I have been playing as Soviets on hard difficulty. It feels pretty difficult as the attacker. It's very difficult to break the Axis defenses. Historically, wasn't the Soviet so powerful that the Axis defenses broke easily asf?? So, the Army General mechanics made favor Axis? So that they can defend much better than reality/actual battles? For example, historically, Soviets had thousands of artillery to start an attack, but in game we can only slowly build up the artillery?

There was magic, once.
When everything in the world seemed like something new, when memories yet lived. There was that… chill of excitement. You knew it was that mysterious magic, you could feel it flowing like electricity in the air around you. A warmth; a comfort. It was a rhythm—a melody, where each note resonated through your bones, leaving you wanting more.
There are eight senses, you know. Everyone knows the first five—Touch, Taste, Sight, Sound, and Smell—the innate guiding forces built for the spacial axis, but nobody ever gives the same import to the pair relating to the chronal axis: consciousness and memory. Present and past, respectively [thelastonehasnoname].
Let your fear become focus. Focus, sensation, instinct. Wild; brimming with light. White hot potential condensed to a single point of countless echoing infinities, looping back into you.
The Sliver was a place like none other. A kaleidoscopic tunnel of fractures, like the throat of an immeasurable crystal beast, painted in a range of sparkling purples and pinks by some unseen light source. It called to my soul with a powerful vibration, begging me to explore every inch of its majestic and terrifying unknown… to take it all within myself. I tore through the veil.
Up. I have to go higher, have to push harder, further. There is purpose in the thrill, I feel it in my soul. Write more! I scream. My mind goes blank. [keepgoing] I close my eyes, breathe deep, feel the chill shoot through me.
I look within: A dark sphere begins to crack, spewing forth light. I feel I should cry, yet no tears fall. Instead, I am filled with energy. A cold, ambivalent flame of a thousand mirrored reflections burns inside me. My skin begins to glow bright white from within, but suddenly disperses in an outward pulse. Then again. Again; again. [totherhythym] I lose myself, then return, then fade.
A reminder. A boundary. My eyes flutter open.
The storm of anxiety always seems to cloud my thoughts, yet it is in the eye of the storm where I find my head is the most clear. I dream of a beautiful golden supernova [waitturnaround]. A familiar voice calls to me from long ago: Do not force your mind to calm, let your body become the calm, and the rest of you shall follow by instinct. Ringing. Ringing. Endless ringing.
Suddenly, I am flying. Lifted into the sky by wings of golden light. Wonder and awe consume every shadow of doubt, and I am free for approximately three to five minutes. I understand; I see the path.
Reality sets in. I sit again in deafening silence, and the feeling is gone. Nothing feels the same anymore. I could listen again, but with diminishing returns. The feeling is gone. That place is gone [thatplacewasneverreal].
I see thousands upon thousands of distant flickering candles. They split before me, forming speckled walls of light at my sides, leaving only darkness before me. Calling; calling. I hear the calls of the dark. Whispers and ringing. I see a single radiant sphere of blue.
Suddenly, I am frozen in the fear of stagnancy; sharpened to a point. The me who is writing these words will die. I realize they will never see the light of tomorrow, forever trapped in the limbo of those “yesterday thoughts” which once defined them as me. Yet, I will continue on, the visage of the past left forgotten in the annals of a scattered subconscious. Now is the envy of all of the dead.

Hi all,
New to PBI, but decent enough with database and programming concepts.
I have two power queries generated from two separate sources.
Query “Projections” contains the fields: Company ID, Quarter End, Projection Type, Iteration, and Value.
Query “Actual” contains the fields Company ID, Quarter End, and Value.
Right now, I have a many to many relationship between the two tables based on Company ID
I am trying to create a line chart with values on the y axis, quarter end on the x axis, and the lines based on the values from the respective table.
I have slicers based on Company ID (projections), projection type (projections), and iteration (projections).
It successfully generates the line from the projections query, with the company selected, iteration (ie 1st projection model or a subsequent model), and type selected (ie revenue projections, expense projections, net cash flow projections).
Where it falls short is how it generates the line from the actual table. For example, it filters the actual line based on the company ID selected in the slicer, but it appears as a flat horizontal line representing the sum of all revenue across time in the actuals table, instead of basing it based on the associated quarter end.
I’ve tried seeing if there’s a way to relate the two date columns, but it will not let me create a secondary relationship as it “creates ambiguity”.
Any thoughts on how to get the data from the actuals table to relate to the quarters from the projections table on the x axis?
Thank you!

