How to make an explosion with household items

Councillor Vek stood on the observation deck of the cruiser Balexa, as she watched the blue planet below. Earth, as the inhabitants called it. Indigenous life had only just developed tools and weapons of metal and combustion, yet something about this world felt...different.
Vek's assistant, a young Dreth named Pylor, approached. "Councillor, our sensors have detected an unusual energy signature coming from that landmass." He pointed to a region on the planet's map.
Vek peered down at the indicated area. "Life signs?"
"Massive. Billions within that small area alone. And..." Pylor double checked the readings. "Their technology...it's exceeding all models for their stage of development."
Intrigued, Vek ordered the Balexa into a lower orbit to investigate directly. Below, sprawling cities dominated the landscape, towers of metal and glass thrusting towards the heavens. Ground vehicles filled roadways in great herds.
But it was what Vek saw in the skies that made her gasp. Dozens of giant space ships above the planet.
Vek urged the Balexa closer, honing in on the largest vessel. Over a kilometer long, it resembled an arrowhead piercing the clouds. Guiding it through flight tests, no doubt. But its capabilities went far beyond simple transport.
Her eyes analyzed the gleaming hull. Powerful weapons arrays, ultra-dense alloys, inertial dampeners—this was no mere explorer ship. It bore the armaments of a capital warship, yet wielded in the skies of a supposedly primitive world, according to 1000 year old reports.
"Scan it," Vek ordered. The results shocked even her aged sensibilities. Particle beam projectors, gravitic torque generators, ablative shield matrix far exceeding, any known galaxy-class defenses. She watched silent as the warship shrugged off simulated meteor bombardments, and energy lances that would have crippled a flagship.
"Are the sensors malfunctioning?" Pylor asked. "This...this shouldn't be possible."
Vek didn't respond, lost in thought. The colonization directive had brought her here expecting a standard uplifting, not...this. A new species on the cusp of space, yes, but with a military capability challenging the Grand Fleet itself. Her duties were clear, yet prudence demanded further observation before revealing her presence.
That evening, Vek witnessed lights illuminate the cities as perpetual twilight fell. Not the flickering fires of a primitive settlement, but vast geometric patterns flooding the night with steady radiance. Roadways became rivers of motion as noxious fumes belched from pipes. She watched holographic entertainments broadcast atop towering spires, their realism surpassing even the Dreamcast pleasure worlds.
It was all too much. This world had advanced beyond all projections, its technology perfectly integrated within human civilization. Yet had achieved spaceflight only yesterday. An impossibility...unless directed by an outside influence. But signatures showed no alien contamination, only the fingerprints of natural evolution.
"Councillor," Pylor interrupted her thoughts, "I'm detecting a new vessel launching from the underground test site."
Vek shifted her gaze and witnessed madness. Rising from its berth came a colossus the size of a hab-moon. Twenty kilometers of pitiless metal rising on pillars of blue inferno, a vast sphinx of iron. Its armored prow glinted cruel in the light of its world. No other word could apply but "leviathan."
She watched speechless as it performed basic maneuvers. Its motion sent ripples through the atmosphere itself, as entire mountain ranges would shake. Multispectral scans revealed engineering beyond rational thought, a work of art and horror, given form in girders and armour-plates. No known drive system could shift its bulk, yet it drifted with ethereal grace.
Vek collapsed into her command throne, as the giant ship vanished into the mottled sky. Only one thought echoed through her stunned mind.
This changes everything.
Councillor Vek's findings on the human home world of Earth, had rocked the Galactic Council to its core. A species possessing technological marvels far beyond their years of spaceflight, should not exist, yet Vek's evidence proved otherwise. As the leaders convened an emergency session, their debate centered around how to handle this unprecedented development.
"Negotiations must be made at once, to assess if these 'humans' pose a threat," stated Morax of the Androrian Conglomerate. "We cannot allow such advanced militaries to emerge unchecked in the galaxy."
Vek spoke up. "I caution haste. The humans integrate their technologies peacefully on Earth, and welcomed our observations from orbit. Forceful intervention risks destroying what could be a powerful new ally."
Others argued humanity should be contained for study and surveillance, to learn their intentions. Tempers flared until Councillor Porx silenced the chamber. "Further debate is pointless without understanding these beings. Vek, with your ship the Balexa being closest, you are tasked with open contact and assessment of the human condition."
Reluctantly agreeing, Vek set course for Earth with escort vessels. As the Balexa entered atmo, she watched the armada of human vessels fill the skies once more. Her mind raced with what to make of such a belligerent yet benign species. Perhaps hospitality ruled here while militarism emerged elsewhere, as with so many spacefaring civilizations.
The Balexa landed in an open field outside a sprawling metropolis. Vek and her delegation exited warily, the high oxygen air thick in their respiratory systems. Above, jet aircraft flew patrol routes. while curious onlookers documented the arrival on personal communicators.
Approaching vehicles emerged, this time carrying humans who exited with open hands. "Greetings, I'm Commander Jasmine Chen of the United Earth Space Command," said the apparent leader. "We welcome peaceful contact and welcome you to our world."
Her relaxed yet watchful presence put Vek at ease. "I am Councillor Vek of the Galactic Council. We come in friendship to learn of your people and capabilities."
Chen nodded. "Please, come with me and we’ll discuss how we might cooperate for mutual benefit.” She guided them into waiting transport vehicles towards a towering citadel. Along the route, Vek glimpsed, colossal fusion reactors, automated infrastructure, and most astonishing, families and children walking without fear amongst such technological wonders.
Arriving at the United Earth Space Command headquarters, Vek received a cultural download on human history. Only an eyeblink ago, they waged wars from the back of beasts and shattered each other with primitive explosives. Now they spanned the Solar System and bent physics to their will, yet retained community and empathy in their evolution.
Chen brought them to a viewing platform high above the city. "This is what 350 years of focused progress has achieved. Our advance began, when we discovered alien wrecks on the Moon containing lost knowledge. From there, our science boomed while social reforms fostered cooperation."
Vek struggled to process such rapid development. "And your military capabilities? Ones matching capital fleets already?"
Chen smiled knowingly. "A necessity of our past, yet now a guarantor of peace. We keep stride to ensure safe expansion, not conquest. See, all technologies serve life's betterment."
Her wise words allayed Vek's fears of some belligerent power. Indeed, humans bore responsibility for such marvels rather than recklessness. She thanked Chen, believing a new partnership had begun that could uplift the galaxy.
As the Balexa departed that day, Vek pondered all she now understood of humanity. A species arisen from war to wisdom, empowerment and care for others. Their defense of all requiring defense through strength guided safely by conscience. Truly an example to follow into a brighter future, if accepted.
But ominous clouds gathered where none before have been...
The Council chambers fell silent as reports of the Balexa's findings spread across the Galactic network. Councillor Vek recounted humanity's technological feats and philosophical underpinnings in great detail. While unsettled by Earth's military prowess, the consensus agreed their intentions seemed benevolent.
As debate resumed, an aide burst in with urgency. "Attack fleets have engaged at the Estron outposts. Casualty estimates are catastrophic."
Gasps filled the room. Estron, a core Council world renowned for compassion, laid defenseless against the ravaging warships. But how had the Anti Council faction pushed this deep so quickly?
Vek turned to the hologlobe, coordinating response forces to intervene quickly. But she knew conventional fleets, couldn't match the invader's new annihilating momentum. Unless...
An idea formed, She opened a channel to Commander Chen, as other leaders objected in shock. "Humanity proving themselves is unwarranted. We cannot condone--"
But Vek sensed Chen had come to the same conclusion. "Councillor, send us all you have on this threat. Our ships stand ready to aid in whatever way is needed."
The Council fell silent at her resolve. Vek transmitted Battle Assessment 716-C and tracked the human warship streaking into hyperdrive, escorted by two escort cruisers. She prayed this unprecedented response would succeed where fleets had failed.
As the human task force arrived at Estron, they beheld utter ruin. Planetoids bombarded into dust, settlements glassed from space. The last distress calls wept through static, as heat shimmered off molten continents.
Captain Sato of the Yamato grimaced at the carnage. "This ends today. Shields to maximum, charge main cannons. Helm take us in."
The faction armada appeared like demons bursting from an inferno, dozens of war beasts thirsting for more conquest. But they weren't prepared for the grey giant, punching through their formation's heart.
Blue lances of plasma speared the leading ship, overloading its shielding and armor in a microsecond. The massive ship erupted in a brilliant fireball that consumed several nearby fighter craft. Meanwhile, precision volleys from the Yamato's mass drivers sheared through the battlecruiser amidships. Secondary explosions ripped the cruiser to pieces, as it drifted lifeless.
The humans coordinated their attacks with flawless synchronization. Squads of escort gunships strafed and bombarded the swarm ships, attempting to flank the capital ships. Their advanced targeting systems, allowed multiple targets to be engaged simultaneously. Within minutes, over a dozen enemy vessels had been eliminated with surgical strikes.
The surviving faction forces regrouped and organized a desperate counterattack. A dozen assault frigates charged headlong at the Yamato, unleashing everything in their arsenals. Shields flared as energy lanced and missiles impacted across the human warship. But its shields held easily, dissipating each strike with efficiency.
Resuming its offensive, the Yamato activated its main cannons once more. Two gigawatt particle beams lashed out, melting through the foremost frigates in a pair of massive explosions. Shrapnel and debris pelted the remaining ships, crippling their systems. Bombardment from the escorts mopped up the drifting hulks.
With their main attack crushed, the rest of the fleet broke into a panic-fueled retreat. They scattered in all directions, pursued relentlessly by human forces. Within the hour, only broken ship fragments remained of what was once a formidable invader fleet.
Aboard the Yamato, Captain Sato surveyed the devastated aftermath with a heavy heart. So many lives lost unnecessarily, due to the faction's brutal conquests. But now, Estron could begin to heal thanks to humanity's intervention. As cleanup crews tended to survivors, Sato opened a channel to Earth and to Galactic Council to deliver their mission report.
Word of the battle's outcome would help forge new bonds of trust, and cooperation between humanity and the Galactic Council.
In the ruins of Estron's capital, Councillor Vek witnessed humanity's compassion firsthand. Survivors were rescued, and cared for without regard for species or faction. She knew in that moment that the Pax Terra had begun, and a new era of partnership had dawned with Earth.

Councillor Vek stood on the observation deck of the cruiser Balexa, as she watched the blue planet below. Earth, as the inhabitants called it. Indigenous life had only just developed tools and weapons of metal and combustion, yet something about this world felt...different.
Vek's assistant, a young Dreth named Pylor, approached. "Councillor, our sensors have detected an unusual energy signature coming from that landmass." He pointed to a region on the planet's map.
Vek peered down at the indicated area. "Life signs?"
"Massive. Billions within that small area alone. And..." Pylor double checked the readings. "Their technology...it's exceeding all models for their stage of development."
Intrigued, Vek ordered the Balexa into a lower orbit to investigate directly. Below, sprawling cities dominated the landscape, towers of metal and glass thrusting towards the heavens. Ground vehicles filled roadways in great herds.
But it was what Vek saw in the skies that made her gasp. Dozens of giant space ships above the planet.
Vek urged the Balexa closer, honing in on the largest vessel. Over a kilometer long, it resembled an arrowhead piercing the clouds. Guiding it through flight tests, no doubt. But its capabilities went far beyond simple transport.
Her eyes analyzed the gleaming hull. Powerful weapons arrays, ultra-dense alloys, inertial dampeners—this was no mere explorer ship. It bore the armaments of a capital warship, yet wielded in the skies of a supposedly primitive world, according to 1000 year old reports.
"Scan it," Vek ordered. The results shocked even her aged sensibilities. Particle beam projectors, gravitic torque generators, ablative shield matrix far exceeding, any known galaxy-class defenses. She watched silent as the warship shrugged off simulated meteor bombardments, and energy lances that would have crippled a flagship.
"Are the sensors malfunctioning?" Pylor asked. "This...this shouldn't be possible."
Vek didn't respond, lost in thought. The colonization directive had brought her here expecting a standard uplifting, not...this. A new species on the cusp of space, yes, but with a military capability challenging the Grand Fleet itself. Her duties were clear, yet prudence demanded further observation before revealing her presence.
That evening, Vek witnessed lights illuminate the cities as perpetual twilight fell. Not the flickering fires of a primitive settlement, but vast geometric patterns flooding the night with steady radiance. Roadways became rivers of motion as noxious fumes belched from pipes. She watched holographic entertainments broadcast atop towering spires, their realism surpassing even the Dreamcast pleasure worlds.
It was all too much. This world had advanced beyond all projections, its technology perfectly integrated within human civilization. Yet had achieved spaceflight only yesterday. An impossibility...unless directed by an outside influence. But signatures showed no alien contamination, only the fingerprints of natural evolution.
"Councillor," Pylor interrupted her thoughts, "I'm detecting a new vessel launching from the underground test site."
Vek shifted her gaze and witnessed madness. Rising from its berth came a colossus the size of a hab-moon. Twenty kilometers of pitiless metal rising on pillars of blue inferno, a vast sphinx of iron. Its armored prow glinted cruel in the light of its world. No other word could apply but "leviathan."
She watched speechless as it performed basic maneuvers. Its motion sent ripples through the atmosphere itself, as entire mountain ranges would shake. Multispectral scans revealed engineering beyond rational thought, a work of art and horror, given form in girders and armour-plates. No known drive system could shift its bulk, yet it drifted with ethereal grace.
Vek collapsed into her command throne, as the giant ship vanished into the mottled sky. Only one thought echoed through her stunned mind.
This changes everything.
Councillor Vek's findings on the human home world of Earth, had rocked the Galactic Council to its core. A species possessing technological marvels far beyond their years of spaceflight, should not exist, yet Vek's evidence proved otherwise. As the leaders convened an emergency session, their debate centered around how to handle this unprecedented development.
"Negotiations must be made at once, to assess if these 'humans' pose a threat," stated Morax of the Androrian Conglomerate. "We cannot allow such advanced militaries to emerge unchecked in the galaxy."
Vek spoke up. "I caution haste. The humans integrate their technologies peacefully on Earth, and welcomed our observations from orbit. Forceful intervention risks destroying what could be a powerful new ally."
Others argued humanity should be contained for study and surveillance, to learn their intentions. Tempers flared until Councillor Porx silenced the chamber. "Further debate is pointless without understanding these beings. Vek, with your ship the Balexa being closest, you are tasked with open contact and assessment of the human condition."
Reluctantly agreeing, Vek set course for Earth with escort vessels. As the Balexa entered atmo, she watched the armada of human vessels fill the skies once more. Her mind raced with what to make of such a belligerent yet benign species. Perhaps hospitality ruled here while militarism emerged elsewhere, as with so many spacefaring civilizations.
The Balexa landed in an open field outside a sprawling metropolis. Vek and her delegation exited warily, the high oxygen air thick in their respiratory systems. Above, jet aircraft flew patrol routes. while curious onlookers documented the arrival on personal communicators.
Approaching vehicles emerged, this time carrying humans who exited with open hands. "Greetings, I'm Commander Jasmine Chen of the United Earth Space Command," said the apparent leader. "We welcome peaceful contact and welcome you to our world."
Her relaxed yet watchful presence put Vek at ease. "I am Councillor Vek of the Galactic Council. We come in friendship to learn of your people and capabilities."
Chen nodded. "Please, come with me and we’ll discuss how we might cooperate for mutual benefit.” She guided them into waiting transport vehicles towards a towering citadel. Along the route, Vek glimpsed, colossal fusion reactors, automated infrastructure, and most astonishing, families and children walking without fear amongst such technological wonders.
Arriving at the United Earth Space Command headquarters, Vek received a cultural download on human history. Only an eyeblink ago, they waged wars from the back of beasts and shattered each other with primitive explosives. Now they spanned the Solar System and bent physics to their will, yet retained community and empathy in their evolution.
Chen brought them to a viewing platform high above the city. "This is what 350 years of focused progress has achieved. Our advance began, when we discovered alien wrecks on the Moon containing lost knowledge. From there, our science boomed while social reforms fostered cooperation."
Vek struggled to process such rapid development. "And your military capabilities? Ones matching capital fleets already?"
Chen smiled knowingly. "A necessity of our past, yet now a guarantor of peace. We keep stride to ensure safe expansion, not conquest. See, all technologies serve life's betterment."
Her wise words allayed Vek's fears of some belligerent power. Indeed, humans bore responsibility for such marvels rather than recklessness. She thanked Chen, believing a new partnership had begun that could uplift the galaxy.
As the Balexa departed that day, Vek pondered all she now understood of humanity. A species arisen from war to wisdom, empowerment and care for others. Their defense of all requiring defense through strength guided safely by conscience. Truly an example to follow into a brighter future, if accepted.
But ominous clouds gathered where none before have been...
The Council chambers fell silent as reports of the Balexa's findings spread across the Galactic network. Councillor Vek recounted humanity's technological feats and philosophical underpinnings in great detail. While unsettled by Earth's military prowess, the consensus agreed their intentions seemed benevolent.
As debate resumed, an aide burst in with urgency. "Attack fleets have engaged at the Estron outposts. Casualty estimates are catastrophic."
Gasps filled the room. Estron, a core Council world renowned for compassion, laid defenseless against the ravaging warships. But how had the Anti Council faction pushed this deep so quickly?
Vek turned to the hologlobe, coordinating response forces to intervene quickly. But she knew conventional fleets, couldn't match the invader's new annihilating momentum. Unless...
An idea formed, She opened a channel to Commander Chen, as other leaders objected in shock. "Humanity proving themselves is unwarranted. We cannot condone--"
But Vek sensed Chen had come to the same conclusion. "Councillor, send us all you have on this threat. Our ships stand ready to aid in whatever way is needed."
The Council fell silent at her resolve. Vek transmitted Battle Assessment 716-C and tracked the human warship streaking into hyperdrive, escorted by two escort cruisers. She prayed this unprecedented response would succeed where fleets had failed.
As the human task force arrived at Estron, they beheld utter ruin. Planetoids bombarded into dust, settlements glassed from space. The last distress calls wept through static, as heat shimmered off molten continents.
Captain Sato of the Yamato grimaced at the carnage. "This ends today. Shields to maximum, charge main cannons. Helm take us in."
The faction armada appeared like demons bursting from an inferno, dozens of war beasts thirsting for more conquest. But they weren't prepared for the grey giant, punching through their formation's heart.
Blue lances of plasma speared the leading ship, overloading its shielding and armor in a microsecond. The massive ship erupted in a brilliant fireball that consumed several nearby fighter craft. Meanwhile, precision volleys from the Yamato's mass drivers sheared through the battlecruiser amidships. Secondary explosions ripped the cruiser to pieces, as it drifted lifeless.
The humans coordinated their attacks with flawless synchronization. Squads of escort gunships strafed and bombarded the swarm ships, attempting to flank the capital ships. Their advanced targeting systems, allowed multiple targets to be engaged simultaneously. Within minutes, over a dozen enemy vessels had been eliminated with surgical strikes.
The surviving faction forces regrouped and organized a desperate counterattack. A dozen assault frigates charged headlong at the Yamato, unleashing everything in their arsenals. Shields flared as energy lanced and missiles impacted across the human warship. But its shields held easily, dissipating each strike with efficiency.
Resuming its offensive, the Yamato activated its main cannons once more. Two gigawatt particle beams lashed out, melting through the foremost frigates in a pair of massive explosions. Shrapnel and debris pelted the remaining ships, crippling their systems. Bombardment from the escorts mopped up the drifting hulks.
With their main attack crushed, the rest of the fleet broke into a panic-fueled retreat. They scattered in all directions, pursued relentlessly by human forces. Within the hour, only broken ship fragments remained of what was once a formidable invader fleet.
Aboard the Yamato, Captain Sato surveyed the devastated aftermath with a heavy heart. So many lives lost unnecessarily, due to the faction's brutal conquests. But now, Estron could begin to heal thanks to humanity's intervention. As cleanup crews tended to survivors, Sato opened a channel to Earth and to Galactic Council to deliver their mission report.
Word of the battle's outcome would help forge new bonds of trust, and cooperation between humanity and the Galactic Council.
In the ruins of Estron's capital, Councillor Vek witnessed humanity's compassion firsthand. Survivors were rescued, and cared for without regard for species or faction. She knew in that moment that the Pax Terra had begun, and a new era of partnership had dawned with Earth.

