, you not only have a large open world map with a diverse destructible enviroment, but then you throw 100 players on to it that all are doing lots of things, making changes to said enviroment thru activities, construction, destruction, combat, etc.
All this information about what these players are doing (at least the ones in your render distance) has to get stored and read in and out of system memory as stuff happens in real time, this is why FPS tends to be low in stacked endgames with lots of players in a concentrated area, its saturating your memory bandwidth trying to keep up with all the constantly updating information about all the players and what theyre doing.
This is why AMDs line of X3D CPUs are super strong in games like this, because the cache is essentially turbocharged RAM running at almost a terabyte a second. having fast access cache for redundant tasks can speed the process of all this constant transfer up significantly.
Its also the kryptonite for why older Intel CPUs like 8th 9th 10th Gen etc, all really struggle these days, because they have significantly less cache than their AMD counterparts from the same time periods.
And its also the principle of how a certain special device that is now becoming more known technically works, its called Direct Memory Access because its reading the location and info of the players from your RAM and sending that to another device whether PC, Rasberry Pi, etc.
Ill have more information at the bottom for more specific stuff in regards to RAM, but the cliff notes is that enabling XMP is important, but it does leave a good bit on the table, and too many generic kits, especially DDR5, are really bad on the settings they come with out of the box. This is why people think the game runs bad on high end PCs, that come with generic DDR5 kits that have atrocious timings.
Again, more info on this aspect of things at the bottom.
BUUUUT leaving all that aside for now, lets get into what you can do right now that should fix a lot of your FPS problems, no overclocking or any BS snake oil tweaks, just proper configuration thats surprisingly close to stock, you'll be surprised at the amount of settings that don't actually matter.
Ive spent over a year now doing consulting with numerous people thru either Reddit DMs or Discord, helping many peoples game go from zero to hero, some rags to riches stories for sure. (most of it is undoing snake oil from FPS booster kids) and thru that I have developed a shotgun approach that generally is the gist of what needs to be done, and its had a pretty solid success rate.
DISCLAIMER, I am not telling you to do things that I wouldn't or have not already done countless times on all of my many test machines, but you still do this at your own risk and so obviously be precautious, but rest assured I know what all this stuff does.
So obviously starting off things, you probably wanna do some basic housekeeping
Get rid of any garbage software you dont use and stuff that just runs in the background, like
RGB software, ASUS Aura Sync/Armory Crate are HOGS
Extra Anti-Virus software aside from Defender (Especially Norton and MCaffe
(You dont need it, just get a adblocker and dont go to sketchy sites, the antivirus companies sell the viruses to malware companies, and then sell you a solution to the problem they create, classic marketing, dont buy into it)
Double movement software *can* also be a hog in some cases, use ingame diagonals if possible
Controller interfacing/overclocking software can be a massive offender of bogging things down
High polling rate mouses and keyboards like 8000Khz, 4000Khz, eat up CPU cycles, just use 1000.
Also undo any existing exotic FPS booster tweaks, if youve made a lot of changes over the past years it may be a good idea to install fresh windows from USB, I reccomend Windows 11 22H2, its generally performed the best on all my numerous systems, you can get an ISO from the internet archive, but do whatever you want for OS.
Its also beneficial to turn off Virtualization/SVM in the BIOS, with it on windows sandboxes the OS and it does create a mesuarable hit to performance.
Next thing is basic windows changes, starting with HAGS. Most GPUs support it so if you have it it is beneficial to turn this on. Search "Graphics settings" in the settings search and click the first result. Then once in there hit the link for Change Default Graphics Settings. Once there enable Hardware Accelerated GPU Scheduling.
https://preview.redd.it/5radxkbud65d1.png?width=477&format=png&auto=webp&s=f29927b28c6516abf4a245cf08311e1a62ecb33c
https://preview.redd.it/6rx34d95e65d1.png?width=301&format=png&auto=webp&s=c062787f52f60379e485d9012805884a552e78d1
https://preview.redd.it/3b0rjep6e65d1.png?width=507&format=png&auto=webp&s=c3c47a808cabecff3b13c77395975d00888cb60c
The second option is also beneficial for if you want to run a stretched resolution that requires you to be in Windowed Fullscreen mode, as this uses Flip to give you the same input delay as if you were on Fullscreen.
This leads into the next thing, which is DONT have the "Disable Fullscreen Optimizations" box checked for your Fortnite EXE file, this disables Flip functionality for Fullscreen on modern games especially DX12 that dont use old Exclusive fullscreen, so you get more input delay as the game runs in bad window fullscreen, and your alt tabbing takes longer too, Flip offers much lower latency than old exclusive fullscreen with faster alt tab support.
Like if you read it, it litterally says your disabling optimizations, dont listen to boneheads on youtube who think this does anything, your just giving yourself more input delay.
https://preview.redd.it/1b6u8wf2f65d1.png?width=692&format=png&auto=webp&s=10d0ed514e0017df7a2e814998db09f7e57e3f3b
https://preview.redd.it/25zykhk4f65d1.png?width=405&format=png&auto=webp&s=3c52e8ac6639f22f8bf2f2355889112d07fdbe41
Now into graphics drivers, its always a good idea to run DDU or Display Driver Uninstalller from time to time, to clean everything out with the shader caches and reset settings. There also is the fact that a lot of the newer drivers from Nvidia are a dumpster fire right now, its never a good idea to constantly update them. Now AMD can be the same way too, but in most of my consults Ive not experienced any problems just running DDU and installing the latest once supported by the card. You can always run DDU again and install a different driver and find one that works best for you.
On Nvidia I tend to prefer 537.58 or 551.86, the former is a bit older than some of the 4060 and Super variants of the 40 series so you may need a slightly newer one but 4070 and older are just fine with this.
For downloading specific versions just google it, make sure you get the right one for either desktop or notebook variants depending on what your on.
https://preview.redd.it/f4wxqa7jm65d1.png?width=1217&format=png&auto=webp&s=7d870e469c0d9b18e6fb874d1f5024ff4c84286f
I get the best lows on 537.58 but 551.86 has slightly better average FPS and feels a bit snappier at times, but of course you can DDU and try as many as you like till you find one you like.
The DDU tool itself is pretty self explanatory, select on the right GPU and then the appropriate option for your GPU whether it be Nvidia or AMD (or Intel for ARC and iGPU users), and then hit clean and restart. Once back on the desktop install fresh drivers.
https://preview.redd.it/sita48jng65d1.png?width=672&format=png&auto=webp&s=d2a7f138f7a891cd9196c12bd62178dd388cb0a6
From there on the Nvidia side of things, the only settings in here that really matter (aside from setting your monitor refresh rate of course) is setting your Shader Cache size to Unlimited, and setting PhysX to your graphics card instead of having on auto select. On auto this can sometimes run physics on the CPU and give you nintendo switch framerates when builds are breaking and etc.
https://preview.redd.it/o85hjwx6h65d1.png?width=950&format=png&auto=webp&s=b937f4bb4de9002d0677959e380c72e527037735
https://preview.redd.it/d7iluic9h65d1.png?width=953&format=png&auto=webp&s=7ef51a5beacbdfb5539e70a664797ce97aac876d
All that other crap doesnt make much of a difference if at all, lets move on to your Epic launcher.
Now in your library go to your Fortnite install options. The big thing is dont have High Res textures installed, doesnt look any different, and have the DX12 Shaders and Cosmetic Streaming disabled, it sometimes is called Predownloaded Assets or something.
https://preview.redd.it/tu3iis8th65d1.png?width=634&format=png&auto=webp&s=925381e11d6df3fe47f1df46c9569006beace36c
Fun fact about the Pre-download Assets option, I am partially the reason it exists, as back during the May 4th update for Chapter 4 Season 2 last year, they removed the old settings and fuctionality for texture streaming, forcing the game to constantly hog internet bandwidth downloading textures on the fly as players were in your render distance, creating constant packet loss if you werent on 10 Gig Fiber.
Through a handfull of reddit posts, a video detailing the behaivour, and emails, I was able to get thru to the developers and ask them for this option to download everything ahead of time, because SSD storage is cheap whereas fast internet isnt even available in a lot of places.
Everyone has theyre own mark on this game, mine is a setting that everyone uses because its so beneficial.
ANYWAAYYS so now we got that done, lets go to the manage page.
In here you really only want the -NOTEXTURESTREAMING command, this is different from the assets one as this affects game textures like map roads grass buildings etc, not the player skins like the other one does. Having this in there essentially cuts down on CPU and memory traffic by loading everything into your RAM ahead of time rather than constantly move it around, this helps with pop in and hitching.
The other ones litterally dont affect shipping releases of the game, only content cooking on dev builds.
https://preview.redd.it/lz9ordoyi65d1.png?width=662&format=png&auto=webp&s=1ef859766dda0e241d28e6fb9ec48c1c0e8c68b1
Alright so now assuming youve done everything correctly, lets get into building a shader cache for your game. A lot of this has been moved to be done during loading screens, so if your loading in on DX12 with fresh drivers, your CPU is gonna be working hard.
If your not on DX12, just switch it and restart, most GPUs these days run DX12 anyways, DX11 is not worth using at all, and Performance mode is held back by crappy DX11, but if you must use it just change your settings on DX12/11 pages and then load performance mode back up.
For this though were assuming your using DX12 cause it really is just built better, especially for Radeon cards, so let get into shader caching.
Now a big thing here is turn off Nvidia Reflex, because its only beneficial if you are completely GPU bound, which is impossible if you run low settings and or cap your frames. It manages your frame buffer by slowing the CPU to prevent the GPU from getting behind, but if your not GPU bound your game will just feel like crap. You also will get much more consistent input delay with it off, and stuff like shotgun not shooting twitchy framerate generally goes away as well.
https://preview.redd.it/h8fnuo2ck65d1.png?width=1148&format=png&auto=webp&s=9fcd6d0ec0a33b7cbc61fedd9f3ac9f140bc39ee
Just cap your FPS right below whatever you average around, even a 3060 with DLSS balanced can run 144 on High DX12 1440p, which leads into the next thing, being that higher settings help with better caching. Obviously after a few rounds once the stutter from caching is done you can put it on low, but run something like this to start. Cap FPS, fullscreen, DX12.
https://preview.redd.it/zhi5lodvk65d1.png?width=1163&format=png&auto=webp&s=4d4811030aa4abb2121b5054dd3f287adab3fcfe
https://preview.redd.it/ko0o4df0l65d1.png?width=1137&format=png&auto=webp&s=a8d8ea1afc8dbba61af22eb0bedd02de05b261f2
This runs even like 70 FPS at native 1080p on a 1660. Just drive around for a few games visiting all the biomes and POIs till it evens itself out, then switch back to low or whatever you want for settings once its cached.
If you want DX12 to look like performance mode, put render distance on Low, that runs a locked 160 on a 2060 laptop GPU with a 9th gen i7.
The big thing is setting your cap below what your averaging for frames because consistent frames are better than high frames, and youll get less delay if you arent GPU bound. You may need to play with it to find what works best for you.
Assuming im not forgetting anything this should be close to about it for what you gotta do, lmk how this goes for you, if its still running bad you can always try different nvidia drivers and a windows reinstall if you feel ambituos.
Otherwise yea this should get you a fair bit of improvement, now onto extra stuff.
Now in regards to RAM overclocking, I spent months heavily studying memory tuning and overclocking because of the difference it really makes having good ram with all the timings tightened down, theres a reason on my main system I run DDR5-8000 with all the timings and subtimings tightened way down, its not for everyone but for a hardware enthusiast like me I like that last extra bit, and it results in great dividends on the 1% lows.
https://preview.redd.it/aawjma6o565d1.png?width=415&format=png&auto=webp&s=7905b36fbb477712457ec89c0ca86830a4b0f2a3
https://preview.redd.it/m1xjqiyr665d1.png?width=1397&format=png&auto=webp&s=2b78bf19e451c425929d4a3092b178cbc6618ee9
https://preview.redd.it/iugbkqst665d1.jpg?width=1454&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=ef2fc60c96a240b82d547598219ea8b047cc317b
This of course has spent a lot of time on rigorous stress testing to ensure its absolute stability, dont OC memory if you dont know how to stabilize it, it will slowly corrupt your OS and will make your game run like crap as modern ram has a lot of error correction built in that comes at a performance hit.
My lowly 5800X has no problem maxing out a 3080Ti at a steady 300 FPS on DX12 thanks to its tuned Samsung B Die ram, putting good ram on my 5900X nearly doubled my FPS over the garbage that was on there.
If you want to dive into the world of learning how to identify what ram you have and overclock it properly, theres github guides and plenty of existing resources on the overclocking subreddit, as well as youtube content by guys like Actually Hardcore Overclocking AKA Buildzoid, I learned so much from watching his videos of reacting and critiquing other peoples ram timings, and then diving into his own ram overclocking content.
He even has a great guide for DDR5 on Ryzen 7000 with Hynix memory (almost any 6000 CL30 2x16 kit) that offers some timings that should work for most kits just fine and offer much improvement over stock, just ignore the part about 2033 FCLK as that was simply a bug with AGESA that made the ram run at 6100MT/s which is why it WAS faster, just run 2000 FCLK for DDR5 6000.
It is a valuable skill to learn how to tune ram as it can breathe new life into a underperforming system, but you cant teach a bird how to fly as it is an acquired skill, so if you want to really make this game fly, you should learn how to tune your ram.

submitted by DryClothes2894 to FortNiteBR [link] [comments]

2024.06.07 16:02 eregis BB Bookclub September voting: Retro Rainbow Reads

Thank you for all the nominations! I have collected the top 5 (after that there was a big gap in upvotes at the time when I checked the post) into a poll that will decide what book the BB Bookclub will be reading in September, for the Retro Rainbow Reads theme - books published before December 31st 1999.
The nominees are:

Ammonite by Nicola Griffith

Change or die. These are the only options available on the planet Jeep. Centuries earlier, a deadly virus shattered the original colony, killing the men and forever altering the few surviving women. Now, generations after the colony has lost touch with the rest of humanity, a company arrives to exploit Jeep–and its forces find themselves fighting for their lives. Terrified of spreading the virus, the company abandons its employees, leaving them afraid and isolated from the natives. In the face of this crisis, anthropologist Marghe Taishan arrives to test a new vaccine. As she risks death to uncover the women’s biological secret, she finds that she, too, is changing–and realizes that not only has she found a home on Jeep, but that she alone carries the seeds of its destruction. . . .

The Fire's Stone by Tanya Huff

THIEF, SWORDSMAN, AND WIZARDESS
AARON. Clan Heir, he has fled his people when his beloved was slain by his own father's command, abandoning his training, duty and beliefs to become a thief. A master of his trade, he now dared the odds in Ischia, city of the volcano, where the price of being caught was death.
DARVISH. Prince of Ischia, third son of a king who had no intention of giving up his throne. The prince was a drunkard, a lover, and a wastrel, yet was gifted with sword skills and with the ability to charm all around him. But not even his charm could free him from the political marriage now being planned.
CHANDRA. Born a princess, she had chosen to become a Wizard of the Nine, that rarest of beings, able to master all the forms that sorcery could take. Now, promised as Darvish's bride, she undertook a desperate journey to Ischia to convince him they must not wed.
Aaron, Darvish, Chandra—three strangers whose fates were about to become interwined. For someone had stolen The Stone, the magical talisman which stood between Ischia and the volcano's wrath. And unless the three could learn to work together on a quest to find the Stone, Ischia would drown in a sea of lava.

Sing the Four Quarters by Tanya Huff

To call the kigh was the height of bard's magic. Only those born with the gift could learn to Sing these spirits of earth, air, fire and water into doing their bidding, and even someone as gifted as the Princess Annice must spend years studying at the Bardic Hall to truly master the Art. And for Annice, one of those rare talents able to Sing the elemental spirits from each of the four quarters, the call of magic was too strong to be denied, even if it meant renouncing her royal blood and privileges.
But Annice might have made a different choice if she could have foreseen that ten years after she'd transferred her life and loyalties from the Royal Palace to the Bardic Hall, she'd find herself fleeing from the King's Guards. For Annice was twice guilty of treason, first for imperiling the order of succession by becoming pregnant, and second for aiding the father of her unborn child, the Duc of Ohrid, to escape the palace dungeons and the sentence of death hanging over his head.
Now the fugitives' only hope lay in tracking down and bringing to justice the enemy who'd masterminded the Duc's downfall, a dangerous foe who had found a way to tie lies and truths together into a knot even the most powerful of Bardic spells could not unravel...

Bingo (that I know of): First in a Series (HM), Bards (HM), Pubbed in the 90s (HM)

Magic's Pawn by Mercedes Lackey

Mage-Craft—
Though Vanyel has been born with near-legendary abilities to work both Herald and Mage magic, he wants no part of such things. Nor does he seek a warrior's path, wishing instead to become a Bard. Yet such talent as his if left untrained may prove a menace not only to Vanyel but to others as well. So he is sent to be fostered with his aunt, Savil, one of the famed Herald-Mages of Valdemar.
But, strong-willed and self-centered, Vanyel is a challenge which even Savil can not master alone. For soon he will become the focus of frightening forces, lending his raw magic to a spell that unleashes terrifying wyr-hunters on the land. And by the time Savil seeks the assistance of a Shin'a'in Adept, Vanyel's wild talent may have already grown beyond anyone's ability to contain, placing Vanyel, Savil, and Valdemar itself in desperate peril...

Bingo: First in a Series

Gossamer Axe by Gael Baudino

When her lover is imprisoned, Christa—a centuries-old harper—must set her free using the greatest weapon she possesses: music
In ancient Ireland, Chairiste Ní Cummen, a harper, was trained in the secrets of music and magic, but her curiosity and pride trapped her and her lover in the realm of the fairy folk, the Sidh. Chairiste alone managed to escape, and now, living in the modern world as Christa Cruitaire, a quiet harp teacher, she is all but resigned to her inability to win her beloved’s freedom . . . until she discovers that the volume and violence of the electric guitar and heavy metal might prove brutal enough to forcibly breach the barriers between the human and fairy worlds. With the aid of her bandmates—who must themselves overcome inner demons of abuse, addiction, and prejudice—Christa is determined to use her newfound musical power to rescue the woman she loves.

Vote here!

The poll will be open until June 10th, at which point I'll post the winner in the sub and announce the discussion dates. What is the BB Bookclub? You can read about it in our intro thread here.

