About 2 days ago (at the time of writing) there was a post on rant titled 'Why did you haven ruin it Rowling? And why won't you please just stop?' talking about how JKR's transphobic views ruined HP for younger generations, and unsurprisingly, there was a shit ton of transphobia in the comments, ranging from ignorant nostalgia blind millennials to literal bigots. These were the top comments, btw. Any reply agreeing with OP's statement or calling out other people in the thread for their bigotry was downvoted to hell. Mine included.
What makes this even worse is that the mods didn't do shit for 2 days! And even then, only the non-bigoted comments were removed! I was banned just because I condemned the mods for sitting on their asses and twiddling their thumbs.
It's crazy that they even let any of the TERF shit fly, cause they have multiple rules stating that
"***This is an anti-free speech Anti-Alt-right/Nazi/Right Conservatives, a Pro-LGBT community that supports Black Lives Matter. If you don't like it, post somewhere else.*** What does this mean, you ask. It means: Nazis, Bigots, Racists, Trolls will be banned & punted to the Admins. **We reserve the right to moderate at our discretion.**"
"Personal attacks, slurs, bigotry, etc. are not permitted"
"All other site-wide rules are strictly enforced"
"We stand against disinformation/misinformation"
So not only are the moderators of rant hypocrites, they're also fucking LIARS.
Meanwhile, I have been banned for being an ally and calling them out on their stank shit.
rant is NOT a pro-LGBT community, it's a community littered with subhuman trash that disguises itself as a safe space for the oppressed because it's the "politically correct" thing to do.
TBH the sub was always shit anyway. You can't even rant without your post being removed.
(Y'know. The LITERAL point of the sub???)

Looking to sign your first client?
Here's a 3-step framework that works every time.
If you do these 3 things

• Craft your offer and define your ICP
• Build a prospect list and write scripts
• Warm up domains and send emails

You WILL sign a client.

STEP 1: Craft your offer & define your ICP

If you have a skill you want to monetise, The FIRST thing you need to do is ask yourself:

• What unique value do I provide?
• What pain points do I help solve?
• What outcomes can I help achieve?

This is how you come up with your offer.
After you go through this exercise, turn all of your thoughts into a real offer with a Refined Marketing Statement..
"I help X achieve Y through Z"
"I help email marketing agencies book 8-12 qualified sales calls each month on autopilot with omnichannel cold outreach"
Now that your offer is clear, figure out who you want to work with by defining your Ideal Client Profile (ICP).
Figure this out about your ideal clients

• What industry they're in
• How many employees they have
• How much revenue they're doing
• If they've been funded recently

For example...
eCom brands in the fitness niche making $100-$500k a year with 20-50 employees.
By getting this specific with your ICP you'll be able to get super targeted with your cold email scripts.
Your ICP will evolve over time, but be sure to start with a specific one.

STEP 2: Build a leads list and write scripts

Using the ICP you just came up with, use listkit to get a list of leads in your target market.
Each ListKit comes with manually verified emails and personalised lines so you don't need to spend any time getting your list ready.
While you wait for your ListKit to be delivered, use your Refined Marketing Statement to write scripts.
I constantly preach the One Sentence Cold Email...
"Hi {name} - {line}
Do you/are you (insert pain point, desire, tech they use)"
Examples:

• "Do you use Klaviyo for email marketing?"
• "Are you looking for commission-only sales reps?"
• "Are you able to take on new clients in 2022?"
• "Are you looking to improve your Shopify site speed score?"

Make sure this question can be answered with a "Yes" or "No".
As an A/B test, put your One Sentence Cold Email up against a traditional framework like:
"We recently helped client X book 20 sales calls in one month on autopilot from cold outreach.
Would you be open to a quick call to discuss how you can accomplish something similar?"
A typical cold email sequence is typically 3-5 emails, so for your follow ups use things like

• Bold claims or guarantees
• Bump messages
• Case studies
• GIFs / emojis

Space these follow ups 3-5 days apart for the first 2-3, then 7+ days apart for any additional follow ups.

STEP 3: Launching campaigns

Now that you have ALL of the groundwork laid out with your offer, ICP, leads list and scripts, it's time to start sending emails.
Always start with a high sending volume off the bat.
So purchase 5 domains you can send emails from and use http://inboxy.io to warm them up.
Also be sure you ramp up your sending volume to keep your domain in good health.
At my agency, we start with 10 emails a day for the first week and increase output by 10 each week.
The last step of this entire process is to get set up on a sending platform to automate your outreach.
For just cold email outreach, we always recommend mailshake because of how easy it is to navigate and manage.
Their lowest plan will work fine for this.
Plug in your domain and ListKit, set up your 3-5 step email sequence with scripts, and start sending emails.
By doing this entire process, you'll be in a position where one single reply can be all it takes to sign your first client and jumpstart your agency's growth.
I have my students follow this exact process and start sending from 5 domains within the first week of joining the program.
This process will put you on a great track to signing your very first client.
Source

New rules aim to boost renewables and meet surging electricity demand
Patterson, Scott. Wall Street Journal (Online); New York, N.Y.. 13 May 2024.
https://www.wsj.com/politics/policy/washington-tries-to-break-power-grid-logjams-cb2eb006
WASHINGTON—A little-known but powerful regulator has finalized sweeping new rules designed to expand the construction of big power lines and bring more renewable energy to U.S. homes and businesses.
The rules approved by the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission, which oversees wholesale electricity markets, are expected to make it easier for big regional transmission projects to get approval.
FERC approved two rules Monday, one that will require companies that produce and transmit electricity to weigh factors such as supply and demand over at least two decades and another that addresses permitting of critical projects in areas that lack adequate transmission capacity.
The rule requiring long-term planning is "the biggest single action by the federal government to advance transmission," said Rob Gramlich, president of Grid Strategies, a power consulting firm.
The long-term plans will need to account for the impact of extreme weather tied to climate change along with the cost of projects. By expanding transmission capacity, regions hit by weather disasters will be more resilient because they can access power from other parts of the country.
Most utilities already plan for future demand and other contingencies, but few do so decades in the future. What has resulted is a largely ad-hoc national grid that has at times left utilities behind the curve amid shifting power generation technologies, demand and destructive weather events fueled by climate change.
In Georgia, the state's main utility, Georgia Power, has increased demand projections sixteen-fold and plans to burn more natural gas to meet that demand. Virginia's largest utility, Dominion Energy, which supplies electricity to most of the state's data centers, expects their power use to quadruple over the next 15 years , representing 40% of the utility's demand in the state.
"Our country is facing an unprecedented surge in demand for affordable electricity while confronting extreme weather threats to the reliability of our grid and trying to stay one step ahead of the massive technological changes we are seeing in our society," FERC Chairman Willie Phillips said Monday.
Republican Commissioner Mark Christie voted against the long-term planning rule, which he said is unfair to consumers and oversteps FERC's authority.
Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer (D., N.Y.) said on a media call Monday that FERC's planning rule helps make up for Congress's failure in the past few years to pass legislation to expand power transmission. He said he doesn't expect Congress to pass transmission legislation this year.
Across the U.S., plans for myriad new power projects, largely wind and solar, are languishing due to delays in their ability to connect to the grid. The backlog of new power projects, mostly solar, wind and battery storage, seeking to connect to the grid jumped by 30% in 2023 from the previous year, according to a recent report by the Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory. New projects "are mired in lengthy and uncertain interconnection study processes," the report said.
The rule is designed to push projects that benefit ratepayers, resulting in more transmission capacity that can deliver cheaper electricity. It also addresses how costs are spread out among ratepayers in projects that include multiple states.
"Cost allocation is a huge issue, and it's a contentious one," said Larry Gasteiger, executive director of Wires, a trade association.
Critics of the rule say it could clash with oversight of utilities by local regulators and potentially lead to increases in consumer bills. Several Republican attorneys general have threatened to sue the government over the rule, claiming FERC is overstepping its authority in a bid to bring more clean energy onto the grid.
Utilities aren't always proponents of long-distance power lines, which can bring in power cheaper than their own generation. The cost of wind and solar energy has plunged in recent years, making it more competitive with natural gas.
"One of the main reasons utilities don't want to build a major transmission [project] is because it can harm their power-plant business," said Ari Peskoe, director of Harvard Law School's Electricity Law Initiative.
The planning rule also provides new guidelines for the role of states in big transmission projects and seeks to enlist their input in the early stages of project planning.
The new rules come as demand for power is rising, driven by new manufacturing, electric vehicles and giant data centers catering to artificial intelligence. That has caused utilities to scramble to adapt, some backtracking on plans to retire fossil-fuel power plants or add new natural-gas generation.
The planning requirements will also spur utilities to adopt more so-called grid-enhancement technologies , such as sensors and power flow control devices, which can improve the transmission of electricity across existing lines. Such technologies are often cheaper than building new power lines.
The Biden administration is pulling other levers to spur transmission construction. Last month, the Energy Department moved to become the lead federal agency coordinating environmental approval of major transmission projects across the U.S. in a bid to fast-track grid-infrastructure construction . The new process seeks to reduce the red tape grid planners faced as they sought separate approvals from a patchwork of federal agencies such as the Environmental Protection Agency, Interior Department and the Agriculture Department.
Write to Scott Patterson at [scott.patterson@wsj.com](mailto:scott.patterson@wsj.com)
Credit: By Scott Patterson

I woke up today and after I updated my VidIQ app I observed that the user interface changed drastically , I have to manualy write tags in my description, I can't find tags longer than 2 words when I search for them, and the SEO score feature isn't free anymore...
I would've paid for one of their plans, but I have 2 Youtube channels and I don't know how to add them under the same VidIQ account.
Plus, I live in a country where the VidIQ plan is simply more expensive than the monthly phone & electricity bill😂 I would've loved if they offered some cheaper plans too. Also, I don't find the new user interface intuitive.. for me that's a nightmare! :(
I reinstalled TubeBuddy on my phone only to be dissapointed again. Or.. I don't know, maybe TubeBuddy has a better interface and more tools on Desktop, isn't it? If so, I will begin to use it on my laptop.
What do you think about the new changes to VidIQ? Also, does any of you, use the pro plans? Is it worth it right now?
What do you think about TubeBuddy? Are there other alternatives to VidIQ & TubeBuddy?
I feel so frustrated right now... just when I started to see some growth on a new channel I created the last week (I gained over 2,1k views and 8 subs on the new one) and on my other 3 y old old channel... just when I thought all is better, now I am f*cked.
I regret that I didn't posted my videos in batch. Honestly, I had a lot of potential to grow more on Youtube in the past, but I've slept on it. I wasn't consistent.
If any of you know some alternatives that are better, or some suggestions in regards to the TubeBuddy tools, I would appreciate that. So far I found Morning Fame, Vudini and Craide. I didn't tried them yet, but I will.

Intro

It’s not much of a stretch to say that violence is the primary form of interaction in video games. With a handful of exceptions, most video games involve guys whacking other guys, with varying degrees of brutality. Even chill games fall into this - Stardew Valley has sections with combat in them! Considering the pervasiveness of violence in video games, there has been a ton of amateur and academic commentary on the topic. However, while this is a well-established school of thought, I haven’t seen people try to apply this to Fire Emblem specifically.
So, let’s do that now! In this post, I’ll be exploring how violence in Fire Emblem is implemented - what limitations are placed on violence, how it warps wider game and narrative design, and what it implicitly says and does not say. I hope this post doesn’t come off as too early-2010s “makes you think”-y, but I do think there are multiple interesting things worth talking about here!
Despite the length of this post, "a brief discussion" is an appropriate title, as we won't be able to go into depth on everything. After all, video games are holistic works, so the attitude towards violence is relevant to every aspect of their design. However, I have managed to wrangle some of these threads into the following structure: first a discussion on the fundamental mode of interaction in Fire Emblem, then how stories are constructed with regards to violence, and ending with the aesthetics of violence and how they relate to characters. Also, as FE is a huge series, be aware that I am gonna be making some broad statements which may not apply to each individual plot point of every game. I actually planned to write 3 case studies around Thracia 776, Fates, and Three Houses (which have the most interesting attitudes to violence in the series IMO) which point out these deviations, but this post is way too long and full of tangents already. If people are interested, I’ll make a followup to this post which goes into them in more detail. Also also, because of the nature of this post, I’ll actually give a useful TL;DR for once:
TL;DR: Nintendo games must be fun mechanically, and they can’t be too uncomfortable narratively. If you try to provide a counterpoint by saying “oh this Kirby final boss is super dark it eats 100 morbillion galaxies”, you do not deserve rights. IntSys has to keep to this as a 2nd party publisher, but they also have to deal with the fact that their games are at least nominally about ‘war’ (or at least they put their toes into that particular thematic pool). This conflict between making a fun video game for children/teens and the wider framing of the narrative leads to interesting narrative and aesthetic tensions. also fun is cringe, misery is based

“Do you like hurting other people?” (or The Fundamental Mode of Interaction)

