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• general information.

Name: Merek Grimmaldus
Gender: Male
Age: 1,052
Family and Relations: None.
Voice Claim/Accent: American
Role in a party: DPS Tank
Level: 2 (4/10)
Stats:
Strength:4
Dexterity:5
Constitution:2
Intelligence:5(+1 from racial)
Wisdom:1
Charisma:3
Spirit:0

• Personality Info

Species: Artificial Human Bound Monster
Personality: Kind and bigger than life.
Likes: Forges, LMGs, and other high power firearms
Dislikes: Pancor Jackhammer, Goblins, and Eldritch monsters.

• Physical Description

Height: 7’9
Weight: 426
Hair: black
Eyes: blue
Markings/Scars/Tattoos: Scratch marks on his cheeks.
Extra: Has three platinum studs in his skull above his eyebrow.
Appearance:

• Equipment [Pictures also suffice]:

Clothing: While out of his armor he wears Jeans, combat boots, a Evil Dead shirt, and a holster for his Talon of Flames.
Armor and armor attachments:

• Assault Pack: A even stronger version of the jump pack, boasting two massive thrusters as well as a energy field projecter designed to allow for the power armor wearing user to crash down like god himself among enemies.

Only usable while wearing power armor, allows for the wearer to fly up to sixty feet per turn, applies a +3 to dodges, and upon landing from a height greater than thirty feet apply a strength save of 10+ distance in feet above thirty in groups of five + wielder’s strength. On a failed save any enemies that are within ten feet of the landing point are knocked prone and the wearer can make attacks of opportunity against them, on a crit fail the enemies are stunned for 1d3 rounds.
Armor set: Emperor’s Angel.
Helmet: Prateor’s Visage (Legendary) - ”Crush them…slaughter them.”

• Armor Mods - Heads-Up Display (Unlocked): A tactical visor which displays necessary biometric and target-acquisition data. Provides a +2 bonus to Perception rolls
  
• Armor Mods - Treasure Finder (Unlocked): A specialized radar which allows for the detection of hidden treasure in a 15ft radius around the user. Cannot detect treasure hidden by supernatural means.
  
• Armor Mods - Terrain Anomaly Detection System, T.A.D.S. (Unlocks at PC Lvl 3): An A.I. image processing unit constantly scans the terrain within view of the user, highlighting any anomalies such as footprints, claw marks, etc. for easy detection.
  

Gauntlets: Hochmael’s Will (Legendary) - ”You need only to send me to face our enemy. My hands alone will be enough to break their bones and their souls.” — Hochmael

• Armor Mods - Striker (Unlocked): A sufficiently light alloy ensures fluid movement while covered in armor. +2 to dodge rolls and to unarmed strike attacks such as punches.
  
• Armor Mods - Punches of Power (Unlocked): Every punch made has a chance of dropping an orb of power. Roll a d10, if it lands on 1, an Orb of Power is made. When an Orb of Power is generated it is automatically collected by its producer. When collected an Orb of Power reduces the cooldown of the producer’s Super Ability by 1 round. (Gives Grimmaldus 10 Phoenix flame)
  
• Armor Mods - Tempered Rage (Unlocks at PC Lvl 3): Every successful 5 unarmed strikes performed grants a temporary buff to all further unarmed strikes for 2 rounds. Upon being buffed unarmed strikes deal 3% damage than they would normally.
  

Chest Armor: Hollowed Fortress (Legendary) - ”They thought it was impenetrable…they were wrong.”

• Armor Mods - Strong Alloy (Unlocked): A stronger metal alloy ensures the wearer of this armor’s safety even more so than before. Takes 20% less damage from Piercing and Slashing sources.
  
• Armor Mods - Anti-Magic Alloy (Unlocked): A safe Hive spell has been cast on this armor, making it slightly resistant to magic attacks. Takes 20% less damage from magic sources.
  
• Armor Mods - Dense Alloy (Unlocks at PC Lvl 3): The alloy of this armor has been increased in width, allowing for greater concussive force to be absorbed while mitigating damage as much as possible. Takes 20% less damage from Bludgeoning Sources.
  

Leg Armor: Strapped Slingers (Exotic) - ”An outlaw’s never looked this good.”