Hey neighbors! Boise native here. I wanted to just get a poll and discuss this because I’m feeling a bag of mixed emotions today.
I was laid off back in November and started doing Instacart for income. (Personal grocery shopper and delivery)
Now I know tipping culture has gotten out of control toxic but I still believe certain jobs a tip is expected and really relied upon. I was a server for years and managed the Fiveguys here in town throughout my 20s. (Which tipping was not expected but welcomed in the form of a pickle jar on the counter).
So as a shopper, you get a preview of an order before accepting it and how much the tip is. So I don’t accept orders of non-tippers because I’m doing your grocery shopping. Hand picking your produce and making sure to get the best expiration dates of foods. So when I had the chance to do my neighbors shopping and saw they didn’t tip I thought. That’s a mistake, I’ll do their shopping and be friendly and introduce myself.
First time, I thought it was a fluke, second time I did her shopping, I was like ok fuck this bitch I’m never picking up her order again. Then today, her order got mixed in (Boise Co-op order 55+ items $450) with some other orders so I got tricked and meticulously did her shopping again for an hour plus delivery for $10 of pay, no tip.
This is a multimillion dollar house she lives in they built near TacoBell. Am I wrong to think she needs to do her own grocery shopping if she isn’t willing to tip the people doing it for her? Should I adjust my expectations cause man, I am feeling so mad right now.

Hi all. Been looking for a travel (personal carry) / hinking / EDC backpack - the holy grail, which I know doesn't exist, but I try to see if I can find something that works for me. I read multiple reddit threads and it's indeed hard to find a backpack that can fit budget airlines as a personal item, be comfortable for hours of hinking/city tours, be light, fit a 14 inch laptop and also have a waist belt to distribute the weight (which I know is not really compatible with the height of a personal item dimensions of 40cm).
The closest I could find is the ULA Dragonfly which is kind of expensive at around 350euro (270euro + 80euro shipping - I live in Europe).
A more rezonabile priced option is the cabinzero CLASSIC PRO 32L - https://www.cabinzero.com/products/classic-pro-32l-absolute-black

• 46 x 31 x 20 cm dimensions which can be squeezed a bit to fit 40cm of RyanaiWizzair
• waist belt - I'm not tall at all - 168cm, so hopefully the belt will fit me well
• water bottle
• external compression straps
• decent thick back straps and back panels that make me feel it should be comfortable to carry (not to mention it has a waist strap that should help for long hour carry)

The main cons I find are: - heavier weight at 1.2 kg - awkward laptop sleeve in the front??? No idea why someone would carry a laptop in the front pocket! It would make an awful load distribution. - the other place to store a laptop is in the main compartment (which I don't mind), but it would have been really good to have a zipper at the back of the bag to access it from the top instead of having to open the main compartiment and access it from underneath all the items inside (I have the classic 28L from cabinzero and this bothers me a lot)
There are few reddit posts about this bag. Does anyone have experience with this bag? Can you share your thoughts and experience in owning this bag?
PS: I'm also looking at Patagonia Mini MLC 30L - but it seems it's rather big in width at 50cm, which could theoretically be squished to 40cm but i'm worried about how the items in the bag will wobble inside if 10cm need to be loose and without any compression straps inside or outside. Also, at my height of 168cm, it would probably look too big on me. I'm also not sure about the waist belt not being fixed - does it actually work and distributes the load on the hips?
Thanks a lot for your answers!

I've played the long dark before but only on pilgrim, while i loved it, the amount of loot and toned down challenge i personally find a bit boring, so i stopped playing. having come back to playing I've been trying interloper instead and oh my its so much fun having all the odds stacked against you.
I've set myself the challenge of trying to reach 500 days in it, if that's possible? haha
I'm currently on run 30~ with most of my runs lasting less than a day (cant find matches or spawn in a spot that i don't know at a cold time of day)
However a few runs recently I've managed to get up on my feet and last a week or more, with my longest being 26 days as of recent (before dying of intestinal parasites and being stuck in a blizzard with no wood)
I'd like to share some of my learned lessons and get some feedback on improvements i could make to last longer.
My main start is making a plan once i spawn which goes something like:

• Identify where the nearest indoor shelter is (pref. where you've found matches prior or just wherever is closest)
  
• Collect all sticks on the way
  
• Collect a few mushrooms or rosehips to make teas
  
• Very minor detours to rabbit spawns, killing all rabbits i find
  
• Picking cattails from the waters edge for tinder and food
  
• Once inside i search for loot, if my warmth isn't maxed before i need to go the next location i sleep for an hour or gut the meat from rabbits to fill it back up
  
• I just hop from building to building normally heading inland (mystery lake trappers cabin as my main base) if I'm far out or i go to to Milton in Mountain town (good for Hacksaw/hammer) if I'm close to Mystery Lake
  
• Matches > Hacksaw > Hammer are the main items i go for in order, Hacksaw to cut down saplings for bow ASAP and Hammer so i can forge tools and arrows heads (in Forlorn Muskeg normally)
  
• I try to skin every dead deer i see on the way if I'm able to.
  

As for little tips I've learned that might help others are:

• I chop rabbit meat into 1kg Chunks and deer meat into 0.5kg as they both take 30mins to cook in which time i can craft for 0.5 hours at the bench next to the fire in trappers or skin/gut rabbits
  
• If i have to start a fire i normally do it in the morning so i can take a hot tea, and relay torches to future fires i might need during the day
  
• 1-2 pieces of coal on a campfire can keep you warm outside while you harvest animals or in a blizzard (life saver)
  
• dropping a lit torch and aiming a rock at a wolf causes them to charge and then flee, also aiming or hitting a feeding wolf will scare them away
  
• I always try to make journeys between midday and midnight for best warmth
  
• Always look under shelves and in tight spaces with a lot of crouching as in interloper stuff seems to be pretty sneakily hidden
  

Currently im in Trappers Cabin on Mystery Lake (day 7), waiting for all saplings to cure and hides for clothing, Im pushing deer into wolves and scaring them away inorder to stock up on food at the moment, to last until everything is cured. Then my next plan of action is to Kill 2 bears (for a coat) and a moose (for satchel) so i can start curing those, before i head out to Ash Canyon for the Backpack/Crampons (never made this journey on Interloper!)
Any advice on direction or better plans to help me in the long run or places i should visit would be greatly appreciated.
Some questions I have is:

• When to make animal clothing and how long each day to spend doing it?
  
• Should i stay put right now? given i have means to survive and plenty of matches (50~)
  
• Should i kill wolves to make a wolf coat to go with my bear one?
  
• Are there tasks i shouldn't waste my time doing?
  
• Safest way to kill a Bear?
  
• Safest way to kill a moose?
  
• Should i visit Airfield or Blackrock (glimmeTimberwolves) or avoid those zones?
  
• Should i summit Timberwolf Mountain?
  
• How to deal with Timberwolves
  
• Are snares or Fishing snares worth it? if so, when?
  

Sorry if this post is a little long winded or I'm asking too much :)
Cheers!

Today started off to a bad start because I woke up late for work. I’m usually only off Wednesdays, but this week I was asked to take yesterday off instead and like a fucking idiot I forgot to change my alarms, so of course my alarm goes off at 9 instead of 7:30. I jolt out of bed like oh fuck work starts in less than half an hour. By the time I got dressed and brushed my teeth it was 5-10 past 9 and it’s usually an hour+ drive if I get stuck in traffic. I didn’t know who to ring because the main manager had swapped days with me and was off, and I had no other managers number so I rang my coworker. She was also running late so I asked her to pass on the message I’d be late too. Turns out the manager was ALSO not going to be in on time. I managed to get there first thankfully despite being farthest away (was really worried the distance would make me the last one in) and I was there 15 minutes after opening. I don’t have keys to open but luckily some other coworkers on a different floor opened up and covered until I got there and between the two of us we covered the shop. My coworker that was late got in before the boss thankfully. Got myself sorted. Got on track of the morning routine and was working away fine. The two managers ended up coming in and throughout the day kept telling me that I needed to do xyz and I’m doing things wrong and there was stuff that needed to be done yesterday (when I wasn’t even in and they didn’t do any of my jobs except serve customers yesterday so I already had a back pile of work). I just nodded and agreed and said I’d get them done asap, because I know it’s my job. Out of nowhere the manager comes down and starts giving me crap for items that haven’t been collected by customers, even though I’ve rang them multiple times and either they told me they’re coming for them or keep ignoring me multiple calls. I tried to tell her that I’d been doing this but she wasn’t listening and told me to ring every single person. I already had like 10+ jobs to do that I’d already half started because they kept adding shit on so I just added that to my mental checklist for later down the line.
5 minutes later, while I’m already in a tizzy over all the shit that’s being thrown at me left right and centre the boss comes down and goes “what did you do this morning.” They sometimes phrase questions in this vague way to criticise my work or if I’ve done something wrong so all I could get out was “what did I do wrong.” She tells me I was late. So I was like “oh yes, I’m so sorry I misunderstood your question. I’m so sorry I was late. It was my fault Wednesday is usually my day off and I forgot to switch the days on my alarm. Completely my fault and i’m so sorry it won’t happen again.” She stared at me like I was a cretin for a second before going “are you six? Well no, because even a six year old can get out of bed. Functioning adults can get up out of bed and get to work on time. I swear to god you’re worse than a child. Anyone else could get in to work for 9:30. I can’t fathom how a grown adult is having such a hard time- just get out of the damn bed. I’m giving you a written warning. There won’t be any more warnings if this happens again that’s it.”
I think if I hadn’t already been in a panic over all the other shit being thrown at me every two minutes I might have taken it a bit better but then again I probably still would have ended up in the bathroom having a panic attack regardless. I couldn’t fucking breathe because all I could think was ohmygod ohmygod i’m gonna lose my job.
The day continued on with everything I was doing not being right or done fast enough or I should be doing this instead of that when I have a million jobs to do. We also did not get to eat during our 8 hour shift since we were late, and I had skipped breakfast to make it in quicker. I kept making mistakes and getting confused and felt like everything I was doing was wrong.
I understand they have to discipline us, but the words written here don’t even convey how nastily I was spoken to. I was spoken to like a parent who hates their child speaks to their kid. I was spoken to like I was too thick to understand what she was saying so she had to resort to calling me an incompetent child.
I know these conversations need to be had but I hate how it’s always a direct target on who you are. I’m being naive but why can’t it ever be “look you fucked up, but these things happen, try not to let it happen again.” And if it’s reoccurring maybe fuckin ASK if there’s something causing problems leading to lateness and try to understand where they’re coming from rather than just assuming they’re lazy and incompetent.
The thing is that the other boss is usually very chill and will call you out if needs be but in a respectful and clear way. This lady is older though and believes everyone young that makes a mistake Is lazy and incompetent. The even bigger kicker is that not only did my other coworker get a written warning and the ear bit off her, but other members of staff have been late many times and nothing has been said to them. It’s a family owned business and the family are all technically “managers” but they are allowed to walk in 20 minutes or two hours late and leave 3 hours early and it’s fine. I know they own the shop so it’s different but I hate that they don’t lead by example. What frustrates me even more is we have to open 9:30 on the dot, but there’s no respect given to closing times. Nothing about all the times we arrived 20 minutes before opening and stayed back 40 minutes late.
I love this job so much despite the hiccups with this one manager but by god today made me want to curl into a ball and die. Just wanted to vent bc even though it was my own fault I feel like the targeting for a full day just pushed me over the edge. Thanks to anyone who read my lil rant. Hoping for a good day tomorrow but doubtful because my nice coworker is off :(

assalam alaikum warahmatullahi wabarakatuh! i hope you are all doing well and staying healthy. TDLR will be at the end of the post since this might be a bit long.
i (21f) and my potential/fiancé (21m) are supposed to have our nikkah next month inshaallah. i say potential alongside fiancé because he never really proposed, we just both agreed to pursue our nikkah together.
i am a revert alhamdullilah and have been for almost 3 years now. he was born into a pakistani muslim household and has always made me feel accepted (as everyone should with reverts but astaghfiruallah i’ve met some muslims who shame me for being a revert).
he and i met on one of those matching apps because even though i live in a larger city, my nearest masjid is a 50 minute drive or an hour and a half train and bus ride. it was easier to find a potential online than in person. that being said, he lives in a completely different state in the north of the U.S. and i live in the south, so we’ve only met in person one time. he came down to visit and meet my parents almost a month ago and joined my family for my younger sister’s birthday dinner. my family LOVES him and thinks he’s a great guy, and he is! but the past few weeks i’ve been thinking a lot about going forward with him.
i worked at a restaurant as a hostess and unfortunately it closed the weekend of my sister’s birthday because the rent went up a drastic amount and it just wasn’t worth it to stay open, so i’ve been stressed about finding a new job because i help pay rent with my parents and i pay for my cat’s insurance (she was a troublemaker as a kitten so i felt it was needed). because of my stress, i haven’t been communicating with him ,or anyone else outside my family, as much as i used to. so the stress of looking for a job in a city where being a hijabi isn’t common has taken a huge toll on me.
he has brought it up that it stresses him out when i don’t communicate with him because he wants to help me worry less, which makes me feel bad but i understand where he’s coming from.
we haven’t discussed some nikkah topics like mehr, if we’ll move his parents from Pakistan to the U.S. after we get married, finances, and how we would move me from my city and state to his. i haven’t met his family yet but i talk to his sister and female cousin almost daily and he’s said his family adores me. i just got a package the other day from the girls with two traditional Pakistani outfits for me because i mentioned how beautiful they looked anytime they would send me pictures of them together in matching clothes.
i’m just worried that i’m either 1) not ready for marriage after we’ve already been talking for 7 months or 2) if this is just shaytan putting these thoughts into my head.
i care a lot about him and i would feel horrible if we call everything off after all we’ve gone though. i have prayed istikhara multiple times and i haven’t felt i’ve gotten any signs on whether to continue with him or call our nikkah off. i just don’t know what to do anymore.
TLDR : confused on whether or not to continue with nikkah after meeting potential in person. haven’t discussed important topics yet and worried about nothing cross country for him. is this shaytan messing with my thoughts or am i not ready for nikkah like i think i am?

After owning a few extremely boring NPC cars, I'm looking for my next car to be something special. I've spent all my life so far having to painfully drive boring cars whilst I fund training for a new job and now I've finally acquired it, I have a good salary, and as a petrolhead it's time to buy something I can actually enjoy.
To give a quick brief, I'm looking for a car that's a proper drivers car, ideally manual, that I can enjoy on the average UK B-road but also be able to load it up with overnight bags and do long road trips to Scotland and deep into the European continent. I'm okay with having a car that's less than reliable, so long as when it goes wrong it's not going to bankrupt me. My budget is around £30k and I can, if needed, run a second, more boring yet versatile daily.
So far this is my current shortlist with thoughts:

• Hyundai I20N- Love this car. A small, fun, affordable yet economical hatchback that does everything I want it to do and more. They're about £25k barely new and have all the mod-cons of a new car, however unsure if it will feel truly special and maybe underwhelming on long road trips.
  
• BMW M2 - I'd ideally want a Comp, and very undecided on whether I'd get a manual or DCT car as both have their positives. It's my favourite modern M car as it's the successor to the 1M, a car I adore. Smaller, more suited to bashing narrower roads yet practical enough to do daily tasks whilst maintaining a somewhat affordable running cost.
  
• Jaguar F-Type - Let's kick it off with a controversial statement. I prefer the V6. Don't get me wrong, I adore the V8 but I like the smoothness, relatively low running cost, more affordable yet still great sounding V6 (plus I've heard the V8 is a bit droning on long journeys). I love the look of the coupe and they're practical enough to be a single garage car.
  
• Honda S2000 - Always wanted one, they look great, go like stink, are light and great to drive plus VTEC POWER. That being said, they're becoming collectors items, which is great for minimising depreciation, but I'd always be slightly uncomfortable in putting tens of thousands of miles on a low mileage one.
  
• BMW E92 M3 - Much like the M2, I'd really want the comp package, but those are at the top end of my budget (£35k+ for a decent example). I love the V8 of that generation M3 and think they still look amazing compared to modern machinery, however I know they have major issues with Rod Bearings. Is this something to actually fear as it's common or is it one of those things that can happen, but generally don't if you look after your machinery?
  