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2024.06.07 10:16 joe-stuff UK election season is upon us - let insanity ensue

Absolutely Brilliant one of the best e-mails in ages! Nigel Farage UKIP
This is what he said:
"I am the Tory Party's Worst Nightmare. I am a White, Tax-Paying, God fearing English man. I am a hard working Brit and I work long hours to earn a living.
I believe in God and the freedom of religion, But I don't push it on others.
I believe in British products And buy them whenever I can.
I believe the money I make belongs to me And not to some governmental functionary, To share with others who don't work!
I think owning a home doesn't make you a capitalist; It makes you a smart Brit.
I think being a minority does not make you noble or victimized,
And does not entitle you to anything. Get over it. Join in with the majority!
I believe that if you are selling me a Big Mac, You should do it in English. I believe there should be no other language option.
I believe everyone has a right to pray to his or her God When and where they want to.
My heroes are fellow Brits like Freddy Flintoff And Winston Churchill And I know I've missed a few thousand!!!!!
I don't hate the rich. What I hate is the way they always manage to avoid paying proper taxes. I don't pity the poor, I just hate the way they are always moaning that they are hard done by!!
I know wrestling is fake And I don't waste my time watching or arguing about it.
I believe if you don't like the way things are here, Go back to where you came from And change your own country!
This is ENGLAND .....
We like it the way it is and even more so the way it was So stop trying to change it to look like some other socialist country!
If you were born or legally migrated here And don't like it... You are free to move To any Socialist country that will have you. I believe it is time to really clean house, Starting with the House of Commons, The seat of our biggest problems.
I want to know where the "Do Gooders" get their money from, And why are they always part of the problem and not the solution? Can I get an AMEN on that one?
I also think the cops have the right to pull you over if you're breaking the law, Regardless of what race, colour or creed you are. And, no, I don't mind having my face shown on my driving licence. I think it's good....
I dislike those people trying to guilt me into making 'donations' to their cause. Get a job and support yourself and your family!
I believe 'illegal' is illegal no matter what the lawyers think!
I believe the Union Jack flag should be allowed to be flown Anywhere in the United Kingdom !
If this makes me a BAD Brit, Then yes, I'm a BAD Brit. If you are a BAD Brit too, Please forward this to everyone you know....
We want our country back! My Country.....
I hope this offends all illegal aliens.
My great, great grandfather watched as his friends died in the Boer War. My grandfather watched and bled as his friends died in World Wars 1&2. I watched as my friends died in Sierra Leone Bosnia , & Desert Storm. Our sons and daughters watched & bled as their friends Died in Afghanistan and Iraq . None of them died for the Afghanistan and Iraq Flag. Every Briton died for the British flag.
At one high school, Foreign students raised a Middle East flag on a school flag pole. British students took it down. Guess who was expelled. The students who took it down .
West London high school students were sent home, Because they wore T-shirts with the Union Jack flag printed on them.
What is going on?? What idiots do we have in authority?? Enough is enough.
This message needs to be viewed by every Brit; And every Briton needs to stand up for Britain . We've bent over to appease the Brit-haters long enough. I'm taking a stand.
I'm standing up because of the millions Who died fighting in wars for this country,
And for the British flag.
And shame on anyone who tries to Make this a racist message. IT IS NOT ! Britons, stop giving away Your RIGHTS !
THIS IS OUR COUNTRY !
This statement DOES NOT mean I'm against immigration !
YOU ARE WELCOME HERE, IN MY COUNTRY, Welcome to come legally:

Get a sponsor !
Learn the LANGUAGE, as immigrants have in the past!
Live by OUR rules ! Dress as we Britons Do
Get a job !
Pay YOUR Taxes !
No Social Security until you have earned it and paid for it !
Find a place to lay your head !

If you don't want to forward this for fear of offending someone, then YOU'RE PART OF THE PROBLEM !
We've gone so far the other way. bent over backwards not to offend anyone.
WAKE UP BRITAIN ! ! !
If you do not Pass this on, may your fingers cramp !
Made in BRITAIN & DAMN PROUD OF IT!!!!!"
AMEN"
Nigel Farage UKIP
This email is free from viruses and malware because avast! Antivirus protection is active.

submitted by joe-stuff to copypasta [link] [comments]

2024.06.07 09:08 sonicthememester2 Dude I fucking hate sublime (Rant)

For this unawakened, sublime is (I am not shotting you) a bacteria inside of people’s heads that makes them hate mutants… Basically racist cover WHAT!? Ok, not only does it devalue the entire message of X-Men but also goes against how the mutants are stand in for actual minorities and their struggles (racism, homophobia, ableism) instead of it being propaganda fearr like “ooh, so and so are dangerous and they hurt us” and “x are gonna to replace wooh” it’s fucking “ooh boy I’m sick, coughs coughs, better call people slurs” LIKE WHAT!?? The whole entire point of X-Men is that it shows people who have to face bigotry, fighting against bigotry. Hell, fucking magneto, what I like about him is while he’s the X-Men’s arch nemesis he isn’t a mustache twirling bigot, he’s basically on the same side just radical. But now!? NOW? They fucking fighting sick people are you kidding me with this..god damn.. like… whoever wrote this, why??? Just, WHY?? Why was this a good idea? Why would this get approved? Why would anyone, think about this in general and not think about how this franchise is about civil rights and bigotry How..what?? You can argue “ooh it gives explanation” FHERE ALREADY IS mutants could be seen as “dangerous” and “replacing normal people” and heck some of them to a regular human look creepy (I.E eye boy and NightCrawler) you’re telling me all of that fear and hatred is just because gramps(or gram gram) DIDNT TAKE THEIR PILLS?? Are you freakin serious? This undermines everything, the Genoshan attacks, sentinels, the riots…god so much for all that real world reflections, pfft who needs that when we can just the virus Bigotry can’t be fought! It’s an idea that seeps into the minds and vessels of people, to make them think what they shouldn’t think! And I don’t mean literally I meant figuratively!! GOD DAMN Whose idea wa ethos!!!! Magneto is just fighting sick eppple instead of bigots, COULD YOU OMAGINE BEING MAGNETO AND BEING TOLD YOU CPULDVE JUST USE A VACCINE AT THE PEOPLE WHO ATTACKED HOM AND EVERYTHING WOULDVE BEEN HUNCKY DOORY Imagine if in a twisted change of fate that real world bigotry is actually due to real world virus, trust me, haha I’m gonna fucking laugh X,D Anyways that was my rant I needed to get this out, if i misinterpreted this, PLEASE for the love of god tell me I was wrong, just hopefully I am, and it’s actually symbolism I’m out, I’m outy-5000, chain chomp yomp! Be sure to like, comment..subscribe,…I don’t really care anymore CUE THE MUSIX play wolverines theme from children of the atom

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2024.06.07 08:45 healthmedicinet Health Daily News June 6 2024

DAY: JUNE 6 2024
6-6-2024

Digital games may be an overlooked ally in mental health

Playing Wordle or Sudoku each morning over a cup of coffee probably won’t boost your brain powers, but the mood and confidence lift these games provide is reason enough to keep playing, new University of Oregon research shows. Researchers from UO’s School of Journalism and Communication investigated brain-training games, collections of puzzles and quizzes that are marketed to help sharpen the mind but lack scientific backing.
6-6-2024

Alcohol can cause breast cancer, but most women in the US aren’t aware of the health risks

Did you know that casual drinks with friends or having a “wine mom” moment to unwind could actually be nudging up your risk for breast cancer? It sounds like a buzzkill. But it’s a truth that many might not know: Alcohol actually causes breast cancer. The World Health Organization and the National Institute on Alcohol Abuse and Alcoholism lay it out pretty clearly: Compared to those who don’t drink, just one drink a day can bump up your breast cancer risk by 5% to 9%. As alcohol and cancer researchers,
6-6-2024

Hydration is really important for learning. How much do kids need to drink?

Last month, Ballarat Clarendon College began a trial to ban water bottles in the classroom for students in Years 5 to 9. According to the school, “early feedback” indicated it had reduced noise and bathroom breaks during class time. Along with becoming a status symbol and fashion item, water bottles are now considered essential for school. So, how much water do children need in a day? And what impact does it have on their brains? How much fluid do children and teenagers need? The amount of fluid children need will
6-6-2024

Why do we love to see unlikely animal friendships? A psychology expert explains

The internet is awash with stories and videos of unlikely animal friendships, often with many millions of views. This content typically shows animals from different species showing affection to one another, signifying a bond or even a “friendship.” These relationships have been captured in people’s homes, such as with Molly the magpie and Peggy the dog, in zoos, such as with Baloo the bear, Leo the lion and Shere Khan the tiger, and even in the wild, such as one case of a fox and
6-6-2024

The sneaky ways junk food brands get positive news coverage

Public health experts are calling for government action to protect Australians from the influence of the unhealthy food, alcohol, and advertising industries, after new research published today unveiled the “sly” ways they exploit Australian consumers. Two new papers published in the Australian and New Zealand Journal of Public Health showcase industry tactics, from generating news coverage promoting unhealthy foods, to co-opting not-for-profit organizations to push-back against government marketing reforms. In one study, researchers analyzed the way that fast food restaurants use public relations (PR) tactics to generate positive news coverage
6-6-2024

Women with excess weight as a teen or young adult may have higher stroke risk by age 55

In an analysis of more than 50 years of health data, women who had overweight or obesity at age 14 or 31 were more likely to have an ischemic (clot-caused) stroke before age 55, according to research published today in Stroke. According to the American Heart Association, an ischemic stroke occurs when a vessel supplying blood to the brain is obstructed. Ischemic stroke is the most common type of stroke and accounts for about 87% of all strokes. The study conducted in Finland suggests that women with excessive weight at
6-6-2024

From cycling to sex, skin patches promise to make their mark

New high-performance skin patches will help people monitor vital health signs during exercise. What do cycling, showering and making love have in common? All three activities prove the usefulness of a new generation of skin patches that can monitor people’s vital signs like blood pressure and heart rate, according to Professor Klas Hjort, head of the microsystems technology program at Uppsala University in Sweden. Patch work While “smart wearables” are already very much on the market and in people’s lives, researchers are seeking to improve the technologies in areas such
6-6-2024

Do you really need compression socks on long flights?

Since the dawn of the jet age, travelers have been warned about the risks of dangerous blood clots while flying. In recent years, those warnings have often been accompanied by advice to wear compression socks. But the case for keeping them on your packing list isn’t as clear-cut as you might expect. “It’s perfectly fine to use them,” said Dr. Joshua Beckman, director of vascular medicine at UT Southwestern Medical Center in Dallas, but science can’t say exactly how much they might help travelers. Compression socks—sometimes referred to as graduated
6-6-2024

Hidden challenges of tooth loss and dentures revealed in new study

The hidden challenges faced by people with tooth loss and dentures have been identified by new research from the University of Sheffield. Improvements in dental care, more people living longer, and the social value placed on having a healthy smile has led to people keeping their own teeth longer, but it has also led to an increasing number of people needing some kind of restoration work, including crowns, bridges and implants. Many of these treatments remain unobtainable for most people due to the availability of NHS dentists and the high
6-6-2024

Music therapy helps stroke survivors regain lost speech by singing

Ray Hart’s vocabulary consisted of just one word after his August 2022 stroke. “Yep” was all he could say, said Pamela Jenkins, his caregiver and partner of 24 years. Like many survivors, Hart, 62, can understand what’s said to him almost as well as he could before the stroke, but it’s still hard for him to form complete sentences. Now, though, a year after adding music therapy to his rehabilitation schedule, he can sing them. “I’ve got sunshine on a cloudy day,” he sang during a recent
6-6-2024

Many US women unhappy with maternal health care, poll finds

Many women are unhappy with the state of U.S. maternal health care, but a major new poll finds most Americans don’t understand how badly the nation lags behind other wealthy countries in this area. Only about 2 in 5 (42%) women currently pregnant or ever pregnant strongly felt they had access to the best possible medical care while pregnant, down significantly from 50% in 2022, according to The Harris Poll’s second annual survey on the state of maternal health care. Women reported similar numbers regarding their health care while giving
6-6-2024

What toilet paper and game shows can teach us about the spread of epidemics

How can we explain and predict human behavior? Are mathematics and probability up to the task, or are humans too complex and irrational? Often, people’s actions take us by surprise, particularly when they seem irrational. Take the COVID pandemic: one thing nobody saw coming was a rush on toilet paper that left supermarket shelves bare in many countries. But by combining ideas from mathematics, economics and behavioral science, researchers were eventually able to make mathematical models of how panic spreads between people, which made
6-6-2024

Vigorous exercise may preserve cognition in high-risk patients with hypertension

People with high blood pressure have a higher risk of cognitive impairment, including dementia, but a new study from researchers at Wake Forest University School of Medicine suggests that engaging in vigorous physical activity more than once a week can lower that risk. The findings appear in Alzheimer’s & Dementia. “We know that physical exercise offers many benefits, including lowering blood pressure, improving heart health and potentially delaying
6-6-2024

Study links xylitol to increased risk of heart attack and stroke

Cleveland Clinic researchers found higher amounts of the sugar alcohol xylitol are associated with increased risk of cardiovascular events like heart attack and stroke. The team, led by Stanley Hazen, M.D., Ph.D., confirmed the association in a large-scale patient analysis, preclinical research models and a clinical intervention study. Findings were published in the European Heart Journal. Xylitol is a common sugar substitute used in sugar-free candy, gums, baked goods and oral products like toothpaste. Over the past decade, the use of sugar substitutes, including sugar alcohols and artificial sweeteners, has
6-6-2024

Researchers unveil pioneering approach to combat age-related vision loss

Researchers discovered a new treatment for age-related macular degeneration (AMD), the leading cause of vision loss among older adults. Featured on the cover of the journal Science Translational Medicine, this research reveals that boosting a specific protein, IRAK-M, in retinal cells could offer a new and highly effective therapy for AMD. AMD can severely impact a person’s vision. Patients suffering from AMD
6-6-2024

New combination therapy shows promise for bladder cancer patients unresponsive to standard treatment

In an advance that could transform bladder cancer treatment, a novel combination of cretostimogene grenadenorepvec and pembrolizumab has shown remarkable efficacy in patients with Bacillus Calmette-Guérin (BCG)-unresponsive non-muscle invasive bladder cancer. Results from the phase 2 CORE-001 trial, published today in Nature Medicine, reveal a significant improvement in complete response rates and long-term disease control, offering new hope for patients with this challenging condition who face limited treatment options. The trial included patients with BCG-unresponsive carcinoma in situ of the bladder, a condition that is notoriously difficult to treat and
6-6-2024

Researchers say AI blood test provides a reliable way to identify lung cancer

Using artificial intelligence technology to identify patterns of DNA fragments associated with lung cancer, researchers from the Johns Hopkins Kimmel Cancer Center and other institutions have developed and validated a liquid biopsy that may help identify lung cancer earlier. In a prospective study published June 3 in Cancer Discovery, the team demonstrated that artificial intelligence technology could identify people more likely to have
6-6-2024

Unpaid care disproportionately affects low-income households across Europe

Unpaid care has a huge impact on mental health and is more likely to be provided by people from low-income households, finds a landmark Europe-wide study by researchers at UCL and St George’s, University of London. The Eurocare research examined unpaid care provided by people of all ages across Europe. The researchers found that around 1 in 10 people aged 15 to 29 across Europe are caregivers. More than a quarter (27%) of these young adult caregivers come from households ranked in the bottom fifth
6-6-2024

Community-based screening analysis emphasizes need for hypertension screening in young athletes

A substantial portion of are at risk of hypertension, according to a study presented at the American College of Cardiology’s Care of the Athletic Heart conference, held June 6–8 in Washington. High blood pressure, also known as hypertension, occurs in 47% of adults in the U.S., according to CardioSmart.org. Over time, hypertension weakens the heart, blood vessels and kidneys, paving the way for potential stroke or heart attack. Often referred to as the “silent killer,” high blood pressure is a leading risk factor for heart disease and early death. The
6-6-2024

Study finds mpox continues to circulate at low numbers among gay and bisexual men who have sex with men

While mpox cases have sharply declined since the 2022 global outbreak, they continue to occur in the U.S. among gay and bisexual men who have sex with men (GBMSM), according to a UCLA-led study from EMERGEncy ID NET, a multi-site surveillance network. Though no cases were found in women, children or the unhoused, vigilance and vaccination remain important, the researchers write. The findings will be published June 6 in Morbidity and Mortality Weekly Report. Mpox, formerly known as monkeypox, is an infection endemic in Africa that is transmitted by skin-to-skin
6-6-2024

Younger children are more commonly diagnosed with ADHD than their older classmates, says new study

New research, led by experts at the University of Nottingham, has found that teachers may be attributing signs of age-related immaturity in children, to conditions such as Attention-Deficit/Hyperactivity Disorder (ADHD) or Autism Spectrum Disorder (ASD). The results of the study, which are published in the journal European Child & Adolescent Psychiatry, showed that the youngest students in a class, with birth dates just before the school entry cut-off date, were overrepresented among children receiving an ADHD diagnosis or medication for the condition. Experts looked at
6-6-2024

Researchers find flavor restrictions affect tobacco buyers differently depending on socioeconomic status

Restricting menthol flavor in cigarettes while making nicotine replacement therapy, such as a skin patch that can help ease withdrawal, more available and affordable has the potential to reduce socioeconomic disparities in tobacco use. That was one of the findings in a study published in May in Nicotine and Tobacco Research that marks a
6-6-2024

Gender-specific social factors may reduce the risk of cardiovascular disease

Differences in social factors that may reduce cardiovascular disease (CVD) risk for men and women have been identified by Monash University-led research using a field of artificial intelligence (AI). Published in the Journal of Epidemiology and Community Health, researchers employed machine learning (ML) algorithms to pinpoint key predictors of CVD from a set of 25 social factors. The study found that being married/partnered, or having social support from others, was associated with a reduced risk of CVD for men and women. For men, activities like playing chess or cards, having
6-6-2024

Long COVID’s toll outlined in new report

Long COVID continues to plague millions of Americans as the health costs of the pandemic linger four years later, a new report warns. In a hefty document released Wednesday, the National Academies of Sciences, Engineering and Medicine, a nongovernmental group that advises federal agencies on science and medicine, detailed the damage that Long COVID has wrought. “Diagnosing, measuring and treating Long COVID is complicated. This disease, which has existed in humans for less than five years, can present differently from person to person and can either resolve within weeks or
6-6-2024

Precision laser surgery cuts focal epileptic seizure spread

In a busy hospital waiting room, a young man’s muscles began contracting in a harsh, unyielding spasm as a quick-acting student rushed to his aid. “We ran over to help stabilize the patient. To my surprise, his mother calmly reassured us that his seizure was a routine occurrence due to his epilepsy,” said Seth Lieberman, Ph.D. ’21, D.V.M. ’24, who was an undergraduate student at the time.
6-6-2024

Study finds omega-3 therapy prevents birth-related brain injury in newborn rodents

An injectable emulsion containing two omega-3 fatty acids found in fish oil markedly reduced brain damage in newborn rodents after a disruption in the flow of oxygen to the brain near birth, a study by researchers at Columbia University Vagelos College of Physicians and Surgeons has found. The findings are published in the journal Biomedicine & Pharmacotherapy. Brain injury due to insufficient oxygen is a severe complication of labor and delivery that occurs in one to three out of every 1,000
6-6-2024

Possible mechanism for multiple sclerosis detected

The role that Epstein-Barr virus (EBV) plays in the development of multiple sclerosis (MS) may be caused by a higher level of cross-reactivity, where the body’s immune system binds to the wrong target, than previously thought. In a new study published in PLOS Pathogens, researchers looked at blood samples from people with MS, as well as healthy people infected with EBV and

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2024.06.07 08:04 Dimetro_Sparks You've seen me do Kong, now it's Godzilla's turn!