• Armor Perks - Locked n’ Loaded: Weapons which take multiple rounds to reload have that time cut in half. Weapons which take one round to reload are instantly reloaded when stowed away. Allows you to pull out weapons much faster and provides a +2 bonus to initiative rolls.
  
• Armor Mods - Spring-Loaded Soles (Unlocked): Newly added suspension system quite literally gives the user a spring in their step, providing a +2 bonus to movement rolls as well as allowing the user to jump an extra 5 feet.
  
• Armor Mods - All-Terrain Boots (Unlocks at PC Lvl 2): A heap of modifications have allowed the user to properly traverse almost any terrain. Toggleable magnetic plates allow the user to walk up walls and across ceilings without issue as well as stick to any solid surface with an attraction force of about 50 pounds. Magnetic plates do not slow movement speed.
  
• Armor Mods - Even Springier Soles (Unlocks at PC Lvl 3): Previous spring-loaded suspension system has been upgraded, giving a +3 to movement rolls instead of 2 and allowing the user to jump an extra 10 feet in the air.
  

Accessories:

• Servo Ghost: The source of his power, this tiny skull like companion is at the moment broken, keeping it from bringing him back from death beyond what it already has but it’s ability to grant him access to pure plasma and electromagnetic fields to contain them as well as protect him from the Phoenix Flame protocol.

Can hack and scan independently of Merek’s turn.

• Rosarius: A necklace/amulet that can be tied to a belt, the amulet contains technology that produces a transparent field of energy that turns tiny objects and energy moving at high speeds through it into light.

Applies advantage to block bullets and similarly fast ranged attacks. (Does not work against magic)
Weapons/Other:

• Talon of Flame: Merek Grimmaldus’s hammer is made from steel, the Talon of Flame’s haft and head are roughly a foot and a half in length and constantly ablaze. It can be thrown and if not retrieved immediately or relatively quickly it vanishes, slowly being reconstructed by his GS over a few minutes.

Uses Strength to be thrown, deals X1.5 damage when thrown, if it hits and is retrieved Merek is healed for 25% health.
Deals 1d12+STR blunt (or the same amount of piercing if used with the pointed end) and 1d4+INT burning on a hit.
If not retrieved before three rounds are up after being thrown this hammer vanishes and reappears attached to his belt after six rounds.

• P10K: A two handed SMG designed after a old world P90 but takes energy cells, the same shape, mag load area, and the silencer on it resulting in the weapon being perfect for Merek due to him being from modern day earth and used to the SMG. The main body of it is designed with a mag lock body, resulting in it sticking to armor when not needed and the tube at the end not only helps to hide the source of the shots by hiding the flash but also lowering the already quiet Energy weapon.

It has been improved via the pack a punch to a much cleaner version as well as having better cell magazines, holding a hundred rounds instead of fifty rounds.
Deals 5 burn damage but makes five attacks due to burst fire, this damage is boosted to 8 burn per shot against armored targets.
After firing thirty shots, the gun can release the heat generated by the plasma going out in a shotgun like blast of energy.
Deals 25 plasma (Unable to be healed in combat) + 1d20 plasma to a single target up to thirty feet away.
Silenced shots.

• Whirlwind Launcher: A armor module that attaches to any form of armor, as well as allowing for impulse control or manual controls. The unit typically remains folded into a small orb with a rectangle to the side but when unfolded forms four rocket launchers loaded with smart ammo.

Uses intelligence and dexterity.
Deals 2d20 blast damage.
Kraken missiles: ignores armor bonuses, deals quadruple damage to armored vehicles and double armor wearing enemies.
Antipersonal: hits all enemies within ten feet of the target, deals double damage to unarmored targets.
Flak shot: Flying enemies automatically are grounded when hit, advantage against airborne enemies.
Energy surge: On a hit apply a 15+intelligence DC, on a failed save all electronics within ten feet of the target are shut off.
Takes ten rounds to load a barrel. (Passive)
Can be fired as a bonus action or fired all at once with a attack action.
• ⁠Kusanagi-no-Tsurugi: ”A legendary blade who’s name literally translates to “Grass-Cutter”. This blade is said to be able to cut through almost anything and is practically indestructible. In earlier legends, this blade was associated with the clouds or winds and said to have been wielded by Amaterasu, the sun goddess of Japanese mythology. Because of this, it is able to emit a powerful gust of wind every 4 rounds which can knock opponents back a good distance.”
Deals 2d6+DEX slash damage that ignores nonenchanted armor and slash resistance. Can be used to parry and block energy weapons.