OK LISTEN I KNOW I LITERALLY JUST SAID THAT I DIDN’T WANT TO COME ACROSS AS A EARLY 2010s “VIOLENCE IN VIDYA BAD :O????” PERSON BUT I SWEAR I’M GOING SOMEWHERE WITH THIS
The best place to start when talking about violence in video games is to think about the primary form of interaction in said game. In the case of Fire Emblem, this is in the in-chapter gameplay. Sure, in objective terms the player moves arbitrary objects across a 2D grid which perform subtraction on arbitrary objects controlled by the computer, but this is always framed as controlling a squad of soldiers to engage in (typically lethal) combat with enemies (who are normally also soldiers). When you’re not doing this in-chapter gameplay, you are preparing for the next chapter of combat. This involves surveying the area of combat, preparing weapon loadouts, etc, however more recent entries also include light life-sim-esque elements. To summarize, Fire Emblem’s interactivity involves ordering violence as well as the preparations to order said violence.
For players, this strategic thinking is extremely fun and is the primary draw of the series! You have all these tier lists of who’s better at killing, discussion of the maps where you do the killing, complaints about the length of gameplay sections where you don’t do killing, etc. This is by design, as while I don’t know the core brand tenets of Nintendo, I imagine the Reggie quote “If it isn’t fun, why bother?” is carved into a solid gold statue of Mario in the office lobby. This then is enforced on all associated studios, including IntSys and so Fire Emblem. While I would disagree with that Reggie quote (especially the bit where he says “If it’s not a battle, where’s the fun?” which is a wild statement to make about an entire medium), this approach to making games is ultimately fine, and so IntSys tailored the strategic gameplay to be satisfying to your dopamine receptors. You could analyse what the normalisation of violence even in ‘just for fun’ games says about wider gaming culture, but I won’t get into that here. In any case, let’s dig into a few specifics of FE’s interactivity.
One thing that’s interesting with regard to strategy games is the detached perspective of the player. You order units and observe the resulting violence, but it’s not tactile, you don’t directly swing the sword or shoot the bow or cast the spell like with action games. This adds a layer of separation between the player and what fundamentally happens, at least within the framing that the game provides. It’s not like Call of Duty, where your relationship to the violence is very visceral, where you view everything down the barrel of a gun. OK, I probably shouldn’t use a series that I have very little personal experience with (I only listen to the supplementary lore material, so let’s talk about Sekiro: Shadows Die Twice. While you’re not directly in the driver’s seat, John Sekiro reacts to your every input with extreme responsiveness, so overcoming the game’s challenges i.e. stabbing people is incredibly visceral and satisfying. While this violence is fantastical in nature, there is sufficient blood and explicit sword-action to clearly say “oh yeah you are violently killing all of those bozos with a katana”. Coming back to FE, not only are you far more detached from the violence, it is presented in an extremely cartoony manner… but let’s not get ahead of ourselves here, we’ll get to the aesthetics later. Point is, Fire Emblem gives the viewpoint of a stoic commander, who Does What Needs To Be Done™, and not the viewpoint of an actual soldier who has to do the actual killing.
Now let’s view the player’s perspective on violence from a different angle. Fire Emblem intends for its combat to be relatively relaxed on the player side of things - the turn-based nature allows the player to calmly think through all of their moves, and you typically have perfect information on the enemies. The only exceptions to this are Fog of WaSame Turn Reinforcements, which are rare and typically unpopular amongst the fanbase. This leans into ‘combat as sport’, where (going back to the Reggie quote) you have a fun time picking apart a puzzle with the tools you have, and we all collectively enjoy this! This is a valid way of designing strategy games, and I like what IntSys has done. However, it’s not the only way of making these games - for example, in Total War you have to juggle all your battalions in real time whilst the enemy is bearing down on you, and the XCOM games always have Fog of War and limited information on the enemies, with you never knowing what kind of awful new monster is going to suddenly charge at you. Don’t get me wrong, neither of these follow ‘combat as war’, the principle that violence should properly mimic the stress, tension and unfairness of actual conflict. Hell, neither of them are particularly mature either - Total War is the strategy game equivalent of smashing action figures together, and XCOM emulates a pulp sci-fi alien invasion story. However, the additional pressures these games have make them hew slightly closer to actual conflict, putting you more in that mindset in a way that the clean fun Fire Emblem doesn’t really do. Again, I want to say FE’s approach to violence in in-map gameplay is fine, but when all three of these franchises have an explicit narrative framing of ‘warfare’, it does make Fire Emblem’s narrative a little more… stretched.
Finally, I want to briefly mention the maps. To steal from a brilliant Jacob Geller video, these are Worlds Designed For Violence. At least outside of the Kaga games, the maps you fight on are primarily designed around how the player interacts with them, i.e. fights on them. While I imagine the narrative designers and artists at IntSys are involved throughout the map design process, the gameplay flow probably takes precedence most of the time. Maps are not designed to resemble realistic places that you have to fight through, they are instead designed primarily to provide fun gameplay experiences before being dressed up by the artists to look realistic/fit the specific story beat. This is a more consistently entertaining approach to map design - heaven knows we have a lot of Kaga castle assault maps which are as fun as actually assaulting an entrenched position IRL - but this lack of friction could potentially take the bite out of the intended vibe, neuter any commentary on violence throughout the story.
You may have noticed that we’ve only talked about the “in-map” gameplay for now, when there’s an entire second half of these games, i.e. all the gameplay between the maps. Don’t worry, we’ll get to all of that, but this may fit better in:

Something something “ludonarrative” something something (or Narrative Implications)

(To clarify, here I’m going to talk about the wider plots and narrative structure as opposed to characterisation, as that fits more into the aesthetics of the series)
It’s not bold to say that the narratives of games have to warp around the core gameplay structure. Especially in AAA video game production, the narrative designers usually have to take a back seat to the systems and level designers, at least outside of the initial rough outline they provide in the original game pitch. In this case, the job of the writer is to form vaguely coherent connective tissue between individual levels, setpieces and expensive pre-rendered cutscenes. This must be a very difficult job, and is probably the reason why most video game stories are the way they are. I am not privy to IntSys internal meetings, but I imagine they abide by this paradigm, trying to give a reason for why you fight 20 battles which roughly align with plot beats that were decided years ago.
Put another way, the writers of Fire Emblem must contrive a reason why the characters fight a vast number of violent battles in a strategic manner. This has a pretty easy solution - war! We have found something it’s good for, as whenever the gameplay designers decide that an extra map is required, the writers can just insert “oh no there’s a blockade of enemy soldiers in the way, guess you gotta kill them all”. This is the case for almost all the games and is a fair enough narrative choice, as it’s frankly one of the few scenarios where you could reasonably contrive so many battles, but it’s worth examining this in a bit more detail.
Even in the framing of warfare, there are still a lot of skirmishes, which sometimes the narrative or tone fails to support - or at least, their presence means that violence isn’t taken that seriously. Let’s take an example from early in Awakening: Emmeryn sends the Shepherds to negotiate an alliance with Regna Ferox. On the way, they are ambushed by Risen on the Northroad (1), have to fight the border guards who think Chrom is a bandit I think??? (2), and then after arriving they need to take part in Regna Ferox’s ritual combat to secure their alliance (3). These beats aren’t necessarily bad, and I actually think Awakening uses these opportunities quite well: the Risen are established as a constant threat to the world (except not really in the main story but that’s a whole other thing), “Marth'' gets more development, we set up Regna Ferox as fighty people who like to fight, and while the middle encounter is very tenuous it does set up a funny joke in Cynthia’s paralogue. However, I want to communicate that if the map/encounter designers need X maps between plot points A and B - in this case, needing low-stakes trials in the tutorial period - then there’s gonna be a fair bit of narrative filler. That is to say, there must be multiple combat encounters that kinda just happen, which makes violence a lot more casual in the narrative. See also the myriad examples of “oh shit random bandits attack!”, used to have a lower stakes map, with bandits appearing and vanishing as needed. This works fine enough in the context of ‘combat as sport’, allowing your favourite scrunglo to build up a triple-digit body count, but this casual attitude circumvents potentially interesting ideas with regards violence. Taking the example further, banditry and its causes are never seriously explored, as bandits are just treated as a filler enemy (except in Based As Hell Thracia 776).
Another narrative consequence of needing so many fights is that… you need to fight. That is to say, any anti-war sentiment or appeal to diplomacy in the series is fundamentally undercut by a) strategic combat being a core appeal of the series and b) narrative beats needing to be structured around fighting enemies. It’s a struggle to have moments of diplomacy and reconciliation when you had a fight within 3 minutes of said moment, lest some people start screaming that things are getting boring. This also makes any appeals to pacifism kinda moot. Xander’s quote about “war bad” in Conquest is utter bullshit, as a huge part of the marketing around that route focuses on the coolness of the tactical combat and its challenge. Eirika and Ephraim can never be equal, because Ephraim’s “fighting is fucken awesome” is encouraged by the gameplay, and Eirika can NEVER save 11037 because we need a final boss and no-one else fits the bill.
Speaking of, in video games it’s best practice to have a big bad guy you fight at the end of the story, the toughest mechanical challenge coinciding with the narrative climax. In Fire Emblem, you have one grand final battle which decides the fate of the war and/or world, before cutting to a brief wrap-up and then credits. This is an attempt to make these games satisfying, which is fine, but this is at odds with an anti-war message (which FE often gestures towards) - that is, actual wars tend to be deeply unsatisfying in a narrative sense! Oftentimes, after a decisive battle, things just kinda keep going for a little while afterwards with casualties continuing to pile up until peace terms are agreed. In the few cases where there is a final battle, it’s more of a formality as the decisive moment occurred months ago. See World War 1 and… World War 2 for examples of each, not to mention a whole host of war-related books and films. The problem with doing this in a video game is that it would require having multiple one-sided fights past the most climatic fight, which would be unfun, and we return to that fucking Reggie quote again. While video games can effectively explore this anti-war narrative space - This War of Mine is a fantastic example - it just doesn’t gel with the fun games that IntSys wants to make. I bring this up in the context of FE because Fire Emblem has such an aesthetic focus on warfare compared to other video games, so it sticks out even further. Even in FE6/FE9 where the war is effectively over in the final few maps, the enemies still remain extremely challenging, because if they didn’t things would be boring.
A few minor things that didn’t fit in above before we wrap up this section. First of all, in making an action packed story, Fire Emblem neglects an important aspect of army life in warfare - the “hurrying up and waiting”. In the majority of cases, the breaks between fights is under 10 minutes, it’s just glossed over. Fire Emblem Three Houses is the exception to this, but there it’s more framed as school life. Some people may say “what’s the point in having large amounts of timewasting where nothing happens in my game about war” and to that I would say fuck you, I want to play Jarhead Emblem. Next, Fire Emblem involves fighting people AND monsters, but these targets are typically given equal narrative weight, outside of maybe a funny line of dialogue about someone being afraid of monsters. In 99% of cases, enemy soldiers you fight have no more humanity than literal monsters. The death of any of your beloved soldiers is a tragedy with big sad death quotes, the death of those poor fuckers is quite literally a statistic which is proudly used to rank how well your guys have done at the end of the game. Finally, the limited scope of the violence the series can show limits the potential impact of scenes. In some cases, this is good as the implication is enough, e.g. the ‘Monica’ scene in Sacred Stones is wonderfully grim and would be weakened by anything explicit. However, a number of other scenes are neutered by the limitations on violence. This fundamentally relates to the aesthetics of the series:

insert prozd tweet/skit here (or Aesthetics, Tone, and Characters)

I’ve been talking a lot about ‘the violence committed’, and this might have seemed a bit weird to you. It’s a true statement, but because the violence is mostly cartoony and abstracted - bad guys disappear into nothingness, there’s no blood, etc - it’s hard to think of it in that way. It’s basically impossible to place Fire Emblem in the same artistic sphere as, say, All Quiet on the Western Front. This aesthetic sense was partially tech-limited in the early NES and SNES games, which was grandfathered into the more graphically complex titles, but it’s also related to how the aesthetics unavoidably warp the tone of the work. IntSys needs their games to be relatively lighthearted and unconcerned with the consequences of its violence, as one of the core appeals of these games is the charming cast of characters. As you would expect, it would be a lot harder to appreciate your goofy blorbos and their lighthearted chats about nothing if you could see the brutal consequences of their triple digit body counts. If violence was more realistic, there would be a lot less “ooh I like training and/or this one hyperspecific food” or “I like peace, but I guess violence may be possibly needed sometimes” and there would have to be a lot more trauma and dourness. There are also age rating concerns, as you can’t exactly sell Come And See Emblem to pre-teens. And once more, to clarify: Fire Emblem as it exists now is fine! I like the lighthearted tone of this series, and I like the characters that reside within it. However, a few problems do arise from IntSys’s approach to violence, as occasionally they brush up against darker ideas but (due to similar reasons to the above) they can never commit to them, which neuters their potential impact. This is especially troublesome with regards to characterisation, as the little dudes are a core appeal, so if something is off that could cause problems. In a sense, at points we have severe aesthetic tension.
A fairly useful case study to see how this affects characterisation is with Mozu in Fire Emblem Fates. Mozu is a charming character, a genial country bumpkin with a bit of an edge at times, who has fond memories of her hometown. This lines up with the lighthearted tone of her recruitment paralogue, where (checks notes) her entire village gets massacred by inhuman monsters, with her mother literally being murdered right in front of her, and she joins up with Corrin’s party because there is literally nothing left of her old life. I understand that people who experience extreme trauma do still manage to live meaningful lives, and that IntSys wouldn’t want to have a character who is a barely functional traumatised mess for 90% of the campaign. However, this doesn’t explain the sheer dissonance between the relatively normal and well-adjusted Mozu who quietly remembers her lost loved ones, and the fact that her village got My Lai’d a handful of weeks ago in the game’s timeline. IMO this would work a lot better if there were a few survivors (instead of literally everyone else dying), with Mozu actively choosing to leave her old life to help others instead of being forced to leave by circumstance. This reduction in scope would mitigate the dissonance between the character and what actually happens to her. This is by far the most extreme example in the series, however I’m sure you can think of others. My issue here is not with having ‘normal’ characters, or with them suffering tragedies, my issue is the dissonance between the two when viewing the scope of said tragedies. This is just one way the series wants to get into darker territory, then swiftly backing off instead of delving into the consequences.
This aesthetic restriction also affects the potential impact of dramatic scenes in the main story, limiting what the focus of these scenes can actually be. This little bit will involve heavy spoilers for Genealogy of the Holy War and Spec Ops: The Line (I KNOW THESE GAMES ARE VERY DIFFERENT WITH VERY DIFFERENT INTENDED DEMOGRAPHICS IN VERY DIFFERENT CULTURAL CONTEXTS, SHUT UP). Both have a very important narrative moment around their midpoints, involving fire magic/white phosphorus respectively. In each game, the deaths that occur are utterly horrific when you think about them. In FE4 the focus is on the drama of the plot twist and effects on the characters, with the actual effects of the violence being left to implication. We don’t know if this was the original intent of Kaga and the team, or if this was enforced by various tech- and publisher-related restrictions, but in either case we do not see anything explicit. In any case, in Spec Ops: The Line, the horror and graphic nature of the violence is completely inescapable, and therefore forms the core of the turning point of the story. The specifics of the violence itself are crucial - the game does not work if you don’t see the consequences of the white phosphorus - and it leads beautifully to the complete descent of its endgame. You may be saying “of course you couldn’t show that violence in FE, it’s a kids game” which is true, and in any case the scene in Genealogy is very good, even without showing the violence. I imagine if we get a remake in the year 202X we wouldn’t see anything explicit anyway, partially due to the publisher but also because the scene doesn’t necessarily need it. The point I am trying to make is that the aesthetics form a limitation on what Fire Emblem can explore, narrative space that the series fundamentally cannot reach.
One more thing, and this isn’t really about the games themselves but the impressions leading into them, and how the aesthetics can affect that. Do you guys remember when the intro cutscene of Three Houses was released a few weeks before release? I do, and I also remember the collective shock of the community when seeing the early previews. It was so drastically different to everything that had come before, and consequently was really intriguing - you can see a lot of speculation in the above comments. To clarify, I don’t want to pretend that 3H is some kind of super mature ultra gritty war story, or that blood = good game, but that beginning cutscene gave one hell of a first impression. Even though the game isn’t that much darker than any other FE game, the sheer unexpectedness put people off-kilter in a kinda awesome way. Does the game actually deliver? YMMV, but I think this (and some of the later cutscenes, such as the mid-game Dimitri one) work quite well. Sometimes, a little injection of harsher violence can go a long way.