Same response as always! Enjoy the show! Though I think you'll all quite like this, especially since a fan-favorite makes a return here! (Fair warning, as usual, it's very long)
We start off with the Legendary and Warner Bros. logos, before a haunting children's choir blares out as the black cuts to a ruined city, filled with debris, smoke and fires about, ruins all around as many human bodies and wrecked buildings are scattered around. As the "screen" takes a view of the carnage, the sounds of what sounds like a child screaming gradually becomes louder. The "screen" gets more distorted as it enters into a large fog, getting more shaky and shrouded in darkness, before the pure darkness is broken by a pair of red eyes as a harrowing roar, which sounds like a high-pitched alien scream rings out. White lights flash all over the place, and we see Godzilla's eye opening, as whatever epic opening your mind makes happens, before the title seeps in like the gas following it.
The film follows Dr. Mark Russell (Kyle Chandler), having been alerted by "yet another report of Godzilla on the move". He enters a Monarch base of operations in Puerto Rico, asking what's the deal with Godzilla, with Dr. Ilene Chen (Zhang Ziyi) reporting that the King of the Monsters has changed locations yet again, from the Polynesian Islands to Kazakhstan, seemingly rapidly changing locations in a short period of time for whatever reason. Dr. Rick Stanton (Bradley Whitford) snarked that the G-Man was taking a world tour, and was received just as well as you'd expect. Dr. Sam Coleman (Thomas Middleditch) confirmed that he's choosing human civilizations specifically, and wondered if maybe Godzilla was sick of humanity's crap, but Mark retorted that there's no way he's acting out like this without a good reason (Yes, Mark has increased braincells since the Mechagodzilla Incident in 2024). Just then, he gets a call from his daughter, Madison Russell (Millie Bobby Brown).
Speaking of Madison, she was working at a Monarch site in Venezuela, wanting to understand more of the Titans in the world (and maybe slightly follow her father's footsteps ever since Mark finally treats her like she's a grown woman). Anyways, she asks her father if he's gotten the alert of Godzilla, and Mark confirms. Madison then sent her father a camera from an Outpost in Hawaii, where Godzilla looks to be looking around, and using his claws to dig through buildings and even the mountains and the ground. Mark, and the rest of the Monarch Top Brass after showing it to them, comes to the conclusion that he's searching for something. For what exactly, it's unclear. But whatever he's searching for, it's agreed that it is extremely dangerous if it caught the King's attention.
Mark asks his daughter to see if there is more information about Godzilla's personality change as Monarch sets off to Kazakhstan to evacuate the people, and she agrees. Madison calls a friend of hers situated in Germany, young genius Neil Trott (Brady Noon), who was in the middle of tinkering with high-end technology for monitoring Godzilla, and explains the situation. Neil was pretty excited to use his stuff to scour out what could be irritating Godzilla, and gets to work, the "camera" being Neil's, making it look like a first-person perspective, recording them and sending the results to Madison. Back with Monarch, the team has landed in Kazakhstan, where Godzilla was going out of control as the citizens were being evacuated. The Kazakhstan army were deployed to stop him from destroying any more of their city, but it was in vain as the G-Man wiped the floor with their tanks and fighter jets. Mark briefly locked eyes with Godzilla as the King backed out into the waters, and saw, among other emotions, one he never expected to see: Fear.
Back to Neil and his "first person camera perspective", it starts to turn to dusk as he gets to around three blocks, when his scanner goes haywire as it leads him to an abandoned tunnel… or so he thought. Neil enters, and finds a weird, grey nacreous substance… before he finds himself getting ambushed by a group of thugs, knocking him out. Cut back to Monarch, as everyone in base is on edge, frantically searching for where Godzilla could make landfall next. It's gotten so bad, that Madison herself came to base to help with the ongoing and escalating problem. Until Coleman finds Godzilla's next target: Germany. Madison panics, and calls Neil to warn him, but he's not responding. Cut back to Neil, who awakens and finds himself tied to a chair in a knot, and stares up at his captors, who appear to have their own base. The leader (Theo James) explained everything to Neil.
The leader was originally a normal man, living with his family, and doting on his daughter, until 2024, in Mechagodzilla's short reign of terror. The Leader's family was relaxing in Pensacola, Florida at the time, when Godzilla attacked the APEX Base there. While the Leader and his wife survived, their daughter… sadly didn't. Ever since, he has been plotting a way to destroy the King for revenge, and has allied himself with three other people who have lost their families and their (not literal) lives to Titans, and have found a solution in the form of their creation: The grey nacreous substance.
Using it, it will enter a Titan's bloodstream, rapidly destroy the Titan's cells, kill them, and multiply itself with each Titan it kills. And they plan to sic it on Neil, for finding out about their secret. As Neil panics and struggles to break free before the substance devours him, the tunnels blow open as Godzilla's Atomic Breath slices through the area, still in his searching rampage and stomping around Berlin a few miles away. The collapsing tunnels buried the gang alive, but Neil takes the opportunity to get his things, and get the hell out of there. He turns around to grab the grey substance, but does a double take when it vanishes with no trace. Back with Monarch, as the team has landed in Germany, Madison is searching the ruins, begging Neil to be alive, before he spots her, to her relief. Neil reported everything to Monarch, including the grey substance, and during Stanton's question of what a jar of living Play-Doh is gonna do to them, what it's capable of. This substance sees itself as top priority, and a ground team was immediately sent out to find it, with help from the German military to evacuate the injured and the citizens.
Unbeknownst to them, as the evacuation is underway, a young British boy named Lloyd Abbott (Tristan Ruggeri) was separated from his parents and found himself lost in the ruins of Germany. Lloyd was scared as he calls out to his mother and wanders Germany, until he spotted something: The grey nacreous substance, near what looked like some magenta particles and glowing magenta with a hint of gold. Lloyd was curious, and for whatever reason, felt compelled to go it, like it was calling to him, and it surprisingly calmed him down. He got to it and stared at it for a few seconds, but then the substance let out a tentacle and wrapped itself around Lloyd's wrist. As Lloyd panicked, more tentacles wrapped itself around his body and dragged him closer to itself as the substance wrapped itself around him and absorbing his body. Lloyd let out a long scream of terror, echoing throughout the abandoned streets of Germany, before it takes over his head, and his scream starts getting lower, longer and distorted before stopping.
As dusk fully awakens for the humans, their search was unsuccessful as the ground team came up with nothing, with both Madison and Mark concluding that it must have been moved or destroyed when Godzilla attacked the city. Madison suggested the possibility of the substance being what Godzilla's so pissed off about. Mark can't help but admit that it does have some merit, especially after learning what it can do to a Titan, but they can't rule out all possibilities of a world-class Titan threat, something Madison agrees with (you know, because she theorized that same thing with Mechagodzilla in 2024?). Suddenly, an alarm goes off, alerting them of major Titan activity in Guatemala. Which also happens to be where Godzilla was headed next, so they decided to trail after him.
In Guatemala, just as the alarm sounds off, we see Behemoth lumbering about in the coast and its forests, when he stopped for a drink. Unaware of the rippling of the water and whatever was disturbing it coming closer… Behemoth stopped drinking as he looks around the ocean for a while, before a grey colored gas with golden tints surrounds the area. He turns around to investigate… and something erupted out of the water and grabbed Behemoth, dragging him into the water and assaulting the mammalian Titan as he is unable to fight back properly. Behemoth slammed a claw onto his assailant, but it barely fazed it, and in fact, looked like it phased through the creature. Just as Behemoth was about to have its throat slammed down by it, Amhuluk charges in and throws it off. Behemoth stares in what looked like shock as Amhuluk basically helped him up to his feet. Both Titans were ready to combat the threat as the creature leaped out and struck Amhuluk, with the mere contact shockingly burning and decaying Amhuluk's wood body, before lunging at the two roaring Titans.
Back to Godzilla and the humans, who have just made landfall on Guatemala, they stopped to stare in shock as Behemoth and Amhuluk were lying on the beaches, writhing in agony as they looked like they were scared, while a grey gas with golden tints surrounds the area, and the surrounding earth around them looked like it was dry and sucked of life, a major shock to both King of the Monsters and humanity alike. Both of them suddenly took off in separate directions. Godzilla suddenly shakes his head in pain as he gains that same vision from the beginning, and turns to find the creature, searching Rio de Janeiro, where he last brawled with the Skar King and Shimo. Chen remarks that whatever attacked Behemoth and Amhuluk, it was powerful, fast, and must be terrifying. Stanton quipped that maybe it could break Usain Bolt's record and gain a new spot in World Wrestling. Coleman looks over and finds trails of the creature: a grey nacreous substance. This confirms both Madison's and Mark's theories, that it was a combination of both threats attacking the world.
Godzilla finally locks on to his target. He doesn't know what it is, only that it's ridiculously fast underwater, managed to beat and terrify both Behemoth and Amhuluk, shockingly managed to convince them to work together, and most importantly, was draining the environment of its natural resources, a major no-no for the King. Now he's finally got it where he wanted it. Using all his energy to rocket down the ocean, he zoomed to where it attacked next: Lindi, Tanzania. The monster was attacking the cities in a rage, and in the process was siphoning the energy of the world, until it got an Atomic Breath to the back of its head. Godzilla furiously walked up and roared at the monster, who turned its head around to reveal itself as the humans finally gets a good look at its identity. It's Hedorah. It looked like a grey misshapen Shimo with wide unblinking red eyes and covered in the grey nacreous substance all over.
Hedorah roared as Godzilla interrupted its harvesting of the resources, and a fearsome brawl ensued. Godzilla fought well, but none of his usual attacks were doing anything to Hedorah, his claws and tail only inconveniencing Hedorah thanks to his substance. Even his Atomic Breath, which seemed to wound it, was useless due to the substance regenerating the injuries at a ludicrous speed. Hedorah then decided Godzilla had his fun long enough, now it was his turn. He attacked the King, his extending arms tossing and turning Godzilla around. But that wasn't what was shocking. It was the fact that Hedorah began glowing red as it was siphoning energy from Godzilla into himself. Godzilla was screaming in pain as he charged up an Atomic Breath and blasted it into Hedorah's face to get him off, but it was too late. Hedorah now has the ability to let out a beam of his own, and uses his new "Ion Roar" to push Godzilla back a considerable distance. Red energy pulses through Godzilla as Hedorah expels four barbed tentacles from his back, glowing gold and injects three of them into Godzilla, who roars in pain, just for his tail to smack the fourth one away… and whip the aircraft carrying Monarch, injecting the surrounding area into a thick grey fog.
It was darkness for Mark for a few seconds, before he finds himself in the ruins of San Francisco, all the way back in 2014. The place was devoid of any life as he looks around the burning city. He then turns around at a sound, and comes face to face with his late son Andrew (Bentley Storteboom). As Mark stares in disbelief as to what was going on, Andrew stares wordlessly. Lights flash as Mark's vision distorts, and he is now in the ruins of Boston, in 2019. Mark comes face to face with the (horrifically burned) visage of his ex-wife, Dr. Emma Russell (Vera Farmiga), who is once again preaching about her whole "release the Titans to take back what's their's" spiel. As Mark looks around this living nightmare, Andrew appears, lifts Mark's eyes up to a light in the sky, and gently closes his father's eyes. When Mark opens them, he was in a new location, one not his own, and realizes everyone present was looking at him in shock and horror. Madison shakily asked if that was what was going through his mind the whole time on those two days, and Mark realized that whatever Hedorah did, it was bringing back terrible memories, and everyone was audience to it.
We are treated to various traumatic experiences of the other Monarch personnel, including Madison's terror in Boston's battle and her trauma of King Ghidorah, Chen's visions of Dr. Serizawa (Ken Watanabe) and of his sacrifice, and one of Mothra's death psychically linked to her, and most shockingly, Rick's losses throughout his life, such as his father, his son, his wife, and his beliefs that he will die alone and unloved. The trips down memory street gets cut off by an incessant beeping, which snaps everybody out of the visions, and Coleman reveals that Godzilla's vitals are fluctuating at an astonishing rate, his emotions, especially fear, rising while his radiation levels are decreasing, and the humans (and us) see the event that was alluded to, but never seen before until now: The Great Titan War. We see Godzilla in a much different Earth, battling the Skar King's army, only for it to reach that fateful moment when the Great Apes managed to pin him down and clamp his jaws, before the Skar King himself menacingly strolls over, grinning sadistically, wielding a sharp weapon made from a Titan, before slamming it down on Godzilla. Before it could, the memory dispersed as Godzilla roared and sent out a full-power Atomic Breath to Hedorah's face. It got the monster off of him, but Hedorah got what he wanted absorbing Godzilla's radiation, and promptly took off, his whole body glowing red and magenta.
Everybody needed a moment to take in the smorgasbord of stuff that went down just down. Mark needed to find a way to defeat Hedorah, and asked for any suggestions from Monarch. Stanton stated in an extremely cold voice: "Here's one. Kill that abomination of nature, and make sure it dies slowly." Stanton now DESPISED Hedorah with every fiber of his being, no doubt due to unintentionally exposing his traumatic past. Their discussion gets cut off when they hear one of their equipment beeping rapidly, showing Godzilla lying weakly on the ground, his radiation levels dropping significantly. Their veterinarians found a foreign pathogenic substance in Godzilla's system, depriving him of his radiation and weakening him, a virus borne from Hedorah. Everybody at Monarch worked ASAP to treat Godzilla, and all of them seem to be going too slowly for their comfort, until Coleman suggested one possible solution: They inject pure radiation from the Hollow Earth's solar winds. Having already collected samples thanks to the Hollow Earth team, they injected the solutions into Godzilla. The act worked, and Godzilla immediately got up and swam off to settle this crisis with Hedorah once and for all. Mark told Coleman to remind him to give him a raise for this.
Monarch follows Godzilla in the case he needed another dose of radiation to get back into the fight. It was there that their sensors reported that Godzilla was making a beeline to Europe again. In a matter of moments, Godzilla made landfall in London, England. The Monarch team was forced to land their aircraft when a thick, heavy fog obscures their vision and their sensors. Thanks to Hedorah's abilities, London is more of a ghost town than anything. What follows is a shift in the camera to a "first-person" approach as we are treated to shadows and silhouettes among the smoke and fog, as paranoia increases, and the occasional Londoners suffering from Hedorah's hallucinogenic smog, with one poor soul even looking and feeling like he's fused into a Godzilla suit and is acting more feral and deranged. Luckily, Neil and Madison's genre savviness allowed them to not breathe in the gas with masks they brought and helped snap out the others. Finally, Godzilla roars as he spots Hedorah's resting place, with the Smog Monster himself undergoing a major transformation thanks to Godzilla's DNA, evolving until he breaks out into his final form, which resembles a giant Anomalocaris now with both of his large red unblinking eyes on stalks, and has the forelimbs of a praying mantis, all while his four tentacles are in full display. The two Titans charge at one another.
The brawl in London commenced as the two Titans began throwing punches, slashes, bites, and threw the other around during the battle (fortunately for us, sparing Big Ben and other landmarks). It was going well for Godzilla now that the radiation had revitalized him, and Hedorah's new form meant he was actually landing solid hits on his foe, however tough his exoskeleton is. In fact, their battle was dispersing the gas, however slightly, helping Madison and Neil on the ground snap out the others from their horror show. However, just as it was going great, Hedorah manages to gain the upper hand by hiding in the fog and shadows of London, and using his deceptively strong tentacles to pin Godzilla's limbs while using his raptorial blades to slash and attack Godzilla's head, giving him virtually no chance to use his Atomic Breath. Hedorah then started using his tentacles and his mandibles' "Soul Siphon" to start absorbing Godzilla's radiation. This prompted the humans to start shooting at Hedorah with everything they have, which turns his attention away from Godzilla to swat the annoying humans with his Ion Roar. Godzilla managed to kick Hedorah off of him, but the "virus" began spreading more rapidly, weakening his capabilities.
Godzilla was losing hard against the Smog Monster, as Hedorah now uses his new physical advantage to toss around the discombobulated Godzilla, every attack the King dishes out, met with a nasty counterattack. Hedorah tosses Godzilla into the River Thames, and lunges on top of him, and begins absorbing Godzilla's radiation unimpeded, seeing as Godzilla's getting too weak to properly fight back, and the humans have exhausted their weapons. As Godzilla's struggles fade away, his life moments starts flashing before his eyes, from his birth in ancient Madagascar, to the Titan War, battling the MUTOs, MUTO Prime, King Ghidorah, Kong, the Skar King and Shimo, and countless others. This causes Godzilla to regain his strength and lets out a supercharged Atomic Breath to Hedorah's face. The humans were in shock, scanners reading that the Hollow Earth's radiation began actively combating Hedorah's virus. Godzilla begins furiously beating down Hedorah as he punches, claws and slams the Smog Monster around. But Hedorah kept tanking the hits, up until he decided that enough was enough, and used his tail to anchor himself to the King's chest and drove his tentacles into Godzilla's mouth and begins absorbing his radiation.
Hedorah's absorption of the Hollow Earth radiation causes his powers to amplify and absorb more radiation. Godzilla was struggling to breathe, until his dorsal plates begin glowing. Godzilla keeps his mouth open, but something extraordinary happens: His glowing dorsal plates begin flashing red, glowing more intensely until they stay red. Godzilla's entire being glows red and his jaws explode pure energy as he releases none other than the Spiral Heat Ray, directly into Hedorah's mouth. The force was strong enough to lift Hedorah off of the ground and drilled straight through his head. The intense heat of the Spiral Heat Ray also solidifies Hedorah's body. Eventually, all those factors combined was enough to reduce Hedorah to ashes, as they scatter into the wind, in addition to clearing the fog from the skies of London. Godzilla roars in victory, his red body glowing brightly as the humans watch in awe, well, except for Stanton, who enjoyed Hedorah's death just a wee too much. Scans also reveal that, as a bonus, whatever Godzilla's new power-up acted as a fever for Hedorah's virus, completely ridding any trace of it in Godzilla's system.
A few days later, the humans at Monarch, along with Neil were going over the circus that just happened and were glad to put things behind them, with Mark even commenting that showing what happened that day kind of help destress him. Until they got an alarm that Godzilla was in proximity. Turns out, he was just patrolling like he usually does, and after seeing nothing out of the ordinary, returns back to the Colosseum to take a long, well-deserved nap, the film ending on his closing his eye.

submitted by Dimetro_Sparks to Monsterverse [link] [comments]