Link for all the chapters available here: Engines of Arachnea on Royal Road
High above in her hiding spot, Zildiz had heard enough. The Leapers were her kindred’s most hated of adversaries, and she could not allow them to gain even a fraction of the grey behemoth’s awesome might. An apocalyptic vision arose in her mind of titanic Leaper variants towering over the rooftops of Chthonis, setting the Parchment City alight with beams of all-destroying light emanating from their many eyes.
Four against one. Those were slim odds even under the best of circumstances. Still, she had the element of surprise, and ambush predators were often unaccustomed to being preyed upon themselves. But Leapers were notoriously difficult opponents to sneak up on as they literally had eyes on the backs of their heads. But Zildiz was a veteran of countless border skirmishes, and had learned of a small blind spot in their vision. It was above and slightly behind the axis of their posterior lateral median eyes. But many Gallivants who had tried to make their first kill that way did not survive to tell the tale—the flutter of their wings gave them away. She would have to drop straight down on her first target. No hesitation, no second chances.
She saw the alpha Leaper lean down to extract the prey-form’s gilt helix, and saw her opening.
Rene heard a branch snap somewhere above him and felt a gust of wind blow across his neck, bearing with it droplets of moisture that pattered lightly against the visor of his mask. His first thought was that it had started to rain. He glanced up at the monster to find that it had extruded a new mouthpart, some manner of sharp, serrated tongue whose tip oozed a wet and viscous fluid. Rene flinched reflexively, expecting at any moment to feel the point punching through his skull before draining out its contents like a straw. But then the blade twisted sharply, wrenching its way out of the back of the monster’s head and drenching Rene’s mask in a shower of gore, the four-eyed devil letting out a wet gurgle as it slumped over in a twitching heap.
Pawing at his mask with his bound wrists, Rene peered through his smeared vision and saw a figure standing atop the corpse that, if anything, possessed an even less lovely countenance than his erstwhile interlocutor. A bulbous compound eye stared back Rene like a shattered mirror, a thousand miniscule reflections of himself repeating across its scaly lenses.
Rene recognized the creature as one of the harpies from earlier. One of its broad wings was missing. It drew its bloodstained blade across its mandibles, casually licking the weapon clean as an eight-limbed devil leapt at the harpy from behind, letting loose a bloodcurdling scream. But the harpy did not even turn at the sound, merely pointing its other blade arm behind it and letting its attacker impale itself upon it, clean through. With its dying spasms the devil pulled itself up the length of the blade in an effort to reach the harpy, even as its two kin recovered from their surprise and pounced at the harpy from either side. What followed was a blur of movement almost too quick for the human eye to follow as the harpy spun in place, cleaving the monster on the left halfway through its sternum. In the same movement it turned the devil stuck on the end of its blade into the path of the attacker on the right, using it as a living shield. The impact still bowled the harpy over, all four of the combatants rolling on the ground in a ball of threshing limbs and furious struggle.
The din was horrendous. Siezing the golden opportunity which had presented itself, Rene reached once more for the sword of the ancients, stretching his sinews for all they were worth. It was just enough to let him pinch the pommel-button between his middle and forefingers. Raising it up in spite of his trembling, sweat-slick grip, Rene coaxed the hilt into palm of his waiting hand, then pounded the button against his chest, feeling the sword come alive in his hands. As the fight raged on behind him, Rene sliced his legs free. He tucked in his head as he hit the ground, rolling onto his arse and reversing his grip on the sword, swiftly cutting the bonds around his wrists. When he tried to stand, however, he found that his legs were still unresponsive, all the blood within them having flowed up to his torso during his time spent hanging upside down. Pounding the life back into the clammy flesh of his calves with his fist, Rene looked anxiously around and discovered that the battle had since moved elsewhere, leaving two black-furred corpses in its wake. Cries of rage and a frenzied shaking among the bushes allowed him to guess where the other monsters were. He hoisted himself to his feet, picked up the safety kit and staggered away from the sounds of fighting, pins and needles still numbing the soles of his feet.
As he stepped over the dead bodies in his path, Rene was just about to congratulate himself on a smooth escape when his toes snagged on something and he tripped, going down heavily on his side. Rene felt a powerful yank on his ankle and looked to see the previously impaled monster glaring up at him. It wriggled on its belly and pulled him closer with one hand while it held in its spilled guts with the other three. By the ancestors, was it strong! Rene hacked at the hand holding his foot and lopped it off at the forearm, feeling only the slightest tug of resistance as the edge sheared through bone and meat alike. The hand was still clamped shut about his ankle with a death grip as he stood back up.
The fiend’s back arched as it brought its vile hump of flesh to the fore, dozens of sucking orifices on its misshapen surface spreading open wide.
Thwip! Thwip!
Jets of silk flew out of the spinnerets, the monster using its claws to grasp the threads and shuttering them back and forth like the shuttles of a loom. Cords flicked out and ensnared Rene’s sword arm, pinning it to his side while the weaver applied a lightning-fast field dressing on its abdominal wound, closing off both ends with wads of its makeshift bandage. Rene strained mightily against the loops of silk, but they never budged an inch. Meanwhile, the monster raked him with its claws, opening bright lines of agony across his chest and shoulder. Rene bit back a scream and dropped the sword point-first into the soil. It sank quivering up to its hilt, leaving him completely defenseless as the monster jumped and snatched him up in its gangly embrace. Rene fell to one knee as its weight bore him to the earth, reaching out with his free hand to draw the sword out of the ground and cleave through its rows of hairy legs.
Severed limbs went rolling every which way, the black devil tottering. Yet as it fell its outer mouthparts seized Rene by the temples and pinned him in place as it bit right into his face. Venomed fangs skittered across the transparent surface of his mask, scoring it with deep scratches. To his amazement the crystal held strong and did not shatter—once more the materials of the ancients had proven their incredible durability. Rene worked his arm clear and chopped wildly at the monster’s arms, felt its hold on him slacken as they fell away, leaving only spurting stumps. The butchered devil fell on its humped back and began shrieking its head off.
Rene raised his sword to deliver the coup de grace but was interrupted by the sudden reemergence of the other combatants who burst back onto the scene. The harpy was grappling with one of the devils, quickly being overpowered by its brute strength. As the devil sank its fangs into the bulging pair of compound eyes and tore off the top of the harpy’s head, the latter found an opening and slipped both its blades through in tight uppercutting motions, ramming them under the devil’s chin and out the other end. Ripping outwards and across with its arms the harpy tore its enemy’s head apart and sent the soggy chunks scattering into the treetops.
Reeling in obvious pain, it kicked the body aside and took off with a shutter of its wings, attempting an escape. A feral scream split the air as, the last devil leapt up to intercept it, entrails dangling in the place of its missing lower body. Devoid of sanity or self-preservation, it tacked the rising harpy and sent both of them crashing into a stout branch. They fell back to the earth with a bone-crunching thump, followed by a confetti-shower of dead leaves shaken from their stems.
Rene looked back at his enemy and saw the devil stubbornly gathering itself up for another spring. All it had left were a single arm and leg apiece, that and a merciless glitter in its eyes.
“You can’t be serious,” he complained, and put an end to its efforts by splitting its head right down the middle. Rene shook his head in disbelief and went over to polish off the other two, snipping his webbed arm loose as he did. He found the bisected devil crawling on its elbows and mewling with pain as it wriggled towards the unmoving body of the harpy, clearly intending to finish what it had started.
There were eyes on the back of its head, Rene now noticed. Four of them, the same number as on the front. It saw him coming and rolled over, raising its arms to shield itself.
Rene’s boot came stomping down all the same. He felt its head crunching under his heel as he squashed it into a flattened pie and was nauseated. Rene then approached the harpy, eyeing its blade arms warily and giving it a wide berth. He didn’t want to get anywhere near those frightful things, not after what he’d seen. Instead he went over to a fallen log and cut himself an oversized club from one of its boughs. Sticking the sword back into the ground, he hefted the length of wood over the harpy, intending to smash its head in from a distance.
He felt strangely squeamish at prospect of another head going splat. A wave of dizziness came over him and he had to take a moment to collect himself, doubling over and beginning to dry heave. Leaning heavily on the bough like a staff, he examined the harpy and thought that it looked sufficiently dead. Through the gaping holes in its face he saw the gooey interior of its head. Was that its brain poking through the cracks in the armored hide? Blimey, it had a big one. Equal parts revolted and intrigued, Rene reached over with the branch and prodded at it, testing for a reflex.
Nothing. Better to be safe than sorry, though. Rene raised the bough on high and steeled himself to do the deed once and for all.
A piece of the head fell away, and Rene gasped. Abandoning common sense, he threw aside the club and squatted over the body, frantically tearing off the rest of its cranial casing, plunging his fingers into the sticky mess and pulling out clumps of armored flesh until what lay beneath was finally revealed.
Rene clutched at his forehead as if it was about to explode. Backing away with a sense of dawning horror, he repeated over and over to himself: “It can’t be. It can’t be, it can’t! That’s not possible! It’s…it’s…”
Beautiful.
That was what Rene had meant to say. But the word felt so utterly absurd given the context that it took all his will to keep from bursting into a fit of deranged laughter. And who could have blamed him?
For beneath the ruined visage of flesh, the creature wore the face of a woman.
Link for all the chapters available here: Engines of Arachnea on Royal Road