• 996 Carrera/997 Carrera S - Manual obvs because ew tiptronic. I'd much prefer the 997 because I think it looks better and is built better, but there's a part of me that would like a 996 so that I could say I've owned it and can get one step closer to owning every generation of 911. They aren't exactly cheap to run and 996/early 997 do get some common, major issues. How bad are these issues and is it worth avoiding high mileage cars?
  
• V8 Vantage - As per above, manual because the automated manual on those cars are shocking. I'd prefer a 4.7 but am quite price limited on those so would likely settle for a 4.3. They're a poor purchasing choice in every way, unreliable, cost a lot to run and have relatively poor performance, but I just love them. I love the look, the sound, and the fact I can tell people I'm an Aston owner with a smug face which makes people hate me.
  

So there we have it, I'm open to all suggestions and welcome any tips/tricks with the cars above, anything to avoid or look out for. I've also contemplated buying things like Lotus Exiges, G Body Porsches and other less practical cars, but for now I think I want something that's a bit safer.
If you got this far, thanks for reading, and pop any advice/thoughts below!!!

Hi, I’m a first time Reddit user but I’m an avid watcher of the Charlotte Dobre channel. I wanted to write this out, potentially Risking people involved seeing it. It was a lot at first now it’s very comical.
It begins when my boyfriend (m22) and I (f22) found out we were pregnant and we were looking for a place to live. His mom found us a place with her aunt, so his great aunt. It was to help us save money in order to find a decent place for ourselves. My boyfriend was really busy with work and she was getting frustrated that he wasn’t responding to her in time so I took it upon myself to introduce myself and see if her and I could talk about details considering he was super busy. She was rude to begin with, but she’s an older lady. I brush it off and just stayed as respectful as I could. I was telling her what a great opportunity and that I appreciate her helping us out and I will get my boyfriend to try and reach out because she was adamant that she did not want to communicate with me about the process. Fast forward us moving in she gets out a lined piece of paper and writes out the most vague landlord-tenant contract. There were no specific rules or items that would protect us in this instant I’m about to talk about. It rubbed me the wrong way. My boyfriend signed it with out questions. Another red flag was she didn’t want me to sign it because she didn’t want to acknowledge that I was gonna live there too. First month goes by and we are $100 short on rent which she excuses after an apology however, she makes my boyfriend write a letter talking about how he’s going to do better to never be late on rent again as if he’s a high school child. I thought it was a bit extreme considering we’re adults, she’s not his mother and we paid her for the remainder of the rent we missed. But I let it go because we really needed this place. a month later, she gets mad at me for not having found a job yet even though we just moved a month ago and I’m pregnant and it’s hard to find jobs when you are visibly pregnant. I understand that they can’t deny you if you’re pregnant but that doesn’t mean they cant find a different excuse to not hire you. She is yelling at me and I decide I’ve had enough because of her being disrespectful and coming at me after not taking time to get to know me and throwing out a bunch of insults that don’t make sense. So I close my bedroom door to get away from her and she walks in opening the door and I told her that she had no right to do that. She said it was her place and I said I pay rent and I’ve lived here long enough that if I called the cops she would get in trouble so she apologized in a very Karen way then she goes off on how I was in foster care as a child and she knows “my people” have behavioral problems. A few months after that, I stopped talking to her, but she decides to tell us that our shower is leaking in to her garage which we are not allowed to be in. She starts hounding us about how could we not know that our shower is leaking. again we’re not allowed in the garage. We never saw leak. How do we know our showers leaking if the leak is underneath our shower and we’re not allowed in the garage. Also she wouldn’t give us a 24 hour notice before just walking into our apartment unannounced. She walked in on me in my underwear multiple times. She didn’t announce herself and just walked in. And because the shower was leaking she decided to take our shower head which is incredibly illegal and I tried telling my boyfriend that, but he was trying to keep the peace. I was livid because in the state that I live in, If you were going to request a tenant does not use their own shower. You have to provide a shower for them to use it while it’s getting fixed. Another time she bard he’s in to yell at us for leaving lint dust on the dryer. And another instance where she turned to water off without telling us in advance. I told my boyfriend to talk to her and she said she yelled up the stairs that it would be shut off even tho I was awake and never heard her do that. She told my boyfriend that she wanted to have a talk with me about how disrespectful I am, apparently she heard me talking to my mom about how rude she is and thought that I wasn’t allowed to do that. Even though I hadn’t said anything to her since our last argument after she talked about me being in foster care, which come to find out my boyfriend’s mom told her I was in foster care because she didn’t think it was a big deal but clearly Karen used it to her advantage. She was yelling at me talking about how disrespectful I am even though I had been quiet then when she asked me a question and I answered it, she flipped out saying I thought you were going to be quiet and I told her that I wasn’t gonna let her talk to me that way because I’m not her child and I’m an adult and she has no right to talk to me like that , she got angry that I wasn’t letting her talk to me like that so while I was seated in my chair seven months pregnant, she stood up and got in my face like she was about to strike me. My boyfriend stood between us and told her to sit down and I told her that we’re done with the conversation. she said that she wanted me off her property right now and she was going to call the police. I told her to go ahead that I had mail sent here and that I paid rent and she can’t kick me out without a 30 day notice. so she calls my boyfriends mom and says that she needs to come take me off of her property right now. I told her she can call whoever she wants, but nobody can forcibly take me off the property because I live there as a tenant and I had my rights regardless if my name was on the contract or not. finally my boyfriend to calm her down, agreed that we would leave in two weeks which enraged me because legally she needed to give us a 30 day notice. after the two weeks she willingly let me and my boyfriend live in our car while I was eight months pregnant. we moved out the day of my baby shower and his mother has a spare bedroom didn’t even offer to take us. We lived in our car for two weeks before my sister gave up her seven year-old daughters bedroom just so that I could have my baby in a safe environment. My boyfriend and I argued about the way he took their sides and how it made me feel. Eventually we came to an understanding and we’re doing a lot better now. I’m cordial with his mother even though I still don’t agree with what happened considering she on the day of the baby shower, decided to go to the beach with the woman that kicked her son and her daughter-in-law and future grandchild out instead of going to the baby shower. I do not talk to the aunt. She is an awful person. I do not wish ill on her but I would laugh if something bad happened. Call me morbid.

Hello, lovely people! Our party has just hit Level 5, which means that I need to pick out some new spells for my Wizard. My School is Universalist, and my Thesis is Staff Nexus (with GM permitted options to swap out the staff spells I picked at first level using Downtime). I've taken the Loremaster archetype with Free Archetype.
Our party consists of a Bard, Champion, Cleric, Magus, and Summoner. Lots of healing and moderate damage output leading to longer fights.
We're playing through the Abomination Vaults, so keep that in mind. I'd prefer to avoid spoilers, please, but if I'm considering something that's going to be less effective it would be nice to know. We've just completed (or are in the process of completing, we haven't opened the way down yet) the fourth level (Belcorra's Retreat), so I'm aware that there are a lot of Undead and other horrible monsters!
I'd appreciate any advice on spell selection, but particularly for the two new spells I get to pick up at 5th Level, which can now be 3rd Rank.
My current "standard" loadout is as follows:
Cantrips:

• Needle Darts - My "signature cantrip" if you will. I want to hang on to this one, even though it's an Attack spell.
• Eat Fire - React to gain fire resistance! Fun, but it's come up exactly once so far.
• Shield - Another +1 AC, and Shield Block against any physical or magical attack is pretty great
• Draw Moisture - a character spell; for a researcher, keeping things dry is important
• Light - We don't all have Darkvision, so this is important for keeping hands free.

Innate Cantrips:

• Telekinetic Hand (Nagaji Spell Familiarity) - utility, but almost entirely unused. I'm still on the fence about picking up the next feat in this chain, and if I don't I'll likely retrain this one.
• Guidance (Magical Edification) - A nice use of a third action if Shield is not needed or on cooldown
• Sigil (Magical Edification) - Came with the other options!
• Message (Magical Edification) - Utility, particularly for communicating with a scout.
• Detect Magic, Rank 1 (Arcane Sense, from Bibliophile background) - Kind of useful

1st Rank:

• Mystic Armour - +1 AC feels pretty weak, but I need every point I can get. (This will put me at AC21 at 5th level)
• Briny Bolt - opportunistic Blind is nice, and our Hero Point module means that a reroll is more likely to hit. But relying on a Hero Point to be consistent isn't great. I'll likely replace this with Fear once I pick that up.
• Force Barrage - Automatic damage, but three actions for 10.5 average damage isn't amazing at 5th level. I'll likely replace this one with Pocket Library now that I have 3rd Rank spells available to boost my offensive options.

2nd Rank:

• Invisibility - not being seen while in trouble is nice, though maybe another offensive or buff option would be better - Loose Time's Arrow is very appealing.
• Laughing Fit - Disable reactions, and hopefully Slow the target on a Will save
• Revealing Light - Reveal invisible creatures, or give groups of foes a miss chance

Wands

• Ant Haul - I enjoy carrying things. This wasn't a good choice for a first Wand, but I'm very happy to have it.

Staff (Staff Nexus Staff of Earth - I just wanted a cheap staff to get charges for Nexus spells)

• Tangle Vine - not particularly useful because it needs an Attack roll, likely to swap for Read Aura
• Scatter Scree - Area damage and create Difficult Terrain
• Enfeeble - Good status ailment and good duration on a failed save, though perhaps best against creatures likely to have good Fortitude saves
• Pummelling Rubble, Rank 1 - Honestly, I don't think I'm going to cast this. It's an opportunistic push, I guess.

Thus, on to picking Rank 3 spells for 5th Level.
An observation I made in our last major fight was that I need to improve my "boss fight suite". Currently that's pretty much Revealing Light, Laughing Fit, and Enfeeble (plus Briny Bolt if I keep that prepared). That is at least one spell targeting each save (and AC), but the effects are fairly light and none of them contribute damage to the mix.
I'd like to be able to contribute damage, but I feel that as a Wizard inflicting status ailments/buffs is more important (it's not like anyone else in the party is doing much of that). Doing both would be ideal! With that in mind, here's my shortlist of spells and my thoughts on them. I'd appreciate any insight into which of these might be particularly good (or bad) given our adventure and party makeup (and doubtless I've missed a few gems along the way too)!
Potential 3rd Rank picks:

• Agonizing Despair - It's single target Fear, plus some Mental damage. 14 Expected Damage isn't a huge amount (21 seems to be average for Rank 3 even for single target spells, and Heightened Thunderstrike expects 27), but even a little bit would be a nice contribution.
• Cave Fangs - It's Fireball damage, but close range and Piercing type. Creates a big old area of Difficult Terrain too, which could be especially useful against melee foes. I'm pretty sold on this one, since while groups aren't something we've traditionally struggled with it would be cool to have something to deal with them! Downsides being lack of ways to approach an enemy once they're enmeshed in the difficult terrain, but I'm sure that's fine...
• Gravity Well - Draws targets towards the centre of the effect. Big area, but I'm not sure gathering foes together is better than just hitting them with a Fireball, especially given the small size of the rooms in this adventure. Very cool though, and that's a selling point on its own.
• Gasping Marsh - Uncommon. A sustained barrage of area damage and the Sickened condition that can be redeployed at will, the only thing keeping me from locking this one in is the prevalence of Undead foes we've come up against. This is Poison damage, and requires a breathing target, and I have a feeling that locks it out of working on a lot of things.
• Slow - Inflict the Slowed status with a) a fortitude rather than will save; and b) without sustaining the spell. Looks great despite overlap with Laughing Fit.
• Glyph of Warding - Might be a cool option if I'm going to end up having Heightened lower level spells in my 3rd Rank slots most of the time. Summon Proximity Mine is a pretty cool ability!
• Time Jump - Single action double move is pretty awesome, but I suspect not a great use of a top-level spell slot. Probably one to pick up at level 7 or 9.
• Wooden Double - I should be able to pick this up from our party Magus rather than spending one of my own picks on it, but it seems like an absolute lifesaver. One to keep prepared in case of critical hits, but maybe an extravagant use of a top-rank spell slot.
• Haste - Give a party member an extra Stride. Great for me, but spending a turn setting this up feels like a slow start to a combat. I thought it'd be great for use on our Cleric or Magus, but I'm not sure *they* are as keen. I'd love some insight on how useful this ends up being in practice.

Additionally, I'm tempted to pick up (via scrolls) the following with an eye to Heightening them to 3rd Rank. Honestly, I'll probably grab as many as possible, but it'd be cool to know if there are particular standouts among these options - I haven't really considered Heightened spells before.
Spells to Heighten to 3rd Rank:

• Fear - I should have this already, to be honest. It's an alternative area attack at 3rd Rank, and works nicely in a 1st Rank slot (like my staff, for example). Not certain it's a great use of a third rank slot if I'm expecting to fight a lot more Boss monsters though.
• Thunderstrike - It wasn't a thing when we started playing, it's not my fault that the laws of magic themselves have changed since then! Heightened, it seems to be the best single-target damage available at 3rd Rank (and maybe anywhere before Disintegrate at 6th Rank), and if used on someone in metal armour it's still a debuff too!
• Dehydrate - A 10ft burst inflicting 4d6 Persistent Fire damage is pretty dang respectable, and the extra check for Enfeebled is just gravy. The 1 minute duration is a little confusing, however - does the area stick about and continue to apply Persistent damage to anyone entering it? Or starting their turn there?
• Heat Metal - Respectable damage, plus persistent fire damage and potentially make a foe drop an item. Relies on them carrying metal, though so does Thunderstrike if I want it to inflict conditions on the target.
• Sudden Bolt - Uncommon. Even better damage than Thunderstrike (worse scaling, but not for a long time), but no benefits for targeting an armoured creature. No status effects put me off this one.

And that's about it. My current thought process is that I'll take Cave Fangs and one of Agonizing Despair, Haste, and Slow. I do enjoy the idea of stacking detrimental conditions onto a target until it stops being able to do much of anything, but I'm not sure that's actually a viable playstyle given how effectively things make saves in Pathfinder.
Anyway. Thanks for reading this far, and my apologies for the wall of text - hopefully it was at least legible! Any thoughts you may have on spell selection (even if it's just "why would you take X when Y is just better?") would be very much appreciated!

basicly my mom died when i was 7. my dad married this woman, lets call her rachel. they got married when i was around 9ish and had two children who are my half siblings and i have one full sibling. but theyre in the process of a divorce rn. now lets say i live in america however im originaly from another country (lets say morroco). my aunt, from my dads side, (lets call her grace) moved in with us right before corona, she came to 'america' from 'moroco' to find a better job. corona hit and we've been stuck being roomates for 5 years at this point, im 16 rn and shes 32.
i would always spend months saving up money to buy myself nice things, like perfumes, makeup, clothes, stuff for my hair, etc. every single time i would buy something my aunt, grace would automaticly take it and claim ownership. she would put it in her car and refuse to give it back to me. she would always say that 'it was too hot outside' to go to the car, or sometimes even take it to her office and she would never give it back. just last week i got a really expensive perfume from my other aunt who comes from my moms side. ive been wanting this perfume for a year. the moment i got home from getting the perfume grace takes the perfume from me and starts smelling it. she says it smells really nice and gives it back to me. i put it in one of my bags and go to sleep. the next day i wake up and get ready for school and i cant find the perfume anywhere but she said she hasnt taken it, shes lying i can litteraly smell it on her. another thing is that she always smokes cigarets. i had bronchitis and she didnt want to stop smoking around me! which caused my bronchitis to get worse and the doctor recomended that i stay away from her because of how bad it got.
now my full sibling, lets call him alex, is 13 has a lot of problems. not like autism or anything but hes crazy. whenever we would get cakes or anything for birthdays he would eat the cake in ONE DAY A WHOLE A*S CAKE THAT WEIGHS 1KG IN ONE DAY. whenever we get any type of food he finish it all in once sitting. he always eats the really spicy instant noodles in secret which causes him to get very bad stomach problems. he has stolen over $5000 from me. my rooms lock and doorhandle broke a few years ago so i cant even close my door and my dad doesnt want to fix it. i always hide my money or try to keep it on me at all times however he always finds a way to find it. last time i litteraly cut one of my bras open and put the money in the padding and sewed it back up and he still managed to take the money. now ur prolly wondering how do i know for sure hes the one that takes the money. my aunt wont take money from me, only objects, my dad just wouldnt and the only person left in the house is alex. now unless you think my cat is stealing the money then it has to be him. i told my dad about this a billion times and he just keeps telling me "it wasnt alex no way". alex has gotten suspended 4 times since he started highschool (he started litteray 1 year ago). he's gotten into fights at least twice a month. he steals from the whole family not just me. hes stolen so much money from my dad and aunt asweel. he grafitied our neighboors house. whenever he gets something new like a gift like shoes or a game or something, he breaks it in one day. my dad is always making excuses for him and will not punish him for anything he does. my brother always hits me on my vagina and my boobs with belts and slippers and wooden spoons even when im on my period and my dad doesnt do anything about it.
so basicly now about this rachel woman. shes fucking psycotic. when they got married at the beggining she would always fight with me, i would get some crayons or markers to colour and draw with and she would take them from me saying that she wanted to draw. basicly she would act like a kid. a few months before corona she gave birth to my half sister, lets call her mia. she would PURPOSLY STARVE MIA BECAUSE SHE WANTED HER TO HAVE A SKINNY BODY. SHE WOULD STARVE A NEWBORN BRO. she would always put mia to sleep in the middle of the bed right next to my dad and my dad would only get less than an hour of sleep each night for at least two months scared that he was going to crush mia. and he tried to move mia back to her crib but she was already sleeping and if he moved her she would start crying and wouldnt go back to sleep. it got to the point where my dad WHO OWNS THE HOUSE AND EVERYTHING IN IT started sleeping on a carpet on the floor because he was so scared to hurt mia. during corona in 'america' we werent allowed to leave the house at all. we had to file an aplication every week to go grocery shopping and only one person from the whole household could leave the house. since my dad was the one earning the money he went grocery shopping. this one time rachel told my dad she wanted to leave the house so my dad told her next week he would file the aplication saying she leave the house instead. the next day rachel CALLS THE POLICE AND TELLS THEM THAT MY DAD IS HOLDING HER AND MIA HOSTAGE AND THAT HE KIDNAPPED THEM, keep in mind that shes a 32 year old woman. the police obviously come and check things out, my dad told him the story, our maid vouched for him and the security cameras were checked and then the police cleared my dad. a few days after that rachel decided she wants to go back to 'Morocco' because she missed her mom. (her mom is the one encoureging the behavior and encouriging starving mia). rachel said she would report my dad to the police for rape if he didnt let her go so he bought her a ticket and they went. a few days after that we found out that she was pregnant again. but by now corona was really bad and no one could travel.
basicly im not gonna write everything that happened in between then and now but basicly she demaded so many things from my dad around $10,000 monthly for child costs (she doesnt work, never has, even till now) (this is like 2022 by now) my dad does not have that type of money as he already sends them a lot of money and the costs of living in 'america' are a lot and he also has to take care of his parents because hes the oldest so he pays their bills and everything. he filled for divorce because she kept getting crazier, she would threaten to hurt the kids. he tried to get custody of the kids as it was hard because the law in 'moroco' sides with the woman most of the time. she keeps asking for more and more money and my dad went to court and the court set a certain amount. last summer when we went back to 'moroco' rachel and my dad agreed that my dad would take the kids for a full day. the kids were okay with it and had no problems. 2 hours after my dad took his kids from her she comes marching up to my grandparents house, my dads parents, and starts trying to do black magic and demanding that he give her the children back. a few months after that she asked my dad for more money for child care because both of them are starting school now so he sent a bit extra. she used this money to hire a lawyer in 'america' to investigate my dad so she can demand more money from him. today he got a call from one of her lawyers saying that she demands $30,000. since the law in both 'moroco and america' work very fast my dad needs to get a certain paper before firday (its wednsday 9pm at this moment) and if he doesnt then she can take the money from him or something like that im not sure.
i dont know what to do anymore im scared that we're gonna go bankrupt. my dad is paying for expenses for 4 people here in 'america', me him alex and my aunt grace because shes a free loader and is living here for free and refuses to get a job. he's paying for her living and my two half siblings,. the house that my dad aunt brother and me and living in today is under my dads name but alex and i own a bit of it because my dad bought it with my mom before she died and when she died it was split into 3 to me, my dad and my brother, part of it was also given to my grandfather from my moms side lets call him charles and charles demanded that we sell the house imediatly because he didnt want us living there anymore and there was nowhere we could go. my dad had to pay a lot of money to get us to keep the house. rachel wants half of everything my dad owns. that means half of the house, half of his salery half of everything. shes asking for $30,000 and my dad doesnt even make that much in two months.
anyway thats my vent hope u enjoyed. if you read till here congrats thank you! have a good day and a good life! :)