2024.06.07 05:10 the-great-nerd Recently I decided to make My dream Batman game that is not connected to Arkham. I have a main villain and story but I'm not going to post it here

A 3rd person open world Stealth/action and thriller and mystery Batman and Robin game (not Arkham) made with unreal engine 5 and a very realistic and dark Gothic surrealism art direction combining the aesthetic of the animated series, Arkham verse and the Matt Reeves Batman. The game will have a long and emotional story with twist, action and opratunities for unlikely alliances.
SUMMARY:
A rated M Batman and Robin game where you play as Batman and Dick Grayson Robin 3 Years into their partnership. Tension between Batman and Robin is growing as Batman becomes more bitter and angry because of a series of mysterious killings in Gotham and a recent mass breakout in Arkham Asylum.
LORE:
Gotham is still new to the presence of the Batman and Robin. And they have just in the past 6 months learned of the existence of the once Urban legends of Batman and Robin are real and many are still unsure what to think. Batman and commissioner Gordon have a trust that is also pretty fresh and not yet strong. Robin is well trained and starting to find his own path but Batman is unsure Robin is ready to be on his own. Gotham crime is at the lowest it's been in years at the start of the game. It's only four months left in the year and Batman is struggling to crack a case he has been working for 4 years. It's Batmans 6th year as the Capped crusader. The city has fell ill with a new mystery sickness thought to be caused by a chemical spill. And a new deadly drug has hit the streets.
BUTTON MAPPING:
Basic controls:
(Left stick) Move
(Right stick) Control camera
(square/X) tap to light attack ( hold for heavy attack)/interact with points of interest out of combat and tap to stealthy takedown in stealth or hold To do a loud takedown in stealth to cause fear.
(triangle/Y) counter
(Circle/B) Grab
(Cross/A) Evade/roll (hold while in cover to swap cover)
(L1/LB) Grapple gun (hold to swing)
(R1/RB) Tap when standing near throwable objects or improvised non lethal weapons in the environment to throw at enemies or pick up to use as melee weapon until I breaks or to do a Dual takedown if prompted (hold to shield with cape as Batman)
(L2/LT) Double tap to quick use selected gadget (Hold to Aim gadget tap L1/LB to use or use stealth commands as Batman or Robin.)
(R2/RT) Tap Quick use baterangs (hold as Batman for combat command wheel)
(L3/LS) Tap to Run
(R3/RS) Tap to crouch/stealth (to dive in water)
(Tap Down on Dpad) To call for vehicle (Hold Down on Dpad for gadget wheel)
(Tap Left on Dpad) AR investigate vision
(Tap Up on Dpad) Night vision (hold for sonar ping)
(Tap Right on Dpad) To equipped Robins bow staff or activate Batmans focus gauge (hold to activate photo mode.)
Advanced controls:
Press L3/LS to run and then tap R3/RS to slide or circle/B to roll/evade
Hold R2/RT and tap square ,triangle, circle or cross (X,Y,B,A) to select a quick command in combat.
Hold L2/LT and tap up, down, left or right on the Dpad to give stealth commands
Hold L1/LB and R1/RB at the same time to switch between Batman and Robin.
While holding an enemy after grabbing him with circle/B tap circle/B to throw in chosen direction, tap square/X to strike, tap triangle/Y to interrogate, tap cross/A to attach tracking device and tap L1/LB to grapple and take them up to a higher point with you.
Hold Cross/A while running to do parkour with Robin or glide off a ledge as Batman.
Tap L1/LB while gliding as Batman to get a grapple boost in the direction you aim (you can grapple up straight ahead and slightly down to get boost and you can also use the grapple to make sharp turns)
Go from a grapple gun swing (hold L1/LB) as Batman into a glide by holding cross/A
Go from a grapple gun swing (hold L1/LB) to wall run as Robin by holding cross/A
Swing kick enemies by holding square/X mid swing
Glide kick enemies while gliding over enemies as Batman by tapping square/X while gliding
Push left joystick Ford gently while gliding with cross/A as Batman To tilt down to pick up a little speed while gliding or push the left stick forward all the way to do a nose dive to pick up even more speed when pulling up again with the left joystick
Hold Cross/A as Robin mid grapple to launch over a ledge and keep parkour momentum
Tap circle/B mid grapple to hang from ledge (Hold circle/B to cancel grapple)
Hold R2/RT and double tap triangle/Y to pull an enemy towards you with The grapple gun
Hold R2/RT and double tap circle/B To disarm an enemies weapon if they are close enough to you in combat
Hold R2/RT and double tap square/X to pick a down enemy up off the ground during combat
Hold R2/RT and double tap cross/A to drop smoke pellets/bomb.
Vehicle controls:
Hold square/X to enter vehit
Hold R2/RT to accelerate
Hold L2/LT to brake/reverse
Hold cross/A to drift
Hold R1/RB to boost
Double tap L1/LB to eject
Hold circle/B to exit vehicle
Tap R3/RS to submerge (bat boat only)
Tap L1/LB to use torpedo on bat boat only
MAP:
the map is MASSIVE and allows you to explore Gotham in its entirety including five main islands, the Gotham City Bay, slaughter swamp, an airport and a small portion of the suburban neighborhoods inland outside the city. Similar to Queens in Spider-Man 2. The map will be 1½ times bigger than the Spider-Man 2 map. It will include a fully explorable batcave and a few rooms of Wayne Manor will be explorable. The city will feel alive with busy streets and people on boats.
The buildings will feel dense and tall ( twice the height of the buildings in Arkham Knight.
GAMEPLAY:
Some parts of the game require you to play as Batman and some parts require you to play Robin for certain story missions and then some missions will allow you to switch between the two at will. And you will need to switch back and for between Batman and Robin to solve certain puzzles similar to the Lego games. In the open world you can switch between Batman and Robin or choose one or the other and split up.
Combat: Batman and Robin each would have their own play style and gadgets to fit their play style. Batman would be balanced with speed and heavy hits and a master of stealth and fear and be more close range when fighting and can fill a focus gauge to use more focused brutal bone breaking attacks to take care of stronger enemies or quickly thin a crowd, Batman can also give Robin commands in combat. Robin would be faster and more agile but have lighter attacks and is a master of trickery and hacking tech, he would also use a optional bow staff for longer reach and crowd control. The player can customize their gadgets in the bat cave and create a custom load out for the suits and utility belt. They have unlimited baterangs and always have the grapple gun but the other gadgets/tools must be chosen carefully because the utility belts have limited space. But each gadget has its own purpose in the world and for certain missions. They can both use the environment to do takedowns and attacks similar to sleeping dogs or sifu how you can use objects like glass bottles to throw or kick them at your opponents. They have the option to do combat finishers on low health enemies by grabbing them with circle/B and executing the finisher with square/X
Traversal: Batman can glide around Gotham like in the Arkham games mixed with the grapple boost from just cause 3 and 4 but Batmans gliding speed and grapple gun boost is increased depending on which cape you have equipped and grapple gun attachments you have equipped. Robin has a parkour mechanic that would be a fluid and advanced new mechanic for a 3rd person game with short distant wall run included and his grapple gun would launch him faster and further because he is lighter. They can both swing from the grapple hooks like in the animated series and the can also make a tether to walk or Zipline across similar to the tether mechanic in spiderman 2 for the PS5. They also have vehicles. Batman has the Batmobile and Robin has the bat cycle but both have a limited use in the city and can only let loose driving in the city for a few parts in the story. Only Batman can drive the bat mobile but Robin can ride shotgun. They also have the use of the batboat to quickly traverse on and under the surface of the Gotham waters. Batman and Robin can swim in the water and even dive down below it to freely swim underwater using rebreathers.
Stealth: You can play as Robin in stealth or give him orders and commands as Batman. Batman and Robin are both good for stealth but approach stealth verry differently. Batman can physically take out enemies very quickly but Robins physical takedowns are much slower and requires a more cautious approach.
Batmans approach to stealth is very direct, hands on and surgical with the right tools and techniques. Robins approach is more distant and technological using hacking, distractions, and lures, he also acts as a spotter. Robin uses the environment to his advantage and Batman uses fear. In stealth Batmans focus gauge turns into a fear gauge when in stealth. Once the fear gauge is full the enemies will be jumpy and on edge, then the player can lure the enemies to one spot and take most of them out at once causing the rest to surrender or run away. The player can use a pleathra of different ways to fill the fear gauge for Batman. As Batman himself or using Robin. Robin stick to the shadows and rafters and makes and sets traps for the enemy using gadget combinations or the environment. When Robins traps are set off to take out an enemy it fills a great amount of Batmans fear gauge. Batman can profile the enemies and attempt to take the strongest one out first, he can take out lights,
Make enemies screech in pain or terror, or take out enemies silently but strategically and hang them unconscious from a vantage point to build fear in the remaining enemies. Together their synergy makes stealth a literal nightmare for the criminals of Gotham. But Batman and Robin won't always be together to help each other in stealth. Some sections of the game require a stealth approach from either Batman or Robin requiring the players to adjust techniques and think differently while solo during stealth making it more difficult to clear the area.
Reputation: you build a reputation based on how you play. The more fear you use and the more ruthless you are in combat, the more enemies will remember and fear you later in the game or the nextime you encounter the same enemy causing you fear gauge to fill more quickly as the game goes on. But the drawback is they will be more heavily armed than before and more strategic. Most of the police will also be less welcoming of you presence and you reputation in Gotham with the city as a whole will change, they will fear you instead of look to you as a respectable hero. All of this will have an effect on the story in the later missions. Your status in the city as Batman will have an affect on the gameplay and story. This means the player can wager the benefits of being the Heros of Gotham, feared vigilantes, or be balanced between the two. These choices early in the story along with play style will have an effect on certain missions closing opportunities or opening alternate ones with different paths or relationships. The is no dialogue option. Just actions and pivotal choices to decide what kind of Batman and Robin you will become in this ever evolving (or devolving) Gotham.
Gotham citizens walk away or run from Batman or Robin when on street level. regardless of reputation
GAMEPLAY LOOP:
Story missions: There will be multiple mission types. Some missions will require Batman and/or Robin to fight enemies or stealthily take out enemies to get to one last person to get information on who to go to next or to give players answers on a mystery or the location of the next planned crime. Their will be stealth missions with hostage situations where Batman and/or Robin can not get caught Each stealth scenario gives the players several different options to complete a task but a few give a very limited options to do something making it much more difficult. They better the player does and the more difficult the mission the more XP points the get. This is judged on how fast and effective the player was in stealth and how many opportunities they took advantage of. This is similar for combat as far as how fast you handle a fight and how many opportunities you exploit. But how much you XP you get at the end of combat is mainly judge by combos.
There is also some missions the require puzzle solving and a great deal of detective work to proceed in the mission. There are big missions that require all three primary elements of combat, stealth, and puzzles/investigation.
A few other gameplay formulas used in missions include time trials with character traversal and vehicles, time limits in certain stealth and puzzle segments, quicktime cutscenes, tailing and a couple vehicle chases.
Random events: Their will be side rescue missions in the world you can do that will boost you reputation in the public eye with the citizens but won't affect how criminals see you. So your fear reputation will stay the same with them allowing you to balance the reputation to balance out a bit. Some examples of these rescue missions are saving people from a burning building, driving victim of crime or overdose to the hospital and delivering antidotes for the virus to heath centers.
Gotham City is a really big place and will have a bunch of events and random crimes to stop. Some of the random crimes and rescue missions will lead to or connect to bigger missions. And some of the random crimes you can expect to see are muggings, robberies, kidnappings, drug deals and Police standoffs. And three special random encounter. One with Condoment King, one with penny plunderer and one with killer moth.
One important side activity will be managing Wayne industries by renovating buildings and funding research for engineers and scientists at Wayne industries and starlabs. This will all be done from a computer in Bruce Wayne's office. The reason for this gameplay feature is similar to the villa renovation system in assassin's Creed 2 and sending assassins on missions in assassin's Creed brotherhood. Theses Wayne industries task will over time give you money and resources to upgrade old equipment and unlock some new equipment for Batman and Robin including gear peices and gadgets. This also gives the players time to strategies what parts of town to fix and get back to normal so that the player can put extra spots in the city as points to stop to resupply and change gear. But some of the buildings will need to be cleared out first and Batman and/or Robin and other times they will need to take out nearby gang hideouts or sometimes both. There are 14 spots to renavate around Gotham.
GOTHAM STORIES (SIDE MISSIONS):
Solomon Grundy:
Flamingo:
Firefly:
Dollmaker:
Mad hatter and the wonderland gang:
Maxie Zeuse:
Killer Croc:
Tiger shark:
Film freak:

submitted by the-great-nerd to DCcomics [link] [comments]

2024.06.07 05:05 the-great-nerd Because of the recent disappointment with Arkham shadows being a VR exclusive, I decided to make what I would want instead for fun

submitted by the-great-nerd to batman [link] [comments]

2024.06.07 04:58 the-great-nerd Single player Batman and Robin game for current or next get consoles using unreal engine 5.

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2024.06.07 02:28 Storms_Wrath The Human Artificial Hivemind Part 522: An Elder's Disappointment