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Just to lay some background for the scenario in OTL The Popular Front was a mixture of parties from many sides of the political spectrum ranging from moderate to Communist in France. Due to a harsher WW1 more conservative elements rise to power in the UK and France as the Conservative Party is headed by a vehemently anti appeasement Winston Churchill following his election in 1931 and again in 1935 and a more moderate dominated Popular Front after Hitler rises to power calling for a crusade against Fascism. It’s the 7th of March 1936 and the German army has marched into the Rhineland and claims it is merely marching into its own territory. France and Britain seeing this as a flagrant disregarding of the Treaty of Versailles and issues an ultimatum for Germany to withdraw their armies from the Rhineland or face war. Hitler attempting to call the Allies bluff ignores them and is immediately slapped by a declaration of war from Britain, France and the wider commonwealth. Europe after 18 years is once again at war. This war somewhat declared spontaneously is met with the public by horror. Many people saw the horrors of the First World War and are hesitant to send another generation of men off to die in a seemingly pointless conflict. The war further sours in the public eye once King Edward VIII famously isolationist and beloved by the people attempts to veto the war and his royal perogative is overridden by Churchill leading to a constitutional crisis. Similarly in France protests sweep the nation with a March on Paris being put down by the Gendarmie (Military Police). A resurgent left in France launches a coup in Paris reinstating the Paris Commune and attempting to spread throughout France. This situation further worsens when as soon as an offensive is attempted into the Rhineland a mass mutiny begins and large sections of the army pledge allegiance to the Paris Commune. After a general strike is called the Popular Front is paralysed to respond and they are forced to do nothing as their country is consumed by the Revolution. A French Socialist Republic is established and immediately signs a peace with Nazi Germany. With the fall of France calls for peace in Britain only grow louder and Winston Churchill seems dead set on continuing the war. The anti war Communist Party of Great Britain and British Union of Fascists begin to enjoy greater support in large cities both playing off the fall of France to communism and preaching peace. Oswald Mosley and his blackshirts attempt a Putsch to storm Westminster palace and other Blackshirts in other cities attempt mirror marches. This doesn’t having the fast coup effect like Mosley was hoping attempting to mirror the French and it escalates into a full blown civil war. A Revolution also ignites into the industrial cities of Greater Manchester South Yorkshire and Birmingham pledging allegance to the CPGB. Both revolutions declare a state with the British National State (BNS) and British Socialist Republic (BSR) Facing immense internal unrest Britain signs a peace treaty with a relieved Germany that was in no way prepared for war. Alliances and treaties begin to form with a Franco-Soviet pact being signed in early 1937 welcoming France to the Comintern and feeling threatened Germany, Italy, Hungary and Romania all sign a pact linking them into a new Berlin Rome Axis. And finally the Ottowa accords are signed formed the allies closely linked to the UK though not officially due to a non intervention agreement regarding the British Civil War. The British and French empires begin to collapse so there is a fight for control through volunteers and supplies for the empires and the jewel of them all the British Isles. A Cold War has settled upon the world between the Allies Axis and Comintern being an existential matter for every nation involved.