Conclusion

Frankly I don’t really have a conclusion, sorry. As you can see, there are so many disparate strands, I can’t possibly make one grand thesis statement. Maybe the inherent contradictions of having warfare in a family friendly video game weakens the potential end result? I guess, but I don’t want to imply that what we have now is bad, as it is pretty good tbh. So, uhh…
…
OK, if I had to say something, it’s more about the process of making this. Having to try and think about how violence intersects with a video game you like takes you in a number of different directions. Ultimately, this process was really fulfilling for me, and I would recommend that you do the same (for FE or anything else)! Trying to analyse something you enjoy from a perspective not usually applied is pretty neat. If you guys have any thoughts (on the points above or your own), I’d be very interested to hear them!
Also, if people are interested, I’ll try to make a few case studies. I would focus on Thracia 776, Fates, and Three Houses, as (when thinking on this topic) I found that these games were consistently the most intriguing, with the most interesting relationships to violence. This would probably take a while though, as I am gonna be very busy in June, and I probably won’t have time this month either.

Hi everyone! This is my first time posting here so please be gentle <3
I'm at a bit of a crossroads and desperately need advice from more experienced people than me. To give you some context on me, I'm an international student graduating with distinction from a top Electrical Engineering program in Canada. My experience includes:

• 12 months of internship experience in Canada, 8 of which was at a Fortune 500 company
• 11 months at a top tech company you're definitely familiar with in the Bay Area (not Amazon)
• ran my University's biggest engineering design team
• built and scaled a startup as a founding team member that's been featured in Forbes, TechCrunch and elsewhere

Besides that, I've been a Teaching Assistant and Residence Advisor on campus twice.
Last bit of context: I was on a J1 visa during my internship in the US, which has a two-year homestay requirement (I have to return home for two years before I can work in the US again). While there is a waiver for it, the way it's looking, I may not even be able to get that waived for at least 6 months. Because of this, I already lost my opportunity to return to the company I interned with in the US immediately post-grad.
I'm in the process of interviewing for an in-person founding team member role at a top Y-Combinator startup in the Bay Area; the team is absolutely world-class, already funded and generating revenue. It's honestly the sort of opportunity I would have only been able to dream about before starting my degree, and now it's enough of a reality that a recruiter reached out to me for it.
I am also actively applying to opportunities in Canada; I paid for my last year of undergrad myself through the money I earned in my internships, so I have nothing left and am in need of some sort of employment in the next few weeks or so (sort of starving at the moment). While I haven't done most of my 'big' applications yet, I feel somewhat confident that with enough time and effort, I will at least be able to get interviews in Canada in the short-term.
My dilemma is whether to stay in Canada or move to the US. As grateful as I am to be in Canada (and I really am - I love it here), there aren't really any opportunities in Canada that compare to being a founding team member at a YC startup straight out of University. But - and this is the dilemma - I don't even see a path in the short-term to an H1B visa in the US, let alone permanent residency, while in Canada, especially as an engineering graduate from a Canadian University, that's much, much more likely. And while there isn't a comparable opportunity for me here as far as I can see, there are plenty of cutting-edge opportunities in tech in Canada too.
My questions are:

1. Would you suggest staying in Canada or moving to the US? I'm aware that I haven't actually received any offers yet, but I anticipate that this will become a very real issue for me soon and would love to get some opinions before that
2. While I mentioned to the recruiter that contacted me about the Bay Area opportunity some of the complications of my visa situation, I'm not entirely sure how much the team is aware of them. They mentioned that they're happy to sponsor visas, but it seems as if they want someone for this role soon and my minimum timeline may be 4-6 months. I'm supposed to complete a writing exercise as Interview Round II and meet with the CEO to discuss it - should I mention the specifics of my situation via email or during the interview?
3. Any general advice from others who graduated with a bunch of experience on how to maximise the value of that experience? I've worked really, really hard to put myself through my degree and succeed as much as I could, but realised I still don't have a clear idea of what I want to do yet. I do want to ensure I actually use the experience I have to maximise my advantage.

Thank you so much in advance, I really appreciate your input!

1/
Many bought Vietnamese media run with the headlines: VIC explode after VFS jumped 50%. Clear evidencce of Vuong Pham's ochestration for the pump (and then dump of course). VIC jumped in the early session and red ever since. Poor retail traders / investors buying in the morning. Of course, there is no institutional buyers.
VIC volume is just 4.8M so far. Clearly, many retail investors are jumping in to hold the bags on the VF3 rumors but not as many as Vuong Pham's hope to hold the price. Vuong Pham must be very worry.
One thing you might learn by reading my post is that always look at volume and price together.
2/
The trick of pumping VF3 continues in full force.
Random people claimed to be factory employees or sales persons posted various status with varying figures: "secret sources" say 30K reservation, "Vinfast friend" say 50K reservation, 60K reservation. As I have explained, this is rumor game using non official accounts to spread rumor.
Media reported people X Y Z showed the reservation slip. Mr X Y Z or Ms A B C said why they bought VF3.
Well, all this is all seeding to create a sense of red hot products, as if people dont buy now, they will lose the chance to get one due to huge demand. Of course, the media has to write it for the money, they don't do it for free, and who is pay the media to write?
It is just the usual Vuong Pham's marketing trick.
He must think Vietnamese people are dumb for all of his tricks.
Even in the internet age, there are still a lot of clueless people, especially in Vietnam where Vuong Pham has a complete control of the media, but eventually people will tell each other by words of mouth.
3/
But all tricks will have short term effect only, even in the media controlled Vietnam.
Eventually, people will know the truth. Eventually, Vuong Pham has to dump (actually, he continue to dump all the way).
4/
Just this morning, there is a news of a VF8 crashed into a children hospital (no people died this time). As usual, Vuong Pham censored the news. The same as when he censored the Pleasanton's crash.
After a further thought, it appears to me that this is the fault of the cars, not the driver's fault. Newspaper reported that the driver got off the car to go to the back to get a patient out / get stuffs and the cars suddenly went off. The driver was out of the car.
This is the same situation as when a GSM taxi driver was out of the car at a charging station but the car moved ahead on itself https://twitter.com/dangcongkhanh/status/1777470517555204503
This is the same situation when a self reversed VF9 killed a guy in a basement.
5/
Thinking that many people going out to buy a buggy car without test drive is unrealistic. After all, 15M VND and 235M VND are still a big amount of the average Vietnamese. Only those wealthy Vinfans jump in early and these kind of people have already reserved the VF3 and the numbers are drying up, I predict.
6/
FPT guys will get a 6.5% discount. How many IT guys dumb enough to get VF3 before trying?

So, basically, everything started 2 years ago when I moved to a new house in another city to finish my major in IT. In this republic where a lot of students live (8 at the time), my best friend and I went to live there. Upon arriving, I met this female (21), let’s call her S. We started talking and getting intimate even though she seemed like a good person. However, things happened and I tried to get away from her. But since she is crazy and we live in the same house, that did not work too well. She would do things like lock me in the house with her and hide the key, send her grandma to my house asking me to get with her, and all kinds of messed up things that I’m not writing here (if you want to know, ask in the comments).
It was basically more than a year like that. We were not in a relationship or anything, but that did not matter to her. Everyone at the republic knew but no one ever spoke about it and chose silence, even my best friend. I felt kind of bad because when he needed me, I was there for him. I tried to talk to him but he would always change the subject and did not like to get involved.
It was a year and a half like that. I literally would sleep from 2 am to 12 pm, wake up, go to college, and then come back at 11:00 pm so I wouldn’t interact with her. So, I started talking to a girl at my college and followed her on Instagram (I think that was my mistake where I am now). She followed me back. At first, I was really not looking for a relationship or anything, but I really liked her. She was a cool friend. But S did not like that, not even a little bit. How do I know that? I always was low profile. I did not like posting any photos on social media and all of that. My Instagram does not have a profile pic as well and I did not use it until recently, so I know that if I followed someone new, she would know.
So, after that, things kept going and I was not speaking to her. I had two best friends, one lived with me and the other one lived in my city. So, we used to gather at my place every Sunday and do something. It would come, he and his friends. One day we were talking and this best friend of mine showed his cellphone to this other friend with messages from her. I know that because this friend used to message a girl even though I was already talking to her. And when he showed the message to this other friend (let’s call this one L, he is going to be important later), he looked at me and said “you are screwed” and then we changed the subject.
So, for the next month, I kept my normal life as normal but she and my other friend (let’s call him F) started acting suspicious with her. I tried believing him and pretended I was blind and did not give a damn but he would always make things for me which he did not used to do. He started changing things in his life like going to college all day which was a thing I used to ask him to do so I wouldn’t stay all day by myself in college. He would talk about friendship a lot. I would also reply normally and then I felt like he was being an asshole and got mad at him and stopped talking to him so he would understand that I would do what he was doing (mainly the reason was I would not do that to him). And once she said all of my friends were assholes (she was right in here at least). So, going forward, I would speak to him but if he needed something or talked to me, I would respond normally but was still mad because of all of my friends, he was the one I trusted the most. He acted as if nothing was wrong which I felt he was at the time.
Then one day we were at the basketball game and he said to a lot of teammates that I stopped talking to him and he did not know the motive. So, on Sunday at my house with my friend L, he asked if I was not talking to F. I said that we are kind of in the middle of a fight but if they wanted to call him, they could. Then L said he would not call him since we were not on good terms And then I said okay, and after that, he asked what the reason was. I told him the story, saying I was mad because I felt like F was manipulating me. L believed that my friend F was a good guy because he has a girlfriend and all (he betrayed her after 5 years of relationship with his neighbor, which I knew and L did not, and I did not tell him of course, I ain’t no snitch). So, days passed and it was the birthday of S’s cousins, which I used to go to in previous years, so it was planned (she and her cousins are very close) because his birthday this time was at a public place, in a bar to be more exact. After getting there, I had a surprise because she was with another guy at a table, so everyone got mad at me because “I fought my best friend because of her”.
So, one day after that, my “friend” L said everything to his friend (I’ll call this one Y). So, Y and her had a past together and he did not like her at all. He was my friend too, we’ve known each other for the past 8 years. And then this friend got mad at me as well and everyone started making jokes and all, and I said okay, maybe I was wrong and went to talk to F. I called this other friend to go with me at the time because we used to live together in the past and he grew up together with us. When we arrived at his place, he asked us to wait. So, when he arrived, we started talking. I said I would never do something to mess up his life and he said that everything I thought to be true was only things from my head (as if I was crazy). He said sorry for doing something I did not do and asked if we were alright, and then I said no, we were not. I asked him to come to my house the other day and he came but acted as if nothing was wrong. We talked, joked around, and he went away. I still did not understand, but something was off.
So, days come and everyone on the chat group started wishing I was dead every day, which I felt bad about, not gonna lie. And then the break from college came to an end and I got back to college. But when getting there to play basketball, everyone was acting strange with me. I’m kinda skinny, well I’m way too skinny (I weigh 88 pounds) and they were guarding me with everything they had. I did not understand why, but I quit and went home. The other day, I called my friend F and asked him if he told something to them and he said no, I did not say anything, and then went away. After that, I started asking myself what happened, which messes you up when everyone refuses to talk to you. So, I stopped going to college for a month and when I came back to college, everyone in the college was looking at me with disdain. A lot of them would look away when they saw me. I did not notice until I got to the classroom. When getting there, I chose my place and sat.
So, in this class, there is this girl (I’ll call her C). You know, from when I started college, I ain’t going to lie, she was my first passion. I used to go and wait for her bus to come and take her home and all of that, so she would not go alone at night. But then came the pandemic and we did not talk anymore (mainly my fault). So, coming back to the classroom, she got up and then looked at me. I would not say disgust, but like kinda mad at me, but I did not understand at the time. So, I asked this friend for his water bottle because I forgot mine and when I got up to go to the drinking fountain, he said you can right there, do not need to go anywhere. I did not understand what he was saying but did not give a damn because he is a really good friend, he kinda helped me. And then she got up again. I, knowing her, knew she was trying to tell me something but did not know what. Then this friend (I’ll call him P) asked me to tell the professor why I did not come to his class for almost a month and I said okay and went to talk to him. I said, while everyone was listening, that I did not come because somethings were happening in my life and then he said it’s okay. I went back to my place and at the end of the class, I went out to the bathroom and when I came back, my things were on the ground, which I did not notice why at all. And then this guy came to me and asked if those things that were on the ground were mine. I was making a group with this girl since when the professor asked if someone wanted to make groups with me, they all said no. The professor even asked like that “Why? You guys don’t like him?” I did not understand why as well and just laughed. So, this girl that was making a group with me, when I came back from the bathroom, asked me to take photos of the papers. I said that it did not need to and then she insisted and I said okay and took the photo. When I got home, I was looking at the photos of the papers and I saw a photo I did not remember taking. It was the legs of someone which I assumed took my cellphone and took it. I kinda went into my head thinking what caused this issue. And then I remembered something I told F a while ago because he knew about this girl from the past. So, one day I was in the classroom with She also got up and went to fill her water bottle. I asked her to fill mine as well, but when doing that, I kind of got up and she thought I would go with her, but I did not. :( When she came back, she sat at her chair and lied down, which made me feel bad because I like her. She did not come the next week and the next, she was sitting behind me. She had her bottle on the chair and then I asked her, ‘Can I take your bottle?’ She said, ‘For what?’ I took it anyways and filled her bottle, came back to class, and gave it to her. She said thank you and I told F about this situation, which I thought was the reason.
Then, the other day in the classroom, I came back because there was a misunderstanding and she did not come. I thought she did not want to talk to me and I did not come for the next 2 weeks. Then, I came back on test day and like always, I sit at the same place in the classroom and she knows that, so she sat close to me on the day, which made me happy. Her friends would come every so often and pretend like they would kick my backpack. She got angry at them, looked at them, and they stopped. Then, after that day, I do not know what she said, but everyone treated me normally with no issues and I could come back to college.
So, until here, I have a clue or other about what happened, but I still needed to know who would say something like this to mess me up. Then, I remembered Y because every time something would happen, he would post something on Instagram. When I came back to play basketball in my city, everyone was treating me like crap and then everyone was saying to me that Y was my rival. I did not care that much, I thought they were joking. Then, one of his friends asked if he could sleep in the republic with my mattress and I said, ‘Yes, you can.’ Days later, Y on the group chat asked this friend of his if things went all right and then he responded saying, ‘Yes, everything went all right.’ (He probably slept with S on my mattress.) So, I started asking why he would be so mad at me and something came to my head.
So, Y’s father died of cancer and one day, F and I were at his house. When we were getting out, F looked away and passed this door without looking. Then, I came behind him, looked at the room, and it was Y’s father. He could not talk because his cancer was on his tongue. I looked at him and gave him a thumbs up and he did the same to me. Then, out of his house, I asked F why he would look away in that situation and he said to me, ‘I can’t even look because I pity him.’ Then, I said I would not pity him because I would not like people to pity me. But what F said to him was something different and he believed it. Then, he started threatening, not directly of course, and saying things to all the city like I used to have this friend when growing up and he went to jail because he killed somebody. I told this thing that happened to my friend F that when we were young, 10 years old to be more exact, he kissed a girl I used to like and then I went home and started crying. I said that, but if I remember, in that house, the room where S stays, she can hear us and she probably told Y.
Then, I went to my friend who killed someone’s house (his mom sells food, I buy there since I was a kid). After getting there, I bought my food and when going home, his brother and his friend got up on a motorcycle and passed very close to me as if they were telling me something. I did not understand why as well, but after some time, I understood. So, he is probably not stopped until I’m dead or he kills me and since everyone believes him, I can’t do anything. So, I ask, what can I do in this situation?"