First Previous Wiki
Fleet Commander Maaruunaa left Keem to head back to his dreadnaught. With the various security checks now completed, he turned his attention to the task at hand. Several androids with stealth fields would gradually move to various ships in the Alliance Defense Fleet.
They would be carrying additional monitoring equipment to place in the rooms of several traitorous Commanders. The hope was that the Dreedeen would learn more about the Sprilnav factions that had spies and perhaps uncover new ones. But that wasn't the most important matter, either.
The presence of a spy for the Misan Li Heptarchies meant that they were interested more directly in the Alliance. He needed to draft more contingency plans for that.
"Is everything alright? You seem stressed," one of his advisors said.
"I am fine, thank you. My communion with the Ancestors has left me with a new perspective, and I am still accommodating and reconciling it with my knowledge."
"Ah, I understand."
Nothing more was said in the frigid air. The bulk of the massive ship, one of the ripest fruits of the Alliance's labor, lay ahead. Newer dreadnaughts continued to increase in size to account for the larger wires, reactors, thrusters, hangars, and guns.
There was a vast effort at standardization for the largest Alliance ships. The layouts were all similar, such as the armor plating patterns, the wiring patterns, the computer and bridge locations, the reactor locations, the thrusters, the massive cannons and laser batteries, and even the sewer systems. The Type 5 Alliance Standard Dreadnaught currently carried 2 spinal Mercury-class guns, 40 Charon-class guns, and tens of thousands of lesser weapons. The latest line of laser cannons was now capable of brutalizing shields up to Class 9, which was a step below the Class 10 shields usually present on Sprilnav scout ships and Alliance battlecruisers.
There was even talk in the community of new particle weapons, and of missiles with nanite payloads, which could eat into armor to physically weaken it even more than typical explosives. Almost everything was split into either a class system or a type system. Many of the Commanders, though they weren't Fleet Commanders, were still in command of dreadnaughts.
Notably, there were checks in place. There was always a backup in case of something going wrong. A few Long Darks back, it had been made mandatory. Every single spy had someone near them who could take over if it became necessary.
The massive ships were all in battle groups. Swarms of smaller ships defended the massive dreadnaughts from attack by enemy fighters. The local Alliance Defense Fleets were only growing more massive. They were led by competent and loyal people, and Maaruunaa knew that one of those promising individuals would be promoted to Fleet Commander soon.
Probably one of the alien races, perhaps the Knowers or the Guulin. Though it wouldn't be impossible for an Acuarfar to enter the position, there was a lot of politics around Izkrala. Politics and the military rarely mixed well. It was why he was not in any of the Dreedeen offices and would remain out of them for the near future.
Ancestors knew those places were pits of despair and moral destitution. His spines rattled in his spacesuit, and he seized his emotions by the horns.
Dreadnaughts, battlecruisers, carriers, and cruisers were all made to accommodate mixed crews. They carried spacesuits for all species and could carry many types of atmosphere, though Earth was the standard. The Dreedeen didn't need to breathe, so Keem's atmosphere wasn't required specifically. And the pressure differentials were minor enough to justify the change. However, it did require his shuttle to have a decompression airlock that was larger than normal.
Mist poured out as he left, where several androids watched it closely. 'Mist Checks' were another procedure the Alliance had adopted to attempt to capture Sprilnav spies directly. They had caught a few, though the numbers dropped off more and more these days. The spies had ended up in interrogation for a long time. Their stealth equipment was seized for any research and reverse engineering the big brains wanted to do. Most of them went to prison, though a few had simply been given over to Kashaunta when she requested them.
The alien warlord didn't seem to care about the Alliance much. That was good in some ways but bad in others. She was more concerned with Penny, which meant she could be manipulated. Fyuuleen claimed that Penny had started a war, which Maaruunaa didn't doubt. Humanity seemed to love them, especially when a cause was involved. The Dreedeen weren't much better in that regard, but they still were. Maaruunaa had seen enough of history that he didn't trust her. Kashaunta was an incredible risk, and only the circumstances were why she was put up with.
There were probably a lot of problems he hadn't heard about, but they were still incredibly important. He knew that at least some of the Alliance was compromised. It was impossible otherwise. But he couldn't do much. He moved to the elevator and immediately felt something wrong.
Trusting his instincts, a gift from the Ancestors, Maaruunaa turned back. He couldn't lift his spikes in his space suit. He felt something tackle him from behind. There was a loud roar of an alien creature near his head. Maaruunaa rolled, trying to dislodge the invisible assassin before he died. He called up his psychic energy just in time to block a dagger from shattering him utterly. A vibrating blade brushed against his arm and tore the ground beneath him.
He skittered back. His guards rushed forward, shields up and ready. A shot rang out, and a Sprilnav tumbled to the ground, stealth coating now pierced. The pitiful individual was clad entirely in black, though a pool of red was now spreading beneath their thrashing body. The guards held the Sprilnav down so Maaruunaa could remove their helmet.
The Sprilnav looked... oddly crystalline. He had a blue complexion, with crystal skin and something approaching scales lining his mouth.
"What in the Ancestors' graces are you?" Maaruunaa asked.
The assassin stayed silent. A Phoebe android sauntered over, placing two fingers in the person's mouth to pry them open. She dropped a pill into the Sprilnav's closing eyes, which flew open.
"What did you do to me?"
"A better question is what you will tell us, now that your plan to die is scrubbed. Oh, and your implant won't cut it for this."
"You can't-"
"This is a military vessel," Maaruunaa said. "We have laws regarding how prisoners are treated. Normally, they would be followed. But you will tell us how you got past our defenses."
He left the threat unsaid. Phoebe pulled the Sprilnav onto his feet, then hoisted him over her shoulders. They moved to an interrogation room near the brig. They got some 'stares' from curious soldiers on the way, but a captured Sprilnav on a dreadnaught meant only one thing. Heads turned back to their positions, and conversations resumed in quieter, more inquisitive tones.
"Name," Phoebe said.
"Your circuits will be purged, foul AI."
"Do you go by a nickname?" she asked.
"This is not a joke, but a promise."
"You are a joke, and I promise that you never would have succeeded."
"There are more."
"There were more," Phoebe said. "We've been squashing you like bugs. Now, I'm sure you're acquainted with all the fascinating ways I can pry your secrets out of you. And since I'm a super morally bankrupt and evil AI, the bane of all organic life, responsible for every stubbed toe, crashed car, and cloudy day, I think I have time for an interrogation."
"You'll just kill me anyway."
"There are worse things than death," Phoebe warned. "Since I went to the lengths of disabling your implant, I'm at liberty to tell you a very gruesome life to survive. You see, several years ago, a very bad Elder by the name of Zelisloa created something we call the Reaper Virus. It killed billions of people, and while he was skinned and shredded, very few were properly punished. I have created a mirror to the Reaper Virus. A derivative, if you will. It is capable of infecting Sprilnav, and has two variants.
One is for organic life, the other is for digital life. Together, they are called the Retribution Virus. It's quite genius, actually. All Elders and Sprilnav have psychic and conceptual energy that keeps them alive. But to regenerate like that requires an imprint. What I can do is introduce incredibly tiny flaws in the imprint. Healing wouldn't work. Medical devices would not find it. And we are capable of delivering it. You have 20 sisters, I believe. Made in a lab to serve your masters. What if I told you that Elder Kashaunta could reach them all? And give them a little gift?"
Maaruunaa shifted in discomfort. Phoebe laughed. "Just kidding. I'm not going to infect your family with that virus. Because I'm a good person, and these are all just words, right? Here... let me... there you go," Phoebe said. She pressed a finger against the Sprilnav's forehead. "You had a lock on your memories. I have just undone it."
"What do you want me to do?"
"Talk."
"Just take the memories."
"I'll only get shreds, not the full picture. I want the ugly 500 year history. If you give that to me, you will not be killed, and your sisters will remain safe. I especially need to know about that lab."
"Why?"
"It might be useful for us."
"To make another weapon?"
"No. To cure the cancer of one of our species. If I can locate the lab, I can hack it."
Maaruunaa knew who she was talking about. Though her attitude here was certainly concerning. And sure, they were just words... but how many of them were true? And if she was doing it while he was here, how much worse would it be when he wasn't? He would bring this up with Fyuuleen later to see if anything could or needed to be done.
"Can you... destroy it?"
"Should it be destroyed?"
"Yes. Though I will need to see proof you can."
Maaruunaa wondered if Phoebe was stable. She didn't normally act like this toward anyone. Was it the Judgment that was making her angry? Something related? She seemed to be enjoying the power dynamic. So perhaps it was something she'd felt powerless in.
He would know before she guarded him again. If she was unstable, the Alliance would know about it. Phoebe flicked him an unhappy look.
"Here," she said, showing a hologram of an alien cityscape. The perspective was crisp and moving with the video. It almost looked like a reproduction. "This is the complete defeat of a slave city by a single human."
Something was odd about the way she spoke, too. Phoebe, considering herself as human, usually wouldn't refer to Penny as a 'human' to anyone unless asked. Maaruunaa's thoughts turned deeper into suspicion.
= = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = =
"Reform the mind and body of Elder Saleis," Elder Sanjiva growled. Two bleached skulls hung from his front shoulders, held in place by metal plates of his black armor. A yellow personal shield surrounded him, and his Soul Blade was at his hip. The dark room was made brighter by its soft glow.
Accompanying that light were those of the computers and networks. The cooled air inside would have frozen a normal Sprilnav to the bones, but Sanjiva bore the weight without issue.
The Elder in front of him executed a command. The mind's copy became active. A new body was already in reserve. The implanting process was quick. A small vibration from a nuclear explosion far above passed through them.
Saleis' consciousness was inserted into the brain of his new body. Once it settled, the body began thrashing. Sanjiva didn't wait to see what was happening. He dove straight into the mindscape, grasping the Elder's mind to tear the experience from him. His claws stopped short of the failure's inner defenses when a rotted corrosion spread outward in thick black cords. The rotted layer had a smell, and that was never a good sign in the mindscape.
Sanjiva retreated, barely avoiding the destruction that would have required far too much energy to fight. He caught a glimpse of the mark of a blade on Saleis' soul before he died again, likely forever. The funds to resurrect a soul-broken mind were never going to be allocated.
The Elder in front of him quaked in fear. Another leader might have killed him. But Sanjiva valued his subordinates more highly than that. The Elder had done all he could to the best of his ability. A Soul Blade's corruption was impossible to truly erase if you weren't a Progenitor. That was why they were being used as weapons instead of better and more devastating options banned by the treaties and the Progenitors.
"My Lord, forgive me!"
The Elder prostrated himself now, hanging his head in fear. A small pleasure rushed up inside, but Sanjiva didn't let a hint of it reach the outside world. He was pleased to see the Elder was still loyal and fearful. He'd checked this one with his implant, and he really had done everything right despite his known dislike of Saleis.
"There is no fault of yours to forgive," Sanjiva rumbled. "You did not falter. You have served me well."
"I can still serve you, my Lord!"
"You can. And you shall."
He made no further remark, turning to leave the room. Stealth equipment activated, muting his steps and hiding his body. He came to a door. It opened.
He went to his communicator. He tapped a code. Then he went to a box, normally kept in a lock. He extended his psychic energy into it and moved it into select patterns. Up. Up again. Down. Down again. Left, right, left, right. He formed two meaningless glyphs, made from a whim in his memory a long time ago. And then he pressed the energy in.
The lock clicked. Then it opened. It set off a notification in his implant, which he verified. He selected the verification option twice, which confirmed he was the one who'd opened it.
Inside the locked case was a communicator. It was an ancient device built before even Justicar established his empire on the surface. Nanites kept the device in working order.
He tapped it.
"Who is calling?" a dark voice asked.
"Sanjiva."
"Lord of the Nine," the voice said. "To what do I owe the displeasure of your voice?"
"The human is killing my Elders with a Soul Blade from Kashaunta."
"Why is that my problem?"
"Because you can do something about it."
"Not right now."
"Would you like to explain why?"
"She is in the Fort Court. Already a fortress which is nearly impenetrable, I would say. We'd lose billions in any attack on it. But it is heavily guarded now, more than it ever has been in history. Justicar has three Progenitors there, one of whom is Indrafabar. He is the High Judge on this case, along with 18 others and Justicar himself. Filnatra is also there."
"The Sword Master?"
"No one else bears her name. The old laws are strict."
"You will fix this anyway," Sanjiva said. "Or you will be cut from contact with the Syndicate."
"Penny is too strong for me to deal with easily."
"How far you must have fallen to say such a thing," Sanjiva replied sadly. "I thought you were an Elder, not a bug."
"You do not understand what she has done, then. Even after she laid waste to one of your holding cities. If you bothered to pay attention to the outside world, you'd notice that Penny Balica, yes, a lowly human, has killed Elders easily. She has massive levels of power for any alien. She is almost your equal in conceptual weight."
"Without the Soul Blade?"
"She would be lesser then."
"You sound like you admire her," he accused.
"I admire her story and legend, and the power it represents. She has fought Twilight and lived."
Sanjiva frowned. "Her supposed accomplishments are unimportant. Can you kill her or not?"
"She would need to be outside the Fort Court. And I would require a dreadnaught's level of power at least, or a Soul Blade."
"This is a sad thing to hear, my friend."
"It is prudence. I have not survived this long, in my profession, without knowing the risks I take. There is no trust in the Underground, only relationships. I know this. But this is something I will tell you for free, Elder Sanjiva. Penny is powerful enough for me to learn her name. You do not have to respect her species, or her age. I doubt anyone would. But if you wish to profit from this debacle, at least respect her power."
"...Very well. Since you are all but begging me, I will not send you to die. Does she have any more loved ones?"
He knew she hadn't brought any more humans to Justicar. Getting detailed information past that was a slow process, as he needed to take precautions to avoid being tracked down. Even in normal circumstances, when open war wasn't on the horizon, news rarely developed this quickly. The fact that this was becoming such a major concern showed something. He wasn't quite sure what.
Sanjiva contemplated changing some policies. There was more protection he could give to the cities. Perhaps they would kill the human, perhaps not.
"Only the speeding space entity and the Servant make proper targets. Hitting the Guides will void the treaty."
Sanjiva recalled the speeding space entity. If he remembered correctly, it had been seen on the human. She was wearing it like an accessory, which somehow didn't anger it or make it complain.
And if the speeding space entity wasn't already dead, it was stronger than normal. Others would have thought to target it before, either for their own hatred or to gain that of the human.
"How do you suggest we kill it?"
"See if you can expose it to the Frequency, or to the Reality. Either would likely work, unless it also shares in her conceptual power. It seems more resistant than normal to the fields Justicar set up."
"The warding fields?"
They were meant to ward off speeding space entities near the star system. And to kill them if they manifested in any way. Sanjiva had forgotten those. It seemed he needed to change the settings on his implant again.
"Yes. It is entirely unaffected."
"Entirely?"
"Yes."
That was incredibly concerning. Either the entity had insane levels of durability, or it was far stronger than it let on. But for either of those, why would it bond with a human? And why would she take it into Justicar's territory knowing that it was an enemy of all Sprilnav? Better yet, why were Justicar and Kashaunta allowing its continued presence?
"Then be cautious. What of the Servant? This far into our territory, would the Great Enemy notice?"
The mindscape twisted around Sanjiva. A distant, oppressive power moved closer. It was like being caught in the wake of a water-bound ship. The eddies alone threatened him with their largess, so he raised himself higher through the layers of the mindscape to avoid them.
"The mindscape has suggested that it would," the Elder on the line said. Sanjiva agreed with his sentiment, so he said nothing further on the topic.
"What of Kashaunta?"
The Elder's presence was another thing that could put a wrench in his plans. Sanjiva didn't know why she was really here. It obviously wasn't for the human. Perhaps a new deal with Justicar was being set up. Her largest business was arms dealing. And there was only one group Justicar would take up arms to destroy if he could.
The Underground as a whole. He hadn't managed to do it in the last war, which was why the treaties binding both of them were in place. Sanjiva even suspected his place on the Judgment was bait to make more stupid organizations try and go after things on the surface. And when he returned, he'd prune them down.
It was good that the Syndicate was more decentralized. He'd designed it to be capable of taking heavy losses and still be moderately effective. The presence of Kashaunta's Grand Fleet was slowing down the slave trade, which was costing him money. But it was costing her money, too, so that wasn't the reason she was here.
Nor would she care about him at all unless he approached her with a deal. And by the nature of the treaty, approaching Kashaunta would be incredibly difficult for him to do himself. He'd have to trust someone to do it for him. He had his contacts, of course, but Kashaunta was way out of most of their leagues. She was an Elder best met in person or the closest possible equivalent.
"She is at the Fort Court, though her flagship is too close in orbit for us to attack. If she dies, her people will blow up the planet."
"Is that a public threat?"
If she'd been stupid enough to say that, he might be able to drive a wedge in the deal she was making with Justicar. And then she'd leave, and his profits would return to their proper values.
"With Kashaunta? What do you think?" the voice mocked.
So she didn't. It was likely an implicit threat, then. She always loved those.
"Are there plans in place for her, then?"
"Plans around her, yes. But while our relationship is unique, Lord Sanjiva, I will not target the Fort Court with three Progenitors and Kashaunta inside."
It was incredibly prudent. Sanjiva and the other Elder knew it was the right decision. But as the Lord of the Nine, it was still necessary for him to push on it a little.
"Then you play right into their claws."
"Survival is something my claws would also be grateful for. I do have a suggestion if you wish to make Penny angry, though."
That was the first name of the human. Because of course her species was one of the ones that liked to have multiple names. Some Elders and Sprilnav did that mess too. All it told everyone was who their parents were, and a lack of ability to seize opportunities using their own merits and names.
"What is it?"
"Kill her slaves. She is foolish to care about such lower lifeforms. They are nothing but unwashed gibbering animals, rolling about in their own filth. The only costs would be those of the bullets or the lasers spent on their unworthy hides."
Sanjiva smiled. "I will set up a task force, then. Past that, I will begin taking more psychic energy in for a confrontation."
It was likely a waste of money. But he hadn't lived this long by not taking precautions. She was a lowly creature. But the fact that they were discussing her alone meant she was likely more than she seemed. While his disdain for alien barbarians was immense, Sanjiva knew some of them were capable of holding high physical power. Even if their brains were... less developed than more superior species.
It was proven science, after all. Alien skulls were rarely large enough to accommodate proper brain structures. And even if they were, the lack of sufficient genetic technology made them unable to pack more into less. Such was the fate of the lesser filth populating the Sprilnav's universe.
"You have the armor?"
"The best kind, against a creature like her. I also have a number of hostages I will use against her if it comes to that. However, I will be verifying all that you have said against other sources."
"Of course. I am willing to offer my services around assassinations should you need them, as long as they fall within my conditions. I warn you that if the other gangs hire me out first, then I will finish their job before yours."
"Reputation."
"Reputation," the other Elder sighed. "If you beat her and she's still alive, what would you do?"
"If she's as strong as you say, I would offer her up to Twilight and indulge myself with the Progenitor's gratitude, as well as agreed upon favors."
The power of Cardinality was weak to him. And nothing protected him from a Progenitor coming down to kill him for it. Sanjiva would take her psychic power for his own and that of Nilnacrawla. If he could reach the others when the Judgment ended, he would take them, too.
Psychic energy was best served alongside living meals. His tongue slid over his jagged teeth as he imagined the savory feast he would have. It had been far too long.
"I wish you the best, Lord Sanjiva. Show her the superiority of an Elder. Be strong, be quick, and be victorious."
"To victory."
Sanjiva shifted his Soul Blade from passive to active form. He ended the call and got to work.
= = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = =
Elder Yasihaut frowned as the human again read the law faster than her. Was this Justicar's doing or that of Indrafabar? Without enough information, she didn't dare complain. Going against the wishes of a High Judge was one thing, but Justicar, or especially Indrafabar, was another. Progenitors were spiteful and petty creatures. They would not hesitate to ruin this for her if she wasn't careful.
She had less influence on him in particular than any Progenitor save Nova and Lecalicus. Politically, Indrafabar was the most powerful Progenitor ever to exist after the collapse. He would not be capable of being influenced by her arguments.
And even if she could somehow meet with them, the presence of two Progenitors deterred it. Even if they were mere guards, it was a sign that none of this would be safe. Yasihaut didn't have the influence she was owed as an Elder, and that annoyed her.
"High Judge," Yasihaut began.
"You may speak, Challenger."
"Must we continue with this? I believe both I and the Defendant are well versed in the laws on this."
One of the High Judges, who wasn't Justicar or Indrafabar and thus unimportant, turned to Penny. The human looked up at them, having already handed the tablet back to the Guide.
"It is your decision whether or not to continue, Defendant."
"I wish to know the exact conditions for this trial. My nation and my entire species are staked on the outcome. It would be a betrayal of my very being to accept the request of the Challenger on this case. To be more exact, I wish to continue until the last law. I treat this trial and the Court seriously."
Her voice was laced with the false conviction she always put up around the Elders. She didn't even look at Yasihaut. She just continued staring into the High Judge's eyes. Yasihaut felt Indrafabar's gaze alight on her, and she settled down. Her own High Lawyer's nervous look disappeared simultaneously.
She'd failed to trap Penny in a negative view. Now, the longer this went, the more the High Judges would admire Penny's supposed conviction. It was stupid. She hated it. But the knowledge that Penny would lose this whole thing and watch her species die was still sweet.
"In that case, the Court will proceed with the law readings."
The High Judge didn't give her any compliments, which was something. But there were no insults, either. So, at least this High Judge's opinion would matter less than usual.
With every pulse that passed, Yasihaut's displeasure only grew. But it was she who was trapped. She couldn't express her anger, and she knew it. Hundreds of thousands of bored Sprilnav watched from the stand above, their holograms locked in shapes that suggested they were doing something else.
The next law was more time-wasting words. Despite reading over it as fast as she reasonably could without just ignoring the laws entirely, Penny was still faster. Five kilopulses later, Yasihaut gave up. She skipped over some passages entirely and then handed the tablet to the Guide very early. And Penny finished later.
"The Court reminds the parties that your eye movements are tracked by the tablet. If you wish to cease the readings, you may make an official request to do so."
Yasihaut looked up to contest the voice, but she recognized it even before seeing Justicar's head staring down at them.
"High Judge," Yasihaut began.
"You may speak, Challenger," Justicar replied.
"This seems like it is designed to spend time."
"All actions spend time, Challenger. You agreed to do this. You cannot retract your agreement unilaterally unless the Defendant also wishes to move on from this."
Justicar turned to Penny, who was smiling. "It is your decision whether or not to continue, Defendant."
An exact copy of the other High Judge's words. Justicar spoke them flatly, but Yasihaut knew he was amusing himself at her expense. Penny's response was a little louder this time.
"I wish to know the exact conditions for this trial. My nation and my entire species are staked on the outcome. It would be a betrayal of my very being to accept the request of the Challenger on this case. To be more exact, I wish to continue until the last law. I treat this trial and the Court seriously."
Now she was doing it, too. With great effort, Yasihaut concealed her anger. Once the evidence showcasing began, she would regain the momentum.
Justicar clacked his jaws. "In that case, the Court will proceed with the law readings. This matter is now settled. Repeating the same inquiries and requests is unnecessary, and, as the Challenger eloquently stated, would spend time."

submitted by Storms_Wrath to HFY [link] [comments]

2024.06.07 00:34 ThatGingerGuy69 Surprisingly strong: Handlock to early legend

I've been trying to play a non-insanity/pain warlock deck and have found a really surprising amount of success with handlock - I started using it around plat 8 and just hit legend with a 65% win rate (currently legend 1365). My climb was not particularly difficult, but the most surprising thing has been how even the matchup spread is for the most part. The only matchup that felt particularly bad was spell mage, while handbuff paladin and excavate rogue were on the more difficult side. Other than that, everything felt either even or favored for me.
Here is the list I've been using:

CONTROLOCK

Class: Warlock

Format: Standard

Year of the Pegasus

2x (1) Felstring Harp

2x (1) Gul'dan's Gift

2x (1) Mass Production

1x (2) Defile

2x (2) Endgame

1x (3) Domino Effect

2x (3) Mortal Eradication

2x (3) Reverberations

1x (3) Sketch Artist

2x (4) Dark Alley Pact

1x (4) E.T.C., Band Manager

1x (2) Dirty Rat

1x (2) Watcher of the Sun

1x (4) Siphon Soul

1x (4) Forge of Wills

1x (5) Symphony of Sins

1x (6) Doomkin

1x (6) Loken, Jailer of Yogg-Saron

1x (8) Lord Jaraxxus

1x (0) Zilliax Deluxe 3000

1x (3) Virus Module

1x (5) Perfect Module

1x (9) Sargeras, the Destroyer

1x (9) Yogg-Saron, Unleashed

2x (10) Table Flip

2x (12) Mountain Giant

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To use this deck, copy it to your clipboard and create a new deck in Hearthstone

A few notes on this list: sketch artist is probably cuttable, but sometimes you can high roll super hard with it and hit something like an extra endgame and snowball super hard if you have a big demon to rez. The only card in ETC I am really sold on is dirty rat, the others are pretty much just filler. Watcher is nice sometimes for the extra healing, but I think siphon should probably be replaced with something like soulfreeze - particularly against handbuff pally, a lot of the times it feels like you just need one more turn to stabilize and soulfreeze can buy you that.