I've been playing the game since launch and am by no means a game developer or balancer, but I thought I'd start some discussion on how I'd like to see the game's weapons balanced to provide more choice and interesting weapon options.
Overall, I feel that many of the current primaries feel too similar to each other with no distinguishing features and I'd like to see these weapons stand out by offering a higher risk and reward aspect to the player. Guns that offer higher damage, penetration, or explosive traits should be balanced by higher recoil, lower rate of fire, bullet drop etc.
Here are my thoughts on some specific guns:
ARs (Tbh, there are so many of them, making them harder to balance and differentiate)
Adjudicator: Rather than lowering the recoil like in the last balancing patch, I would rather increase the recoil and the damage (to be similar but less than Diligence at 100-120). Additionally, I would give it worse handling like the Dominator or the original Diligence CS (not as bad though)
Tenderizer: I'm OK with not giving this medium armor pen if we can increase the damage (80?) and give it a slight stagger while also increasing recoil (in-between Liberator and Adjudicator) and weapon sway. This would position it as harder hitting than the Liberator, but with less ammo and more recoil.
Liberator Penetrator: I'd like to see the burst fire come back as a quick, 3 round burst option with higher damage (80?) like a Halo 3 BR to offset the lack of full auto and a much smaller magazine size.
Liberator Concussive: Make the gimmick more useful for its trade offs, such as slowing down Brood Commander charges or staggering Bile Spewers out of spewing if you shoot them in the head a few times.
Slugger: Give it back the stagger it had previously, but lower the range by increasing damage fall off and bullet drop. This would prevent it from being used a sniper and more like a shotgun (up close engagements) while offering higher damage potential vs the regular punisher
Eruptor: While I never thought the release version of this weapon with shrapnel was too strong (balanced by slow rate of fire and tendency to kill yourself at close range), I thought it didn't make sense that the large explosive projectile it fired traveled in a straight line like a regular bullet. It would further increase the skill required for this weapon by giving it a slower projectile speed and bullet drop.
Crossbow: I don't agree with the changes this weapon got since it offered something unique in its original form, a large AoE weapon that was difficult to use due to the slow projectile speed and drop, as well as the possibility of killing yourself if used too close to the player. Ammo could have been reduced to 8 or 10 instead of 12 since I never ran out of ammo while using it.
Defender: To differentiate it more from the Pummeler, I'd like to see this get a higher rate of fire (800-900) with a larger magazine (55-60) since it didn't make sense that an SMG had the same magazine size as the Liberator. Recoil should be slightly increased to compensate.
Grenade Launcher support weapon: This only tickles most armored enemies on higher difficulties and I don't see it used much anymore as a result. It could use another reload and damage/penetration that matches the impact grenade.
Breaker: I haven't really used it since the nerf but the magazine should be brought back to 16 with the higher recoil but also higher spread (like an auto shotgun should have).
Let me know if you agree or disagree and why!

The rift between them has caused a lot of tension in my family and now my mom wants to be in the life of her newborn grandson but refuses to address or try to mend things with my wife.
Little history: I probably introduced them too quickly. My grandmother was in town in south Florida about to move here from Illinois for a retirement community. My wife, girlfriend at the time, came with cookies or some form of baked goods like she usually does when visiting someone as a sign of affection and respect. Where it went wrong from here I have no idea. I suppose the initial crack was when wife scheduled a skitrip for her and I to have as a 1 year of dating anniversary present. We are not rich, this is a huge gift that made sense to her since I refused to let her pay rent. Our combines salaries are barely over 120k. So wife calls mom 6 months in advance because she is a planner for the sole purpose of asking my mom to watch one of our four dogs. Wife has already paid in full for the trip. Yet Mom decides it is a great idea to instead use the opportunity to hop on and take a family trip because it is the last time the family will have for a family vacation - I am the oldest of two boys and two stepsisters, my mom married the guy she left my father for who has twin girls of his own that were in the womb during the infidelity. Anyway mom completely takes over and decides to make our one year gift a family vacation, so she books tickets for a hotel nearby. Wife is bold but at the time not bold enough to stop my mom in her tracks for overstepping a boundary. At this time she still respected my mother and kind of let herself get steamrolled.
Probably skippable Family history: Now I have always had issues with my mother, resentment for leaving my father for my stepdad behind my own fathers back and constantly trying to keep brother and I from seeing “Disneyland dad who doesn’t do any of the work but gets all the fun.” my mother was very strict growing up, always bringing us to church and making my father feel guilty for not bringing brother and I on his weekend. So mom marries stepdad age 11, divorces him around 13 after asking me advice for her relationship and i encourage her to move out. Then remarries him and moves us back into his house age 15. Here I begin rebellion and normal teeenager stuff but stepdad won’t butt in because he isn’t my “biological father” so would have my mom intervene brother and i from behind the scenes. For example, I am young and messing around on the piano because music is important and I never had any formal training and mom comes in to tell me stepdad “wants to know when the concert is going to end because it is a little annoying.” Anyway, they have me prescribed adderall at 16 and in the parking lot holding my first prescription I am told that they would like me to move out and in with my father, who had chased us every time mom and stepdad moved several miles away (5 moves from age 5-15 all in one county). Anyway, brother and I are recovering alcoholics with (my) slipups triggered from interactions or visiting my mom, which mom claims is genetics from my father alone and has nothing to do with her. Maternal grandfather, mother, and I have some nasty temper problems which certainly are exacerbated by drinking (at least mine and moms).
Skitrip revelations: Wife and I are on the way to brothers graduation in Chicago, and wife has yet to reveal to me that my mother has taken over her massive investment of a couples ski vacation and it will now be a family vacation for mom, stepdad, brother, two stepsisters who are all getting out of gradschool. On the way to the airport I am told the news by future wife of my one year surprise. So I get upset and call my mom to call it off. She obliges my request and now holds resentment against me and now wife for “ruining her last family vacation.” Fine, whatever. Mother never says a word about it for months until we are out for a distant family members birthday dinner and at a table of about 8-10 people that are having a group conversation and gets real close to my wife’s ear and tells her privately along the lines of “you deprived our family of our last family vacation.” During this time my wife is frantically tapping my leg under the table because my mom can get a little aggressive. My mom saw this and later (privately to me) mocked her for doing it to my leg under the table.
Christmas blessings: Closer to Christmas maybe 2/3 weeks later we went to go see my mom and my mom had a couple drinks in her (not an alcoholic like brother and I just very sensitive to a couple glasses of wine and occasionally some hidden sips of wine or something) and invites my wife to Christmas church and out to dinner after because the family needs photos for a Christmas card and future wife “will be the photographer for it.” Now this can easily be a nothing comment but given the way my mom had been making future wife feel, it was taken as an insult. So wife declined church and showed up to family dinner just in time for photography session to be over.
The distance: Then mom moves to a fancy house up the coast and invites us up to visit. At first it is ok to bring the 4 dogs then the day before she says they will not have dogs at the house and we can easily find a sitter. 2 Dogs don’t get along, they need to be separated always as there has been two attacks on one from the other, so we can’t trust someone to come to the house and keep them separate and we won’t board 4 dogs it’s too expensive for us. Anyway we go back and forth being invited with the dogs then they retract the offer and say pick one dog to bring and leave the others and it’s just annoying, so we say forget it and don’t go. But my brother becomes engaged and decides to throw his engagement party at my mom’s new place near the beach. Great. First all the dogs are welcome, then day before they say it is too chaotic and she will pay for a small hotel room for one night for future wife and her dogs and my one (the attack dog) can stay in a crate at the house with me but I may not leave the dog to stay with her. And no reasonable cheap hotel in the area is going to accommodate 4 dogs. Anyway wife is stressed but feels obligated to come because I am the best man and I stay at the house while she checks her dogs into the hotel. Wife had made a cheesecake and brought it up in a separate car from me, 4 hour drive by the way, and night of.. my mom says no desserts for engagement party dinner, the dessert is themed or some crazy stuff. Wife shows up to dinner a little later and very flustered because of the situation plus I had relapsed on a bottle of whiskey a couple days prior to seeing my mom. Related, I don’t know. Anyway. Mom has had a couple drinks and future wife and I are talking about having children and religion comes up. Mom asks what we were thinking of doing about baptism or not and I jokingly said (guiltily to get on my moms nerves a bit) that he would have a bris and would love it if she would come to the bar mitzvah. now my wife’s mom was forced to convert from Catholicism to Judaism for her own mother in laws acceptance for a failed marriage so wife is not religious, but it hurt my wife and reasonably so when my mom replied “oh, son, I raised you better than that.” Still no acknowlegement of fault from that comment and mom thinks wife is “overly sensitive, dramatic, and childish” for wanting an apology for it.
Weddings: Future wife becomes current wife. We had gotten engaged on our next anniversary trip she planned for us. I proposed on our bike and barge through tulip season in holland with our feet in the water of the North Sea after a picnic in the dunes. her family business manufactures photo albums for professional photographers, so aside from our families all being divorced, estranged, difficult, and us trying to save money, we did not have a wedding, we just did the paperwork within a month of the proposal. I had already decided to have a baby with her before the trip so we were trying. 2 weeks before brothers wedding in Tennessee we become pregnant, so we break news immediately as to not steal limelight from brothers expensive wedding. Mom says she will cover cost of rental car so we can save money. Ok great. She books the tiny car and we pack it and head up the Smokey mountains to the cabins we are staying at. Two cabins for grooms family, one for his mother and one for his father, ten paces from each other: they havnt spoken but twice im since divorce in 1995 but through lawyers. Grandmother, mother, stepdad, 2 stepsisters and one boyfriend stayed in mom’s side. Wife and I stay at father’s side cabin with just his wife. His Wife’s 3 daughters and family’s stayed a town away down the mountain among extended family. Anyway, beautiful wedding takes place. My wife is sent into town to collect flowers and run errands for my mom which she happily obliged to since she is a solitary person and did not want wedding day drama. Day after, we are loading our rental sedan with our bags. Mom and grandma need a ride to the airport and our flight is before theirs so they will drop off the car for us 4 hours or so after we go to the airport 5 hours from current time. We’re loading the car. Stepcousin passed out in mother’s cabin night before and needed a ride. Disorganized brunch for 20 people is trying to be made. Father’s wife’s daughter books a reservation for 10 people which include her family, her sisters, me, my wife, dad, and their mom. My stepdad had left for home at this point as he had taken his own suv instead of flying with my mom and 90 year old grandma. So mom is trying to pack grandma in the car with bags and my wife and stepcousin. At this point mother asks stepmother if she and grandma are on reservation for the brunch. Stepmom says no they are not, she wasn’t sure of their plans. Mom says under her breath “fucking assholes, so typical,” and she goes into a bit of a rage to which my stepmom says here “it’s ok I will call and add you two it’s no big deal.” So we continue packing the car and realize we won’t all fit. So my wife tells my stepcousin to go ride with my father to the restaurant 10 minutes away we will meet you there. Mom says to wife, “no you go with the father.” Wife says “no I am going to ride with my husband” mom gets close to her face with her finger and says “this is my car, you can fucking Uber!” Wife is 6 weeks pregnant at this point and it all escalated from here. wife and mother start yelling at each other swearing at each other and we get into the car, mom behind wife who was in shotgun. 2 occasions on the trip I had to stop the car because mom had taken off her seatbelt to stand over the seat and scream in my wife’s face with so much vigor that spit came on to her face multiple times. I’m trying to tell them both to behave and mom sit down shut the f up. Mom is telling wife to get the f out of the car and find a ride, she has no right to speak because she’s “new here” (dating and living together for 3 years at this point). The following brunch she apologized in a crowd with a hushed voice at a table of 20 people trying to have a group conversation again privately to my wife “I’m sorry you get so upset” and my wife told her “that is not an apology.” The following several hours in the car with grandma and stepcousin and wife were some of the most uncomfortable moments of my life. At a gas station I pulled my mom aside and said I need ther to give a huge apology, that it was so nasty and inappropriate, my brother and I are used to abusive language and aggressive behavior but to my pregnant wife and any other human being it is disgusting and unacceptable. Sitting in the car was quiet for many hours until we got to the airport. No speaking about what happened just mom happy go lucky about Tennessee and Dollywood and wife and I in shock, cousin still half in the bag from a fun wedding, grandma 90 years old probably confused about what happened.
The family groupchat: Im waiting on an apology from my mother to my wife who is extremely hurt and expressed to my mom loads of time she needs to reach out and apologize. We’re not talking until she will do so. It is bugging me and keeping me up at night. My appendix flares up and I am admitted to the hospital with emergency appendectomy. Still pregnant Wife suggests I reach out to mom to let her know what’s going on. So I text mom I’m at the hospital and will have surgery. I send a pic or something that on my end says hasn’t gone through. Mom group texts our family group with stepdad, his daughters, brother and his wife, and grandma that I am in the hospital and attaches the pic I sent of me in there. Then she continues to rave about the success of her startup company and how they got FDA approved clinical trials finally completed or some pivotal moment that made the text about her. Wife and I are in a hospital so the picture comes up on moms end as unable to have been sent. Mom assumes that my wife has blocked her phone, so mom removes my wife from the chat. Wife is rushing home to take care of the dogs at this point and is not alerted on her phone, but on everyone else’s phone it clearly reads “(mom) has removed (wife) from the chat.” Immediately I text my mom and basically say how dare you do that to her she is the one who insisted I let you know out of respect and mom responds with blah blah she did this she did that I will not have it. So I go back to the family chat and remove mother. At this point I let everyone in the chat know what my mother has done and how she refuses to take responsibility for how she made my wife feel, address her feelings, apologize or do anything at all to reach out about the wedding incident or even inquire about the wellbeing of the pregnancy for her first grandchild. Stepdad finally steps in and tells me “enough.” Grandma says “shame on you.” I am dumbfounded. This is a hush hush family that hates to have anything out in the open and likes to maintain a picture perfect image. For examples; 1) I and wife were on the family Christmas card of a photo taken at the wedding that the whole world received except for wife and I. 2)brothers alcoholism was to remain hidden from the family as was his rehab treatment and how it affected his career. Now understand that they like to keep things quiet but that is not how I want to handle my problems, these things trigger alcohol use and violent outbursts on my part that I no longer wish to live through. Now appendectomy’s are pretty simple so I recovered quickly (it don’t rupture we just took it out). But during the time I was scheduled to be under anesthesia, stepdad reaches out to wife to have a chat and clear the air. Wife waits until I come to so i can be there and I hear the conversation. He claims to be here as a middleman like a business meeting to fix things once and for all. Wife and I are like wow great. He then proceeds to double down on my moms behalf that they will not be apologizing or meet any of her demands as she had already apologized as confirmed by 90yo grandma who was in the car and my mother herself. The term he used was stalemate to describe the situation. Wife and I are shocked but she has me keep quiet to show me what he will say. He proceeds to yell at her and they were screaming at each other, again steamrolling the conversation assuring us that he was down the middle yet maintains that mom has made a sufficient apology that needs to be accepted and wife needs to grow up and move on, then wishing her luck with the baby and a nice life. Next day I call stepdad to see how it went. He reassures me that he has done all he can and everything is back to normal. At this point I call him out and tell him I was conscious and explain to him what an apology is. But there is no dialogue with this guy like there is no dialogue with my mother. He proceeds to talk loudly over me like she does and basically call me a piece of shit for the amount he and mother have done for me. I speak to him first time like I never have before by calling him a hands off father and a pussy of a man who finally reaches out while he thinks I am under anesthesia to yell at my wife then pretend it’s cool, and I basically tell him he has never done a single thing for me to try and develop me into a man or nurture me as a child into an adult, but he thinks taking me on fishing trips and ski vacations are equivalent to love and nurturing growth and development just like my mom does. I reassure him that he has no right to talk about family being that he ruined his own as well as mine and couldn’t even tell my dad to his face that it was him who was sleeping with my mom behind his back when my dad came to him very upset as a friend when he got an anonymous phone tip at work one day. Then him and my mom laughed about it in court when my dad brought it up during the divorce. We ended with swearing and I felt very happy for finally giving my true feelings to him.
The birth: Months go by and nobody has said a thing. I can’t sleep at night seeing how much love I am getting from my father and his side for the baby, and my wife’s family, then thinking about how my own mother hasn’t reached out a single time. I’m dreaming about beating up my stepdad and it’s driving me mad. So weeks before the due date I reach out to my mom begging her to clear things up and apologize to my wife. Nothing. A week later i tell her how disappointed and abandoned I feel and want her in the family. Nothing. Baby comes a couple days early. Everyone is excited. Mom texts me begging for photos and to let everyone know. I tell her my brother and two stepsisters have received photos. I ask her to please reach out to wife she still needs to make amends for what’s happened between them and all she needs to do is reach out. Mom’s responses have been defensive, derisive, projecting, playing victim and referring to herself as a kicked puppy. Telling me my wife needs to apologize to her and making the conversation about mother son instead. She is beating around the bush. And she is sending me photos of my own baby that I did not send her. Her friends are congratulating me that I did not tell. Again she is pretending that everything is ok and it is not. She asked me to apologize to her husband for what I said on the phone that day. I said ok, watch this. So I sent the guy a message that was very apologetic and not passive aggressive or backhanded comments in any way. Still my mom won’t say anything.
Now: Baby is 6 days old. He is the best thing in my life and I wish my family were involved but it seems like I am living in a fantasy world where everyone can be happy together. I can be a jerk and have a terrible relationship with my mom, but I want more than anything to just feel loved enough where she can swallow her pride and make amends with my wife. Thats it. And she asked the other day to put a family group chat so everyone can be involved… for real? I know she is stressed with a high pressure job, but it seems heartless to me. She asks what big items she can get for the baby. Mom, baby is here we have everything for a couple months already. I said the biggest thing you can do is reach out and have a heart to heart with my wife so this rift can end and we can at least be cordial if you two can’t get along. I don’t think it will happen.