Recently Gates of Hell released the American faction and did a full overhaul of the German faction, leading to a pair of interesting factions with an incredible variety of historically authentic uniforms. You could zoom in on any of the squads and see the diverse uniforms depicted right down to the insignia on their caps and the regiments on their patches. Shermanator’s interview of Chase/Trudel (the lead animator & 3D human artist) gave me faith in the developer’s passion for the history and the game. This made me quite excited, because we have yet to see a British Commonwealth faction but there is some heavy implication that we can expect one in the future.
I wanted to make this thread, because I wanted to express my desire to see elements in the game that would make the Commonwealth faction a wealth of interesting units, uniforms and nationalities, particularly via the doctrines system that exists within the game. The intention is to throw in representatives across all the major nations of the British Commonwealth as well as some of the Allied armies-in-exile that came under British command. I also want to highlight some of the vehicles that are rarely mentioned in other games due to their obscure theatre or role. For the record, I'm not telling the devs what to do - I'm just making some example doctrines that I came up with as an example of the variety of units I'd love to see and making their inclusion plausible. Mostly to get the community talking.
I won’t talk about early war, partially because ‘Early war’ in Gates of Hell is largely post-Dunkirk, but also because I feel like what I am asking is still quite a lot just for one faction across two eras. I also I won’t be mentioning the more obvious or general units like Stuarts, Crusaders, Cromwells, Grants etc, as I expect them to be added nonetheless. It’s the vaguer aspects of the Commonwealth I wanted to talk about; the weird, wonderful and the diverse.
Mid War Doctrines
I think the mid-war should be largely inspired by the North African Campaigns, centred largely on the 8th Army and utilising the huge variety of cultures that fought within it. Extra bits can be added from the Italian campaign where the faction is lacking, and the Italian campaign can also be represented in the ‘Temperate’ skin for the mid-war faction. There are a lot of inspirations one can draw to create a variety of options for the Commonwealth player and each doctrine should draw from their unique aspects.
All-Round: Inspired by the Desert Rats, the 2nd Battle of El Alamein and Operation Crusader this one balances the various aspects of the other doctrines while keeping it unique. I’d like to see the Infantry include British Desert Rats Infantry, 2nd New Zealand Infantry, & 1st South African Infantry. I’d also like to see South African Marmon-Herrington Armoured Cars (multiple variants) as an early-battle option, plenty of the more common tanks and maybe the Bishop as a slow but mobile artillery piece. As a special call-in, we could probably include the Free French Legionaries as a powerful assault unit, just to really complete the variety in this division.
Defensive: Inspired by the Siege of Tobruk, this doctrine should primarily represent the Australians. Variations of the Australian 9th Division troops as infantry alongside minor British elements with a heavy emphasis on field engineers, emplacements and field guns. Defensive doctrine could also include RAF Regiment infantry, RAF 20mm Oerlikon guns, RAF Rolls Royces, India Pattern Carriers (from the Indian 18th Division), air strikes and, as a special unit, they could even have captured Italian tanks from the 6th Australian Division Cavalry Regiment! As a defensive doctrine, they should also have access to the best mid-war field guns, including the rare (but historical) ’Pheasant’ 17/25 Pounder Field Gun.
Offensive: Inspired by the Battle of Tunisia and Operation Torch, I think this one should show off the might of the UK’s heavier vehicles in the latter stages of the African campaign, particularly the Churchill III, Sherman III, the Priest 105mm and the Stuart Command Tank, alongside the more standard British tank options. As for infantry options, we can include Indian troops of the 4th Infantry Division (India), Gurkhas, and a motorised unit of 22nd Guards Infantry. I would also add the British Commandos in this division - partly because they were involved in Operation Torch, but also because they had an iconic impact on the mid-war (outside of Africa) that it would be a pity not to add them.
Irregular: This one would be quite unique in mid-war as it is effectively the light vehicle special forces doctrine. Although some standard British units would form the basis of the army, they would have access to a variety of assets representing the Long Range Desert Group; Chevrolet trucks with mounted Vickers MGs, Boys AT rifles, twin 303 Brownings or even Bofors and captured 20mm Breda guns! ‘Bamtam’ jeeps with twin Vickers Ks or 303 Brownings. The transport and logistics would be different too, using the Marmon-Herrington 6-ton Heavy Truck or the White 1064 10-ton. Other unique special call-ins would include an LRDG WACO Recon plane and the SAS (armed with the Lewes bomb). The downside to this doctrine, however, is that imagine it to be much lighter on armoured support, relying mostly on towed guns for its heavy firepower.
Other Units: I’ve tried to use inspirations from specific parts of the war to get a rounded but also diverse array of units, but there are loads of obscure units across the mid-war that I’d love to see; the Priest 105mm SPG, the AEC Deacon Gun Carrier, the Daimler Dingo, the Humber Light Reconnaissance, and so on.
That is as much as I want to say on mid-war without labouring the point. I’m sure there’s interesting things I’ve missed accidentally, and I’m afraid there’s some I have missed on purpose. For example, I considered the Australian Matilda Hedgehog, but it turned out to be late war and never used. I also considered the Greek and the Czech Division, but I think I’ve already stretched it too far as regards voice acting alone without adding units that, as distinguished their service might be, are just too obscure without adding anything extra - appearance or gameplay. That said, my hat would go off to the devs if they achieved that.
Late War Doctrines