Mulligans

Always keep dark alley pact and mass production, and if you have dark alley then also keep endgame. Pretty much everything else depends on the matchup. If you are going second and have mass production in your starting hand, you can play a mountain giant on turn 3 and then a 9/9 taunt on turn 4, which oftentimes just wins the game right there. I will go over the removal(s) that are worth keeping when talking about matchups.

Matchups

Against handbuff pally, the only removal spells I've found that useful are mortal eradication and table flip. It's really difficult to get good value with defile against pally because they're generally not playing 1/2 health minions, and that's a big reason why I only run 1 copy. Mortal eradication is nice to give you some early healing and remove an early gold panneserpent/weapon tutor, and it also does well if they have divine shield minions. Other than that, I've found this matchup to pretty much just be a taunt check. If you don't draw your dark alley pacts and/or endgame, you're not going to have a good time. But if you're able to survive long enough to get Sargeras down, it should be an easy win from there. This matchup really boils down to whether you can survive until you get Sargeras down or not. Don't be afraid to reverb a buffed up tiger so that you can get the lifesteal rush for yourself, just one more turn of dodging lethal can often be the difference between winning and losing.
Defile is insane in the hunter matchup and solid against DK since it nullifies mining casualties and they often just set you up really well for it. Mortal eradication is also great against hunters - I've found this matchup really easy because I get so much healing and value from my removal. The main thing to be careful of against hunters is them discovering freezing trap - if they discover secrets and I have a big taunt on the board, it is normally worth it to just assume one of them is freezing trap and just not do anything with your taunt minion. They have no way to deal with the huge bodies you put out, so as long as you don't get screwed by freezing trap the matchup is pretty free.
DK is generally pretty straightforward, but can be hairy if they get the minion that makes their undead poisonous down. As long as you play around that, you will outvalue and outlast handbuff DK with Sargeras and Jaraxxus.
Against warlocks, pretty much every removal spell is good, domino effect/table flip in particular since they deal with the crazed conductor so well. Insanity and painlock both have a really difficult time dealing with your tall boards, so as long as you're able to get down the taunts/giants this matchup isn't too tricky.
Warrior is probably the most interesting matchup, and is a lot better than most people would expect. Here you don't really need any of your removal spells so if there's ever a spot you can slam mortal eradication for +4 healing don't be afraid to use it. Aside from your giants/dark alley pact, the big keys to this matchup are doomkin, jaraxxus, and symphony. You want to pressure them as hard as possible with your big minions, and if you're able to get doomkin down it is massive. Basically the entire goal of this matchup is to pressure them hard enough that they're forced to Reno before you have to play Sargeras. The remove 6 cards from your opponents deck is also REALLY good in this matchup, because if you discard some of their key cards it basically guarantees the win (it can also destroy a fizzle snapshot, and it gives you a better idea of what they have in their hand). Mass production is an unsung hero in this matchup too, because it dilutes your deck a good bit to help you dodge the TNT's.

General tips

Handlock is an absolute classic and this variant doesn't play that different than it always has, so there's only a couple things I want to call out here.
First, don't be afraid to play mortal eradication whenever you can get some decent healing from it. It quickly becomes less effective as an actual removal spell against most classes, but the +4 or +6 healing can be massive in a lot of matchups.
Second, the big key in most slow matchups is being able to play Jaraxxus. But you have to make sure you have a decent hand before you play him - I have had games where I just run out of steam because I don't have enough card draw after playing Jaraxxus, so try and make sure you have mass production in hand before playing him if you're in for a grindy game.
Third, and this is probably pretty obvious, but against Reno decks the key is to force Reno before they force Sargeras. I've found most people will feel pressured enough by zilliax to play reno because they don't want you to heal a ton from zilli, but YMMV.
I've been having a lot of fun playing this deck, so I hope it works well for you all too!

submitted by ThatGingerGuy69 to CompetitiveHS [link] [comments]

2024.06.06 20:30 david30121 i know mods are making the robloxhackers.lol website slightly better but it still pisses me off so

Ill just make my own page on my website (https://davidsaltacc.github.io/, just as proof i actually DO have one, not just yappin) and the page just contains the information from robloxhackers.lol, except completely free, since i actually do NOT need money (i still like it, i just like to make it via donations and other unobtrusive ways)
ill maybe also add like all the "exposed" ratted and virus exploits (lots of people like to expose fake exploits here) just to raise awareness
i usually do not do this typa shit, but this amount of ads on a website that doesn't even require money to be funded (my website is online for free too), and especially not just google ads but 18+ ads (mods are working on it, I KNOW) and shit like lootlabs (again, i know you can just bypass it, I KNOW!, but a little kid aint gon know that and might aswell just click allow notifications, get these fake "your pc is infected with a virus" browser notifi, and wipe their hard drive because of that)
also, apparently the page is "copyrighted"? first of all thats public information (unless you mean like the website design and everything) yeah i won't copy it 1:1, just the general idea so like yeah lol
will probably not take too long - its really just a static site containing a bunch of text formatted fancy (robloxhackes.lol does look kinda good doe, gotta give u that, although it seems like yall used a framework tho like electron or smt (EDIT: they use firebase. for the backend. stumbled over that by accident. frontend probably your average js frontend framework ANOTHER EDIT: they use react. i hate react btw (i hate all js frontend frameworks (i hate all of js anyway))) , and the card tilt with glare also looks like a js library ive seen quite a while ago)
!!! DISCLAIMER !!!
No offense to anyone here, the website isnt bad, just overloaded with ads, so ill make my own page, but i still appreciate yall (except mods :3)

submitted by david30121 to robloxhackers [link] [comments]

2024.06.06 14:22 monkaSman Program Review: Brian Alsruhe's Mass Builder

My Background:
I’m 28 years old, and have been lifting consistently for the past 8 years. Since I largely learned about programming from lurking on Reddit, I’ve tried just about every program that’s been popular here since 2015: many variations of 5/3/1 and GZCL, Greg Nuckols programming, Sheiko, Mag-Ort, and Brian Alsruhe programs, to name a few. Over this time, I’ve gone from being a 160 lb. 6’ skellie up to 213 lb as of the start of this program. I’ve done two powerlifting competitions, but once I tried strongman, I found that I enjoyed it much more. I’ve competed in 5 strongman competitions: 2 novice and then 3 open. I’m not very competitive yet, never having gotten out of the bottom half in open competitions.
In the past 2 years I’ve had several health problems that have prevented me from gaining much strength. In early 2021, I got a strain in my right glute that made deadlifting anything above 225 lbs. extremely painful. I could do elevated deadlifts though, so I decided to train for a competition in the summer that had a Ukrainian deadlift while also doing the daily rehab work prescribed by my physical therapist. Unfortunately, during that competition I broke my thumb by smashing it on my belt when lowering an axle clean. I still finished the competition (and actually did better on the events post-broken thumb than pre-broken-thumb!), but I did need surgery to repair my hand, which meant 6 weeks off from any form of lifting. This did seem to benefit my glute injury, which had completely disappeared by the time my surgeon cleared me for lifting again. But I didn’t have much time to get back into training before I caught a very rough case of covid in January 2022. Even after beating the virus, my lungs were really weak, and for 2 months I couldn’t do any exercise more strenuous than a mile long walk.
I’ve eased myself back into training over the spring and fall of this year, while also going through many major life changes: finishing grad school, moving in with my girlfriend, and starting a full-time work-from-home job. I’ve been lucky enough to have the money and space to build up a nice home gym in my basement, with a bunch of strongman implements in my garage. A strongman competition I was planning to do in November got cancelled, but that was okay by me—when my training partner and I did a mock meet with lighter than contest weights, my log numbers were 20 lbs. lower than I needed to be to not zero the event, and it took me about 20 minutes for my breathing and heart rate to recover from the truck pull/loading medley.
Why I picked this program:
I wanted to get my lungs and conditioning back on track, while also focusing on building up my overhead strength. My gym setup only allows me to use implements outside, but the cold/wet/snowy weather where I live in northern Illinois makes that untenable in the winter. I thought the giant set format that Brian Alsruhe’s programming uses would be a good way to build up work capacity for strongman without the need to use implements or do moving events. I had really enjoyed my incomplete runs of his Powerbuilder and Darkhorse programs, so I already knew what I was getting myself into. Of Brian’s programs, The Mass Builder sounded like the most fun, contained giants sets with a dedicated conditioning movement, and gave me a great excuse to go on a proper winter B U L K T O 220 and fill out the middleweight weight class.
Program Structure and my Customizations:
econds off DB OHP SSB Good Morning, Squat superset Tabata with 2 different Isolation movements EMOM deadlift. Start at 225x3, add a rep every minute until failure DB angle drop set supersetted with curls
Light Assistance Bring Sally up pushups Bring Sally Up Squats No-rest superset of 3-4 bicep/tricep/shoulder isolations AMRAP 135 trap bar deadlift 300 reps of just the bar (Bench) for time
Each workout of the Alsruhe Mass Builder has three components: Giant sets of a main lift variation (which is where the heaviest work is done in this program. If you want heavy competition squat/bench/deadlift, you’ll be disappointed with this program), giant sets/EMOM work with a main lift, then an assistance finisher. There’s also optional dedicated conditioning that you can slot in at the beginning or end of the workout. It’s a UppeLower split, with 2x/week frequency for squat, bench, deadlift, and OHP or close variations. Brian’s original version is a 4x/week program, run in four 3-week waves. I wanted to put extra emphasis on overhead pressing, but could not do standing OHP due to the 7’2” ceilings in my basement gym, so I did seated OHP instead. I also added an extra day to the base program with incline bench as the main lift, and added slingshot bench in as an additional pressing variant. Each workout took about 60-80 minutes, including setup and teardown time.
Variation Lifts
The main lift variations have a rotating percentages system, where in each 3-week-long wave, you’ll have a “heavy”, “medium”, and “light” day for each variation, where the reps decrease as the weights are heavier. Each wave has slightly heavier and lower reps than the previous wave (i.e Wave 1’s Medium sets/reps are Wave 2’s Light sets/reps, Wave 1’s Heavy sets/reps are Wave 2’s Medium sets, and so on). The variation work is done in a giant set of four exercises, with an antagonistic movement, the main movement, a core movement, and then a conditioning movement. The antagonistic movement is horizontal/vertical pull for the bench/press, and for Squat and Deadlift, Brian considers the antagonistic lift an explosive jump or hip extension. The variation lifts I used were the close-grip bench, high handle trap bar deadlift, slingshot bench, SSB squat, and Z Press.
Giant Sets
The 4 exercise giant sets can be quite overwhelming to plan out. Only the main mover has programmed set/rep schemes, and you need to figure out your own progression schemes for the other 3 lifts. It could have been a massive programming rabbit hole, but I think I came up with a few simplifications to make it easier to set up and execute. I kept the pulling and core movement the same for both the variation and main lifts on each day to reduce the setup time and number of exercises I had to choose. For example, on the Close Grip/Flat bench day, I did barbell rows as my pulling movement and dragon flags as my core movement for the slingshot and flat bench.
My progression scheme for pullups was to do 7 per set in wave 1, and added one per set in each wave. For Barbell rows, I did sets of 8, 9, then 10 in each week of each wave, with the weight increasing by 10 lbs per wave. For cable rows, I always did sets of 10, with weights increasing by 10 pounds for two weeks, and dropping back by 10 for the next wave (2 steps forward, 1 step back). After wave 3, I felt that I had been too conservative with the weights increases, so I didn’t decrease the weight going into the final wave. I didn’t really have a progression scheme for face pulls/band pullaparts; I just did about 15-20 of them with the same bands throughout the program. I think it makes sense to not push hard on these movements, as they’re easy prehab movements that are paired with lower-body lifts that are far more taxing than any pressing.
For the core work, my initial thought was that timed holds would be harder than rep work, so I would do rep work on the lower body days to try to make those giant sets a bit easier. I did dragon flags on my closegrip/flat bench day, since I could do those without even moving from the bench. I started at 4 reps and added one per wave. I did ab wheel rollouts on Trapbar DL/Squat days, starting at 5 reps per set and adding 1 per wave. I did timed superman holds and planks on Slingshot/OHP and Z Press/Incline days, respectively. I started at 40 seconds and added 5 seconds each wave. On the SSB/Deadlift days, I initially did hanging leg raises, but as the waves progressed, my grip became a limiting factor when part of the deadlift superset, since the deadlift, hanging leg raises, and KB swings were all taxing my grip. I wasn’t happy with how much I had to wait for my grip to recover, so I eventually swapped these out for the superman holds and found that worked fine.
For every giant set on each day of the workout, my conditioning movement was a kettlebell swing with my plate loadable kettlebell. It’s a movement I haven’t done very much, and I also wanted to justify my recent purchase of Rogue’s adjustable kettlebell to myself. Since I was doing the same weight every week, it took no setup time. This was also the easiest conditioning exercise to do in a low-ceilinged and cramped basement where there was not enough space to do (unlike things like hammer swings, jumps, barbell complexes, or animal walks). I did 10 kb swings per set with 58 lbs (two 25 lb plates plus 8 lbs base weight) in the first week, then added a rep per week through week 9. At that point, the swing sets were starting to get really long and a bit boring (and hard for my brain to count when in a meatheaded fugue state), so in the final cycle I increased the weight to 68 lbs, and did 10 swings/set in week 10, 12 swings/set in week 11, and 15 swings/set in week 12. Now that I’ve got lots of experience with the movement, maybe I’ll hop on the bandwagon for the 10,000 kettlebell swings in a month challenge.
Main Lifts
After the variation lift giant set, the second part of each workout has you doing your main lift at one of three rep schemes: Light (10x3 EMOM), Medium (4x8 Giant Sets), or Heavy (5x5 Giant sets). These lifts start at 55%, 60%, and 70% respectively, and increase by 5% each wave. The light EMOM work is not done as a giant set, so those workouts go by much quicker. My main lifts were the bench press, back squat, seated overhead press, deadlift, and incline bench.
Assistance Finishers
The third component of each workout is an assistance finisher, which also have heavy, medium, and light versions that you cycle through in each wave. These in effect are like WODs that you do at the end of your workout. I pulled these from a variety of sources: Brian Alsruhe’s videos, u/MythicalStrength’s Book Of Bad Ideas, agonist supersets (rather than the antagonist supersets that Brian Alsruhe is well known for) based on this video from Mike Israetel and from pump workouts my training partner and I used to do. The goal here was to find fun ways to get in a bunch of accessory work in a short period of time, and I’d often end up with a pump as a nice bonus.
Optional Conditioning
Brian does include optional conditioning section either at the start or end of the workout. I tried out doing a dedicated conditioning segment at the end of my very first day running the program, which consisted of doing 10 minutes of alternating between sets pull-ups, dips, and kettlebell swings for 10 minutes straight. I was totally gassed after doing this, and decided that I would just push hard on the giant sets throughout the program and not do a separate conditioning portion of the workout, which I think was the right decision. Even without dedicated conditioning, I would just come upstairs and lay on the couch for a while after finishing each workout; more exercise would have made me useless for the rest of the evening.
Scheduling
I had two vacations and 3 trips for work while running this program, which when combined with adding an extra day per week made this 12 week program take 13.5 weeks for me to complete. When possible while travelling for work, I’d do assistance finishers from the upcoming week’s workouts in the hotel gym. It was nice to get some exercise in while travelling, which reduced soreness when returning to my regular schedule, and also shortened the workouts in the upcoming week. I did not skip any workouts, but on days when I ran out of time to work out or got too gassed, I would stop after finishing the variation or main work, and finish the rest of the workout on the following day.
Results:
My lift numbers (in lbs) and links to PR videos (warning: may contain grizzly-esque yelling) are shown in the table below.
Variation Work Analysis:
The way the variation lifts are set up is exceptionally well designed. At first glance, it’s reminiscent of 5/3/1, where you have 3 sets which each increase in intensity by 10% while the rep ranges get smaller, with the final set being an AMRAP. But unlike 5/3/1, the percentages are based on true maxes rather than a training max. Also unlike many variants of 5/3/1, where the first two sets often feel like they’re your last warmups, I never felt like the first two sets here were too easy—they always felt like solid working sets.
Before doing the AMRAP set of the day, I’d look at my past few weeks’ performance and pick a goal rep number that would give me a small estimated 1RM PR, or at least more reps than the last time I did an AMRAP at that weight. The rotating structure of the heavy, medium, and light weights means that you never repeat the same AMRAP weight closer than two weeks apart. This makes it pretty easy to hit either a rep PR with a weight or an estimated 1RM PR every time you work out, which was always a good motivational boost that made me excited to continue and move on to the next section of the workout.
Over the course of the program, I always got at least 2 reps over the minimum target on the AMRAPs, and I always either tied or beat my previous rep record with any given weight. With so many AMRAPs at so many different percentages of my maxes, I was able to develop a quite accurate sense of how close to failure I was getting. The last rep of the AMRAPs was always slow and sometimes grindy, but only once during the 60 AMRAPs I did over the course of the program did I get too greedy with an AMRAP and fail a rep. While it’s a complicated progression scheme that requires a spreadsheet, this program has by far my favorite use of AMRAPs as a fun challenge that keeps the workouts engaging and challenging.
In the first cycle, the giant sets left me pretty gassed and I was taking as much as 4 minutes between them, especially on lower body days. By the end of the program, I was down to around 2 minutes of rest between giant sets on the upper body days, and around 3 minutes on lower body days, a great sign that my conditioning had significantly improved! Early in the program, I would often just lay down on my bench for a few minutes after finishing the workout, but I found myself doing that less often at the end of the program, even though all the weights were much heavier and all the assistance work had gotten harder.
Main Work Analysis:
EMOM work was my favorite of the three rep schemes for the main lifts. EMOM work gets you very efficient at doing your setup because the faster you complete your set, the more rest you get before your next set. I think they’re also a good way to get a good stimulus from weights that are further away from your max. These workouts also tended to be among the shortest, especially for the lower body workouts. I’ll definitely be doing more EMOM work in the future.
The 5x5 and 4x8 rep schemes were not as fun as the EMOM work. They also took quite a bit more time due to the giant set format, typically being 25-30 minutes for 5x5 and 20-25 for 4x8, whereas EMOMs were done in 10 minutes. That said, the weight percentages were expertly chosen. After finishing the first wave, I thought there was no way I’d be able to hit the weights called for in the final waves, but in the end I was just strong enough to get through everything. The final wave has you doing 5x5@85% of your max, and sometimes got a bit grindy, but I never missed a rep. Any program that can get you up to doing 5x5 @ 85% in 12 weeks is truly impressive. In order to balance out the length/difficult of workouts, I should have done assistance finishers that were shorter on the 5x5 and 4x8 days, with the option to do longer ones on the EMOM days.
The lower body days were often very draining, especially if the main lift was a 5x5 or 4x8 rep scheme. There were a few times when I was feeling really tired and I’d just do the first one or two thirds of the workout, and complete the rest of the workout on the following day. I had expected these workouts to be harder than the upper body workouts and tried to make the lower body workouts less draining by doing easy prehab movements as the first element of the giant set, but this alone wasn’t enough. Lower body workouts were made even harder when I travelled, and would drop below 2x/week frequency on lower body lifts. To avoid crushing DOMs, I think I’d prefer to have some upper and lower body work on every day so that my frequency is high enough that I won’t ever go too long between squat/DL sessions. This was compounded by my decision to add a third upper body day, which meant that the weekly schedule was ULULU rather than ULUL, which sometimes made for too many days between lower-body workouts. After my first intense leg soreness that made it embarrassingly hard to stand up and sit down the next day, I decided I’d proactively swap around workouts when I was going to be travelling to try to minimize the time between lower body workouts. I still think that my soreness is kept in check best by having some form of squatting/deadlifting on at least 3 days per week. To make that work with the wave structure of this program while still doing a good job of managing fatigue would require some careful work. It would even open up the possibility of uppelower body giant sets, which I really enjoy as a time-saver.
Assistance Finisher Analysis:
I hadn’t done many challenge-style WODs before this program, and found that I really loved them. I think other lifters give crossfit WODs a bad rap, but I think they can be a nutritious part of a complete program. I expect that many assistance finishers I did for this program will enter my regular rotation. If you keep the same assistance finishers for each cycle, then you’ll be revisiting them every three weeks. Much like the AMRAPs in the variation work, this is enough time for most people to have gotten stronger and have a good chance of exceeding their previous performance, which is always a fun motivational boost. I’ll discuss some of the highlights and lowlights of my assistance finishers few paragraphs. If you want more thoughts on the other finishers I did, let me know in the comments.
Mythical Strength’s “+2 bonus to squats” is a great workout for squats (or really any lift where your max is 350-600), and I loved doing it for both the back squat and the trap bar deadlift. Start with a weight that can be made with 45s and 25s that’s around 85-90% of your max and do a hard set of 1-5 reps. Then remove a 25/45, and do 2 more reps than in your first set, and repeat until you’re at 135 (or you give up/get bored/ run out of time). It gives a great pump, and is basically a slow way of putting away your weights.
My Heavy OHP finisher was initially going to be Crossfit Grace (do 30 clean and press with 135 lbs as fast as possible) with seated strict press. Unfortunately because I’m so awful at seated OHP, I wasn’t going to be able to complete 30 reps. So I turned it into a challenge to get as many reps at 135 as I could, and ended up getting 13, 15, 20, and 22 reps in each cycle. I’ll reuse the format of “get as many reps as possible with x lift at y weight in 10 minutes”, which should work well for a wide variety of lifts.
Bring Sally Up (perform reps in time with the lyrics of this song(https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6A2V9Bu80J4) , total of 30 reps over 3.5 minutes) was a lot of fun on squats. I did it with an SSB to take arm/elbow/wrist cramping out of the equation. I increased the weight each cycle, starting with just the bar and finishing with 155 lbs, but probably had room for more. For pushups, however, I hated it. I was limited more by my inability to hold a plank for much more than a minute than by chest/tricep strength, which led to me just feeling like I was wasting my time once I couldn’t plank in between pushups. So I didn’t get a pump, and did about 15 pushups while with a plank for a minute and a half. In cycle 4, I swapped this workout out for doing 100 bodyweight dips in as little time as possible (getting it done in 10 minutes flat). This was much more enjoyable, and something I’ll probably do again.
A finisher that I love doing whose origins I can’t remember is the Dumbbell Press Incline drop set, wherein I start with a dumbbell seated overhead press, and then drop the angle of the press rather than the weight, so that eventually I’m doing a flat bench. This works well if you have an adjustable bench with lots of settings (mine has 10, from 0 to 90 degrees in 10 degree increments increments), but might not be as fun if you don’t have many settings. For extra fun, you can superset with one or two other isolation movements.
I really enjoyed doing agonist supersets as part of a bench or bench variation pyramid. I’d do a set of 10 tricep extensions, then 3-5 bench presses, add 20 lbs to the bench, and repeat until I got to a max effort weight. Then drop by increments of 10 lbs on the way back down. This ended up being around 15 sets usually, took around 20 minutes, and was a ton of fun. If you want more “rest” you can also add in a curl to the mix, but don’t rest in between doing each exercise for The Maximum Pump.
Mythical Strengths’ 135 trap bar deadlift AMRAP was a great test of grip and will. I ended up increasing my total number of reps each time I attempted it, going from 30 reps in cycle 1 to 51 in the last cycle. This is one I’ll do regularly. I’d love to get into the triple digits with this.
Diet/Recovery/Etc:
I have a work-from-home engineering job and haven’t been doing much physical activity outside the gym. I should have made more of an effort to go on a daily walk during the winter, but only went for walks on days when I had to run errands, around 3 times per week. I sleep about 6-7 hours per night on weeknights, and around 8 hours per night on weekends.
Since I work from home and love to cook, I seldom eat out unless I’m travelling. In order to bulk for this program, I added Became A Hobbit and added a second breakfast. This was either a bagel with cream cheese or sausage patty and fried egg on an English muffin with aioli. My main breakfast was a smoothie of a banana, cup of frozen fruit, cup of oat milk, cup of orange juice, scoop of protein powder, and scoop of creatine (the only supplement I take). Lunch was either leftovers from earlier in the week or chicken sandwiches with chips and some fruit. My girlfriend is a vegetarian, so most of the meals I cooked for dinner were vegetarian (but always having a good amount of legumes/tofu/eggs/cheese for protein) and rice/potatoes/pasta for carbs. Sometimes in addition to the vegetarian food, I’d cook up a chicken breast for myself. I’d eat some ice cream or cookies for dessert a few times per week, and would have 2-3 drinks on a few nights per week.
Advice for Success with This Program
Think carefully about the logistics of your giant sets. Don’t be like me and do hanging leg raise right after deadlifts; your grip won’t hold up. Dragon flags as a core variation right after bench variation is a good choice—you don’t need to move or set up any other equipment.
Don’t use old maxes for this program. I recommend testing your maxes prior to this program in the giant set format (that’s how I tested all my variations prior to running this program, since I didn’t have any maxes for them). This way, if you’re not accustomed to a high training density, your weights won’t be too brutally heavy. Then as you get used to it over this program, you’ll feel awesome smashing your AMRAP targets.
Pick your assistance finishers to balance out the lengths of workouts. The Heavy assistance finishers will always follow EMOM work, so these can be longer, while I’d recommend doing something around 10 minutes or less for the Medium and Light assistance, since these follow your 4x8 and 5x5 main mover work.
Don’t go overboard with picking completely unique exercises for each giant sets. You get decent variety via the rep ranges and the assistance finishers, so you can cut down on analysis paralysis by repeating exercises between your variation/main work, or between days (as I did with the KB swings in every workout).
Final Thoughts
This program was awesome. I made huge strength gains across the board, adding 90 lbs to my PL total, and a large amount of weight to several variations. I’m back above 20 bodyweight pullups again, and finally hit a 3pl8 bench. My squat and deadlift gained 30 pounds each, and I’m well on my way to finally set new lifetime PRs on those lifts. I think my conditioning got a lot better based on how much rest I needed between giant sets at the beginning of the program versus the end of the program, thought that’s a bit less quantifiable. I’d love to hear any ideas people have for a good metric to evaluate conditioning.
I also gained 7 lbs while increasing my arms by half an inch, my legs by 0.75 inches, and my chest by 1.5 inches while only gaining half an inch on my waist. I’m not sure how to measure shoulder size increase, but they definitely got a lot bigger. Most of my shirts and jackets are quite a bit harder to get around my shoulders now.
I made major gains in strength, size, and conditioning while having a ton of fun. I’ll probably run this program again next winter when it’s too cold/icy for event training and I want to make my arms even bigger. Brian's programming is incredible, and I thank him for putting out so many excellent programs for free. Anyone who's willing to work hard, has a well-stocked gym, and is willing to put in a decent amount of effort customizing it for your needs (or just pay Brian to do it for you, he deserves the money) could see great gains across a variety of dimensions running this program.
What’s next:
In May, I’m going on a vacation to Brazil to visit my friend and training partner, who’s recently moved there. While I’m there, we’re doing a strongman competition with a circus DB ladder (45,50,55,65 kg), deadlift ladder (160,180,220,250 kg), log for reps (90 kg), and Hercules hold. My goal will be to at least get the first 3 DBs and DLs in the ladder. Those are above my current maxes but should be achievable with a decent peak. Now that it’s spring, I can train log consistently and should turn 90 kg from a max into a weight I can hit for a couple reps—5 would be a great number to hit. I’m going to run a frankenprogram using bits and pieces of mag-ort, Greg Nuckols programs, GZCL Jacked and Tan, and various assistance finishers to prep for this. All done in giant sets, of course.
I’d like to hang around 220 lbs for a while and recomp. My waist has gotten a bit big for some of my pants and I’d prefer not having to squint to see my abs in the mirror. I'll do this by ending my hobbit-style Second Breakfast.