Hi everyone! We are a shared household of 3 heavy TV watchers. We have had Xfinity since 1996 with all the bells and whistles, and it's now become prohibitively expensive ($220pm).
We're considering going streaming only, but one of my roommates watches a lot of sports and wrestling. We're in an area/situation where Monkeybrains and Sonic are not an option, so we're wondering if there is another choice for both internet AND sports coverage/local channels (Survivor addict here), besides Xfinity packages. We've downgraded to the fewest channels that still allow for sports, and it's still $220.
We've looked into FUBO since it has sports, and we belong to literally every other major streaming service so don't really "need" cable TV, but my one roomie is concerned about losing sports channels.
Not sure how much Xfinity is for just internet, but FUBO is $90 and only carries a few channels. If internet w/o channels is $60+, it wouldn't really make sense to cut the cord for only a $50-ish savings per month. Any insight is appreciated!

Source: https://www.bungie.net/7/en/News/Article/weapon_tuning_the_final_shape
Hey, Guardians, it's the Weapons Team here with the weapon balance update for The Final Shape.
There's a lot to go through, from a comprehensive PvE weapon damage pass to Exotics changes, varying from substantial reworks to minor tweaks. We are also tamping down some outliers with an eye toward the World First race for the upcoming raid. And maybe there's a hint in here about a returning fan-favorite weapon, too...

Weapon Archetypes

Back in update 6.3.0, we rolled a set of Spec mods (Dragonfly, Surrounded, and Rampage) into the base functionality of those perks, and now we're coming for the rest of the Spec mods. We've increased base weapon damage almost universally (making exceptions for weapons that were already overperforming or that we buffed very recently) and have retired the following weapon mods:

• Boss Spec, Taken Spec, Minor Spec, Major Spec, and Adept Big Ones Spec.

We were already happy with the damage output of Exotic Primary weapons and Trace Rifles, so we only slightly reduced their damage bonus versus red bars. In most cases this means their damage output is roughly unchanged (since they receive the buffs below).

• Reduced damage bonus versus Minors from 40% to 30% (except Fighting Lion).

Included below are the matching damage changes by weapon archetype. Note that we made some exceptions for Exotic weapons that were already performing strongly and applied some buffs just to specific tiers of enemies. Except where noted, these changes are in PvE only. Also note that, because Exotic weapons can't equip mods, this gives them a larger relative buff than Legendaries, e.g., Riskrunner's maximum possible damage is increased 10% versus red bars, but Shayura's Wrath's is increased by 3% in effect because it can no longer slot a Minor Spec mod.
In addition to compensating for the removal of Spec mods, we've taken this opportunity to buff some weapon types that have languished in endgame PvE, most notably Pulse Rifles.

• Increased base PvE damage versus all combatants.
  
  • Pulse Rifles: 20%
    • Exceptions: Graviton Lance and Revision Zero's Heavy Burst mode. (These both have an intrinsic PvE damage buff built in.)
  • Pellet Shotguns: 10%
    • Exceptions: Legend of Acrius, Tractor Cannon, Conditional Finality, and The Fourth Horseman. (These are all already performing as intended.)
  • Slug Shotguns: 9%
  • Fusion Rifles: 7%
    • Exceptions: One Thousand Voices. (This one was just buffed.)
  • Sniper Rifles: 7%
    • Exceptions: Izanagi's Burden's Honed Edge shots and Cloudstrike's storm. (These are both performing well.)
  • Glaive projectiles: 7%
  • Linear Fusion Rifles: 5%
• Increased damage versus Minors (red bars)—this stacks with the base PvE damage increase.
  
  • Sidearms, Trace Rifles, Scout Rifles, and Bows: 20%
  • Auto Rifles and Pulse Rifles: 15%
    
    • For Pulse Rifles, this is in addition to the above buff, and Graviton Lance and Revision Zero's Heavy Burst mode are included.
      • I.e. Pulse Rifles will do 1.2 * 1.15 = 38% more damage to red bars.
  • Submachine Guns: 10%
    
  • Hand Cannons: 5%
    
• Increased damage versus Majors (orange bars).
  
  • Trace Rifles: 20%
• Increased damage globally, including PvP.
  
  • Machine Guns: 7%
  • Swords: 7%
• Splash damage from add clear-Exotic Primary weapons was overperforming in The Final Shape when combined with the damage buffs listed above, so we've pulled it down slightly on a handful of weapons.
  
  • Reduced splash damage by 10%:
    • Sunshot
    • Trinity Ghoul
    • Polaris Lance
    • Graviton Lance

Several releases back, we gave Kinetic weapons a substantial damage bonus in PvE to account for it being harder to use them in subclass builds. In general, we're ok with leaving this in place until we have a better-defined role for Kinetic weapons, but the bonus damage versus Boss-tier combatants was making it hard for weapons of other damage types to compete.

• Kinetic damage type weapons no longer deal bonus damage to bosses; damage to other combatant tiers is unchanged.
  
  • For example, a kinetic Sniper Rifle and a Stasis Sniper Rifle of the same subfamily will both deal the same damage to a boss.

We've also made some quality-of-life changes to several weapon types.

• Updated Heavy, Adaptive, and Aggressive Burst weapon intrinsic names to match burst count across all weapon archetypes. Functionality is unchanged.
  
  • 2-burst: Heavy Burst
    • Includes Sidearms, Hand Cannons, and Pulse Rifles.
  • 3-burst: Adaptive Burst
    • Includes Sidearms, Linear Fusion Rifles, and Adaptive Pulse Rifles.
  • 4-burst: Aggressive Burst
    • Includes Pulse Rifles.
• Removed the foundry name from the Veist Rapid-Fire, Häkke Precision, and Omolon Adaptive weapon intrinsics.
  
• Scout Rifles
  
  • Updated the hip-fire reticle to better show accuracy and aim-assist state.
• Hand Cannons
  
  • Some aggressive Hand Cannons struggle to compete with the stats of the top-tier examples [cough] Igneous Hammer [cough], so with Crimil's Dagger and Something New returning in The Final Shape, we updated their stats.
    
    • Crimil's Dagger (Iron Banner)
      • Stability: 23 to 31
      • Handling: 23 to 31
      • Magazine Size: 8 to 9
      • Airborne Effectiveness: 10 to 21
    • Something New (Solstice)
      • Stability: 27 to 30
      • Handling: 24 to 30
      • Magazine Size: 8 to 9
• Low inventory Sniper Rifles were a little too low in PvE for our liking, so we've increased the minimum.
  
  • Increased minimum reserves from 14 to 17 shots; maximum reserve is unchanged.
• Linear Fusion Rifles
  
  • Adaptive Burst Linear Fusion Rifles are strong, but in some cases are quite hard to control.
    • Reduced firing animation kick and recoil for Adaptive Linear Fusion Rifles.
• Wave Frame Grenade Launchers deal competitive damage as of the Destiny 2: Into the Light update, but some stats on these didn't have a gameplay effect. In this pass, we're adjusting the blast radius.
  
  • The size of the wave is now affected by the blast radius stat. This will mostly impact the width of the wave, though the length and height will also be scaled.
    • The default display stat for the blast radius has been changed from 100 to 50 (where 50 represents the previous baseline—any stat over 50 will result in a larger wave segment than what was possible before).
  • Special ammo Wave – Frame Grenade Launchers overperform as add clear weapons in their current state, so we've pulled the length of the wave back a little.
    • Reduced the length of the waves from 22 meters to 15 meters (except for Dead Messenger).
• Swords
  
  • Updated the Sword reticle to better indicate its charge state. When Sword energy is consumed, the amount of delay the Sword has before it begins to recharge now subtly appears in the reticle.
  • Bug fixes:
    • Fixed an issue where the Overwhelming Battlesong debuff from some missions would prevent Swords from recharging or losing energy while guarding.
    • Fixed an issue where unpowered caster Sword heavy attacks would not reset the Sword's energy recharge delay.
    • Fixed an issue where uncharged adaptive Sword heavy attacks cost the same amount of ammo as their charged counterparts. They now cost 1 ammo, same as other uncharged heavy attacks. ##Exotics

Divinity's ability to bypass combatant gameplay by generating a weak spot (called a "cage" internally) on command has too high an uptime as it stands, particularly with trigger feathering. We're not changing how effective the cage is or how feathering works, but we are increasing how long it takes to generate the cage, which will make it less ammo-efficient and less useful against targets that break aim frequently.

• Increased the number of shots required to generate the cage by 75% against combatants (PvP unchanged).

Rat King's firing animation makes the weapon hard to control at high rate of fire, so we've updated it.

• Swapped the firing animation to the same one used by other auto-fire Sidearms.

Devil's Ruin could be made to apply its firing animation to other equipped Sidearms.

• Fixed an issue where the firing animation from Devil's Ruin would get applied to other equipped Sidearms if the weapon was swapped during the firing animation.

Symmetry needed a little attention, particularly its reload speed and handling, so we took this opportunity to increase those via the catalyst.

• Catalyst now provides +10 reload speed, +10 handling, and the Eddy Current perk, in addition to its existing effects.

Gjallarhorn's Wolfpack Rounds always looked like Arc projectiles, regardless of the weapon's actual damage type.

• Updated the visuals of Wolfpack Rounds to match the damage type of the weapon.For example:
  
  • On Gjallarhorn, they will use Solar effects.
  • On the Royal Entry Void Rocket Launcher buffed by Gjallarhorn, they will have Void effects.

Touch of Malice's burn from the Darkness Ball didn't last long enough to be useful in PvE.

• Increased duration of burn applied by the Darkness Ball against combatants from 2 to 3.5 seconds.

Osteo Striga made it too easy to spread poison across a whole encounter from a couple of kills of weak combatants.

• Now has a 4-second cooldown on the poison burst on kills. (Poison burst from sustained damage doesn't receive this cooldown.)

Necrochasm's add clear role wasn't as strong as we'd like, so we've buffed it and replaced the Outlaw perk on the catalyst with a new, custom perk that leans into this role.

• Intrinsic perk now provides increased reload speed after precision kills.
• Increased duration of burn applied by the Cursed Thrall explosion against combatants from 2 to 3.5 seconds.
• Catalyst has been rebuilt.
  
  • One for Thrall: Damaging 3 combatants in quick succession provides a period of increased damage, range, and aim assist.

While The Lament’s damage is roughly equivalent to other Swords, the healing on hit largely removes the intended downside of using a Sword for boss DPS, and the chained heavy attack was too strong.

• Reduced healing effect by 20%.
• While this weapon does inherit the 7% global buff to Swords, we've reduced the damage of the high end of the chained heavy attack by 20% from that point.
  
  • This means combos at lower stacks are less affected by the change than combos at higher stacks.

Dead Man's Tale's rapid-fire hipfire fantasy isn't landing as well as we'd like, so we've bumped up the rate of fire and added a bit of stability to Cranial Spike to make this easier to control. At the same time, its strength is skewed a little high on mouse and keyboard and a little low on controller, so we've tuned accuracy and magnetism (controller reticle friction) to address this.

• Baseline:
  
  • Cranial Spike stacks now grant stability in addition to aim assist stat and range (+2 per stack).
  • Increased reload speed benefit of Cranial Spike stacks.
• With catalyst, iwhen hip-firing:
  
  • Slightly reduced accuracy benefits.
  • Increased magnetism falloff scale (1.6 to 1.7).
  • Increased baseline rate of fire from 130RPM to 140RPM.
  • Removed PvE-only damage buff that scaled with stacks of Cranial Spike and added a 15% damage bonus at maximum stacks of Cranial Spike.

The Colony's fantasy of spawning self-replicating insectoid robots is something we've wanted to juice for a while now. This update allows The Colony to deal with waves of combatants in a unique way.

• Now spawns additional insectoid robots on final blows. More robots (up to five) spawn from tougher combatants.

Truth has fallen far behind other Exotic Rocket Launchers, largely due to its lackluster damage, and we wanted to lean further into total rocket count.

• Increased area-of-effect (AoE) damage such that it doesn't lose noticeable damage due to not dealing impact damage.
• Increased total reserves by 3. (This is on top of the reserves change to high impact Rocket Launchers from the 7.3.5 update.)

The Queenbreaker's damage output is outpaced by Legendary Linear Fusion Rifles, so we've increased its damage and reserve ammo to compensate. We do see frequent requests to move Queenbreaker to the Energy slot, but given the number of Special ammo damage options in this slot, we have opted to push it further in the Heavy slot. We're working on some functionality changes to this weapon for a future update as well.

• Increased damage versus bosses, minibosses, Champions, and vehicles by 12%.
• Increased reserve ammunition by 3.

The power from Cerberus+1's focus fire perk from the Exotic catalyst was limited by it being always available. We've changed this to only being available following a kill, allowing us to increase its strength.

• Focus fire now will activate on Special reloads following a kill and will no longer reduce range or rate of fire.

In a world where Bastion has competition for a Fusion Rifle in the kinetic slot, we felt that it was time to lean further into emulating Saint-14's combat style.

• Reworked Saint's Fists perk: Dealing damage with melee increases your charge rate, damage, and reload speed for a short duration. Landing a majority of pellets in a burst increases melee damage.

Eriana's Vow has fallen behind other anti-barrier Special weapons and, as a Solar weapon, has the opportunity for a subclass tie-in.

• Breaking a matched shield or piercing a Champion's Barrier will cause the target to ignite.

Deterministic Chaos didn't have a clear niche when it shipped, so we've redesigned it to be an anti-Champion and weakening powerhouse.

• This weapon is now intrinsically anti-barrier.
• The Heavy Metal and Vexadecimal perks have had their locations and behavior swapped.
  
  • Heavy Metal now causes every 4th bullet to make targets volatile.
  • Vexadecimal now causes every 16th bullet to also weaken targets.

The flexibility offered by The Fundamentals (on the Borealis, Hard Light, and Dead Messenger Exotic weapons) is useful, but most of the time there's no need to switch damage types rapidly, so it's irritating having the current damage type clear on death.

• The Fundamentals now maintains its state across death or respawn. ##Perks

Alacrity working in solo activities is intended, but it's too strong a perk to have 100% uptime in PvP.

• Will no longer work in Rumble.

Archer's Gambit has been brought down a bit so it can be used on Legendary weapons.

• Reduced draw time buff from 66% to 60%.
• Reduced buff duration from 8 to 4 seconds (but it can now stack up to 8 seconds).

Grave Robber needed some extra love.

• Will now activate on dealing damage with a powered melee, in addition to standard melee kills.

Chain Reaction is too strong on Special ammo weapons in its current form, so we've branched it between Heavy and Special ammo weapons and will be shipping it on new Special weapons in The Final Shape.

• Special: About 15% smaller AoE size and 20% less damage.
• Heavy: Same AoE as before and 30% more damage.

Eddy Current was a little too slow to activate and didn't provide a strong enough bonus, particularly when amplified.

• Now takes 1.5 seconds of sprinting to activate instead of 3 seconds.
• Also provides a bonus to handling and a 5% scalar on each stat at base.
• Being amplified will immediately activate the perk at its maximum effectiveness.

Underdog was shelved a long time ago, but we wanted to swap it out for a more viable perk on weapons that still had it.

• Instances of Underdog have been replaced with Pulse Monitor.

Osmosis and Permeability have some interesting build-crafting potential, but when all they do is change damage type, they don't have enough general utility. It's also irritating when the perk effect falls off when you don't actually put your weapon away.

• These no longer drop off when pulling out a Ghost or similar actions.
• Now partially refill the weapon's magazine on activation.

The previous Chill Clip change hurt slow rate of fire weapons disproportionately and left Rapid-Fire Fusion Rifles as the clear best option, so we've branched the functionality to account for this.

• Adjust the number of slow stacks applied based on properties of the weapon.
  
  • In this case, Rapid-Fire Fusions like Riptide will still require 3 shots to freeze, but slower firing Fusions only require 2.
• All other archetypes have been un-nerfed and only require 2 shots to freeze.
  