Here we get to represent the Commonwealth units from Operation Overlord up until Operation Varsity.
All-Round: The quintessential British doctrine, combining bog-standard infantry with hardy tanks and a decent array of equipment. Partially based on Gold Beach, but also Operation Varsity/Plunder towards the end of the war, I would personally give them 50th (Northumbrian) Infantry, RAF Regiment Gunners, RAF Humber Light AC, Churchill AVRE, the Cruiser Mk. VIII Challenger and the Comet. Maybe give them some 6th Airlanding troops and 1st Canadian Parachute Infantry as a reference to the Normandy paratroopers if we feel they need more skilled infantry.
Offensive: The Canadian Doctrine - mostly inspired by the First Canadian Army in Normandy with elements of their experiences later on (including the Battle of the Schelt and Operation Veritable) with the doctrine largely focused on armoured assault infantry. They’ll look quite unique compared to the British because their uniforms were greener and they were the first to use the British-designed Mk.III helmet at D-Day. Troops of the 3rd Canadian Infantry Division as standard, supported by assault infantry. Eventually, armoured infantry can spawn in Buffalos (used at the Battle of the Schelt) and, as a special call-in, Ram Kangaroo APCs (sporting an armoured MG turret). The Otter armoured car would be an early call-in, with M4A1 Sherman Grizzly tanks as well as Ram IIs available in the standard tank tab. Some unique but limited special call-ins would include the Skink AA tank (of which 2 saw historical combat in Normandy) as well as a skilled sniper wielding the Ross rifle.
Defensive: Just as the US Defensive doctrine features the 101st Airborne (no doubt inspired by the Battle of Bastogne), the British Defensive doctrine can feature the British Airborne - particularly based on the defense of Arnhem Bridge in the Netherlands as part of Market Garden. Infantry units can include the 52nd (Lowland) Infantry, 1st Airborne Paratroopers, 1st Airlanding Infantry, Parachute Squadron Royal Engineers and 1st (Polish) Independent Paratroopers (who are distinctive with their grey berets). Armoured units can include the Tetrarch and the M22 Locust. To suit their defensive doctrine, they should get some decent guns and I’m thinking the airborne jeep-towed 20mm Polsten Gun, airborne 17th Pounder as well as (in a departure from the Parachute theme) the BL 7.2-inch howitzer. The Patchett sub-machine gun could make an appearance here too.
Irregular: Based on Sword Beach, Commandos and the 79th Armoured Division, with the more unusual units in the British arsenal. Probably with 3rd Infantry Division Infantry as standard, this unit could have access to No.41 (Royal Marine) Commandos, Fusilier Marines Commandos (based on No.4 Commando’s assault on Ouestreham), the Centaur Mk.IV QF 95mm, the Sherman DD, the Churchill Crocodile and Royal Engineer Assault Teams deployed in the cute Terrapin 4-ton Amphibious. If we want to be really wacky, we could even add the M3 Grant CDL (an unarmed searchlight tank) for armoured spotting, similar to the 150cm Flakscheinwerfer searchlight.
Other Units: Further unique units that would fit in any one (or multiple) of these divisions (based on balance) include the Land Mattress Rocket Launcher, the Loyd Carrier, the Universal Carrier WASP (flamethrower), the Sexton SPG, Sherman Firefly, the Archer TD, Achilles TD, the Priest Kangaroo, the Morris C8, Staghound and so on. There are SO many strange and obscure British vehicles that don’t often see the light of day, but would be perfect for Gates of Hell.
Post-release Doctrines -
More of a final thought than anything else, but if/when the Japanese get added into the game, I’d love to see a fifth doctrine to represent the British 14th Army to match the Japanese. A doctrine that is mostly comprised of Indian infantry and Indian tanks, with representation from the East/West African Divisions, Gurkhas and the British 2nd or 36th Infantry Divisions. Special call-ins could include the Chindits (using Thompsons and the Jungle Carbine) and paratroopers of the 50th Indian Parachute Brigade. If we’re feeling generous enough to allow the doctrine to encompass the Pacific Islands as well, we could also include an Australian squad armed with the Owen SMG, South Pacific Scouts, the Matida Frog (flamethrower) and the Matilda QF 3-Inch.
Conclusion: I apologise for such a long read. But I hope we see how a bit of ambition could really help the Commonwealth stand out and be worthy of the variety seen in the other factions since their overhaul. While the Germans have Spanish soldiers in their ranks, the Commonwealth can see the UK, Canada, India, Australia, New Zealand, South Africa, Poland, and France (and technically Nepal) all get some recognition. While the German Kriegsmarine and Luftwaffe stand out on the field, the Commonwealth might get the distinctive blue battledress of the RAF Regiment, or the long white tunics of the Foreign Legion. We would see such a variety of hats including pith helmets, berets, kepis, dastars, keffiyehs and slouch hats. Some units, like the LRDG vehicles, might even stand out as unique from any of the nations already in the game. It’s a lot of colourful uniforms, a lot of voices and a lot of strange and wonderful machines.
However, it does come with its downsides. Firstly, Africa and Europe are such dramatically different theatres that their version of mid & late war are incredibly different to one another. So much so that the depth of variety might make the faction too big, making it a lot of effort for the art department (especially with uniforms changing for the map’s climate. Imagine making skins for temperate, desert AND snow). The second issue is whether France is getting its own faction in future iterations of the game (the French flag appears in the loading screen during Axis vs Allies games). The final (and probably biggest) issue is voice acting. I’m no expert on games development, but I gather that getting enough voice actors for a faction is hard enough as it is without having to accurately represent 9 countries at once. I would love to hear the developer’s thoughts on the matter - whether such a project is within the game’s scope and if they have the ambition to take it this far.
Do let me all know what you think as well.