"So, basically, everything started 2 years ago when I moved to a new house in another city to finish my major in IT. In this republic where a lot of students live (8 at the time), my best friend and I went to live there. Upon arriving, I met this female (21), let’s call her S. We started talking and getting intimate even though she seemed like a good person. However, things happened and I tried to get away from her. But since she is crazy and we live in the same house, that did not work too well. She would do things like lock me in the house with her and hide the key, send her grandma to my house asking me to get with her, and all kinds of messed up things that I’m not writing here (if you want to know, ask in the comments).

It was basically more than a year like that. We were not in a relationship or anything, but that did not matter to her. Everyone at the republic knew but no one ever spoke about it and chose silence, even my best friend. I felt kind of bad because when he needed me, I was there for him. I tried to talk to him but he would always change the subject and did not like to get involved.
It was a year and a half like that. I literally would sleep from 2 am to 12 pm, wake up, go to college, and then come back at 11:00 pm so I wouldn’t interact with her. So, I started talking to a girl at my college and followed her on Instagram (I think that was my mistake where I am now). She followed me back. At first, I was really not looking for a relationship or anything, but I really liked her. She was a cool friend. But S did not like that, not even a little bit. How do I know that? I always was low profile. I did not like posting any photos on social media and all of that. My Instagram does not have a profile pic as well and I did not use it until recently, so I know that if I followed someone new, she would know.
So, after that, things kept going and I was not speaking to her. I had two best friends, one lived with me and the other one lived in my city. So, we used to gather at my place every Sunday and do something. It would come, he and his friends. One day we were talking and this best friend of mine showed his cellphone to this other friend with messages from her. I know that because this friend used to message a girl even though I was already talking to her. And when he showed the message to this other friend (let’s call this one L, he is going to be important later), he looked at me and said “you are screwed” and then we changed the subject.
So, for the next month, I kept my normal life as normal but she and my other friend (let’s call him F) started acting suspicious with her. I tried believing him and pretended I was blind and did not give a damn but he would always make things for me which he did not used to do. He started changing things in his life like going to college all day which was a thing I used to ask him to do so I wouldn’t stay all day by myself in college. He would talk about friendship a lot. I would also reply normally and then I felt like he was being an asshole and got mad at him and stopped talking to him so he would understand that I would do what he was doing (mainly the reason was I would not do that to him). And once she said all of my friends were assholes (she was right in here at least). So, going forward, I would speak to him but if he needed something or talked to me, I would respond normally but was still mad because of all of my friends, he was the one I trusted the most. He acted as if nothing was wrong which I felt he was at the time.
Then one day we were at the basketball game and he said to a lot of teammates that I stopped talking to him and he did not know the motive. So, on Sunday at my house with my friend L, he asked if I was not talking to F. I said that we are kind of in the middle of a fight but if they wanted to call him, they could. Then L said he would not call him since we were not on good terms And then I said okay, and after that, he asked what the reason was. I told him the story, saying I was mad because I felt like F was manipulating me. L believed that my friend F was a good guy because he has a girlfriend and all (he betrayed her after 5 years of relationship with his neighbor, which I knew and L did not, and I did not tell him of course, I ain’t no snitch). So, days passed and it was the birthday of S’s cousins, which I used to go to in previous years, so it was planned (she and her cousins are very close) because his birthday this time was at a public place, in a bar to be more exact. After getting there, I had a surprise because she was with another guy at a table, so everyone got mad at me because “I fought my best friend because of her”.
So, one day after that, my “friend” L said everything to his friend (I’ll call this one Y). So, Y and her had a past together and he did not like her at all. He was my friend too, we’ve known each other for the past 8 years. And then this friend got mad at me as well and everyone started making jokes and all, and I said okay, maybe I was wrong and went to talk to F. I called this other friend to go with me at the time because we used to live together in the past and he grew up together with us. When we arrived at his place, he asked us to wait. So, when he arrived, we started talking. I said I would never do something to mess up his life and he said that everything I thought to be true was only things from my head (as if I was crazy). He said sorry for doing something I did not do and asked if we were alright, and then I said no, we were not. I asked him to come to my house the other day and he came but acted as if nothing was wrong. We talked, joked around, and he went away. I still did not understand, but something was off.
So, days come and everyone on the chat group started wishing I was dead every day, which I felt bad about, not gonna lie. And then the break from college came to an end and I got back to college. But when getting there to play basketball, everyone was acting strange with me. I’m kinda skinny, well I’m way too skinny (I weigh 88 pounds) and they were guarding me with everything they had. I did not understand why, but I quit and went home. The other day, I called my friend F and asked him if he told something to them and he said no, I did not say anything, and then went away. After that, I started asking myself what happened, which messes you up when everyone refuses to talk to you. So, I stopped going to college for a month and when I came back to college, everyone in the college was looking at me with disdain. A lot of them would look away when they saw me. I did not notice until I got to the classroom. When getting there, I chose my place and sat.
So, in this class, there is this girl (I’ll call her C). You know, from when I started college, I ain’t going to lie, she was my first passion. I used to go and wait for her bus to come and take her home and all of that, so she would not go alone at night. But then came the pandemic and we did not talk anymore (mainly my fault). So, coming back to the classroom, she got up and then looked at me. I would not say disgust, but like kinda mad at me, but I did not understand at the time. So, I asked this friend for his water bottle because I forgot mine and when I got up to go to the drinking fountain, he said you can right there, do not need to go anywhere. I did not understand what he was saying but did not give a damn because he is a really good friend, he kinda helped me. And then she got up again. I, knowing her, knew she was trying to tell me something but did not know what. Then this friend (I’ll call him P) asked me to tell the professor why I did not come to his class for almost a month and I said okay and went to talk to him. I said, while everyone was listening, that I did not come because somethings were happening in my life and then he said it’s okay. I went back to my place and at the end of the class, I went out to the bathroom and when I came back, my things were on the ground, which I did not notice why at all. And then this guy came to me and asked if those things that were on the ground were mine. I was making a group with this girl since when the professor asked if someone wanted to make groups with me, they all said no. The professor even asked like that “Why? You guys don’t like him?” I did not understand why as well and just laughed. So, this girl that was making a group with me, when I came back from the bathroom, asked me to take photos of the papers. I said that it did not need to and then she insisted and I said okay and took the photo. When I got home, I was looking at the photos of the papers and I saw a photo I did not remember taking. It was the legs of someone which I assumed took my cellphone and took it. I kinda went into my head thinking what caused this issue. And then I remembered something I told F a while ago because he knew about this girl from the past. So, one day I was in the classroom with She also got up and went to fill her water bottle. I asked her to fill mine as well, but when doing that, I kind of got up and she thought I would go with her, but I did not. :( When she came back, she sat at her chair and lied down, which made me feel bad because I like her. She did not come the next week and the next, she was sitting behind me. She had her bottle on the chair and then I asked her, ‘Can I take your bottle?’ She said, ‘For what?’ I took it anyways and filled her bottle, came back to class, and gave it to her. She said thank you and I told F about this situation, which I thought was the reason.
Then, the other day in the classroom, I came back because there was a misunderstanding and she did not come. I thought she did not want to talk to me and I did not come for the next 2 weeks. Then, I came back on test day and like always, I sit at the same place in the classroom and she knows that, so she sat close to me on the day, which made me happy. Her friends would come every so often and pretend like they would kick my backpack. She got angry at them, looked at them, and they stopped. Then, after that day, I do not know what she said, but everyone treated me normally with no issues and I could come back to college.
So, until here, I have a clue or other about what happened, but I still needed to know who would say something like this to mess me up. Then, I remembered Y because every time something would happen, he would post something on Instagram. When I came back to play basketball in my city, everyone was treating me like crap and then everyone was saying to me that Y was my rival. I did not care that much, I thought they were joking. Then, one of his friends asked if he could sleep in the republic with my mattress and I said, ‘Yes, you can.’ Days later, Y on the group chat asked this friend of his if things went all right and then he responded saying, ‘Yes, everything went all right.’ (He probably slept with S on my mattress.) So, I started asking why he would be so mad at me and something came to my head.
So, Y’s father died of cancer and one day, F and I were at his house. When we were getting out, F looked away and passed this door without looking. Then, I came behind him, looked at the room, and it was Y’s father. He could not talk because his cancer was on his tongue. I looked at him and gave him a thumbs up and he did the same to me. Then, out of his house, I asked F why he would look away in that situation and he said to me, ‘I can’t even look because I pity him.’ Then, I said I would not pity him because I would not like people to pity me. But what F said to him was something different and he believed it. Then, he started threatening, not directly of course, and saying things to all the city like I used to have this friend when growing up and he went to jail because he killed somebody. I told this thing that happened to my friend F that when we were young, 10 years old to be more exact, he kissed a girl I used to like and then I went home and started crying. I said that, but if I remember, in that house, the room where S stays, she can hear us and she probably told Y.
Then, I went to my friend who killed someone’s house (his mom sells food, I buy there since I was a kid). After getting there, I bought my food and when going home, his brother and his friend got up on a motorcycle and passed very close to me as if they were telling me something. I did not understand why as well, but after some time, I understood. So, he is probably not stopped until I’m dead or he kills me and since everyone believes him, I can’t do anything. So, I ask, what can I do in this situation?"

Preamble

This is going to be a bit of a lengthy post so bear with me. I am going to get into boons, arcana cards, vows, and weapon/equipment choice in this post and how I eventually was able to clear the underworld at 32 fear. All of this is in context of the build I am going for and the weapon I am using. Different vows, cards, etc. may be better for different weapons and playstyles. This is not a definitive guide and I have only beaten it once so far and by sticking to one weapon during my attempts. I enjoy writing about stuff like this and hope that this can possibly help y'all.
I finished the surface on my 23rd run and then the underworld on the next for reference. I just now cleared the underworld at 32 fear on my 143rd run. Of those between were me completing testaments, trying out weapons/aspects, and chaos trials. I attempted 32 fear a total of 36 times before I finally got it. Total in game time according to steam is 74 hours lol (I had a four day weekend and my gf is out of town so this is pretty much all I did).
Proof of run

Weapon/Aspect: Momus Staff

Firstly you want to get enough resources to unlock and fully upgrade the aspect, I think 10 total nightmare? Giving your special +30 power. I wouldn't bother 32 fear until you can get it all the way up.
For a few runs while I was using the skull with Melinoe/Persephone aspect, as I was trying to complete the 20 fear testament simultaneously. Stopped since I decided I wasn't really comfortable with the skull and switched to Melinoe's staff. Did that for a while and then saw this video and decided to give the Momus staff a shot, where i then won in 7 runs after switching. It also probably helped that I changed around some vows around this time, more on that later.
Watch the video for a breakdown but essentially you want Poseidon special + legendary boon, and ideally the double moonshot hammer that gives your special 2 more projectiles that seek. He switches his binds for left and right click but I did not, up to you.
Took a minute to get used to but essentially I just spammed speciall the entire time in fights, kiting enemies when necessary. I used my cast defensively to root enemies and create space mostly until I got a 3 specific boons, more later. Did not really use omegas at all, as I turned off the magick regen card and turned on the vow that removes your magick at the start of each encounter. If I did gain some magick, I would only use it for the omega special to regain some health when it was safe in fights (5 healing if you are near it when it explodes).

Arcana Cards

This is what I used but some may find other ones more to their liking. I will explain my choices below. Be sure to upgrade these to their max potential. The descriptions that I give are referencing their maxed out bonus. I almost exclusively used my charon cards (obol points) to order 8 moon dust in the camp to upgrade faster. Also having 30 grasp is required so be sure to get that maxed out too. Just playing the game should get you there. Gathering bones and completing minor prophecies are helpful in getting more moondust and nightmare faster to upgrade your cards and aspects. I have starred the one's that I think are almost absolutely necessary.
Arcana card choices
I. The Sorceress: Not using omega moves with this build for the most part, mainly chosen to just fill out the top row to awaken the divinity card.
II. The Wayward Son: +2 health (with 50% healing reduction from a vow) is definitely helpful, some much needed passive healing.
* III. The Huntress: +50% attack and special damage when you have less than 100 magick is probably a must have. Especially in my vows set up where I pretty much never have any magick.
IV. Death: Also to just fill out the row for divinity, not really using omega moves.
* V. The Messenger: +10% dodge chance is a lifesaver.
VII. The Titan: More health (and magick) is helpful for the early game before you get any centaur hearts.
* X. The Lovers: 0 damage from bosses for 3 hits is absolutely nuts, this was a whole keepsake in the last game. Attacks that miss you from dodge or daze from Apollo don't count towards a hit as well.
XI. The Swift Runner: Just generally helpful for kiting and running around, especially with increased enemy movement from a vow.
* XII. Eternity: 3 death defiances are absolutely essential probably in any playthrough unless you are a god at not getting hit ever.
* XVIII. Origination: Enemies with 2 curses take +50% damage is fantastic and helps to absolutely shred through them
* XXII. The Champions: 3 chances to reroll boon choices among other things is pretty much a must for run consistency. I would mainly use it on my first Poseidon boon to get the special. Would also use again to try and get slip or blast damage one or legendary from him, also on Hestia to get her cast or the one that allows you to aim the cast (both possible prerequisites for their duo boon, more later).
XXIII. The Artificer: I slept on this one big time at first until I saw someone using it in a 32 heat run on youtube. Change a minor reward into a major one 3 times is fantastic and really helps in the early game. I would use all 3 in the first region for a chance to get a pom, heart, gold, boon, or hammer. I would almost put this one as a must but you do you.
XXIV. Divinity: 20% extra chance to get an epic boon. Activated by the full top row, its just nice to have to possibly get some more benefits out of boons.
Alternatives: Like I mentioned before I only activate I and IV mainly to activate divinity. You could lose them and go for IX Night (automatic charging for your hex) or XVI The Fates (+3 rolls to change location rewards). I feel like hexes are not all that impactiful personally (except for a couple). Also changing location rewards is a toss up, meh. You could also lose XI extra sprint speed to to open up 5 grasp and go for XV Stength (take and deal more damage at low hp), XVII The Boatman (get more gold at the start of the run), or XIX Excellence (higher % for rare boons offered), which all have valid arguments. In hindsight I think giving up those 3 for Stregnth or Excellence might be worth it, might try in future runs.