High Ground's functionality wasn't delivering on the concept strongly enough, so we've granted it better baseline functionality while retaining the fantasy.

• Reworked to provide a stacking damage bonus when getting kills in any context (like Rampage) or instantly granting the maximum amount of stacks when damaging an enemy from the high ground.
• PvE max bonus increased to a 25% damage bonus, and PvP max increased to 15%.

The Killing Tally perk on the original 21% Delirium Machine Gun has been updated to match the version found on random-rolled weapons.
Perks that currently match your equipped subclass have been changed as follows:

• Osmosis and Tessellation now match the damage type of your equipped grenade.
• Permeability and Elemental Capacitor now match the damage type of your equipped Super.

Deconstruct had a variety of issues that cropped up when it started to appear on AoE weapons. It's been updated to address bugs and prevent exploiting ammo generation:

• Now refills from reserves instead of from thin air and should trigger more reliably across weapon types. ##The Future

Now that we’re largely happy with weapon damage in PvP, we’re going to move the PvP-specific tuning out of the game modes and into base weapon tuning in the future. This will give us the ability to fine-tune damage per weapon subfamily, e.g., on precision Hand Cannons instead of all Hand Cannons.
We also have some big systems changes we’re working on for a future release, including redesigns of the PvP and PvE ammo economies, introducing more player choice into weapon mods and more new weapon types.
And that's all we had for today. We hope these changes will help you better understand how your arsenal will fare once The Final Shape arrives on June 4 and that you can better prepare your loadouts for the new raid. Be on the lookout for another sandbox-focused article coming on May 22 about abilities and Exotic armor.

Source: https://www.bungie.net/7/en/News/Article/weapon_tuning_the_final_shape
Hey, Guardians, it's the Weapons Team here with the weapon balance update for The Final Shape.
There's a lot to go through, from a comprehensive PvE weapon damage pass to Exotics changes, varying from substantial reworks to minor tweaks. We are also tamping down some outliers with an eye toward the World First race for the upcoming raid. And maybe there's a hint in here about a returning fan-favorite weapon, too...

Weapon Archetypes

Back in update 6.3.0, we rolled a set of Spec mods (Dragonfly, Surrounded, and Rampage) into the base functionality of those perks, and now we're coming for the rest of the Spec mods. We've increased base weapon damage almost universally (making exceptions for weapons that were already overperforming or that we buffed very recently) and have retired the following weapon mods:

• Boss Spec, Taken Spec, Minor Spec, Major Spec, and Adept Big Ones Spec.

We were already happy with the damage output of Exotic Primary weapons and Trace Rifles, so we only slightly reduced their damage bonus versus red bars. In most cases this means their damage output is roughly unchanged (since they receive the buffs below).

• Reduced damage bonus versus Minors from 40% to 30% (except Fighting Lion).

Included below are the matching damage changes by weapon archetype. Note that we made some exceptions for Exotic weapons that were already performing strongly and applied some buffs just to specific tiers of enemies. Except where noted, these changes are in PvE only. Also note that, because Exotic weapons can't equip mods, this gives them a larger relative buff than Legendaries, e.g., Riskrunner's maximum possible damage is increased 10% versus red bars, but Shayura's Wrath's is increased by 3% in effect because it can no longer slot a Minor Spec mod.
In addition to compensating for the removal of Spec mods, we've taken this opportunity to buff some weapon types that have languished in endgame PvE, most notably Pulse Rifles.

• Increased base PvE damage versus all combatants.
  
  • Pulse Rifles: 20%
    • Exceptions: Graviton Lance and Revision Zero's Heavy Burst mode. (These both have an intrinsic PvE damage buff built in.)
  • Pellet Shotguns: 10%
    • Exceptions: Legend of Acrius, Tractor Cannon, Conditional Finality, and The Fourth Horseman. (These are all already performing as intended.)
  • Slug Shotguns: 9%
  • Fusion Rifles: 7%
    • Exceptions: One Thousand Voices. (This one was just buffed.)
  • Sniper Rifles: 7%
    • Exceptions: Izanagi's Burden's Honed Edge shots and Cloudstrike's storm. (These are both performing well.)
  • Glaive projectiles: 7%
  • Linear Fusion Rifles: 5%
• Increased damage versus Minors (red bars)—this stacks with the base PvE damage increase.
  
  • Sidearms, Trace Rifles, Scout Rifles, and Bows: 20%
  • Auto Rifles and Pulse Rifles: 15%
    
    • For Pulse Rifles, this is in addition to the above buff, and Graviton Lance and Revision Zero's Heavy Burst mode are included.
      • I.e. Pulse Rifles will do 1.2 * 1.15 = 38% more damage to red bars.
  • Submachine Guns: 10%
    
  • Hand Cannons: 5%
    
• Increased damage versus Majors (orange bars).
  
  • Trace Rifles: 20%
• Increased damage globally, including PvP.
  
  • Machine Guns: 7%
  • Swords: 7%
• Splash damage from add clear-Exotic Primary weapons was overperforming in The Final Shape when combined with the damage buffs listed above, so we've pulled it down slightly on a handful of weapons.
  
  • Reduced splash damage by 10%:
    • Sunshot
    • Trinity Ghoul
    • Polaris Lance
    • Graviton Lance

Several releases back, we gave Kinetic weapons a substantial damage bonus in PvE to account for it being harder to use them in subclass builds. In general, we're ok with leaving this in place until we have a better-defined role for Kinetic weapons, but the bonus damage versus Boss-tier combatants was making it hard for weapons of other damage types to compete.

• Kinetic damage type weapons no longer deal bonus damage to bosses; damage to other combatant tiers is unchanged.
  
  • For example, a kinetic Sniper Rifle and a Stasis Sniper Rifle of the same subfamily will both deal the same damage to a boss.

We've also made some quality-of-life changes to several weapon types.

• Updated Heavy, Adaptive, and Aggressive Burst weapon intrinsic names to match burst count across all weapon archetypes. Functionality is unchanged.
  
  • 2-burst: Heavy Burst
    • Includes Sidearms, Hand Cannons, and Pulse Rifles.
  • 3-burst: Adaptive Burst
    • Includes Sidearms, Linear Fusion Rifles, and Adaptive Pulse Rifles.
  • 4-burst: Aggressive Burst
    • Includes Pulse Rifles.
• Removed the foundry name from the Veist Rapid-Fire, Häkke Precision, and Omolon Adaptive weapon intrinsics.
  
• Scout Rifles
  
  • Updated the hip-fire reticle to better show accuracy and aim-assist state.
• Hand Cannons
  
  • Some aggressive Hand Cannons struggle to compete with the stats of the top-tier examples [cough] Igneous Hammer [cough], so with Crimil's Dagger and Something New returning in The Final Shape, we updated their stats.
    
    • Crimil's Dagger (Iron Banner)
      • Stability: 23 to 31
      • Handling: 23 to 31
      • Magazine Size: 8 to 9
      • Airborne Effectiveness: 10 to 21
    • Something New (Solstice)
      • Stability: 27 to 30
      • Handling: 24 to 30
      • Magazine Size: 8 to 9
• Low inventory Sniper Rifles were a little too low in PvE for our liking, so we've increased the minimum.
  
  • Increased minimum reserves from 14 to 17 shots; maximum reserve is unchanged.
• Linear Fusion Rifles
  
  • Adaptive Burst Linear Fusion Rifles are strong, but in some cases are quite hard to control.
    • Reduced firing animation kick and recoil for Adaptive Linear Fusion Rifles.
• Wave Frame Grenade Launchers deal competitive damage as of the Destiny 2: Into the Light update, but some stats on these didn't have a gameplay effect. In this pass, we're adjusting the blast radius.
  
  • The size of the wave is now affected by the blast radius stat. This will mostly impact the width of the wave, though the length and height will also be scaled.
    • The default display stat for the blast radius has been changed from 100 to 50 (where 50 represents the previous baseline—any stat over 50 will result in a larger wave segment than what was possible before).
  • Special ammo Wave – Frame Grenade Launchers overperform as add clear weapons in their current state, so we've pulled the length of the wave back a little.
    • Reduced the length of the waves from 22 meters to 15 meters (except for Dead Messenger).
• Swords
  
  • Updated the Sword reticle to better indicate its charge state. When Sword energy is consumed, the amount of delay the Sword has before it begins to recharge now subtly appears in the reticle.
  • Bug fixes:
    • Fixed an issue where the Overwhelming Battlesong debuff from some missions would prevent Swords from recharging or losing energy while guarding.
    • Fixed an issue where unpowered caster Sword heavy attacks would not reset the Sword's energy recharge delay.
    • Fixed an issue where uncharged adaptive Sword heavy attacks cost the same amount of ammo as their charged counterparts. They now cost 1 ammo, same as other uncharged heavy attacks. ##Exotics

Divinity's ability to bypass combatant gameplay by generating a weak spot (called a "cage" internally) on command has too high an uptime as it stands, particularly with trigger feathering. We're not changing how effective the cage is or how feathering works, but we are increasing how long it takes to generate the cage, which will make it less ammo-efficient and less useful against targets that break aim frequently.

• Increased the number of shots required to generate the cage by 75% against combatants (PvP unchanged).

Rat King's firing animation makes the weapon hard to control at high rate of fire, so we've updated it.

• Swapped the firing animation to the same one used by other auto-fire Sidearms.

Devil's Ruin could be made to apply its firing animation to other equipped Sidearms.

• Fixed an issue where the firing animation from Devil's Ruin would get applied to other equipped Sidearms if the weapon was swapped during the firing animation.

Symmetry needed a little attention, particularly its reload speed and handling, so we took this opportunity to increase those via the catalyst.

• Catalyst now provides +10 reload speed, +10 handling, and the Eddy Current perk, in addition to its existing effects.

Gjallarhorn's Wolfpack Rounds always looked like Arc projectiles, regardless of the weapon's actual damage type.

• Updated the visuals of Wolfpack Rounds to match the damage type of the weapon.For example:
  
  • On Gjallarhorn, they will use Solar effects.
  • On the Royal Entry Void Rocket Launcher buffed by Gjallarhorn, they will have Void effects.

Touch of Malice's burn from the Darkness Ball didn't last long enough to be useful in PvE.

• Increased duration of burn applied by the Darkness Ball against combatants from 2 to 3.5 seconds.

Osteo Striga made it too easy to spread poison across a whole encounter from a couple of kills of weak combatants.

• Now has a 4-second cooldown on the poison burst on kills. (Poison burst from sustained damage doesn't receive this cooldown.)

Necrochasm's add clear role wasn't as strong as we'd like, so we've buffed it and replaced the Outlaw perk on the catalyst with a new, custom perk that leans into this role.

• Intrinsic perk now provides increased reload speed after precision kills.
• Increased duration of burn applied by the Cursed Thrall explosion against combatants from 2 to 3.5 seconds.
• Catalyst has been rebuilt.
  
  • One for Thrall: Damaging 3 combatants in quick succession provides a period of increased damage, range, and aim assist.

While The Lament’s damage is roughly equivalent to other Swords, the healing on hit largely removes the intended downside of using a Sword for boss DPS, and the chained heavy attack was too strong.

• Reduced healing effect by 20%.
• While this weapon does inherit the 7% global buff to Swords, we've reduced the damage of the high end of the chained heavy attack by 20% from that point.
  
  • This means combos at lower stacks are less affected by the change than combos at higher stacks.

Dead Man's Tale's rapid-fire hipfire fantasy isn't landing as well as we'd like, so we've bumped up the rate of fire and added a bit of stability to Cranial Spike to make this easier to control. At the same time, its strength is skewed a little high on mouse and keyboard and a little low on controller, so we've tuned accuracy and magnetism (controller reticle friction) to address this.

• Baseline:
  
  • Cranial Spike stacks now grant stability in addition to aim assist stat and range (+2 per stack).
  • Increased reload speed benefit of Cranial Spike stacks.
• With catalyst, iwhen hip-firing:
  
  • Slightly reduced accuracy benefits.
  • Increased magnetism falloff scale (1.6 to 1.7).
  • Increased baseline rate of fire from 130RPM to 140RPM.
  • Removed PvE-only damage buff that scaled with stacks of Cranial Spike and added a 15% damage bonus at maximum stacks of Cranial Spike.

The Colony's fantasy of spawning self-replicating insectoid robots is something we've wanted to juice for a while now. This update allows The Colony to deal with waves of combatants in a unique way.

• Now spawns additional insectoid robots on final blows. More robots (up to five) spawn from tougher combatants.

Truth has fallen far behind other Exotic Rocket Launchers, largely due to its lackluster damage, and we wanted to lean further into total rocket count.

• Increased area-of-effect (AoE) damage such that it doesn't lose noticeable damage due to not dealing impact damage.
• Increased total reserves by 3. (This is on top of the reserves change to high impact Rocket Launchers from the 7.3.5 update.)

The Queenbreaker's damage output is outpaced by Legendary Linear Fusion Rifles, so we've increased its damage and reserve ammo to compensate. We do see frequent requests to move Queenbreaker to the Energy slot, but given the number of Special ammo damage options in this slot, we have opted to push it further in the Heavy slot. We're working on some functionality changes to this weapon for a future update as well.

• Increased damage versus bosses, minibosses, Champions, and vehicles by 12%.
• Increased reserve ammunition by 3.

The power from Cerberus+1's focus fire perk from the Exotic catalyst was limited by it being always available. We've changed this to only being available following a kill, allowing us to increase its strength.

• Focus fire now will activate on Special reloads following a kill and will no longer reduce range or rate of fire.

In a world where Bastion has competition for a Fusion Rifle in the kinetic slot, we felt that it was time to lean further into emulating Saint-14's combat style.

• Reworked Saint's Fists perk: Dealing damage with melee increases your charge rate, damage, and reload speed for a short duration. Landing a majority of pellets in a burst increases melee damage.

Eriana's Vow has fallen behind other anti-barrier Special weapons and, as a Solar weapon, has the opportunity for a subclass tie-in.

• Breaking a matched shield or piercing a Champion's Barrier will cause the target to ignite.

Deterministic Chaos didn't have a clear niche when it shipped, so we've redesigned it to be an anti-Champion and weakening powerhouse.

• This weapon is now intrinsically anti-barrier.
• The Heavy Metal and Vexadecimal perks have had their locations and behavior swapped.
  
  • Heavy Metal now causes every 4th bullet to make targets volatile.
  • Vexadecimal now causes every 16th bullet to also weaken targets.

The flexibility offered by The Fundamentals (on the Borealis, Hard Light, and Dead Messenger Exotic weapons) is useful, but most of the time there's no need to switch damage types rapidly, so it's irritating having the current damage type clear on death.

• The Fundamentals now maintains its state across death or respawn. ##Perks

Alacrity working in solo activities is intended, but it's too strong a perk to have 100% uptime in PvP.

• Will no longer work in Rumble.

Archer's Gambit has been brought down a bit so it can be used on Legendary weapons.

• Reduced draw time buff from 66% to 60%.
• Reduced buff duration from 8 to 4 seconds (but it can now stack up to 8 seconds).

Grave Robber needed some extra love.

• Will now activate on dealing damage with a powered melee, in addition to standard melee kills.

Chain Reaction is too strong on Special ammo weapons in its current form, so we've branched it between Heavy and Special ammo weapons and will be shipping it on new Special weapons in The Final Shape.

• Special: About 15% smaller AoE size and 20% less damage.
• Heavy: Same AoE as before and 30% more damage.

Eddy Current was a little too slow to activate and didn't provide a strong enough bonus, particularly when amplified.

• Now takes 1.5 seconds of sprinting to activate instead of 3 seconds.
• Also provides a bonus to handling and a 5% scalar on each stat at base.
• Being amplified will immediately activate the perk at its maximum effectiveness.

Underdog was shelved a long time ago, but we wanted to swap it out for a more viable perk on weapons that still had it.

• Instances of Underdog have been replaced with Pulse Monitor.

Osmosis and Permeability have some interesting build-crafting potential, but when all they do is change damage type, they don't have enough general utility. It's also irritating when the perk effect falls off when you don't actually put your weapon away.

• These no longer drop off when pulling out a Ghost or similar actions.
• Now partially refill the weapon's magazine on activation.

The previous Chill Clip change hurt slow rate of fire weapons disproportionately and left Rapid-Fire Fusion Rifles as the clear best option, so we've branched the functionality to account for this.

• Adjust the number of slow stacks applied based on properties of the weapon.
  
  • In this case, Rapid-Fire Fusions like Riptide will still require 3 shots to freeze, but slower firing Fusions only require 2.
• All other archetypes have been un-nerfed and only require 2 shots to freeze.
  

High Ground's functionality wasn't delivering on the concept strongly enough, so we've granted it better baseline functionality while retaining the fantasy.

• Reworked to provide a stacking damage bonus when getting kills in any context (like Rampage) or instantly granting the maximum amount of stacks when damaging an enemy from the high ground.
• PvE max bonus increased to a 25% damage bonus, and PvP max increased to 15%.

The Killing Tally perk on the original 21% Delirium Machine Gun has been updated to match the version found on random-rolled weapons.
Perks that currently match your equipped subclass have been changed as follows:

• Osmosis and Tessellation now match the damage type of your equipped grenade.
• Permeability and Elemental Capacitor now match the damage type of your equipped Super.

Deconstruct had a variety of issues that cropped up when it started to appear on AoE weapons. It's been updated to address bugs and prevent exploiting ammo generation:

• Now refills from reserves instead of from thin air and should trigger more reliably across weapon types. ##The Future

Now that we’re largely happy with weapon damage in PvP, we’re going to move the PvP-specific tuning out of the game modes and into base weapon tuning in the future. This will give us the ability to fine-tune damage per weapon subfamily, e.g., on precision Hand Cannons instead of all Hand Cannons.
We also have some big systems changes we’re working on for a future release, including redesigns of the PvP and PvE ammo economies, introducing more player choice into weapon mods and more new weapon types.
And that's all we had for today. We hope these changes will help you better understand how your arsenal will fare once The Final Shape arrives on June 4 and that you can better prepare your loadouts for the new raid. Be on the lookout for another sandbox-focused article coming on May 22 about abilities and Exotic armor.