Grave is i think my favorite OSR game. it's a lesser-known hack of Knave 1e designed for dark souls inspired games and i've been running a campaign of it for roughly 2 years now. i praise it here every time i get the opportunity - i've ended up liking it so much, actually, that i really wanted it to be the default system i use for D&D-style fantasy.
this is a bit of an issue as the dark souls elements (souls as both currency & XP, PCs getting multiple deaths, etc) are a pretty specific flavor, so it requires some tweaking. but i want to talk about why i like the system so much before talking about making it work more seamlessly for vanilla fantasy.
good stuff unchanged from Knave: knave 1e is popular enough here that i probably don't need to introduce it, but in case anyone is out of the loop, here you go

• super lightweight, as knave's only 7 pages long
• rather than picking a class, your character is defined entirely by randomly rolled stats & gear. you be a fighter by spending your limited inventory on a big sword & armor and having good strength, you play a wizard by carrying a bunch of spellbooks and having good intelligence. etc etc. very elegant and streamlined
• simple, quick iterations on various old-D&D mechanics, like reaction rolls, morale, monster stats, etc. one-roll side-based initiative. i tend to prefer these over actual D&D/retroclones since they're so clean and easy for new GMs and players to remember

reasons i like Grave specifically:

• PCs have stamina - a resource for spells/combat maneuvers - equal to their empty item slots, adding an axis of customization where a fighter might be more heavily armed & armored for bigger numbers with fewer maneuvers, or play a more nimble swashbuckler for lower numbers with a lot more maneuvers.
• spells are divided into wizardry (INT), theurgy (WIS) and witchcraft (CHA) which adds much more diversity to casters. a wizard and cleric now feel different whereas in knave 1e all spellcasters are largely interchangeable. combined with the stamina mechanic this gives grave vastly more PC diversity than knave while adding very little extra crunch, which i think is super impressive
• grave adds premade packages of starting stats/gear as an alternative to rolling (though you can still roll), essentially adding back character classes. this is really nice, especially when running for new players whose expectations are closer to something like 5e.
• multiple second chances at death per PC (because dark souls) - a little anti-OSR, but i really like it for giving new players a bit of a buffer & time to get invested in their PC. importantly, this only ever goes down as you die, never up, so you have this really nice ticking-clock thing going on as you die more often. it is still way too generous with extra deaths tho, if you run grave i recommend cutting the amount of second chances in half
• whole page of 50 magic items that are all cool and flavorful. the $2 PDF price is probably worth it just for these honestly
• sands off a couple of knave's oddities, like using wisdom for ranged attacks instead of dex. this is an upside or downside depending on preference, but i find it more intuitive to new players

seriously you should play grave. it's so good

my houserules

with 5e being my first ttrpg, that slightly more heroic-fantasy vibe influenced my design here a bit; my goal was to essentially replace 5e with grave as my go-to system for people new to RPGs. you can find the full PDF here!

• diceless skills: i really like skills as a way to customize PCs a little further, but i dislike defaulting to a die roll for task resolution. so instead the game uses a spin on joseph manola's skill system, i.e. if you have the skill on your sheet, you're just considered really good at that thing for the purpose of the GM's rulings. & that's the whole mechanic.
• weapon traits: easy-to-remember, one-sentence traits like crushing weapons being good against armor, rapiers giving you more maneuvers, axes cleaving through enemies, spears having extra reach, etc. weapons deal more damage if they're heavier or don't have traits. the goal is for weapon choice to feel impactful without there being an obvious best one.
• dungeon crawl procedure: this is something knave & grave lack and it's the only thing i feel is really missing from them. i don't really like super-structured dungeon turns with each PC picking exactly 1 action/movement each 10 minutes, so here the referee just marks off 10 minutes behind the screen as appropriate.
• balance adjustments: i love getting to discover characters instead of hand-craft them, so i kept the rolling option on top of grave's classes. but it is reworked so now it gives you the same amount of stats as everyone else, just randomizing where they go instead of how good or bad they are, since i've never liked that power variance. HP is also standardized now.
• ticking-clock deaths: i wanted to keep grave's feeling of gradually getting closer to death the more you fall in combat, even though there's no extra-lives thing built into the lore here. instead you take a mortal wound each time you reach 0HP, and when you hit 3 wounds, you die. they never go away. i like it better than straight death at 0HP because it gives new players a chance to make mistakes without instantly dying, but is still an impactful, permanent consequence.
• other additions: different playable creatures like elves/goblins/etc, a little bestiary, some GM advice, a d50 potion table, proper XP-for-gold rules, free maneuver on to-hit rolls of 20+ (stolen from knave 2e), and a simple character sheet.

i've run this version of grave for kids a few times and it's gone really well. ben milton & jason tocci (knave and grave designers respectively) deserve most of the credit here, since i'm just building on their work and creativity. huge thanks to both of them

*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.

Update 2

@Lajamerr_Mittesdine Started some code to implement the algorithm in a comment below. I made some changes to it, and the result is below. Thanks @Lajamerr_Mittesdine! Also, I want to reiterate that this is not meant to be an efficient or practical implementation of the self-attention. Each taylor series basis function takes logN time and NlogN computation, but you would need a lot of basis functions to properly approximate the softmax of attention scores. Alternatively, the algorithm can be ran in recursive mode, which turns it into an RNN that runs in O(N) steps. This is more to show that self-attention can be implemented as many RNNs running in parallel. To make this efficient, a different formula for self-attention would have to be used, not the softmax of the dot product of queries and keys, but something else that can be computed with few parallel scans.