Oath of the Unseen Vows

Throughout my runs I experimented a lot with the various choices and found that the ones I chose are best for how I play. It is really up to you, this is just how I did it. I mostly messed around with damage taken, enemy spawns, and health, the rest pretty much stayed constant. I originally was using the 9 minute time limit per region for a majority of my runs until I switched aspects (and the 7 minute several times). I eventually decided that I was playing too aggresively to beat the clock and would lose most of, if not all my death defiances by Tartarus/Chronos, or earlier. I did still have decent amount of time to beat Chronos if I got there with the time limit, just the health and death defiance loss was too much. Here is what I went with and explanations for each, I starred the ones I think should be kept on and are relatively easy to deal with.
Vows Used
Vow of Blood (+3): Just don't get hit duh. No but seriously +60% damage to you hurts, a lot. I really wish I did not have to use this, but the alternatives I think are worse. As you play more you'll get better and learn attack patterns and how to kite effectively.
Vow of Dominance (+3): Enemies now have +30% health which is rough, but with no time limit, just take your time in killing enemies off safely.
Vow of Rebuke (+2): Enemies have 2 barriers before they can take damage, not too bad. Makes clearing enemies a bit harder, but with the poseidon boon, you apply two instances of damage with each hit. So only one special shot with the boon will clear the barrier, also the wave the shoots out of them helps to clear barriers of the other enemies.
Vow of Fury (+3): Enemies are 20% faster (and their projectiles too?! I'm pretty sure this is the case, I haven't played without it in a while so I'm not exactly sure). This one took some getting used to, not much I can say except just keep trying. Another +3 makes them 40% faster which I do not recommend. The screaming shades, wolves and their heads, thorny spinny guys in Oceanus, rats, and Chronos are all insane with 40% extra speed.
Vow of Suffering (+2): +100% for the first hit you take in each encounter. Same as Vow of Blood, its rough, wish I could go without it as well.
Vow of Commotion (+3): 60% more foes in encounters (does not affect the boss summons). Had this one a tier or two lower, or not at all, when I was experimenting with the time limit. The AOE from Poseidon definely helps here, just take your time to clear out enemies. It can get pretty bad in tartarus with the bags and skulls everywhere though so just be careful.
Vow of Haunting (+2): Enemies have 50% of spawning a revenant when killed which if left alone long enough will respawn them. These are annoying as hell but not terrible once you get used to it. On death a flaming green skull thing launches out of them and travels a bit of a distance, just run ovecollect them and they are negated, don't need to damage or whatever. Can sometimes be hard to spot if behind a wall or obstacle. Overall not that bad, its not the end of the world if you let them respawn. Definitely though go for the ones that would respawn an enemy that are hard/annoying to deal with ASAP e.g. rat spawning satyrs, wolves, any projectile shooting enemy. Sometimes I feel like rats almost always spawn a revenant which is annoying. I honestly think they should also rework this so that if an enemy respawns it can't have another revenant spawn.
* Vow of Wandering (+3): 25% chance for enemies to be from the next region. Really not that bad at all, just have to deal with some more annoying enemies with larger health pools.
Vow of Scars (+2): Healing is only 50% effective is not that bad. You only get +2 healing passively from the card now and a lot less from fountains and such, goes hand in hand with blood and suffering, you'll get better at not getting hit.
* Vow of Destitution (+2): Charon's shop (and wells) are 80% more expensive. You'll miss out some boons, healing, poms, hearts, etc. but its not awful, you will still gain a good amount of gold to usually buy a boon or something at the end of each region except Oceanus I found. Also with Poseidon in your god pool, he has some boons that can help with getting more gold like minor find doubling up, increased value of minor finds, and sunken treasure.
* Vow of Panic (+1): No more magick at the start of each encounter. In this build you don't really need it anyways so this is a freebie point of fear pretty much. Also if you decide to have the card that regens magick on it pretty much negates it after a little while.
** Vow of Forsaking (+2): This one might actually be beneficial. The two boon options you don't pick will not longer show up in your run. This is why I have the boon rerolls on, so I can guarantee to get Poseidon special on my first boon. Otherwise this helps to increase your chances of getting legendary or duo boons (if you have the prerequisites) since the boon choice pool is lowered after each pick. It is unfortunate though if both prereqs for poseidons legendary are in the given choices and you are out of rolls though.
* Vow of Arrogance (+4): Prime 10 magick for each level of rarity above common that you pick. Again, not using magick hardly in this build so doesn't really matter. Also in lower fear runs I have used this, it does not really matter all that much even when you are using omega moves.
Unused:

• Vow of Bitterness: Replace the first boon reward of each region with an onion (does not affect shop boons or trial of the gods rooms if they are the first ones you encounter). I tried this many times but it really just worsened run consistency. Also w a keepsake equipped after Erebus to guarantee a certain god's boon, that would become an onion if it was the first one I found, and then would not encounter that god again in that region.
• Vow of Desperation: Time limits for regions: 9, 7, then 5 minutes with increased fear for each increase in tier. Like I said, I stopped playing with this so I could play more carefully.
• Vow of Abandon: Negate all your arcana cards. Insane. Tried it once, it is just too much, the arcana cards are absolutely necessary I feel to clear 32 fear.

Boons/Hammers/Keepsakes/Familiar

Poseidon: Equip his keepsake at start, reroll for wave flourish (special) if needed and rarify. Afterwards look for slippery slope then crashing wave ideally. This primes you to get his legendary which gives +150% damage from splash effects to bosses. Other great ones are double up which is nuts that it can possibly double your hearts, gold, and poms you pick up. Ocean's bounty is nice to increase gold. Water fitness is pretty good if you can get 4 water elements to give you +100 health. Flood control is also nice for damage reduction.
Hestia: Equip her keepsake after Erebus if you did not already get her in your god pool (you get up to 4 gods like in Hades I). Ideally you want her both cast and glowing coal, which lets you aim your cast. Either of which in combination with slippery slope gets you access to Poseidon/Hestia duo boon scalding vapor whcih does insane damage over time. I'm not sure if you should prioritize glowing coal over her cast honestly, both have their upsides alone, but you do want both hopefully. With glowing coal so you can aim your cast since you will be fighting from a distance mostly (not always but in how I played this build I did for the most part), which can activate the steam cloud on foes with slip. Hestia cast is less safe and you need to be closer to enemies to get the steam cloud to activate, but it does more damage, continously applying steam on the enemy. Other boons like soot sprint are nice, almost like Athena's dash in the first game. Slow cooker infusion is alright but you may not get many fire elements to increase your base damage power. Flammable coating is great and helps to melt through armored enemies. Burnt offering is pretty nice to increase you health (and magick) pool if you happen to get offered to sacrifice a useless boon.
Other helpful god boons: Pretty much anything that can help apply another curse to enemies. Demeter and Aphrodite are probably the best since theirs are easy to apply without much effort like frigid sprint, gale force, glamour gain, and passion dash. The other gods require secondary boons to get a curse or your attack/special needs to give the curse, you won't really ever be using your attack and your special is reserved for Poseidon.
Hammers: Correct me if I'm wrong, but I feel like I remember in Hades I if you chose a specific hammer you would be locked out of other hammer choices that affect the benefitting move. If the same applies to this game avoid picking a hammer that affects your special for your first hammer if it is not double moonshot, and hope for it on your second hammer. The DPS from Momus staff is still great with spamming special without it (I won my run without it). You could also go ahead and pick up rapid moonfire or shimmering moonshot on your first one because they are pretty powerful too, and I also may be wrong about the hammer exclusion thing.
Keepsakes: So of course Poseidon first, always. Hestia second if you don't get her in your god pool Erebus. Up to you and what you like for Oceanus, maybe choose Demeter or Aphrodite. If I got Hestia I would generally use any one of the following:

• Engraved pin
• Gold Purse
• White Antler
• Crystal Figurine
• Silken Sash
• Aromatic Phial (be sure to pick it up before using the fountain)
• Experimental Hammer
• Transcendent Embryo

Once in the mourning fields I would typically go with the Lion Fang, or possibly one of the above maybe. Lastly in Tartarus I would either use Knuckle Bones (if I felt comfortable with my health and death defiances), Luckier Tooth, or Evil Eye (if Chronos killed me last).
Sidenote: Is Echo bugged? Or is my game just messed up? I was never given the chance to give her a gift so I've never gotten her keepsake :(
Familiar Toula: Sorry Frinos, but Toula is just superior. She gives you an extra death defiance which when upgraded fully gives you 40 health on death. Also upgrading her attack lets her attack more times before she takes a little catnap (cute). She does 99 damage with each strike which is not insignificant. You don't need to go out of your way to sprint over her whenever she is resting to activate her, if she happens to be where you are running it is just some nice extra little bit of DPS. She has actually killed a few bosses for me in my runs lol.

The Winning Run

So all of this information is from finally beating 32 fear. I followed this strategy in my head for the most part. I ended up not getting double moonshot, but did get rapid moonfire. Poseidon offered me both prereqs for his legendary in the same choice without any rerolls left unfortunately, chose slip of course. I did get the duo boon and both of Hestia's cast boons which was nuts. Also I got rare crop right after I got Poseidon's special so it became heroic by the end. I also got offered to sacrifice rare crop after it became heroic by hestia to get more health, and I was then offered it again at epic rarity which increased 3 other of my boons which happened to hit Hestia's cast boons. I did not get any other way to apply another curse other than slip unfortunately as well. Started Tartarus with 2 or 3 death defiances + luckier tooth and beat Chronos on my last life. Overall though, not a perfect run but it still worked. Would have been even more nuts if I got the right hammer, legendary, and another curse effect

TL;DR

Momus Staff good. More special projectiles hammer + Poseidon special + legendary + Poseidon/Hestia duo = nuts DPS. Arcana cards important, vows are tough.