According to Wikipedia, "Weaponized incompetence, also called strategic incompetence, is a concept in popular psychology related to an individual using feigned and/or deliberate incompetence to avoid unwanted responsibility."
It's a concept that has received particular attention in gender studies as a description of one partner in a relationship, usually the man, not carrying their equal weight in the responsibilities of household work.
Over the years in /Zen we have had countless New Agers and institutionally-unaffiliated folks come into this forum and make assertions about Zen while being unable to answer questions about the source of their info. When challenged to write something as simple as a high-school book report on a Zen text, they run away; when challenged to AMA, as is Zen tradition, they harass, choke, and then delete their accounts.
All of it raises some interesting questions that demonstrate the stark differences between trends going on in popular culture and Zen:

• What does it mean to meet someone ignorant of the Zen tradition where they are?
  
• Why don't Zen Masters universally assume good-faith in their interactions?
  
• How can "being nice/tolerant" enable anti-Zen bigotry?
  

The whole idea of weaponized incompetence is that incompetence/ignorance can be a strategic decision people use to get STUFF THEY WANT.
Zen isn't about giving people something to believe in, no matter how badly they want it.
From Zhaozhou:

A monk asked, "I have come a long way, please instruct me."
The master said, "You have only just entered my door. Is it proper that I spit in your face?"

From the Zen perspective, the monk is demanding something that is so utterly offensive from a Zen Master that it would arguably be not only appropriate but COMPASSIONATE to spit in the monk's face.
Zen Masters reminise fondly on this kind of treatment they may have once received from a Zen Master.
From Linji:

Twenty years ago, when I was at Huang-po's place, I asked three times what was clearly and obviously the real point of Buddhism, and three times he was good enough to hit me with his stick. It was as though he had brushed me with a sprig of mugwort. Thinking of it now, I wish I could get hit once more like that. Is there anyone who can give me such a blow?

Huangbo delivering a beating to the former-Linji means he was good enough to be his teacher.
Huangbo didn't tolerate the incompetence Linji claimed he had.
So when people from unaffiliated religious backgrounds or the chronically offended come to /Zen and complain that people that cite historical facts and the Zen record aren't being "nice" we really know that they just mean that they don't understand the meaning of Linji's gratitude.

I am currently dealing with a problem. I'm really exhausted, I don't know how to distinguish OCD from normal anxiety, I'm confused, and I don't want to seek reassurance if it's because of OCD. I'm employed by an association, and we were cleaning our storage area and basement today. During the process of moving items in a particularly dusty room filled with debris, which hadn't been cleaned for a long time, I believe I might have come into contact with rat feces while lifting a heavy object. I was wearing fabric gloves, as I always do during work. I washed my hands after cleaning the room, but I'm still worried about the potential risk of inhaling harmful particles or viruses during the cleaning and sweeping process.
I have contamination OCD, which often leads me to fear contamination and the contraction of severe diseases. In the past, my fears of getting a deadly illness have led me to visit doctors and hospitals multiple times, only to be told that my concerns are psychological and that my visits were unnecessary. As a result, I was referred to a psychiatrist for a consultation. I'm doing ERP therapy, and try to face my fears and avoid reacting with compulsive actions or seeking reassurance, as these behaviors only intensify OCD symptoms.
It's difficult for me to determine whether it's rational to seek reassurance from a doctor, or whether a person without OCD would do the same, or if it's merely a problem in my mind causing panic. I don't want to visit the doctor unnecessarily, only to find out once again that my visit was unwarranted due to my fear of a virus that spreads on the most on aerosol ways when inhaled, which is my current fear due to touching rat feces or that i might inhaled aerosol and infected particle
Moreover, there is a shortage of doctors in my country, as many of them work abroad, and those who remain here are often overworked, holding multiple positions at the hospital, and frequently in a bad mood. Previously, I used to visit them due to a fear that I had some deadly neurological disease, and they referred me to a psychiatrist then as well. I don't want to go again without a valid reason, especially since I'm known for having visited before without a valid risk or reason.
I'm unsure if it's even rational to seek reassurance and visit a doctor given that I have OCD or would it be a compulsive behavior. I don't know what a person without OCD would do in this situation. Even if I visit the doctor, the question remains whether they could even detect something if I theoretically contracted something due to this contact with rat feces. Honestly, I'm uncertain about what decision to make. I thinking about going to the emergency psychiatrist ambulance, but then they will offer me to stay there if i want to. I don't know how long i can hold on and don't go insane and the end up in the psychiatric ambulance. For now I'm ok, used my meds that are for cases when i get panic attacks, now a little bit better, but i don't now will it get worser.

I've never had a good opportunity to sit down and do a run through TTWL. I'd played a couple hours in the past, but never really made it the game I was going to play. Well, I've now spent about two weeks playing it in my spare time. I'm at or just after the Wastard boss fight, which is pretty close to the end of the main story. I've been doing some side quests, but I've wanted to unlock gear slots so I've been sticking to the main quest.
Overall, I am having fun. The good:

1. The game is fun. The enemies are fun to fight. Flying enemies are a bit annoying, but they're kept pretty rare. I like how chaotic combat feels.
2. I like that they made melee combat repeat by holding the button down. You don't have to mash that button anymore. 100% that should always be there going forward.
3. I like the idea of armor, rings, amulets, and melee weapons being drops. That's cool. I kinda wish armor actually gave you armor, though.
4. The story is fine. I appreciate the TTRPG jokes.
5. Setting is cool. A fantasy world that feels true to TTRPG settings and as goofy as Borderlands likes to be.
6. Voice acting is great. Villain is great. Tina is great. Other players are... whatever. I like Wanda Sykes even if her character is meh.
7. Enemy variety is good. Talking skeletons are hilarious. Goblin "tricksters" in barrels are fun even if their ram attack has too much knockback.

However, I've got some criticisms. I'm wondering if I'm the only one to notice these. Most of these are small, but... there's so many little things that together I think TTWL is easily my least favorite game. It's like a death of 1,000 cuts. No huge glaring issues. Just things that tell you they didn't put as much care into Wonderlands. The game is undercooked. The bad:

1. There aren't really mechanics around melee combat. You just hold down melee, and then try to keep the enemy on screen. There are talents that make you better and the weapons often feel satisfying, but overall melee doesn't feel very deep for how important it seems to be.
2. Melee interrupting and resetting reload animations feels awful. Reload animations feel relatively long in WL, and if you miss the timing a little bit because some mob is eating your face that you want to finish off, you have to start the whole thing over. I really, really hate it.
3. The classes are kinda underwhelming. They remind me of BL1 classes more than anything. The ability trees are kinda dull; mostly static mods that don't do a whole lot plus a few kill skills. The action skills just feel like unique spells unless it's a pet, but the number of spells waters them down a lot. Having two classes is a great idea, but... it's not transformative gameplay like the BL3 classes were. Ability scores in particular feel lazy.
4. The way encounters work in instances really sucks. Instead of organically approaching an area, you're dumped into a combat arena. There aren't enough maps, either, or they get reused way too much. Instead of knowing where the enemies are and where safety is, they teleport in around you so you're constantly surrounded. Surrounded by melee enemies that will happily mob you and pin you in a corner. That might be realistic, but it's sure as shit ain't fun in an FPS. It's a good thing that snipers seem mostly terrible because there's so many encounters where they won't do anything. Need to run away and reload? The game will helpfully teleport enemies in front of you! And god help you if you die during the third stage of one of these instanced dungeons because you get to do all three of those fights again!
5. OK, it's a little thing, but when you complete an overworld shrine they don't activate on their own. You have to go back and activate them. Why? Why isn't finding all 4 parts good enough? And why are the bonuses so boring? Faster walking on the overworld? 10% more XP? These... suck. They feel like, "We nerfed you from baseline so we could find rewards to give back to you!"
6. The overworld likes to steal or lock your camera controls in certain areas. No. Bad. Stop that.
7. Map navigation on PC is fucked, too. You have to drag the reticle on the map to select things. The mouse just isn't used as a pointing device. Oh, but if you accidentally have the mouse where the list of travel locations are going to be on the UI when you open the map, well, then the map will automatically refocus to that spot instead of where you are. Want to refocus on yourself? Too bad. The easiest way to do that is to move the mouse to the right side of the screen then close and re-open the map.
8. The enemies feel... bizarrely bullet spongey. Worse, quite a lot of them just charge at you and melee. Even with an FOV of 105+, it's obnoxious simply because it's hard to see what is going on. I want the option of switching to third person camera.
9. So many enemies randomly have immunity shields, too, where you have to wait until you can attack them. That's maybe fine for an area boss, especially when they flood the boss arena with adds or do a phase change, but it's bullshit that a mook pirate with a ship's wheel as a "shield" just takes no damage or that the miniboss has a 15s immunity shield on a 20s cooldown. It's not overpowered. It's boring. I'm reminded of EgoRaptor's Ocarina of Time video: "There is so much goddamn waiting"
10. There's a lot of enemies that explode randomly when they die or have damage zones that persist after they die (sometimes from your own elemental weapons!). This has the knock-on effect of sometimes you win a combat, but then the last enemy explodes or drops a poison pool and that knocks you out. It feels very cheap and bullshitty in solo play whenever BL knocks you out after all the enemies die, and WL seems uniquely good at doing that to reset your progress by denying a Death Save.
11. The character creator doesn't really work. You get 5,000 sliders for the head and face, but they don't seem to do a whole lot. More oddly, there are only two body types, and they're kind of fixed based on class. You're a stabbomancer. Want your character to be a waifish girl assassin? Well, too bad. That's not possible. You either look like a kind of buff male wrestler or a kind of buff female wrestler. It feels like it misses the point entirely.
12. So many guns have slow projectile speeds or arcing projectiles that the gunplay really suffers. Certain weapons (magic blast shotguns and explosive lobbers) feel like they don't do the damage they're rated for, and the range of impact on the target is both extreme and too varied. Some weapons just have no effect at all. Others have huge knockback... but only sometimes. Both of these feel like they harm the quality of gunplay.
13. The loot feels like it sucks. It's too time consuming to go through it all, especially with the stupid inventory still being the same as it was in BL2. Like the rings and amulets don't feel like they do a lot unless you get a god drop, so it's hard to compare them.
14. The non-weapon class modifiers feel lazy and nebulous. "+10% Stabbomancer power." OK, great. I'm a stabbomancer. 10% of what now? Just my active skill? Every skill or talent? And the Epics have two classes chosen at random. So there's about a 1 in 20 chance that the game will drop loot with mods for both my actual classes, and about a 50% chance that it will have neither of them. Most non-weapon drop drops are automatically trash loot for you. But you had best pick it all up to sell, because....
15. Why are the SDUs so goddamn expensive? In fact, why is everything so goddamn expensive? If you want to buy something from the vending machine it's going to be 50% or more of your funds. I remember saving up to be able to afford maybe one thing from the vending machine in the future. That's steady throughout the whole game for me. SDUs are just a further drain.
16. Dark element seems too good. Like I just always keep a dark element weapon on me now because it's basically the only active way to heal. You can either find potions on the ground (why can't I carry them?) or use a vending machine to heal (which I don't think I've done since BL1) or explode a healing barrel or I can use a dark weapon. That's it. Oh, I suppose you might get a drop with 0.5% heal per second on it, but whatever. I get that lightning is good vs ward, poison is good vs armor, fire is good vs flesh, and ice is good vs bone. But dark is the only way to extend survivability, really. Mainly because running away is often impossible (instanced encounters).
17. The default keyboard layout is total garbage now, and I think it's because melee is important. WASD. E use. R reload. 1-4 weapons. Space is jump. F spell and G skill (or vice versa). H another skill sometimes. LCtrl slide and crouch and slam. Q is tag (I think?). C weapon mode. V is melee? Really? Why is such an important key there? It doesn't feel like they actually planned any of this out. I know it's the exact same layout as BL3, but the gameplay is much different. It's really annoying in ways I didn't expect. Why does it feel like there was just no thought put into how making melee important might prompt changes to the key layout? It just feels like every character is as input heavy as BL3's Zane, and it's because they didn't really think about anything.
18. This has been a constant issue for me since Borderlands 2 (in BL1 it felt appropriate). Since they keep making this thoughtless design mistake I'm going to keep bringing it up. Why do they keep starting you off with only 2 weapon slots? Why does gear drop that I can't even equip? Why are gear slots locked at all if you can just level-gate drops from some categories? It's a looter shooter focused on switching weapons and gear frequently! Let me use the loot that drops and let me use more weapons! This is a shitty progression mechanic, and it feels even worse here. I think I found my first ring 4-5 levels before I could actually equip it. I'd found two epic rings before I could even equip one.

I'm not going to give up on the game because in spite of all that it is often fun. But I think this is the worst BL game. Which is a shame because Tiny Tina's Assault on Dragon Keep is probably the top tier for Borderlands, IMO.

Hello,
I am not sure if this is the correct subreddit
Me (24M) and my ex-girlfriend(22F) met in high school while living with our parents, and it was the first serious relationship either one of us has had. Right now we both still live with our parents and are working to complete college. As of the time she broke up with me, we had been together for just under 7 years. We began dating when both of us were under 18 (17 and 15). We have been long distance for the duration of our relationship except for a brief 2 month period when she tried moving in with me. About 3 weeks ago I asked her if she would be ready for me to move in with her (her family had offered to let me move in with them a few times over the past couple of years, but the timing is right now because I am about to finish school). One day after this conversation and without any other warning, she broke up with me and initially wanted to go no contact, but we are still talking and getting closure on the relationship. She told me the reason for the breakup was she has had several doubts and concerns over the course of the relationship and not enough of them improved to the point where she wanted to continue. Most of these doubts have either never really been mentioned to me aside from in passing, or have been mentioned seriously one time about a year ago when she broke up with me citing the same doubts but decided to give it another chance. She said that the main reason why she didn't mention these doubts on an ongoing basis was to see how I would change naturally and without her input, but I think it is unfair to have so many doubts go for such a long time without a chance to talk about them. She worries that too much damage has been done and that she could not trust me again. She also worries about whether we are compatible with some of the doubts relating to small things like daily interactions.
Less than 2 weeks after the breakup she is already seeing somebody new, after saying that she would want to wait 3-6 months before trying to see anybody else or trying to get back together. I know that this is all totally her choice to do, but it really feels like she is rushing and not thinking about things clearly. She told me that she is able to move on so quickly because she mourned our relationship during our previous breakup about a year ago that lasted for a couple of days, and never fully regained the trust required for a successful relationship which is why she's moving on so quickly.
As much as I would like to keep fighting for the relationship to work, she thinks too much damage over too long of a period of time to try and continue at this point. For our current conversations, she has been in closure and move on mode where I was initially in the mode of trying to understand her reasons, then bargaining mode, and now I'm finally in a closure as of these past couple of days. She seems to be pulling away very fast, at first not much changed, but within the last week she has turned off location sharing, unshared her calendar, and just last night she deleted all of our saved message history on snapchat.
She had mentioned going no contact and blocking me during the first time she spoke to me about this breakup, but now is not sure and wants to wait and see how she is feeling and how the closure conversations go. I may have made a mistake during our last closure talk a couple of days ago when I asked her if there is anything that she hasn't forgiven me for, or what I have done that has hurt her the most and that seemed to dig up a lot of emotions (understandably so).
I recognize that I was never a perfect partner, and I have struggled with my own mental health issues. I always loved her but after these closure talks I can honestly say that I understand how so many of my behaviors have caused her hurt. I was going to include the list of doubts and everything that contributed to them, but I decided that would make the post unnecessarily long. Generally, the doubts and concerns stem from my mental health issues causing me to not treat her properly, general immaturity on my part, and events occurring during and after the 2 month period where she moved in with me. She showed up at my house practically unannounced saying that she was going to move in with me after she got in an argument with her family, without any prior conversation with me about it and during a time that I was not ready for her to move in with me. She had just begun a medication that seriously threw off her hormones and caused her major mood swings. The beginning of her moving in was decent, but after she started physically and emotionally distancing herself from me while getting closer with my family members, I asked her to go home. We did fully speak about this time period until she broke up with me about a year ago, the extent of the conversation at that point was me telling her that it felt like she was emotionally abusing me, which shook both of us enough that we never finished the conversation and did not discuss it further until starting 3 weeks ago with the recent breakup. This trip occurred right after she turned 18 while I was 20, and she told me that she fully intended to stay with me from that point on.
As a side note, right after the initial breakup conversation I began writing a list of all of the relationship issues that I could think of, and all of the doubts that she told me. For both of these, I wrote down ways that I contributed to or caused hurt to her and have been working through the list acknowledging and apologizing for the behaviors in our closure talks. Initially, she seemed interested in hearing out all that I had to say, along with occasionally watching a movie together and playing video games maybe once or twice a week.
Where we currently are:
We currently have another closure talk (phone call) planned for Thursday. We haven't spoken since she deleted our message history from snapchat. In the last closure talk, she said that she wanted to focus on the big and important items from my list and that at this point she does not want to talk about the smaller topics I thought of.
Here are my questions:

1. What is the best way to move on from where we are that minimizes further damages, puts her in a position to heal, and hopefully does not result in me getting blocked or her going no contact?
2. It feels like she is pulling away hard and heading to no contact. Should I tell her that I am done with the closure talks to speed that up, or is it worth continuing to talk while she is willing to?
3. Please provide any other generally helpful advice or ideas for this situation. This is my first breakup and I really don't know what I'm doing.

TL;DR
Girlfriend broke up with me after a relationship of almost 7 years, due to a list of doubts and concerns she had that she is now sharing with me. I am currently wondering how to best proceed without causing more damage and leaving the door open for hopefully staying friends into the future.

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MNS Oengro

“How’s the fuel status of the Oengro?” Grionc asked.
Vastae, eyes glued to his console, replied without hesitation. “We have just enough blink fuel for one jump, but we aren’t going anywhere once we get to the other side without a refueling ship.”
“One blink is all we need. And if the Oengro is good to go, the other, smaller ships should be fine too then,” Grionc responded, bringing up the system map on screen with her paws. “Four minutes to blink limit. Have the ship’s crew secure themselves for the blink and get ready for shift change to execute post-blink procedures when we arrive.”
“Yes, High Fleet Commander,” Vastae acknowledged with a brisk nod.
Suddenly, three quarters of the sensor readings on her sensor board disappeared, and the fidelity on the remaining took a nose-dive in accuracy. A low murmur ran through the sensor stations, which she waved away with a paw. “No need to panic. It looks like our friends jumped before we did, as arranged. Our sensors are on their own for now.”
Vastae swallowed hard. “Are you certain about this plan, High Fleet Commander?” Vastae asked nervously. “Not that I don’t trust what Sphinx— Speinfoent cooked up, but this is a last-minute plan modification we haven’t rehearsed. And with our fuel situation, we only get one chance here.”
Grionc put a calm smile on her face. “Remember that exercise we did with the Grass Eaters a while back?”
“Which one?”