submitted by monkaSman to MensWellbeing [link] [comments]

2024.06.06 14:12 Galileo1609 Election voting using a mobile app

You live in a democratic country where voting has been traditionally done using paper ballots. In the not too distant future, a generation arises that feels the time has come to dispense with paper ballots and believes that secure voting can be done using an app on a mobile device. This generation has come to realize that since the majority of people use mobile banking and no one has ever had their account hacked, it would stand to reason that if mobile banking is secure and you trust the bank to protect your money, it should be possible to use a mobile app that is likewise safe and secure.
The reasons for wanting to go mobile when casting a ballot include the following:

No need for humans to count votes.
The voting results are virtually instantaneously known.
Voters can vote on a large number of issues directly, both locally, state-wide and nationally.
The same app can be used periodically by the public to vote on key issues directly such as during a crisis and the overwhelming population wants new elections.
There is no need to have polling stations where long lines can form or where the gathering of large groups could potentially be unsafe, such as during a pandemic.
Weather and other environmental factors will have little or no effect on voter turnout, since voting is done from an app.
A large amount of demographic data will be instantly available to anyone on the voting results such as votes per gender, age group, race, location, income, etc.

As an elected politician who campaigned on introducing mobile voting, your challenge is to determine how the system will be implemented and how safe and secure it will be. With little to no background in technology, this becomes an even greater challenge.

Solution

As a politician who lacks a technical background, some would just resort to hiring a bunch of Ph.D computer and software engineers to figure it out. But being a critical thinker, you decide to take a more hands-on approach and where you lack knowledge in something you will learn along the way. Nevertheless, you do decide to bring in several Ph.D experts in the field of computer science who have extensive experience in the banking industry who will determine the tasks that need to be completed and whether additional professional support outside of their expertise is required.
Your team of experts has provided the following tasks that need to be covered:

To determine what encryption mechanisms will be used to secure the transmission of data.
Proving that a voter is a real person, alive, a citizen of the country, and is legally allowed to vote.
Proving that the mobile device that they cast their vote from is really their device and that the real person is using the device at the time they cast their vote.
Deciding who operates the voting servers.
To determine whether the source code for the app and backend servers is open source or closed to the public.
To determine who writes the code for the app and backend servers.
To determine who verifies the code that it is free from bugs, security flaws and backdoors that would allow hackers to access either the app or the backend servers.
Deciding how the app will be distributed to citizens.
A way to prevent or significantly reduce the likelihood that any malware running on the device is capable of interfering with the app or accessing its data.
A way to prove that the vote received on the voting servers could only have originated from the real person using their actual device.
A way to detect and prevent any attack on the system during voting.
A way to verify the number of invalid votes and determine what action to take if the number would cause the final results to change.
An alternative to a smartphone.

While this is not an exhaustive list of things that need to be covered, these are the most important points. Because technologies continue to advance every year, providing a concrete solution for each of the above points is not as meaningful as taking the correct step for each of them. So, keeping with the focus on critical thinking, the following steps would be taken. Only when all of them have been evaluated collectively, is it possible to know more accurately whether a mobile voting system can be done securely and reliably.
Encryption
There are many different encryption protocols available and no doubt more will evolve over time. But one particular type of encryption is known as end-to-end encryption, or ETEE. Using ETEE means that data is sent directly between two computers without any computers between the two acting as a mediator. A VPN (Virtual Private Network) is an encryption method where a computer acts as a middle man. While VPNs are typically safe, they cannot be 100% trusted. Even without any middleman computers, the Internet in general is made up of millions of these middlemen who are responsible for getting your data from one device to another, so in effect, the Internet in general is not safe. However, if the data can be well encrypted at one end and sent to its destination without any VPN middlemen, then it becomes extremely difficult for anyone to intercept the data and decrypt it. The encryption protocol known as Signal is one such mechanism and is used in WhatsApp and Facebook Messenger, making it extremely difficult for even Facebook to access user messages.
While there is talk about future quantum computers being able to easily and quickly decrypt data, it should also be noted that when such computers do arise, new algorithms will also be developed for quantum computers to prevent other quantum computers from decrypting the data.
In summary: End-to-end encryption can be used to safely secure the data between a mobile device and a voting server.
Identity
In order to prove someone's identity whenever they use the voting app, they would be required to come into a government office within 8 weeks of an election. They would be required to bring their ID card proving that they are a citizen. They must also bring one or more mobile devices that they want to have registered. . Bringing multiple devices is for safety purposes in the event that one device doesn't work or later on gets lost or stolen. Each device must be equipped with a retinal eye scanner. When their identity has been verified, the person then uses their device to scan their eye using the voting app. They must do this in the government office. The app will then transmit this to the government servers. At this point, the person's identity is known and the devices they plan on using are registered for their use. It is not possible for anyone else to use the device for voting unless the app is uninstalled or a hard reset is done on the device. The eye scan also acts as an unlock mechanism for the app. No passwords will be supported.
Servers
The servers that handle voting data must be highly secured. They must be operated on secured property owned by the government and have the highest level of security systems and procedures in place that limits who has access to the facility. The level of security should be equal to if not higher than guarding a gold vault in Fort Knox which includes armed guards with orders to kill trespassers. The only people ever allowed to work at these facilities are naturally born citizens who have passed extensive background checks. Excluding nuclear missile launch sites, these facilities must be considered the most secured in the country. A country can survive a nuclear power plant meltdown. It may not survive a collapse of democracy that could lead to a civil war. While the servers can be powered from the public electrical grid, there must be generator backups that can sustain the system for days. There should not be just one facility but a dozen or more located around the country in low populated areas, which would make it easier to spot intruders at a distance.
Software Development
Transparency is vital to ensuring a true democracy. For this reason, the source code for both the app and the servers must be open source. This will also allow the public to scrutinize the software for potential bugs and security flaws. Any software developer can download the source code and compile it and compare the binary they generate to the ones published by the government. If there is any difference, then it probably means that someone in the government is using a different version of the source code which should raise suspicion that the voting app is being tampered with. Even though the software is open source, it is vital that it be developed entirely at a government facility and preferably at the server facility. This includes the code for the mobile app as well. The reason for developing the code at a server facility is because testing needs to be carried out between the mobile app and the server and by limiting the network between the two to one that is private and secure and has no connection to the Internet, there is little chance of some hacker infiltrating the development environment and replacing executable binaries with ones that contain malware. Only those that are naturally born citizens can be allowed to work on the software and hardware. Verification of the software must be done by a third party, non-government organization. Because the software is open source, there is no need for them to be on site. However, the employees that do the verification must be naturally born citizens.
App Distribution
Normally apps are distributed from an app store like Google Play or Apple's App Store. But these companies act like middlemen. This makes them vulnerable to hackers gaining access to the app binaries and replacing them with ones that contain spyware or malware that can potentially affect the voting app. For this reason, the mobile app needs to be hosted on government run servers and preferably at the same facilities where the backend servers are used for processing voting data. By keeping the source code, software development, app distribution and servers all within the same guarded facilities, the risk of a hacker breach is significantly reduced. Allowing users to download the app directly from a government server should not be allowed because the transmission of the app is vulnerable to middlemen lurking on servers across the Internet that are used to transport the app to the user. Instead, when someone comes to the government office to register their device, it is during this visit that the app is installed over a local and secure wireless network. Should the person later on delete the app on their device, they will have to return back to the government office to get it reinstalled. The app will never be allowed to be installed on a device that has been rooted, which is a process that strips off all the security limits allowing any app to do whatever it wants with the device.
Dealing with Malware
Google's Android operating system and Apple's iOS have proven after 15 years of evolution, including more stricter security measures, that using these operating systems for mobile banking is safe and secure. Even though malware and spyware still exists, apps operate in a sandbox that isolates them from access by other apps and processes on the device. Even if a malware manages to take advantage of a security flaw, the backend servers have multiple barriers that need to be overcome and any attempt at hacking the system will almost certainly be detected. Many, if not most banking apps, require some form of communication over a mobile network instead of the Internet as part of authentication. This often includes the need for the user to verify a code that is only sent by SMS.
Google and Apple both employ malware detection on their distribution servers to periodically scan apps for viruses and other malware. If detected, it is possible for Google or Apple to either install a patch on every device, disable the malware, disable apps affected by the malware or even uninstall those apps that are affected. Because the voting app would be distributed from government servers, a collaboration between the government and Google and Apple would be required. The voting app would be installed in the app stores but not be made available to the public. They get scanned for malware whenever they run their scanning software on all the other apps. Should malware be detected, the government would be notified about the severity. If the government decides that the malware is severe enough, they could request Google and Apple to remove the app from all devices and then require all users to visit a government office to obtain the updated version. For less severe malware or where security flaws are discovered, the government could just create a fix using what is referred to as a patch and send this directly to the device without requiring the user to visit the government office. A patch only requires a small portion of the app to be updated rather than the entire app, so sending this patch over the Internet should be a very minor risk worth taking.
Verification Using the App
Whenever someone uses the voting app, it is crucial that the true identity of the user be verified. Many banking apps today will often require the user to take a photo of themselves and then compare this with the photo on a government authorized document such as an ID card or passport. While this is a safe approach, it isn't foolproof. For this reason, a retinal eye scan needs to be done when the app is opened and whenever the user needs to make a critical action such as placing their vote. Using video to verify someone should be avoided as it is possible to obtain videos of people and use AI to create deepfakes that could pass the person off as being the real person. Retinal scans are extremely difficult to hack.
Dealing with System Attacks
Servers and networks have evolved over the past many decades to the point that it is very difficult for some malware or hacker to successfully assault a major website or Internet service and cause major disruption or damage. While this does happen from time to time, it is almost always the result of some organization failing to implement proper safeguards to detect and inhibit these kinds of attacks. A Denial-of-Service (or DOS) attack is one type of assault that a malware can execute by sending a vast number of requests to the servers in the hopes of overloading it resulting in it either crashing or becoming extremely slow to service normal users. This would certainly be a favorite attack during an election. One approach to avoid this is to give every voter a designated voting time period in which they can vote. This could be a two hour time period on certain dates. Because voting can be held over several days, everyone would have multiple time periods in which they could cast their vote in the event that they are not available during one of the designated time periods. If a malware attempts to execute a DOS attack against the voting servers, even though the IP address can be faked on every request, the request received by the server must include the retinal verification which identifies the person and device they are using. If this identification doesn't match up with the voting time period, the request would be ignored. And because there are a dozen or more server facilities hosting the voting servers, the incoming requests would be distributed evenly across all of them further preventing any one facility alone from bearing a heavy attack.
Verifying Votes
No matter how secure the mobile voting system is, it is bound to happen that some votes are invalid. This could be for example the result of a software bug, a hardware failure, some problem on a voter's device or even the voter making a mistake and making the wrong choice. Even paper ballots come with their own set of potential problems. The goal of the mobile voting system however is to significantly reduce the likelihood of problems.
To be certain that the final voting results are valid, there can only be so much error allowed. If the amount of errors isn't enough to change the voting results, then the errors can be ignored. But if the number could potentially alter the results in a way that would affect the people getting elected, or laws being passed, then action needs to be taken to correct the mistakes. One way to achieve this is to send a letter by mail to the voter containing a code. The user then visits the government voting site and enters the code. Their voting choices will be displayed while keeping their identity hidden on the web page. They can then compare their voting choices on the web page to the one in the voting app and if they don't match, they can update their choice using the website. They must use the website and not their mobile app because if their app has been hacked and compromised, then any attempts to update their voting choice might fail.
Changing a vote can only be done within days. Once the backend has received all the votes, it then compares the votes to the changes and if the number of changes would affect the election results in a way that would change the number of seats a party gets or whether some other politician wins or some law passes or does not pass, then the voting needs to be repeated, but only after the changes have been investigated and the reasons for why the discrepancies arose are dealt with and prevented from happening again.
An Alternative to a Smartphone
Even though smartphones today are secure enough for mobile banking, the constant updates to deal with security flaws both in the voting app and the operating system gives rise to the question of whether an alternative to smartphones can be used. One solution would be to use a custom smartphone developed entirely by the government. This device however would have significant differences from a regular smartphone. The operating system would be custom developed but still remain open source. As a custom operating system, it would be significantly simpler and scaled down from the massive operating systems that Google and Apple offer. Another feature is that these devices would never allow any apps to be installed. They come pre shipped with the voting app but are capable of being updated over the Internet. There would not be Bluetooth or any other communication interfaces. Starting the device would require a retinal scan. While it could support SMS messages, the hardware would be hardwired to only communicate with a government server. It would not be possible to send or receive text messages from anyone else. To keep costs down, citizens would pay a fee that basically covers the cost of producing the device. This is unlike Samsung or Apple who sell their phones to make a significant profit.
While the overall cost of developing and maintaining these devices will be significantly higher than using publicly available devices, the security it offers would be the highest that could be achieved, ensuring that a country's democracy is safeguarded. And what price can you put on that?