The effect of pandemic still follows me, I'm chronically online, watching YouTube, playing games, watching twitch streams, or porn, as much as I hate to say I feel like I've let down my close ones and I cheated them, my dad is abusive and strict, while my mom is so innocent, while they were thinking I was studying the whole time, I was procrasting and watching things I shouldn't be watching, I FEEL LIKE I CHEATED THEM. I'm a dropper and I was a topper till class 10, got selected for many many olympaids and did well in almost any exam, so they had high expectation in me, but when I changed my school in class 11 and the pandemic started, everything went wrong, I stopped studying, I was hiding my marks from my parents (cuz I literally got no marks) I made friends with extremely wrong ppl, I had the toxic friendship, they were making me feel bad, they made me feel like a looser, why didn't I cut their friendship u may ask? It's cuz I was a pus$y and was so scared to battle jee alone, and being a looser in the middle of loosers made me feel good, I learnt to do all bad things in the pandemic, me and my frnds used to catfish guys acting like girls, and made fun of them, never in my life did I thought I will send a link to a frnd which is 18 and above content, and as long as I want to blame them and everything around me, the fault was mine too. But when the offline started in class 12 everything changed, every fun ended and I felt like an absolute looser. My marks became known to my parents, they were devastated, THEY ALSO CAME TO KNOW THE MARKS OF CLASS 11TH MARKS, EVERYONE ELSE COPIED AND GOT LIKE 200+ MINE WAS AT 40 MAKRS CUZ I HATE DISHONESTY, i didnt try to explain anything to them cuz I was happy I did the right thing anyways , my dad scolded me every day, beat me, death threats, and my mom was sad all the time, I felt suicidal thoughts for the first time in my life, I'm still feeling it, for 2 years, at random times I feel like ending my life, even tho I know jee isn't everything, I feel the guilt of I could've been more and the guilt of I've let down my parents and ppl who trusted me (even tho I don't like my dad cuz he is abusive and too much controlling) I feel like running away, the effect followed the entire 12th class, didn't study anything in 12th, ended up with 90 percentile and 1 lakh rank in class 12th 2023 jee mains. I had no hope for jee advanced but my unintelligent dad was forcing me to study and do something in advanced he again gave me death threats and I ddidnt feel worthy living at all. I gave advanced, didn't clear cutoff got like 74 in total. They agreed for a drop after scolding me so much and making me hate life, they said we thought ur a bright student (I was in narayana in class 8th to 10th) and I've got selected to central office branch in class 9th, it's so rare and only a handful of ppl got there from my entire state). And fast forward to 2024 first attempt of the drop in Jan I wasted all the time I had again by procrastinating, studied almost nothing, at the last min I watched one shots and scored terribly. The lope of failure kept me away from pursuing jee at all, I gone from topper who likes studying and exams to hate studying now.
Again I wasted the entire Feb month. I didn't take life seriously, I had parasocial rships with youtubers (im a boy) cuz cut of all frnds who were toxic and made me a looser. If I don't watch youtube, I will loose my mind. It was that bad, I couldn't change anything, worse than this I stuck in a rut, a weird 9 hours sleep cycle still waking up tired, scrolling scrolling scrolling until I sleep, depressed, felt like a looser. Somehow got the courage to text my crush and she said "get lost bro, ur a loser". I've had enough I've hit rock bottom, I tried su1cide, but I took the knife, but I was so scared to do it after all the trouble I've put my parents already. So I didn't. Now it's March 15th my exam is in April 5th. It was March 1st I tired to k1ll myself, for the next 15 days I did nothing but procrastinate, it has gotten so worse to a point I stopped eating breakfast. My mom was concerned, she sat me to talk and asked me what the problem was, I never said anything except "mom I'm scared of the exam". She sat me and said "son no matter if u loose mom is there for u always, I know even if u don't succeed in jee, u will be successful in some other thing, u r that kind of a person, I've seen u win in the past 😭😭, my mom doesn't know english, she was like make sure u read all the question and answers and make sure u write ur April attempt with a good handwriting, the teacher will provide u with good marks, make sure u fill up the page. (Yes my mom didn't even know jee is computer based, I felt so bad, she is thinking I was studying the entire time in my laptop, instead I'm watching porn, my mom doesn't even know porn exist, if she finds out what I'm doing really, she will go unconscious, I felt so bad cheating that innocent soul) and she said, " my siblings (my uncles and aunts) all forgot about me, ur dad is abusive and repellent, I only have urself and ur brother to take care of me. So write the exam well, it's not just for u but also for me, ALL I WANT FROM U IS A SEAT AT IIT". I cried. She spent the entire next 2 days searching for tips in a language she doesn't speak, came up to me and said son these are the imp chaps (honestly that was made by some unauthorized source by a dougebag in his mom's basement) I noded my head said mom u don't have to worry about me I will do the exam well.
For the next 20 days I slept like 4 hours, shut my ears to the trash talk my dad did to me, forgot everything else, I DID IT FOR MY MOM, I studied 16-17 hours for the next 20 days, it was hard cuz I stopped the procrastination and I was loosing my mind without watching the sidemen and hearing ksi laugh. Porn addiction was high too game wanted me to pick it up and play, I said no the every urge, solved like 1000 pyqs in 20 days, studied chemistry even tho I don't like it. Exam day came, I was almost sure I got 100/100 in physics I said it to my dad he was very happy after years, but I said I attended 58 questions in total, he was like why didn't u attend close to 67? After studying 3 years u only attended 58? If u don't get 99 percentile or above ur life is done (seriously I hate him) I said ill get 99. I got 180 in mocks consistently with 80 marks in phy, if everything goes well I'll sure get around 205. But result came, I got 90 in physics (I was very happy 😊) but got 170 in total and got 96 percentile with 60k rank 😭. I lost all hopes for advanced as I only prepared for 2 weeks and have no indepth knowledge. Moepre over I was burnt out, I rest for 5 days after exam (big mistake) I became complacentand wasted time till result day (20th April or smth) I again got my procrastination habit, I lost all the drive cuz of my mom, u til the result my dad set me alone, after the result he was annoying me that "u know nothing about this exam (bro I literally got 170) so listen to me (but ur dumb and are picking advises from quora) I had a lot of chemistry left, but he annoyed me to solve papers, I never did that or either what I wanted to do and ended up procrastinating. Now it's 14th May guys, I'm so scared and guilty at the same time I again fell prone to my addictions and didn't prepare for advance. Pls help me do smth in the last 2 weeks, I'm clueless how to improve, I need help and I promise, I have very good iq and I won't procrastinate, I'm getting like 92 marks in mocks, sometimes 120. I want to improve to something like 150, my physics is capped out I guess I'm scoring 75 marks. 30 In chem and 15 in maths cuz of lack of practice.
Kindly send me advises to improve my chemistry and maths (I dont think so I can improve maths in 14 days) thank u for reading!
tdlr: I'm feel so guilty and feared cuz of the exam and no I didn't cheat on exam, pls read the thing, now I need advices to improve my chemistry and maths in the last few days, promise imma good student and I'll implement any advise u give me. Make sure u read the second paragraph lol Thank u so much! I REALLY WANT TO GIVE MY MOM WHAT SHE ASKED FOR

Little Author's Note up here since it was missed in the last chapter by some people: I don't approve of anyone "narrating" or using my story for their youtube channels or whatever as it makes me uncomfortable. I’ve been getting messages whenever I post a chapter asking the same thing and I keep saying no. If you see this story on youtube or elsewhere, I didn’t approve of it or give them my permission to do so.
Also I hope you enjoy this chapter, I had some difficulty writing it, so it’s probably not my best quality.
Cerelia, Altrin Female, Captain of The Opal Star
I smirk at my wrist data pad as I can see Triwt is basically hunting and chasing down the remaining pirates while expertly leading them to me for a trap.
“Triwt, you know me so well.” I say with a fully smug tone as I ready my rifle and prepare to open fire.
Not yet
The footsteps are getting louder.
Not yet…
The footsteps, given how good my hearing is, have now rounded the corner and there’s a shriek of terror.
“Boys! Turn back and save your damn Captain! The damn girl has me!”
I can’t help but smirk, it seems the ugly bastard did come aboard the ship. What’s better is that Triwt has grabbed him, leaving the remaining 4 pirates not looking this way.
Now.
Triwt, Female Valis-Trobat Hybrid, Security Commander
I’m slightly annoyed as I have to constantly dodge and weave going through the corridor. These dumbasses aren’t even aiming where they're shooting. I quickly duck low to the ground to dodge a barrage of plasma bolts, when I hear the one thing I was looking forward to. Click click click…
Silence follows the clicking of empty TOR’s besides the frantic running. It’s then replaced by one of the pirates, not the Captain, shrieking as she runs ahead of the others in a panic. In no sense am I a sadistic person, but however in this situation, I might have smiled a bit to her reaction as I pick up the pace and quickly enter melee range.
Hm, maybe we can afford one prisoner…
I see the corner coming up as I whip my body around and grab the Captain with my tail.
EWWWW He’s all slimy and mucusy! Goddess this is worse than Jordan Cores bleeding on my fur. EWWW!!!
“Boys! Turn back and save your damn Captain! The damn girl has me!”
Despite my own internal hatred of the sensation of having to get that gross slime like mucus on my tail of all things, I still pull the Captain back as they round the corner looking back at me as they abandon their captain. I give them a wave right before a hail of gunfire shreds through them, leaving only a fine mist.
I’m surprised Cerelia is allowed to even own such a modified weapon. I can’t even shoot it while holding it with all 4 of my arms due to the recoil! She says it’s registered as a ceremonial weapon. I suppose a sudden funeral is a ceremony in itself.
I smirk at the thought before returning my attention to this gross captain wrapped up in my tail.
Cerelia, Altrin Female, Captain of The Opal Star
I let out a relaxed sigh as I released the trigger from my grip. I don’t particularly enjoy battle, but there seems to be something within my own instincts that triggers dopamine at the end of a battle.
Probably something to do with Altrins being a hunter race before we were modern and spacefaring. Might have to ask a historian about that, if not at the very least a psychologist.
I lower my rifle as Triwt slithers down the hall, her fur was undeniably red in a few spots where it came into contact with Jordan’s blood, but it was mostly on her uniform. She keeps moving with the Alcoranth Captain getting dragged along by Triwt’s tail as she had already bound up and gagged them.
“I can deal with the blood of Jordan Cores, but take this bastard away from me before I slit his throat for getting mucus on my tail.”
Oh, she is pissed. She’s just doing a good job at mostly containing it.
I nod before speaking, “Just knock him out for now and we’ll put him in a cryopod or something. His slime-like excretions from his skin might make him an easy flight risk since we can assume he can slip out of handcuffs and other bindings fairly easily.”
Triwt nods at me and uses a Stun Baton to knock him out for now after hitting him with probably more volts than regulated.
I suppose it’s better than bashing his head against the wall until he passes out.
The remaining guards who were left with me take the now prisoner captain away from Triwt and begin transporting him to a cryopod room meant for emergencies like if the ship’s thrusters were to stop working and we’re years away from rescue.
We could just set up an SOS frequency broadcast and then put everyone in cryo until rescue arrives. But now, it’s a makeshift prison for a cowardly pirate.
Now… for the real battle in all of this. The battle on the inside.
Lys, Verkrawn Male, Fauna Research Specialist
Silence. Well, except my ears are ringing from the sound of gunfire that has now stopped.
I take in a shaky breath in what feels like the first time in forever. Everything is shaking now that the fighting seems to have stopped. It seems I’m not the only one who was holding their breath for so long as other crew members near me seemed to breathe in, while a few start to break down crying.
We’re not fighters like security, Triwt, or Cerelia. Most of us had never seen people die, to say the least how brutal it was to see how Jordan Cores attacked the Alcoranth. I feel my face with my clawed hands and feel the warm liquid of my tears running down my face.
When did I start crying?
The realization hit me like a powerloader as it’s my turn to break down crying, my own legs failing me as they shook before I found myself weeping on the floor as the thoughts and emotions flooded my head with what happened and how terrible this was. I keep crying as I feel the large paw of my older sister as she slowly sits me up and holds me in a warm embrace. It makes me think about when I was younger. The days when she and I were in the orphanage. She used to hold me just like this after she would chase away the older kids who would be mean to me. I still remember some of the things she’d say to them.
“I don’t care if a Verkawn’s scales can deflect most bullets, he still has feelings!” The first thing she ever said to the bullies as she chased them off. It was also the day I met her. She had lost her family due to a Slaver raid on the colony world she was living on at the time. She didn’t tell me much about it, and I doubt she would tell me even today, but she always called me her little brother, so I started calling her my older sister. It’s been like that since.
I keep crying until it’s more of a sniffle as I slowly return the embrace.
“They will never hurt you like they hurt me, Lys.” She whispers to me before slowly turning her attention to the crew members with a sad expression. “Nor any of you. Oh, none of this was ever supposed to happen.”
“Y-You can’t predict pirates, Cerelia”
“I know, but they got so close to hurting and enslaving you. I failed to keep you all safe.”
“Cerelia, we’re fine. No one got hurt physically. We should probably just go to the nearest planetary city, maybe see some therapists and psychologists while the ship gets repaired.”
Cerelia nods as she thinks about what I said.
“Yeah, but what about the furless beast? What are we supposed to do about it?” A member says as everyone was slowly coming to grips that they are alive and well. “Are we just going to keep it here? Who knows if it’ll attack us again like it did to Lys or that Alcoranth on the floor there!?”
“He was scared!” Cerelia counters, with a hint of personal anger in her tone. “He couldn’t understand us and was only trying to escape because he thought he was in danger!”
“He was in danger? He is the danger for all I’ve seen!” They countered as I felt like shrinking down and hiding away, before a bit more of an emotional burning sensation rose up in me.
“Shut up!” I suddenly snapped. Silence follows as they wait for me to say something. I have never raised my voice.
“Sure, they found us in here because Jordan Cores had a chip on him, but he didn’t know about it! Not only that, but he at least protected us from that psychopath, breaking his own body and getting shot before doing so! You haven’t even had time to interact with him. While my interactions with him were brief, I could at least tell that he was scared and that he was sorry!” I huff as I silently cry while I look at both Cerelia and the crew member. I think their name is R’dorn. They’ve always been brash and rude, so I had a tendency to avoid them.
R’dorn looks at me annoyed, but as they are seemingly unable to come up with a good counter argument, they storm out of the safe room.
I look at Cerelia and Triwt before sighing and sitting down. “Sorry…”
“It’s alright, you kinda said what we were all thinking.” Someone says as they place a wing on me. “That, and R’dorn needs to shut up every now and then.” There’s sounds of agreement before it becomes a group embrace of comfort. Much different to huddling in fear.
“So wait, where is Jordan Cores now? Is he okay?”
“He’s in Med Bay 07’s only regeneration pod. He’s going to be fine, but it won’t be a while until he’s out due to his injuries.” Triwt responds as she slithers to the entrance of the room. “How about everyone gets cleaned up, or takes a hot shower to calm their nerves, and in about 2 hours time, we can see how Jordan Cores is holding up?”
That sounds like a good idea. To wash away the stress and some time to think, it sounds super nice.
I let out a sigh and nod. “Yeah, that sounds good to me… I’ll be there then. I guess if everyone else wants to show up, you can as well? Not like I can stop you or force you to, but the suggestion is there. Just trying to be considerate.”
With that, I stand up and I’m escorted back to my room to try and freshen up and clear my head.
And that is chapter 9! I was personally a little bit of mental and emotional wreck while writing because sometimes I don't know what I'm doing. At least that's how it feels. Gonna try and do some experimenting as I kinda want to explore some places now as we’ve been stuck on The Opal Star since the very beginning. So what are we feeling? A desert world, tropical world, or maybe a world that’s high in gravity, but Jordan seems to be just fine? Let me know your thoughts, ideas, and suggestions below, and thank you so much for reading!
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I'm in a very dark place and I just need to rant.
I'm 32 y.o., 4 years into my PhD program in a STEM field... I have 1 published paper and 1 half-written manuscript at this point. None of my work is high impact or significantly novel/interesting.
My experience going through that PhD was completely miserable... mental health issues (anxiety, depression), isolation of COVID, cancer during my 1st year, etc. No sense of comradery at all; I work in the computational lab and everyone works from home (including my advisor). I feel so lonely and left to myself. I also have a non-negligible amount of student debt at this point.
When I started my PhD, I had high hopes. We had a core idea that we thought would carry my PhD. My advisors just told me "Oh, we could do XYZ." without concrete ideas as to how we could make that work, just a very vague idea. I was just not able to figure out a way to bring that idea to reality. It's technically beyond my ability and I feel like I don't have the expertise that I need myself (or around me). I feel like I have nothing to show for the 4 years I was enrolled. I have no sense of direction and just feel like I'm floating aimlessly.
People are trying to reassure me, "oh you've done a lot, blah blah.", but it's clear I don't have enough.
I sent my 1st draft of my PhD proposal (which took like a year to write, because of depression) to my advisor and a lot of the feedback pertains to the novelty of the work. A lot of my work is around an algorithm which is essentially a faster reimplementation and minor tweaks to another software for biomolecule design—not super novel... A lot of the content of the proposal is vague. I just don't know exactly what to do!
I feel like I'm the only one who's made it that far and who wonders whether they are going to be able to finish. All my colleagues are graduating one after another, but I just feel like I'm not moving forward. Honestly, I'm panicking, and I don't know what to do...