4 months ago

“Since it’s New Years, it’s time to have some fun,” Mark announced with a grin to Grionc and the rest of the curious bridge crew. “I’m going to show you guys a fun teambuilding exercise we did on Terra.”
“Teambuilding exercise?” Grionc asked suspiciously.
Mark didn’t let her skepticism color his enthusiasm. “Well, I’m not sure how much teambuilding it does, but it is fun. And I have never seen aliens do it. In fact, this might be the first time this has ever been done outside of Sol!”
“Fine, fine. What are we doing?” she relented.
“This exercise is what we call the trust fall.”
“The trust fall?” Grionc repeated. “It’s about building trust? Like trust in your crew?”
Mark nodded vigorously. “It’s supposed to. I’m not sure if it truly works, but it truly is fun. You and I can demonstrate for the crew.”
Grionc sighed. “Sure. What do I do?”
“Come stand over here,” Mark pointed to a spot on the floor, and then stood in front of her with his back to her. “What I’m going to do is I’m going cross my arms… like this… and on the count of three, I’m going to fall backwards, and you have to catch me when I do.”
“Huh. That seems dangerous. What happens to you if I don’t catch you?” Grionc asked, mild concern creeping into her voice.
“Traumatic brain injury, probably. Something similar for your species too, I assume,” Mark shrugged nonchalantly. “But don’t worry about that. We have good medical facilities on the Nile, and you will catch me. That is the point of the exercise. Alright, you ready?”
Sensing his insistence, Grionc sighed and held her paws out, bracing herself. “Ready.”
“One, two, three…” Mark did as he described, crossing his arms, and falling backwards into Grionc’s outstretched arms. She grunted with slight effort as she intercepted his fall and then gently lowered him onto the ground, “Oomph. Huh. You Terrans are lighter than you look.”
“Yeah, my bones are nano-grafted,” Mark grinned, bounced up to full height, and circled around her back. “Okay, now it’s your turn.”
Grionc crossed her arms and held her breath for a moment. “One, two…”
She didn’t move. A few seconds later, she let go of her held breath. “I can’t.”
“What? Why not?”
Grionc muttered excuses. “No, it’s just— my tail— our balance mechanisms are different, I can’t just fall backwards on purpose—”
Mark insisted. “It’s not that difficult. Just let go. Don’t worry. I’m right here. I promise I’ll catch you.”
She held her breath once again, psyching herself up for a few more moments.
“One, two… doh, I can’t.”
Mark lightly patted her on the shoulder. “That’s okay… don’t worry… Hey, Speinfoent, come over here and give her a light shove. Alright, on the count of three. One, two—”
“Oh, no. Don’t you dare! No! Don’t touch— Yowwwwwww!”
Grionc continued, “And now… we fall. And we trust that our new friends will be there to catch us.”

ZNS 2228

“They’ve blinked,” the computer officer reported.
“Did we catch their blink vector?” Skvanu asked urgently.
“Calculating… got it! We triangulated their blink vector and probable destination! Entering it into our fleet navigation computers,” she responded, paws flying over the controls.
“How long before we can execute the blink?” Skvanu pressed.
“Two minutes before we hit the limit ourselves,” she replied, not looking up.
“Good, get the crews ready and start the countdown. I want to blink the millisecond we are clear of the system limit. And get all systems ready for what’s on the other side. They almost definitely have an ambush waiting for us. I’m guessing that’s where the remaining nine or so squadrons of Sixth Fleet are waiting for us,” Skvanu said confidently. “Twelve Lesser Predator squadrons to twenty-six of ours. Doesn’t matter how many upgrades they have, we will defeat them, especially since the first three will be within railgun range. Get those gunnery crews and point defense computers ready.”
“Blinking in seventy seconds,” she announced. “Sixty-five seconds—” Suddenly, she stood up, “Eight Whiskers, our FTL communications are open again! Both Datsot and Gruccud have just responded to our last message!”
Skvanu spun around to face her. “That makes sense. Whatever device they used to stop our communications must have been on one of the ships that just blinked out. Is there any priority intelligence from either?”
“Yes! Datsot has an emergency transmission for us. It’s from Ten Whiskers Ditvish!”
“What is it?” Skvanu asked, his voice serious.
She began to read. “Lesser Predators have entered Datsot system in force. Nine squadrons spotted so far. They may attempt to engage our garrison force there… His guidance is that we return immediately to trap these aggressor ships, but leaves the decision up to you…”
Skvanu absorbed the information with shock. If those ships are really in Datsot, they must not be on the other side of wherever the Oengro is blinking. And with that context, this now smelled exactly like a planned trap.
He thought out loud. “This must be what the Lesser Predators planned from the start. If we chase, we have no idea what they have on the other side. There may be refueling ships. They may have already gotten away. By the Prophecy, they may even be sacrificing three squadrons to get us to blink through a singularity or anomaly. But wait… If we return to Datsot immediately, we might catch those squadrons split from the rest of their ships and cripple their fleet!”
Having made up his mind, he shouted urgently at the navigation station, “Navigation, hold the blink!”
“Halting the blink procedures.”
“A handful of ships have already completed the blink!” the computer officer reported, almost in a panic.
“Cease blink procedures! Fleet-wide, cease the blink!”
The order went out immediately, and it was a testament to the discipline of the Znosian Navy that most squadrons managed to stop the countdown just seconds before it went through.
“How many ships went through?” Skvanu asked urgently.
“We managed to stop most of our ships, Eight Whiskers. Only five combat ships from Squadron 6 went through.”
He sighed in relief. “Only the Prophecy can help them now… Turn us around. Let’s get back to Datsot.”

TRNS Nile

“I think we are in sufficiently deep space,” Captain Gregor Guerrero said to his crew. “Drop us out.”
“Yes, captain. Emergency drop-out in five… four… three… two… one… now.”
The ship shuddered and creaked as the emergency-stop was activated. The blink engine wound down, forcing the ship back into normal space.
Gregor turned to his navigation officer. “How far from Plaunsollib did we travel, in regular space?”
“Two months on their Alcubierre drives if they combat burn with all their fuel. Four if they plan on stopping,” she replied immediately. “They’d be going too fast to aerobrake anyway.”
“Good,” Guerrero said, gluing his eyes to his sensor board. Ships in FTL are difficult to detect, even on gravidar, but the state-of-the-art technology on the Nile gave them a few seconds of warning.
A few seconds later, the sensor officer’s voice cut through the tense silence. “I’ve spotted the Puppers in blink! All of them, tight formation. They’ll pass us in about fifteen seconds.”
Guerrero nodded his pleasure. “Good, let them pass. Tell me when they’re out of range.”
The seconds ticked by. “Ten… five… they’ve passed our position… and now they’re out of range.”
“Now, switch on the blink disruption field,” he ordered.
The hum of the ship’s ambient noise went up an octave, signaling maximum power drain as the ship’s thirstiest system kicked in.
Gregor looked at his information panel. “Full emissions control. EMCOM Alpha. Deploy the FTL jammer drone and then shut off our engines. If things go well, we’re about to be joined by half the fucking Bunny Navy in a minute.”
“Aye, Captain. EMCOM Alpha.” The rest of the crew nodded, working their controls with practiced competence.
“Jammer drone out. You think they’ve got wild weasels, captain?”
“Unlikely, but we take no chances. If they don’t…” He shrugged. “… we’ll just get our drone back later.”
A tense minute passed, then the sensor officer reported, “Captain, Znosian ships spotted on gravidar! Two… three… five in total… They’ve just been forced out of blink.”
“Five squadrons?”
“No, Captain, five ships.”
Gregor furrowed his brow, surprised, and took another glance at his console. “Only five ships?”
“Yes, sir.”
“Alright, keep the disruption field up, and analyze the drive signatures on them. Maybe one of them is this Skvanu guy we’re supposed to hit,” he speculated hopefully.
After half an hour, Guerrero finally called it quits. “No more guests are showing up. Looks like they must have wizened up at the last moment.”
“Aye, sir,” the executive officer said, shaking her head in disappointment as well. “It was a good plan. Could have stranded their whole fleet out here.”
“Well, bad luck— these things happen in war, Lieutenant. Don’t worry. We’ll get them next time. How are the guests we did get doing?”
“Out of blink fuel, as expected. They’ve been dumping cargo in an organized fashion. I think they’re planning to see if they can reach Plaunsollib with their subspace drives in a reasonable amount of time and call triple A.” Then, she asked, “Where do you think the rest run off to?”
“Probably Datsot,” Guerrero guessed. “Phone Sphinx and tell him he’s probably got the whole shit storm heading his way, ETA about a couple days. Get the estimates to him.”
“Yes, sir.”
“Now, we just need to silence the witnesses so we can use this trick again. Bridge to CIC: let’s keep it simple. One Kestrel for each of the targets. We’ll swiss-cheese them with railguns after. Just in case.”
“Aye, Captain. We’re not dropping off those TRO drones here, are we?”
“Nah. Too much work. No one is finding these guys ever again anyway.”

MNS Trassau

“I just got off a call with the Nile,” Loenda announced. “Looks like the Grass Eaters have discovered our ruse in the other system. The main enemy fleet is heading our way right this second.”
Speinfoent sighed, and suggested, “If we burn closer for just half a day more—”
“No more,” Loenda declared. “We are already risking nine squadrons coming this far into the Datsot system limit.”
“Alright,” Speinfoent agreed reluctantly. “We can still give them a present they won’t forget any time soon.”
“That, we will. That we will.” Loenda turned to her console. “All ships in Battlegroup 2, dump your payloads as quietly as you can. Then wait half an hour to change your vector and make your way to the system blink limit.”
“Yes, Battlegroup Commander.”

ZNS 1841

“Ten Whiskers, the Lesser Predators are turning around,” the computer officer declared, doing her best to hide her relief.
“What? Where are they heading now?” Ditvish asked, confounded.
“Towards the shortest path to the system blink limit, I think.”
“That’s it? They’re just leaving now?”
“Combat computer speculates that they might have seen that Eight Whiskers Skvanu is heading back to Datsot, so they are breaking off the attack,” the officer offered.
“That’s… not very Lesser Predator of them, but very logical,” he admitted. “They must have realized their plan failed and are now cutting their losses.”
He didn’t mention that his fleet was the one that came out behind, losing yet another precious supply convoy and then sending the whole combat fleet on a wild predator chase for nothing. That State Security goon might start to become a problem if he didn’t spin this well in his after-action report.
A few hours later, a foreboding feeling coloring his mood, he ordered, “Sensors, boost our radars towards where they changed vectors. I want to check to see if they dropped any drones or traps.”
“Yes, Ten Whiskers.”
The 1841 boosted its radar towards the direction, blaring out signals on maximum strength and—
“Incoming… missiles? Ten Whiskers, many missiles! Dozens! Over a hundred! They’re well within our minimum abort range!”
“By the Prophecy!” Ditvish exclaimed. “All ships, execute combat burn away from them! Countermeasures and fire counter-missiles, at the ready! Track those missiles!”
Fortunately, the garrison fleet was still in high readiness from before. Their engines were ready to light up to full acceleration immediately.
Unfortunately, the missiles were already close. In desperation, his ships began dumping their entire loads of radar chaffs and flares into space behind them as they maneuvered away from the threat. Counter-missiles sped out of their tubes towards their rear, relying on their motherships’ sensors and radars to find the tiny alien missiles for them to engage.
Quietly gliding through space towards the enemy on inertia inherited from their motherships was the sizable swarm of Terran-made missiles. Obsolete for military purpose in Sol but still produced for the civilian and gray market, they were an easy addition on the TRO’s shopping list. Vast quantities of them had found their way into various shell corporations and dead drops all over Sol, then onto hastily constructed exterior pylons on Sixth Fleet ships.
While they were indeed several times outside of the maximum effective range of the Znosian ships at launch, missiles technically did have unlimited ballistic ranges in space — if their enemies were not moving and they did not need to constantly fire their thrusters to adjust course. Relying on a short first burn and then inertia, they flew most of the way towards the stationary enemy fleet completely undetected. By the time they were spotted, it was too late; the Znosians were well within their effective ranges.
Their intelligence chips might not have been super-Terran state-of-the-art computers, but the Pigeons had no problem realizing that they were discovered. They had been tracking the enemy targets using passive infrared sensors that did not alert enemy threat sensors to their presence. But the second that the targets started dropping flares to blind them, they activated their primitive late twenty-first century radars and homed in onto the priority targets they’d been given. Their main thrusters began their burns, adjusting their vectors to intercept the now-finally-moving enemy ships.
Then, they saw the incoming counter-missiles — fired by the enemies sporadically, obviously in panic.
The makers of the Pigeons might not have bothered to include next-generation electronic dazzlers on them, but penetration aid on missiles had been standard in Terran warfare for a century. They littered the space they were in with chaff and their own bright flares, coordinating with the other missiles in the area with short range laser communication to ensure that none in the swarm would confuse or disrupt each other.
The Znosian counter-missiles were certainly confused and disrupted though. Many veered off into phantom signals. Some lucky ones did manage to find their targets. When a few of their comrades dropped off their impromptu mesh net, the Pigeons constantly corresponded with laser communications to re-prioritize their targeting.
At the top of the list was the fattest, easiest target of them all: the enemy flagship 1841.
Seconds before impact, the missiles finalized their targets, and they spent every drop and fume of their remaining fuel on terminal maneuvers.
The Znosians’ close in weapons systems had milliseconds to engage the incoming threats. They performed admirably… for trying to deal with this unknown alien threat for the first time. A couple dozen more missiles were plucked out of space, but it was not enough.
Not nearly.
The rest slipped through the net.
Miraculously, the 1841 managed to survive initially. Despite it being the primary focus of the Pigeon mob, the other ships did their best to shield its most vital components in its rear with their own point defense. And the Pigeons — like most missiles of its era — were loaded with just enough firepower to destroy much smaller Terran ships. The larger hulls of the Znosian ships gave their obsolete mid-century intelligence chips a slightly more interesting exercise in module identification and targeting.
The massive Thorn-class battleship took fourteen hits to varying systems that the missiles visually identified as “that looks pretty important” on their final approach: its primary missile and gun tubes were trashed, venting atmosphere to space in those compartments. A proximity hit near the stern took out four of its eight massive main thrusters and several system modules at the rear of the ship. And perhaps worst of all, one Pigeon managed to zero in on its vulnerable front bridge, the explosion emptying its contents and occupants into vacuum.
Luckily for Ten Whiskers Ditvish, none of them hit the armored flag bridge where he was in the belly of the ship, vindicating the Znosian Navy’s practice of separating the two for redundancy.
Nonetheless, Ditvish fell to the ground as the simultaneous impacts temporarily overloaded the inertial compensators and shook the ship to its core. Sparks flew around him, and he smelled a pungent stink as the automated fire suppression systems kicked in to save as much as they possibly could.
He slowly climbed to his feet and looked at the scene around him. A sensor officer was spraying foam at a small fire with a handheld device, successfully extinguishing it in seconds. Several other of his crew were recovering and returning to their stations with remarkable calm. After all, they were elite, well-trained spacers and officers of the Znosian Navy.
Ditvish did the same, propping himself back into his command chair with slight effort. He operated his console in a concussed daze. One glance at the status board told him that the 1841 was a write-off. It wasn’t going to be combat effective ever again. At least its life pod systems were working, and he watched in relief as dozens then hundreds of crew members in the damaged sections of the ship climbed into theirs and ejected into the relative safety of vacuum.
He checked up on the other ships: several others were hit. Six had outright detonated: no survivors nor signals came from them. Two were irreparably damaged, their remaining crews also abandoning their ships in an orderly fashion. And another six had visible fires or scorch marks on their damaged hulls, but those crews were still valiantly fighting to keep their ships alive.
Ditvish noticed that the missile didn’t go for all his ships, just the ones on the outer edge on his sensor board— wait, the missiles—
To his horror, several more dozen missiles they’d detected were still active, and they were going for—
He looked at his computer officer’s station and yelled, “We have to warn them!”
She yelled something back at him, but he realized that he couldn’t hear her. Hitting the floor must have injured his hearing organs. He yelled again, hoping that she could still hear. “Warn the orbital support fleet! The logistics and fire support ships! Evasive maneuvers and take cover in the atmosphere!”
Her lips moved again. He got out of his chair and stumbled over to her in a daze, trying to hear what she was saying.
She was saying something.
It must be important.
“… not reach them. Our communication array… destroyed! Ten Whiskers, we need to get… We don’t have much time!”
Ditvish finally understood her from reading her lips. He didn’t respond. Just numbly watched the planetary battlemap of Datsot on the main screen.
It didn’t take long. They were completely defenseless.
The remaining missiles plucked every last orbital fire support and logistics transport ship out of the skies of Datsot. Most detonated; a few left behind trails of black smoke as they sank uncontrollably towards the planet’s surface.
Then, Ditvish’s hind legs gave out and he crumpled onto the bridge floor.
He was dimly aware of one of his subordinates dragging him towards the bridge escape pod as he blacked out.

MNS Trassau

“Don’t worry, Speinfoent,” Loenda said, putting her paws around the junior commander looking glumly at the image of Datsot retreating from their view as the rest of the bridge cheered the better-than-anticipated success of the raid. “We’ll come back, and next time, we’re coming back for everything.”
“That we will, Loenda. That we will.”

Meta

There is no research that shows the effectiveness of trust falls for building trust in a team and plenty of research showing that falling backwards from a full standing position without adequate bracing or padding can lead to serious brain, spinal, and back injuries.
Coercion or retaliation against Malgeir employees who refuse to participate in trust fall exercises may be considered investigable or actionable violations of workplace safety regulations by the Republic Office of Occupational Safety or anti-discrimination regulations by the Office of Equal Opportunity.
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Chapter 53: Apostasy