import numpy as np # note, there is a slighlty more efficient algorithm for partial sums that computes in O(log(N)) time and O(N) computation. This one runs in O(log(N)) time and O(NlogN) computation. See the wiki link for the more efficient algorithm. def parallel_partial_sum(arr): """Parallel scan (prefix sum) implementation.""" n = len(arr) steps = np.ceil(np.log2(n)) for i in range(steps): # check if this is the numerator or denominator if len(arr.shape)==2: array += np.concatenate([np.zeros_like(arr[:2**i,:]), arr[(n-2**i):,:]], axis=0) else: array += np.concatenate([np.zeros_like(arr[:2**i]), arr[(n-2**i):]], axis=0) return arr def compute_taylor_basis_function(q, k, v, n, m, i, j): """Compute a Taylor basis function for given powers n and m.""" k_power = np.power(k[:,i], n) # k[:,i]^n element-wise q_power = np.power(q[:,j], m) # q[:,j]^m element-wise if len(v.shape) == 2: k_power = np.expand_dims(k_power, axis=-1) # change: maybe needs this to properly broadcast q_power = np.expand_dims(q_power, axis=-1) partial_sum_kv = parallel_partial_sum(k_power * v) basis_function = q_power * partial_sum_kv return basis_function def compute_causal_self_attention(q, k, v, max_n=3, max_m=3): """Compute the causal self-attention using Taylor series approximation.""" attention_numerator = np.zeros_like(v) attention_denominator = np.zeros_like(v[:,0]) for n in range(max_n + 1): for m in range(max_m + 1): for j in range(q.shape[-1]): for i in range(k.shape[-1]): # note, either i or j loop can be removed because basis functions can be computed in parallel A_nmij = 1.0 # Simplified coefficient for illustration basis_function = compute_taylor_basis_function(q, k, v, n, m, i, j) attention_numerator += A_nmij * basis_function normalization_basis_function = compute_taylor_basis_function(q, k, np.ones_like(attention_denominator), n, m, i, j) attention_denominator += A_nmij * normalization_basis_function attention_denominator = np.expand_dims(attention_denominator, axis=-1) attention = attention_numerator / attention_denominator return attention # Example usage sequence_length = 10 embedding_dim = 4 # Randomly initialize q, k, v tensors q = np.random.rand(sequence_length, embedding_dim) k = np.random.rand(sequence_length, embedding_dim) v = np.random.rand(sequence_length, embedding_dim) # Compute the causal self-attention attention_output = compute_causal_self_attention(q, k, v) print("Causal Self-Attention Output:") print(attention_output) 

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Acer Aspire 5	14" WUXGA (1920 x 1200) IPS ComfyView, Intel Core i5-1335U, Intel Iris Xe, 8GB LPDDR5, 512GB SSD, Thunderbolt 4, Wi-Fi 6E, Win11 Home	$499.99
Dell Inspiron 15 3530 Laptop	Intel i5-1335U, 16 GB RAM, 512 GB SSD, 1080p 15.6″ 120Hz Display	$580.77
Lenovo Flex 5 Laptop	14.0″ FHD (1920 x 1080) Touch Display, AMD Ryzen 5 5500U Processor, 16GB DDR4 RAM, 256GB NVMe SSD Storage, AMD Radeon Graphics, Windows 11 Home, 82HU00JWUS, Graphite Grey	$618
ASUS Vivobook 16	16” WUXGA (1920 x 1200) 16:10 Display, Intel Core i7-13700H CPU, Intel Iris Xᵉ Graphics, 8GB RAM, 1TB SSD, Windows 11 Home	$849.99
HP Envy x360 15 inch Laptop	FHD Display, Intel Core i7-1355U, 16 GB RAM, 1 TB SSD, Intel Iris Xe Graphics, Windows 11 Home, 15-ew1199nr (2023),Silver	$919.99
Acer Swift Go 14	Intel Evo Thin & Light Laptop, 14" WUXGA (1920 x 1200) IPS Touch, Intel Core i7-13700H, Intel Iris Xe Graphics, 16GB LPDDR5, 512GB SSD, Win11 Home	$949.99
ASUS VivoBook S 15 OLED Slim Laptop	15.6” FHD OLED Display, Intel Evo Platform, Intel Core i7-12700H CPU, 16GB RAM, 1TB SSD, Windows 11 Home, Indie Black	$999.99
ASUS VivoBook Pro 14 OLED Laptop	14” 2.8K OLED Display, AMD Ryzen 7 6800H Mobile CPU, NVIDIA GeForce RTX 3050 GPU, 16GB RAM, 1TB SSD, Windows 11 Home, Quiet Blue	$1,199.99

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hi! im sorry if this is posted in the wrong place since i dont post on reddit often, but im looking for help finding an old neopets youtuber i used to watch.
it was a guy that used to post walkthroughs / playthroughs of the old ps2 neopets: the darkest faerie game. the only detail i know that could definitely identify him as the one i remember is that theres a part of the game where you go to a graveyard / crypt area of the map and you encounter the gelert assassin. he has some line where he says something like "people have no respect for the dead" and the guy playing was like "I dont respect you and youre about to be dead." me and my sister thought that was the sickest burn when we were younger but i have never been able to find his videos since.
this is probably a shot in the dark but i was feeling nostalgic and i figured there would probably be someone with better searching powers than we do lol. for more specifics, this was from when i was way younger so the videos have to be at least like 7+ years old. thx to anyone in advance