Using a throwaway account since this is a pretty vulnerable post.
I'm a female in my early 20s, and I'm about to graduate from college with an English degree (double concentration in literature and creative writing). My tentative plan is to become a Professor of English Literature since I've always been an avid reader and writer. I'm incredibly passionate about learning and media literacy, and there's few things I love more than discussing art and helping others develop a deeper appreciation for it (and vice versa -- I'm always eager to gain a new perspective on something). I have no teaching experience (yet), but I feel like I have a lot of potential in this field.
Here's the thing, though: I struggle with intense feelings of social anxiety and shame. I have very little work experience due to feeling incompetent outside of my wheelhouse in English. Because I'm so anxious in social situations, I struggle to be present and often say/do things that come across as "ditzy" or awkward. I'm very afraid of how I'm being perceived, so I internally freak out -- I'm stuck inside my head instead of being present with those around me (other students, professors, coworkers, acquaintances, basically anyone who isn't in my close circle of friends and family). I feel like I have a reputation of being elusive, isolated, and/or sketchy because I tend to keep to myself and people pick up on my nervous energy (hence the "sketchy" vibes). I have internalized these feelings of incompetency and awkwardness and, as a result, my self-esteem is very low. I have been labeled as socially inept and unintelligent, and I often worry that these things are true. These feelings are made worse by my tendency to compare myself to others. While I know comparison is a losing game, I can't help but observe the accomplishments and talents of others and see the deficit of those things in myself... I recognize that this is an unhealthy mindset and am working hard to change that. I'm often my own worst enemy, so I'm trying to practice self-compassion in order to grow and become a more authentic, uninhibited version of myself. I know that, in order to achieve my goals (e.g., become a better writer, improve social skills, become a professor one day), I need to cultivate more confidence and self-trust. I've carried these feelings of shame for a long time, so it's going to take awhile to deconstruct them, but I'm trying to trust the process and believe in a brighter future.
Also, some context that may or may not be important: I'm in therapy and it's been a great resource. My therapist and I think that I could be on the autism spectrum as well. I'm not currently diagnosed so I hesitate to mention it, but I feel like it explains a lot of my discomfort socializing, the intense "special interest" in my field of study, and my heightened sensitivity (emotional and physical sensitivity -- I get overstimulated easily).
Here are some general questions I have for y'all, but feel free to share whatever insight you feel is appropriate:
What advice do you have for someone struggling with intense shame and social anxiety? How do you detach from other people's perception of you? How do you build genuine, lasting self-esteem?
Also, if there are any professors and/or writers here, what advice do you have for a fledgling undergrad?!

Hi, outsider to 3D printing here. I’m wanting to formulate a proof of concept for an art project, and I’m wondering if it’s possible to write a script/program for a 3D printer to basically script the movement it does (but not actually print anything/use filament)
For example, say I wanted to write a script that would raise the printer head (is that what it’s called?) by 0.02 inches, then move the printer head 2 inches on the x axis, 3 on the y axis, over an interval of 2 seconds. Would something like that be possible?
My end proof of concept would be the program input being something like a json file that’s just a large array of sequential coordinates, with some amount of metadata associated with them (e.g. interval of time between translation from point a -> point b). The program would just move the printer head head to each point until it has exhausted all points in the file.
Would this be possible to do with a 3D printer? I don’t own one, but my roommate does. Again I have zero understanding of how 3D printing works, but I have a computer science and math background.

I am NOT OOP, OOP is u/MediumGrouchy5547
Originally posted to TrueOffMyChest
I found my sister who disappeared from everyone more than 15 years ago after she ran away from home
Trigger Warnings: abandonment, depression, self-harm, eating disorder, possible mental health issues
Editor’s Note: TCA stands for trastornos de la conducta alimentaria which translates into “eating disorder”
Rastafarian: a religious movement
Original Post: April 26, 2024
I'm really happy and confused and I really don't know if I can talk about this with friends and family but I need to share my experience with someone because I missed my sister. I don't need or want any advice since no one really knows the situation to be able to give a good advice without assuming things they don't know and it's weird to read people talking about my sister like if they know what she lived, I just want to share this and I know a lot of people have had experiences like this too so maybe someone can relate.
When I was 10 years old my older sister who was 22 at that time disappeared after leaving a note to our parents saying that she's okay and just wants to start over her life.
My sister was always a lonely but outgoing person, she always told me that she enjoyed solitude from time to time and noisy things took away from her quality of life because tbh it was loud LOUD where we lived and it was annoying even for me (we lived in a dangerous neighborhood so it wasn't too safe and she hated not being able to go for a walk at night or do things at night alone), she was depressed and I remember seeing her suffering from severe anxiety attacks, she used to hit herself to stop them and she had a strong TCA that triggered those things. She suffered from other mental issues as well and talked freely about that, she talked about those things in front of me and these are things that leave a mark on you.
She was the favorite of the whole family although mi parents never out pressure on her, they always let us do our life (my brother who was 19 at that time knows that, my sister was the golden child), my grandfather always made it clear that she is his favorite granddaughter, even now. She was the calm but funny kind of person, she was the closest to my parents and uncles so when she disappeared from one day to the next no one understood what was going on.
Even my sister had never traveled alone except to go to work and she always notified my mother that she was okay for safety reasons. She left a long note clarifying that she doesn't want to be searched but she loves us. It was a big blow for the family, I remember my mother wanting to report to the police but they said that my sister was not a minor and the note said that she left by her own so they can't do anything.
In a way, my other brother knew that this would happen at some point, since our sister mentioned a lot that she wanted to leave everything and go live in the countryside or become a nun and live in a calm place without any worries but nobody took her seriously about that. She was always the kind of person who did things without telling anyone, she liked her solitude sometimes even if she was always friendly.
The first months and weeks were strange, it wasn't that she had passed away but that she disappeared because she wanted to, I remember my mother missing her because they always shared the afternoons together.
I also missed her a lot, Even years later my family missed her and at Christmas or her birthday someone would always say "maybe she'll show up now" or we would wonder how she's doing or if she was alive.
Back to the present. I'm on vacation in the south of my country (This part of my country is very expensive for a tourist and I am the only one in my family who was able to come now that I am an adult), it's a place full of villages and while I was exploring I came to a place where they sold typical handicrafts of the place.
While shopping I can swear that the first thing I saw was my sister looking at some crafts on a shelf, she looked more adult but obviously I recognized her instantly, we are really similar after all.
I didn't really knew how to react after so many years and I didn't know how she would react, but I went over and said her name. What I didn't expected was that she would smile instantly when she saw me and called me by my nickname. I thought she had escaped because she didn't wanted anything to do with the family even if in the note she said she loves us, but she was greeting me as if nothing had happened.
She told me that she didn't expected to see me there and asked me if I was on vacation, she said that the village used to be not so touristy but now more people started to go and many villagers opened stores for the tourists. I was upset, I was angry with her for leaving us and pretending that nothing happened but I couldn't react so I just asked her if she lives in that town and she said yes, It's a place filled with old people.
We talked for a few seconds, she asked me what I'm studying and if everyone at home is okay, she told me I'm taller and thinner. Then she gave me a kiss on the cheek and told me that if I have a few days off I can go visit her but she doesn't have a cell phone so she told me that she's almost everyday there. My sister also told me to send hugs to our parents.
I'm confused and full of questions about her, she doesn't even wants to hide, she didn't looked or talked to me like someone who wanted to run away from something and hide. She was just happy to see me and happy to know that we were all good.
But I also feel resentment for her when I think about all that our parents and grandparents suffered when she disappeared, making my mother feel that she was a bad mother because she couldn't protect her.
But I'm ambivalent as I'm also happy to know that she's okay and that she doesn't hate me or the family but I'm also confused, Her behavior wasn't that of someone who is hiding or who doesn't want to know anything about her past, she was just happy to hear about us.
Edit: I'm sorry but there are people who clearly don't read the post, there are literally people saying that I didn't even knew my sister and commenting as if they knew her and taking things for granted about her life, there are even people saying that they don't understand why I'm 'angry' (it's just a feeling, a normal feeling, it's not that I hate her and I will treat her badly, god. Nor will I talk to my family without talking to her first, at what point in the post did I say that I'm going to expose her? I'm never going to treat her badly either because I have no reason to do so, It's crazy how half the comments draw silly conclusions) with my sister when i literally say it up there, even if my English is bad because it's not my first language, just read the post before you want to get a few likes for some unnecessary advice.
Additional Information from OOP on his sister’s note

OOP: My sister in the note said that she loves our parents, my brother was 19 when our sister left and he himself knows how much our parents loved and supported her when she was having a hard time with herself but the outside always affected her badly.
I was ten years old but I wasn't a baby and I remember what the family dynamic was like, I remember the feeling of my family, my parents are not narcissists and my sister loved them and they love who's my sister, she just had her own problems.
How could a parent miss the idea of their children? There's not a day when my parents don't miss everything about my sister, they miss sharing the day with her, my father even missed when she was cranky. My parents always let us go our own way and I can assure you that they never pressured us to be what they wanted us to be, I don't even know what they want us to be.

Relevant Comments
Mil1512: Is your sister neurodivergent?
With the hitting herself when struggling with anxiety and enjoying solitude.
I'm neurodivergent and my family live in another country. I honestly forget to talk to them most of the time and only really do because my mum messages me first. If she didn't we just wouldn't talk. Not due to any hate or anything, I'm just happy doing my own thing.

OOP: She's not. My sister had a lot of self-destructive behaviors and hurting herself was one of them when she felt 'fat', she also had eating disorders and panic attacks because of that. I don't remember too much but she did other things to not eat besides hitting herself, she was very open about her TCA and yes, she has a diagnosis from a professional.
My sister was always in touch with my mother and everyone in text, she always used to keep in touch when she was going out until the day she left, now she doesn't even have a phone. In her note she just said that she wanted to leave everything

mikuzgrl: It almost seems like the sister has been in contact with someone for a while and thinks news is being passed back and forth.

OOP: I never thought about that but I don't think so, seeing how my parents miss her I think the first thing the family would do would be to at least tell my father that she is okay :/

 
Can people just stop with the aggressive messages? Weirdos: May 1, 2024
I understand that many reflect their personal traumas in this site, but I literally received passive-aggressive messages calling me idiot or even telling me that I would hate my sister if she were neurodivergent or claiming that my parents abused her.
What's wrong with y'all? Go to a psychologist and stop reflecting your unresolved traumas in the story of a person you don't even know. Go out and touch grass and talk to a real person instead of literally sending private messages like that.
I didn't asked for any advice and just wanted to share my story because that's the point of that subreddit, but many took it the wrong way and decided to turn something positive into a way to fight.
I don't even understand why out of nowhere I started getting those kinds of messages or if someone share that post on a weird place.
 
Editor’s Note: TLP is trastorno límite de la personalidad which translates into Borderline Personality Disorder
Update: May 7, 2024
On sunday I finally found my sister again, she was selling things in the park with other stands, all of them are rastafari, not hippies or a sect. I walked over and she greeted me just as happily, we talked a couple of things and my sister told me that she doesn't have a cell phone so it was impossible for her to tell me that she wouldn't be there on Saturday.
I spent the afternoon with her at her stand and after that we went to her house, she lives alone (and sometimes with her friends). We talked for a while and at one point she broke down and hugged me, saying she was trying to stay calm all this time and didn't knew how to react because she didn't wanted to make me cry too bc she remembered that I was really sensitive but she couldn't hold it anymore. We cried and talked a lot.
My sister was tired of people, she said that our house was her safe place but hated the idea of having to work everyday and I didn't wanted to study anything, she was our parents' golden child, so they let her do whatever she wanted, but she knew that at some point she had to make something of her life. She was tired of how stupid and empty everyone was, of the politicians, of the TV showing empty things, of the noise everywhere outside when she wanted peace, even sleeping in our home was stressful for everyone because of the noises outside during the weekends when she wanted to be alone to smoke and listen music (tbh, In my memories as a child I didn't remember the obvious smell of joints that my sister had all the time)
That added to the pressure that society put on her to be physically perfect make her want to leave everything behind.
She didn't wanted to die but realized that my parents were miserable when they saw her being miserable, this is something I didn't know, but my sister said that our father had two jobs to be able to pay for her psychologist and medication, also my father used to spoil her a lot with the only food she eat without guilty. Running away was like dying symbolically.
My sister says that although our parents always supported her, she felt like a failture for not being able to improve and always relapsing, she felt bad to see our father working so hard and also wanted to live according to her spiritual mentality, free from all that is toxic in society.
All of those things make her ran away from everything, she felt like a burden and also didn't wanted to live a life working and miserable like everyone.
Sis told me that she never contacted us because she doesn't wants to have a cell phone and a trip to our province is too expensive to her because it's basically going from one end of the country to the other.
She hates capitalist society with all her soul and doesn't even have a TV. My sister said that she is much better now away from the city. My sister told me that she wants to talk to our parents but doesn't knows what to say and we don't want to give them parents a shock since our dad was sick a few days ago and is recovering from dengue.
I'm writing this with her beside me and doesn't understand what's the point of this site (The last social network she used was fotolog in 2007) but said that she doesn't mind if I post this. She wanted to write something but said she doesn't like writing in English haha
My sister was reading the comments and wants me to clarify that she never suffered any kind of a abuse, she has a lot of friends and never had any problem with anyone but likes to be alone from time to time to meditate.
And she's not neurodivergent (She said her behavior was normal because of her TLP), suffers from ED, borderline personality disorder and see a psychologist twice a month.
During her adolescence, the blogs Ana and mia were trendy, her friends had that 'aesthetic' and she was popular in fotolog (according to my sister, at that time it was taken as an aesthetic and even a book about that was really popular between teens, maybe someone from my country knows Abzurdah?). She hated going out when she felt fat, she couldn't have imperfections like cuts on her arms so she hurt herself with a rubber band when she overate, something she read in those blogs. Now she's in a good weight but it took her really long to not relapse again. It's been a long recovery for her and once you're anorexic you never stop being anorexic, she's always afraid of relapsing.
So that's it for now, we don't know how we're going to talk with our parents without making them freak out. And also my sister after seeing the comments on the post saw other reddit posts and said that her life is definitely better without a cell phone, she says that things like fotolog was the beginning of all evil haha
Relevant Comments
OOP on his sister being involved with Rastafari

OOP: Idk how it is in other countries to be honest, my sister doesn't live in community and there are no camps, she's one of the few who has a house because most of them prefer to travel around the country.
I really think it's impossible for them to be 100% Rastafarian here tbh because we are from South America and the Rastafarian community here is obviously totally different from the REAL Rastafarians, they just follow most of the philosophy
Edit: for example, my sister doesn't consider herself Rastafarian but she share some points of the philosophy they have, I don't know how the rest of them thinks

 

DO NOT COMMENT IN LINKED POSTS OR MESSAGE OOPs – BoRU Rule #7

THIS IS A REPOST SUB - I AM NOT OOP

• Total budget (In local currency) and country of purchase: $700-1K
  
• Are you open to refurbs/used? Yes, as long as warranty is a good one?
  