submitted by Galileo1609 to CriticalThinkn [link] [comments]

2024.06.06 10:39 Exact_Beyond_4296 SGU (Grenada) losing some therapists since SGU wanted them in-person, was that normal at your school to lose some therapists after COVID(?), also helpful notes & warnings regarding SGU (as of 2024 at least)

Serious question, I know the stigma already with Caribbean schools in general; on a related note, I just sought out/booked an appointment through my insurance now (not from the school, not school insurance); reading some comments in the subreddit, some people were also saying you should try to maybe book a therapist outside of your school since you don't know if there will be some accidental cross-talking / intentional cross-talking / HIPAA violations ....
Sorry for the post; I just needed someone to talk to I guess, not really feeling my best at the moment; forgive me...
Also just stressed out about the CBSE and Step 1 stuff, trying my best... (About to take CBSE and Step 1 in a few weeks)
Side notes for myself: Using throwaway account for obvious reasons
Side notes to check myself on the subreddit's rules: I'm not asking for medical advice of course as per the subreddit rules (rule #3); rule #6 this is post is still medical school-related; just checking and making sure (please don't delete, honestly asking, my apologies...)
I'll leave this post here and won't delete it in case it helps anyone else in the future, too.
I'll echo/repeat the general advice, please try and go to a US MD or US DO school if possible first if you are looking at SGU or other Caribbean schools (no need to tell me about the 'bad things' regarding SGU or other Caribbean schools-- I'm adamant on finishing what I started; I take fault and blame for myself for going here, but still appreciate the chance I've been given.)
Was just using the school therapists because it was already free (I'm not using the school's insurance, I have my own that is separate) or already included in our tuition so-to-speak, so I didn't want to "spend extra" on seeking therapy outside, but I kinda have to do so anyways and I think it will be better for me in the long-term anyways.
I'll say the following things mainly as a genuine warning of "caution" that only a student at the school would know for the most part-- some of the things you've probably already seen on this subreddit (there was at least one recent post and one post last year echoing some of the things I will be saying here) in the following:
_________________________________
Notes below, regarding things that may be of interest as a warning if you are planning on attending, please disregard if you are not interested in attending SGU and/or this does not apply to you:
SGU has made some recent changes to their grading system for the newer students [as of 2024] that makes their "system easier" to try and "retain" more students, possibly because they know some "gossip" is spreading out now with the truth that their Step pass rate is actually much lower (it's complicated and multi-variable by nature of course-- for example, it's related to students in general reacting to the Step 1 P/F by being more "complacent" thinking that the "exam is just P/F" but I know for myself I need to treat this exam seriously and still pretend it's scaled for my own sake).
I know this because I tutored some of the SGU students through SGU's in-school system via DES (Department of Educational Services) and learned about those changes by also seeing their new syllabi and grading adjustments; they've intentionally added some grade changes here and there to try and retain students some more and "preventing" some of the "weaker" students from "failing out" at that earlier stage (to try and "coax more money" out of them in the end). SGU's curriculum is not that great in my opinion, they tend to leave out some major concepts that I've seen from practice questions from things like AMBOSS and UWorld; the dean himself even admitted that he will be using AI (artificial intelligence) with a company for practice questions for us (to be determined though, only heard about this from some friends in Student Government).... That may be interesting, but also seems kind of.... hard to tell for sure, we are like their guinea pigs with their recent changes.
Just try your best to do well and study UWorld as best as you can and do not fall into the trap of complacency as best as you can. (Pretend that the Step 1 is still scaled/scored for your own sake.)
SGU has also fired some professors recently, some of the professors that were fired were good and some were..... "meh" but still friendly people that I liked, I am sad that they fired one of them, but oh well (hard to say for sure why they were fired, I can guess why one of them was fired, but oh well, I digress). I don't know for sure what is going on, they also fired/forced retirement on some of the best professors at the school, but I know that will probably be irrelevant/unknown to some of the newer students going, in.
Be skeptical and wary of the administration -- sometimes they can help -- and sometimes they are just limited in what they can do. Forgive them and move on, try your best to survive...
I've also heard that some students were experiencing some hurtful or unhelpful things from their very own DES (Department of Educational Services) where the "DES Monitors" (the employees "guarding" or watching over tutoring) were "bullying" some of newer students who were just trying to get tutoring or some help. I found that really awful and I can definitely attest that DES sometimes do seem to "micromanage" students who are just trying to get help, that sometimes some of the "rules" at SGU felt too micromanaging or restrictive compared to other medical schools, I think.
One example is that there is forced attendance in-person for lectures, but you do have a "window" of skips that you are allowed. (Other medical schools do not force attendance for lectures in-person, but I can understand why SGU forces attendance of the lectures in-person -- one of the reasons why SGU does this may be because the caliber of students at SGU are generally not as strong as the US MD students-- not all SGU students are "bad" -- there are still some great students here of course-- it's partially an "insurance-like" policy of SGU to track and see who can survive clinicals based on what I've heard, which is fine by me personally -- but just important to know beforehand, since I've known some of my tutees/students/friends who have dropped out because of their attendance. I personally am not affected by this since I like going to lectures in-person anyways, but it can be stressful, I imagine, for some people, and can be bad in case of some virus or flu going around.)
Logistics or studying-wise for students, make sure you balance "SGU-specific" lecture material with "USMLE-specific" material -- SGU's curriculum is not exactly the best at matching USMLE material based on my observations of comparing Boards & Beyond + Amboss + UWorld to SGU's curriculum (at least as of 2023-2024) and from talking with others who have done with on the recent Step exams. So, unfortunately, you do need to spend some more time making sure you cover your bases for SGU material if you plan on getting into IEA/Honor Society (albeit, with their recent grading changes, it should also be easier for the newer students to get into IEA/Honor Society, but keep in mind you still need to prepare some more for the USMLE -- try your best to study even more than what SGU gives you. Their new "easier grading scale" is essentially being balanced by SGU's attempt at limiting those who are allowed to take Step by using the CBSE now to filter who is allowed or not allowed to take the USMLE Step 1 once you finish Term 5.)
__________
Edit: Will try to create a summary; I wrote this post originally late into the night, my apologies. I can understand and see why it looks like a mess or a "flight of ideas" as redditor "haveallthefaith" said.
Summary of the notes part if applicable (for people thinking about going to SGU), targeting major main ideas that would help:

Forced in-person attendance (albeit you do have a window of "skips" or number of skips you can use)
Try your best to survive (easier said than done of course), know what works for you and what doesn't
Will generally need to balance "SGU-specific" material vs. "USMLE-specific" material (not necessarily unique to SGU, happens sometimes at other schools too , but might be relatively more so at SGU) if you are trying to do well in terms of both SGU grades and USMLE
Be skeptical of what they say about the pass rate, right now their pass rate is actually not that high (also see here https://www.reddit.com/medicalschool/comments/1cqkn9i/step_1_and_step_2_pass_rates_by_caribbean_schools/ ), keep on your guard and keep studying as best as you can -- study more than what SGU gives you if you can (focusing on also USMLE material to balance what you need to do eventually while also doing well at SGU-specific stuff)

submitted by Exact_Beyond_4296 to medicalschool [link] [comments]

2024.06.06 06:58 Leather-Paramedic-10 I gave my baby daughter herpes (HSV-1) by kissing the top of her head

I posted the following about nine months ago (https://www.reddit.com/NewParents/comments/16m0g5u/) and a user recently suggested that I "share it over and over", so I thought I would repost the story to try to make others aware:
A little over two weeks ago I kissed the top of our then 6.5 weeks old baby's head (top and centre of the skull). It was a single, light kiss on her thick head of hair with no obvious scratches or other skin imperfections underneath. But I had cold sores on my lips at the time.
We have been really careful to avoid giving our children cold sores or otherwise pass along the herpes virus (HSV-1). We have a maintained a strict "no kissing on the lips or face" rule between everyone and our children, and I do not kiss my wife on the lips or other sensitive regions while I have cold sores. But our baby was diagnosed with HSV-1.
She developed sores starting from where I kissed the top of her head within 24-48 hours of the kiss. We weren't certain what the sores were initially (although I informed my wife that I thought it could be herpes due to my prior kiss) so we brought her to a walk-in medical clinic for assessment. They took a swab sample for testing and provided a prescription for topical (skin-applied) antibiotics while suggesting the sores could be due to a bacterial infection. But after 48 hours the sores were continuing to grow and spread across the top of her head. So we phoned the clinic and our family doctor, but they still had no test results. They then provided a prescription for oral antibiotics. But after 24 hours the sores were continuing to grow and were now on her forehead. We still had no test results so my wife took her to our family doctor. But our family doctor did not know the cause of the sores either and suggested we take her to the children's hospital emergency room.
We took our baby to children's emergency that evening. They took a look at the sores and listened to our concerns (I expressed a strong concern that herpes from my earlier kiss could be the culprit). They also took swab, blood and urine samples to try to determine the cause of the sores (bacterial or viral), and to determine if it had spread to other organs or systems. They tried to take a sample near the spinal cord as well to check if it was in her central nervous system, but they were unable to collect what they needed due to her small size (10lbs) and movement during their attempts.
She was admitted to hospital and started on IV antiviral and antibiotic medication. While waiting for the results from the hospital, we were informed that the test results from the walk-in clinic showed only a culture of normal skin bacteria. But the hospital staff said this could be due to them collecting the sample from the surface and not opening up the sore to collect.
After spending 48 hours in the hospital we were informed that she has contracted HSV-1 and that the sores may reoccur in the same region it started originally (top of head) or around the mouth; different infectious disease doctors gave varying options on where the sores may appear in the future.
They told us that she will need at least a week of IV antiviral as she is too young to take oral antiviral.
My mom was infected with HSV-1 when she was in grade 6 (likely from her dad) and was hospitalized for a month. Apparently they thought at the time that she would die from it due to the severity of the response. And my older brother and I both were infected with HSV-1 around that same age or younger from our mom but we have had only recurring cold sores on and around the lips with no other major symptoms. I seem to get cold sores almost exclusively when I have a lack of sleep and thus put stress on the body leading to a compromised immune system.
Now our little girl has been infected despite our best efforts, and it breaks my heart. We are concerned about it now being easier to spread to our other children, and the possibility of it spreading my wife's breasts which would affect her ability to breastfeed. Especially concerning if we have more children in the future. And I have found cold sores to be a cause of physical, emotional and social discomfort in my own life so I am very sorry to have passed it along to my daughter.
I had no idea that HSV-1 could be spread through contact with skin. Growing up I only heard of it being through transfer to the lips or mouth (lip-to-lip kissing, sharing cups and utensils, etc.), and a few years ago I read that it could spread to breasts or genitals despite not being HSV-2 (genital herpes). Looking it up online now, I am seeing that they suggest not kissing babies under 28 days to avoid causing neonatal herpes. But it does not make it clear that kissing ANY part of the baby could spread the virus. The doctor stated it is possible to spread through kissing the top of her head, but prior to diagnosis said he would be surprised if it was HSV-1 because she was not under 28 days (she was 6.5 weeks at time of kiss). She was full-term and at a healthy weight with no complications during pregnancy or post-partum.
So I was sitting in the hospital full of regret over that single kiss, and hoping that she is able to make a full recovery. But I am glad that she did develop visible sores and that I suggested along the way that the sores could be due to herpes, because they were able to diagnose and treat the virus relatively early which may have prevented it from spreading to other regions of the body. I am also glad that our baby was healthy on seemingly all account prior to this incident because it would likely affect her worse had there been other compromising factors. And I am hopeful that effective and safe therapeutic and preventative vaccines for the virus will be developed in the near future.
We were discharged from the hospital four days ago and provided with enough oral antiviral medication for one week. We also have a follow-up appointment at the children's hospital later this week. And we were told that we will need to come back to the children's hospital immediately if the sores present themselves again (I assume at least for the next year or two).
I do not want to cause unnecessary or excessive fear among others, but I want to share my experience and raise awareness of the risk. I wish I knew what I do now a couple of weeks ago. I would take back that kiss in a heartbeat.
I would like to point out the following regarding this post:

I am not a medical professional and I am not trying to or able to provide medical advice. My username was the first randomly offered username by Reddit and I didn't care to change it at that time; I did not mean to suggest that I am a paramedic. What I am explaining is my current understanding based on my own research and experience and those of others.
I do intend on discussing management of the virus with my doctor soon to see what methods may be available, safe, and effective for me in my efforts to reduce the risk of spreading the virus.
Once infected, the HSV-1 virus remains within the body for life. This may or may not be true for all types of herpes.
Stigma surrounding herpes and its transmission has been preventing honest and open transfer of information or discussion on the topic.
Showing affection for those you love is natural and needed, but should be done in a manner that does not put yourself or others at an increased risk of negative consequences.
I deeply regret kissing my daughter when I did (while she was a baby and while having sores present on my lips) and where I did (semi-exposed skin), but I did not know that transmission through skin on any part of the body was possible. My understanding at the time was that active HSV-1 sores can transfer to others when the virus touches lips, breasts or genitals only.
My mom kissed us on the lips frequently growing up. We would kiss her lips and share drinks with her as long as she did not have an active sore. When I was 14 years-old or so I told her I did not want to kiss her on the lips anymore. She expressed her sadness regarding these wishes and said that I must not love her anymore. I do not know exactly when or how I was infected.
Cold sores were sort of accepted as being normal within my family, despite my mom's extreme reaction to the virus as an older child. And until recently we had other family members insist that kissing children and babies (including on the lips) is normal and needed and that it isn't a big deal to spread cold sores.
When I say that the virus spread despite our best efforts, I do not mean to say that we did everything we could have or should have done. What I mean to say is that we were actively trying to stop the spread of the virus given what we had known at the time. Myself and my wife have done some of our own research regarding the virus at different points in our lives, yet we still did not know what we do now.
If the results of my actions which I have shared here is expected to you given the circumstances, I am glad. But my target audience with this post is people who may not have expected what we have experienced.
I am posting on different subs in an effort to reach different people with our story. We wish we knew what we do now before my kiss because I would not have kissed her when I did (as a baby and while I had a cold sore) or I might not have kissed her on her skin at all at any age knowing I could pass it to her via my saliva on any part of her body. What happened has affected us greatly the last couple of weeks and may continue to affect us, and we do not want others to go through what we have or worse.

Update:
Our daughter has had two outbreaks of HSV-1 since we initially left the hospital nine months ago or so. The first of those outbreaks was around three weeks after leaving the hospital and resulted in a hospital stay overnight followed by one month or so of oral antivirals to be provided from home. And the other time was around 1-2 months after the previous outbreak but went away on its own within 24 hours. We were going to pickup antivirals for the last time but all pharmacies were closed so we were going to wait until the morning, but the sores were almost fully gone by the morning.
My wife met with an infectious disease doctor in February to discuss our daughter's case, and the doctor said that "[our baby] got really lucky. There are limited treatment options and [our baby's] case was very minor compared to most."
Herpes is a medical emergency for babies and infants and is often fatal when infection occurs, especially when left untreated, and can result in lifelong disabilities including blindness. Please see the following for further info:

Edit: I would like to mention that myself and our family all now wear masks around our children when we have an active outbreak of cold sores as a means of trying to prevent infection.

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2024.06.06 05:00 Beginning_Speaker777 Drew is the Metaloid Maniac of AI

He zips around on the AI that HE BUILT.

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