Hello! After looking at all the incredibly helpful comments from my previous attempts, I realized that I wasn't doing a great job at making my MC's stakes compelling. Hopefully this version is better! Also, I'm having trouble with my old account, so I'm using this new one. You can find my previous post here
Anyways, thanks in advance for any advice and/or comments provided!
Dear Agent/Editor,
Seventeen-year-old Marla Amari lives in the shadow of her sister, who’s been in a coma for many months. Her once loving parents have become obsessed with getting her sister back and, unless they need a mediator in another argument, Marla remains forgotten. She feels alone. Luckily, a distraction comes in the appearance of strange spirits only she can see. But distraction turns into disaster when they transport her to the spirit realm, a world with its own rules and its own humanoid people. Here, Marla is one of many wayward humans and is treated like a second-class citizen. While she’s used to being overlooked, the disdain is new.
But she has no time to linger on her feelings—her family needs her. Without Marla’s extra income to help fund medical bills, her comatose sister will be taken off life support in just three months.
There’s only one way back to the mortal world, and tickets cost far more than a simple human like Marla can afford. However, residents of the spirit realm have been going missing, more of them by the day. Their grieving families grow desperate for answers no one cares to provide, and Marla sees an opportunity. She starts an investigation of her own.
As she collects nefarious clues and her pockets start to plump, she crosses the wrong person. An attempt on her life makes Marla realize that someone doesn’t want her to succeed in her quest—someone powerful—and she smells something rotten brewing in the spirit realm. Her duty to her family urges her to put down the case and find another way to earn the money she needs. But giving up now seems worse than death itself, because when Marla looks into the eyes of other unheard nobodies like her and finds purpose, she finally feels worth something.
TO BE MORTAL (105,000 words) is a YA fantasy, where the character development of The Girl Who Fell Beneath the Sea by Axie Oh meets the fantastical mysteries of The Left-Handed Booksellers of London by Garth Nix. It can stand alone but has series potential.

Disclaimer: This is a work of fan fiction created for entertainment purposes. The characters of John Constantine and Doctor Strange belong to their respective creators and copyright holders. No infringement is intended, and this story is not endorsed or authorized by any official source. Enjoy the adventure, and remember—it's all in good fun!
John Constantine's trench coat flapped wildly as the air around him crackled with eldritch energy. The ground beneath his feet was a mosaic of screaming faces, the very essence of Trigon's realm. With a flick of his lighter, Constantine ignited an enchanted flame, the light casting long shadows as he faced down the hordes of demons before him.
"Come on then, you ugly mugs," he taunted, the smirk on his face belying the tension in his stance. "Let's see what you've got."
The demons surged forward, a wave of malice and claws, but Constantine was ready. He chanted an incantation, ancient words of power that echoed through the abyss, and a barrier of blue light erupted from the ground. The demons screeched as they collided with the magical shield, their forms dissolving into ash.
But as Constantine prepared to press his advantage, a strange sensation washed over him. The air shimmered like a heat haze, and the very fabric of reality seemed to warp and twist. He felt a pull, a tug at his soul, and then the world went white.
When his vision cleared, he was no longer in Trigon's realm. The air was still, and it was filled with greenery. It was a familiar place but something feels different. It was New York Central Park.
Dr. Strange: (Opening a portal) By the hoary hosts of Hoggoth, who dares trespass in my domain?
John Constantine: (Lighting a cigarette) Oh, look what we have here. Another one of Trigon's lackeys, I presume? You can tell your boss he's not getting the best of me.
Dr. Strange: (Raising an eyebrow) Trigon? I'm afraid you are mistaken. I am Doctor Stephen Strange, Sorcerer Supreme of this reality. And you are?
John Constantine: (Smirks) John Constantine, mate. Master of the dark arts and a thorn in the side of demons like Trigon. And this ain't your reality, it's Earth 1. So, which Earth did you say you're from?
Dr. Strange: I did not. But it seems we are both victims of circumstance. I am from this Earth, and you are clearly not. (Gestures around) This is my sanctum, and you are?
John Constantine: (Takes a drag) John bloody Constantine. And I was in the middle of kicking some demonic arse before I was rudely interrupted by your light show.
Dr. Strange: (Folds arms) There's no demonic activity here, Mr. Constantine. You've been transported to my world by some mysterious force. Now, if we can cease the hostilities, perhaps we can work together to unravel this mystery.
John Constantine: (Laughs) Work together? With a bloke who looks like he's just stepped out of a Renaissance fair? Tell you what, magician, prove to me you're not some illusion of Trigon's and maybe I'll consider it.
Dr. Strange: (Sighs) Very well. (Casts a spell to show Constantine the Sanctum Sanctorum) Behold the Sanctum Sanctorum, the axis of all realities. Does this look like the work of your demon?
John Constantine: (Looks around, impressed) Alright, you've got some tricks. But if you're really the Sorcerer Supreme, then help me get back to my fight. Or are you too busy polishing your orbs?
Dr. Strange: (Smirks) Polishing orbs is a hobby for another time. Let's find the source of your unexpected journey. Together, we might just stand a chance.
John Constantine: (With a wry smile) So, tell me, Sorcerer Supreme, ever heard of the Justice League? Batman, Superman, Wonder Woman?
Dr. Strange: (Shakes his head) Can't say that I have. They do not exist in my world. Here we have the Avengers, the X-Men, the Fantastic Four.
John Constantine: (Raises an eyebrow) Avengers? Sounds like a second-rate football club. And what's so fantastic about this four?
Dr. Strange: (Chuckles) They are heroes of great power and even greater heart. But it seems our worlds are as different as magic and science.
John Constantine: (Nods) Seems like it. My world's got its own brand of chaos and capes. No shortage of troubles there, either.
Dr. Strange: (Looks thoughtful) Perhaps it is our differences that make our worlds unique. And yet, here we are, brought together by fate.
John Constantine: (Smirks) Fate? I call it a bloody inconvenience. But since we're stuck with each other, might as well get to the bottom of this. and they leaves to santum Santorum.
He glanced around the Sanctum Sanctorum, taking in the relics that held powers he could only guess at. There was a sense of order here, a stark contrast to the chaos of his own world.
"Alright, Doc," Constantine said after their exchange, flicking his cigarette to the ground. "Let's crack this pandora box . But just so we're clear, I'm not the sidekick in this story."
Dr. Strange nodded, a hint of amusement in his eyes. "Agreed. Let us begin."
Together, they stepped deeper into the Sanctum, ready to uncover the truth behind Constantine's sudden displacement. Little did they know, their journey would take them across realities, challenging their understanding of magic, power, and the thin veil that separates worlds.