• How would you prioritize form factor, build quality, performance, and battery life?
  
• Performance, 2. Battery, 3. Form factor, 4. Build quality
  
• Do you have a preferred screen size? If indifferent, put N/A. N/a (not too small though)
  
• Are you doing any CAD/video editing/photo editing/gaming? List which programs/games you desire to run. Not really
  
• If you're gaming, do you have certain games you want to play? At what settings and FPS do you want? Not for gaming
  
• Any specific requirements such as good keyboard, touch-screen, finger-print reader, optical drive or good input devices (keyboard/touchpad)? Nothing specific
  
• Leave any finishing thoughts here that you may feel are necessary and beneficial to the discussion. Wanting something with SSD for speed. Decent Ram. Will@be mostly a work, school, paper writing, zoom/teams calls, etc. nothing crazy fancy, but reliable.
  

370, got fired today.
i’ve had a creeping feeling for a while now that my SM wanted me gone, not sure why, but given that two of my three write ups leading up to my separation earlier today were either partly or completely uncalled for, outside of policy, and even cruel, i can’t say i’m surprised. i was fighting demons to not flip my lid and say all of the cutting things that have been bouncing around in my head for months now to my SM during the firing, but im glad i didn’t, as it wouldn’t have changed anything. i did drop a few sentences about the way she runs her store and a petty comment wishing her luck training the new barista she hired, but other than lamenting about how much i would miss my regulars, i left it at that.
it does suck a little bit because i JUST got health insurance back in march and it helped me feel secure, but tbh i will not really miss almost anything about that job. I will miss my regulars and my fellow baristas, they helped me get through some really rough days and i owe so much to them. i do feel sad to think that it’s unlikely for me to see any of my regulars again out in the wild.
sbux really was just a means to an end for me, though, and now that i don’t have to worry about clocking in to guaranteed misery four days a week i finally have time to fully pursue my career and my art, which is fantastic.
cheers to all of y’all still hanging on, get out while you can. goodbye, bux. :’)
eta: also, she’s trying to climb the corporate ladder and a is writing baristas up left and right, so, again, not surprised haha

*Update*: Actually O(N) computation steps(not O(Nlog N)) and O(log N) time.
I think I figured out how to do self-attention in transformer models in O(NlogN) computation steps rather than O(N^2), with a caveat. I'm not trying to be an academic, so I don't care to publish this formally, but I thought that some people might be interested. My construction is not efficient or practical, but the fact that it can be done at all might motivate further work to find efficient alternatives.
tl;dr Use the parallel scan[1] technique to compute taylor series basis functions needed to compute the causal self-attention layer and sum these together weighted by the values vector and 1 to get the numerator and denominator of the softmax activation of the full causal self-attention layer. The basis functions that you have to compute are both the basis functions for the numerator of the self-attention layer, $$\sum_{i=0}^{j-1} k(i)_a^n q(j)_b^m v(i)$$ and the normalization $\sum_{i=0}^{j-1} k(i)_a^n q(j)_b^m$. k(i)_a^n is component-a of the ith key vector raised to the power of n multiplied by q(j)_b^m which is component-b of the jth query vector raised to the power of m, which is multiplied by the value vector at position i in the first equation and by 1 in the second, and all summed together. Once you can do this, you've computed a basis function for a Taylor series. Multiply each basis function by a coefficient and sum them together to create an arbitrary function of k(i) and q(j). Using this technique, we can compute the Taylor series approximation for the numerator and the denominator of the softmax activation each taking logN * {number of coefficients} parallel steps, or O(N) sequential steps by treating the accumulation as a type of RNN.

Background

I was inspired to think about this because I was implementing MAMBA[2] and trying to understand what kind of non-linearities can be created using the parallel scan technique. The parallel scan technique is a way of parallelizing recursive formulas. If you don't know what parallel scan is, let me demonstrate with an example. The simplest example of the parallel scan technique is computing all partial sums of a sequence of numbers in log(N) time. Imagine you have a sequence [a_1, a_2, a_3, a_4, ...]. You can compute all partial sums by first adding a_i to a_{i -1}, where a_{-1} is zero, and generally a_{-n} is defined to be zero. Then take the result, call it r = [a_1, a_1+a_2, a_2 + a_3, ...], and compute r_i + r_{i-2}, which gives [a_1, a_1+a_2, a_1+a_2+a_3, ...]. The first 4 partial sums are already complete. The next step would be r_i + r_{i-2**2}, and the next step, just increase the power of 2 until i-2**power is negative for every i in the sequence. It basically sums groups, and then sums those groups together, and so on and so forth until the partial sum at each position is calculated. The scan technique is a way to parallelize an RNN. Essentially, you remove some nonlinearities in the RNN so that recurrence equation becomes associative. Once it is associative, you can compute the hidden state at each position of the sequence in log N parallel steps, where each parallel step has O(N) parallel computations.

The Meat of It

In the background section, I explained how to compute a partial sum in O(log(N)) time and O(NlogN) computation steps (or O(N) time and O(N) computation steps by using RNNs) using the parallel scan technique. I'll use this now to construct the Taylor series for causal self-attention layer used in transformer models.
Let's assume we have a tensor x of shape (sequence_length, embedding_dim), and we can compute the query, key and value tensors from x using q=Qx, k=Kx and v=Vx, where Q, K and V are matrices. Compute y = (k[:,i]**n)*v. Now use the parallel scan technique to accumulate the partial sums of every vector in y, which will give ParallelPartialSum(y)=[y[0,:], y[0,:]+y[1,:], ...]. Now multiply the result by q[:,j]**m, and now we have a basis function for a Taylor series expansion. The full formula is q[:,j]**m * ParallelPartialSum((k[:,i]**n)*v). Next, we can add up these functions for different powers of n and m using coefficients to approximate any function. The final equation is \sum_{n, m} A_{n, m} q[:,j]**m * ParallelPartialSum((k[:,i]**n)*v).
What is left is to find the Taylor series coefficients A_{n, m} and to calculate the normalization for the softmax. I'm not actually going to give an equation for A_{n, m}, but I will show that it can be done. First, I'm just going to write $q \cdot k$ in place of $q[:,j,:] \cdot k[:,i,:]$ to make it easier to write and read. We want the Taylor series of $exp(q \cdot k) = 1 + (q \cdot k) + (q \cdot k)**2 / 2! + ... + (q \cdot k)**n / n! + ...$. To find the Taylor series coefficient for every component of q and component of k and every power of each, you'd have to expand out (q \cdot k)**n /n! for every n. It can be done but I'm not going to do it. Just assume that A_{n, m} is equal to these coefficients, and voila, we have the numerator of the softmax equation for self-attention. We still need the denominator. To compute the denominator of the softmax over attention scores, you compute the same sum replacing the value tensor with the number 1. $\sum_{n, m} A_{n, m} x[:,j]**m * ParallelPartialSum((x[:,i]**n))$, where again the value vector at the end of the equation is removed. The final equation for the causal self-attention layer is:
$$ (\sum_{n, m} A_{n, m} q[:,j]**m * ParallelPartialSum((k[:,i]**n)*v)) / (\sum_{n, m} A_{n, m} q[:,j]**m * ParallelPartialSum((k[:,i]**n))) $$
Where again, A_{n, m} are the Taylor series coefficients for exp( q \cdot k).

Take-Aways

One big take away from this work, is that since causal self-attention can be calculated using the parallel scan technique, and since a parallel scan can be computed with an RNN, it follows that full causal self-attention can be computed with RNNs. The caveat is that you need many RNNs, one for each Taylor series basis function, so to get a good enough approximation of the softmax activation, you'd probably need a lot of coefficients, more than would be practical. On the other hand, what if there is a related activation that does the job of the softmax, but can be constructed with far fewer parallel scans? Then full causal self-attention could be done using only a few RNNs. Also, there are other basis functions that can be computed with one parallel scan, for instance, basis functions for a Fourier series can be computed with one parallel scan.
Non-linear activations are necessary for neural networks to work well. Linear RNNs can be parallelized using parallel scans, and since it is a linear function, one might think that this technique is not as powerful as other neural network layers. One shouldn't make the mistake to think that only linear RNN can be parallelized with linear scans. Non-linear RNNs can also be parallelized so long as the recursive update rule is associative. One might think that this restriction somehow makes the model weaker, I did, at first. But if associative recursion formulas are enough to create transformers(albeit inefficiently), then it stands to reason that they can do anything a transformer can, which is a lot. The only question is whether it's possible to come up with an efficient activation. Maybe MAMBA already did, maybe there is something better.
[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Prefix_sum
[2] https://arxiv.org/abs/2312.00752

Update

Actually there is a better algorithm for the parallel scan given in the wiki link above[1]. That means that causal self-attention can be calculated with O(log N) time and O(N) steps instead of O(NlogN) steps.*

I’m so itchy!! And I don’t know why. I’m honestly at a loss of words at the time of writing this…
This isn’t like anything I’ve dealt with before, because there’s no other symptoms to indicate what it is.
I don’t think it’s a yeast infection because I don’t have any yeast down there, plus I tried creams and stuff to heal a yeast infection thinking maybe it could’ve been and it felt just as bad or worse after applying.
I don’t think it’s bv because there is no unusual smell, there is no burning, it’s just so horribly itchy….
It can’t be an std or anything of the sort as I’ve been tested for them before and came back negative, and haven’t been sexually active in over two years.
I went to Walmart to buy vagasil anti itch extra strength as a last resort because I just don’t know what to do anymore, but I don’t think it’s really working. There is no other symptoms other than extreme itching. It’s so bad it’s waking me up from sleep, or interrupting me at work, or just messing with my everyday. Nothing I’ve done is fixing it and I don’t know how to get myself help. I’ve been considering going to the sexual health clinic but I don’t even know what I’d say or ask for and that can take some time to get an appointment and this is torture. I’m losing sleep over this.
I thought maybe it could be eczema because I also have eczema on other body parts but it’s not dry or anything, or maybe even just hormonal changes? But that just doesn’t sound right. Please I’m begging y’all, I need help 😭
Realizing I should add in, I don’t use scented products down there or douche either.

Dearest gentle readers, did you miss me? it’s time for season 2! I’m gonna try to do all 8 episodes before s3 drops
Episode 1

• Daphne’s bangs have transformed from pringles mustache to a lovely diadem of hair
• I love lady danbury’s structural lace collar capelet
• The featherington mourning wear is twice as unflattering
• Lol @ gregory rolling his eyes about anthony’s list
• The art in the opening credits is interesting. The texture of it reminds me of a video game
• Ah penelope knows her worth and raised her prices. We love to see it
• Sharpening my knives for all of you damn girl
• pen’s fake irish accent is somehow different than nic’s real irish accent
• “Theyre the ones running around while you sit on your arse” get ‘im girl
• “All the young ladies looked the same” rude
• Violet: you want to give my treasured ring to just some girl? Do you have no respect for love? for me?
• The brothel scenes always crack me up because its just a bunch of big velvet curtains and some candelabras in the background. but Ive never been to a brothel so maybe thats accurate
• Anthony’s perfect lady: independent, intelligent, agreeable, no mama drama. May i suggest a golden retriever
• Anthony did not come off as this heavy-headed, overly burdened with responsibility tortured poet soul in season 1
• Kate!!
• Anthony is surprised and turned on
• It sounds like kate says “Oh fuck it” when he pulls up next to her but the captions say [speaks hindi] does anyone know what shes saying?
• Anthony is absolutely smitten. The stubborn dumbass
• Newton! LD is not a dog person
• The mature age of “six and twenty” keels over as an elderly 31yr old
• Eloise has a new ribbon hat contraption. This one has a round felt disc a la a beret
• Pens face as el talks shit about LW >:(
• Potatoes again?? Yes please
• Favorite fun fact: potatoes are an excellent source of vitamins and minerals, and adding cheese adds calcium/vitamin d and makes it a complete vitamin source. My daily intake of cheesy potatoes is like a flintstone vitamin
• Lol the feather’s maid is like why dont you try selling some of this fancy shit if you need money so bad
• Kate has a blue ribbon braided in her hair. Its so pretty. This cerulean shade looks stunning on her. She’s wearing the bridgerton blue from day 1 ♥️
• Edwina’s perfect match: charming, handsome, a duke or a prince. Might i suggest a king charles spaniel?
• Kate’s perfect match: someone who understands her on a deep spiritual level. Might i suggest anthony
• As the sharmas walk into the ball, theres a horse pulling a carriage that looks like its feet are tied together or something. Its doing the strangest walk
• I love the classical version of material girl
• QC like hi mary still hate you bitch ok bye
• Benedict stealing el away from the gentleman version of chucky
• You know, the gossipy quality of the ton is a great way to give viewers background info
• Fake tears always work
• Phili and finch will make beautiful cheese babies
• LD: anthony is a perfect suitor Edwina: dibs Kate: goddamn it
• Anthony’s smile when he sees kate again 😍
• I want to reach through the tv and smoosh their faces together right now. This annoying adorable banter is too much “You find my smile pleasing?”
• LD and violet like shall we do it again this year? pick another perfect match together?
• Pen is an excellent business woman. 10 pounds for 1 LW edition? Thats more than a thousand bucks in todays money. Girliepop is a girl boss. A true she-e-o
• Aw regency chucky has a crush on eloise
• I sympathize with kate. I am also dreadful and unpleasant
• Benedict trying to get it in with madame delacroix again
• Anthony can dish it out but sure cant take it
• Lower those expectations and settle for someone - violet
• Pen writing to colin. THREE MORE DAYSSS
• LD dressing kate down like girl. I opened my home to you. You really gonna stand here and lie to my face
• Love that kate comes clean and LD is like okay good now that thats out in the open lets get this girl hitched. I can scheme too
• Agan kate in blue here is so beautiful
• I love QCs laugh
• I would rather die! Well well how the turntables
• Pen: i have managed to find joy in this whole spectacle Eloise: WOW so you hate feminism
• LD really looked at kate like watch this and then got edwina diamond-ed
• Edwina: i love a man who knows what he wants and is direct Anthony: doesn’t know what he wants and sniffs kate
• LW: suddenly writing feminist rhetoric Eloise: wow what coincidence i was JUST talking to penelope about this
• I love that QCs wigs have natural textured hair in them

okay good night! thanks for reading