• Komodo shotgun: A belt fed shotgun designed for clearing out zombie infested ships, the heavy gun contains a means of blasting back groups of people to buy the wielder time to reload due to a gravity engine built into the gun under the barrel.

Deals 2d10 piercing.
Upon using the attack action with this gun attack the same target three times or attack three targets.
Deals double damage to zombies.
Has the ability to apply knockback to any enemies inside of ten feet to send them to thirty feet back. Cooldown of four rounds.
Capacity: sixty shells
Loading time: three actions.

• Smart Pistol MK6 ‘HeadHunters’ X2: A tech heavy pistol that relies on power armor to make the most of it’s ability, painting targets and overriding the wielder’s suit to guide their aim towards heads.

Capacity: 9 bullets.
Uses Perception and Intelligence.
Deals 1d6 piercing per shot. Deals triple damage on a crit, crit chance of 18.
Burst: Once per ten rounds tag 3+wielder’s level amount of targets or a single target that many times, firing that many times in a single action.
Burst can only be used by cyborgs, while wearing power armor, or wearing sci fi optical wear and a mechanical arm sleeve.

• abilities:

Weakness:
Magical Null: Merek is unable to be healed by spells or learn magic.
(-3 slots)
Racials:
Artificial Human Bound Monster: Merek’s nature as a HBM made his body stronger and his mind sharper than it had been in life, his body actually becoming unaging and a bit bigger than he was in life originally.
Plus one to strength and intelligence.
Unaging (appears 41)
Superhuman body: Falling damage from a fall up to 10 stories is nullified, all other is subjected to a 90% reduction.
Secret’s in the armor: Grimmaldus can only wear his Imperium Armor set and it replaces stats. The armor gains power as Grimmaldus levels up.
Passives:
Combat Mastery: Grimmaldus moves surprisingly fast when it comes to combat,
Actives:
Hammer of Dawn: Merek’s strongest SG given ability, during it he summons a massive burning hammer and swings it about, smashing bones and burning away his enemies with his Servo Ghost’s plasma. While the hammer itself is extremely powerful it has even more powerful abilities than simply swinging it about, using them results in draining the Phoenix flames that fuel his hammer.
For every attack of Merek’s that lands and enemy attack blocked gain half of the damage dealt in Phoenix Flames, upon reaching 100% Phoenix Flames the Hammer of Dawn can be summoned.
Weapon stats:
Has a plus 3 to attacks.
Deals (LVL)d8+STR in blunt and a additional (lvl)d4+INT in burn damage.
Requires both hands to swing, can be held with one hand. For every round held drain Phoenix Flames by 10%.
Eruption: Merek brings his hammer up and back down, leaping ten feet into the air to slam his hammer into the ground and discharge a blast of flames through the ground and into a single target.
This attack has advantage and adds intelligence modifiers to it.
Drains ten percent Phoenix Flames in addition to the round drained amount.
Dawnguard’s Wrath: Merek’s Phoenix flames wreath his arms and body, blessing his body with sheer strength and speed enough to unleash a flurry of three blows in the span where one should be done…
Grants the ability to attack three times per attack action while wielding Hammer of Dawn but consumes 10% Phoenix Flames per use.
(Ten slots)
Ignition Burst: Merek makes a ball of plasma in the palm of his left hand, contained by electro magnetic fields before being flung like a baseball at a target, upon sticking it burns into the target before exploding!
Deals (Lvl)D6+INT burn damage, this weapon is considered sticky, dealing (X1.5) more damage upon a successful stick. Explosion radius of 4 feet.
Uses Intelligence for casting.
Cooldown of 6 rounds hit or Miss.
(3 slots)

• backstory: Merek was a spec ops in life, helping to train American troops in Europe with a captured AS Val, showing them how it could not only pierce body armor but also served as a suppressed sniper rifle or a SMG. Eventually he was shifted over to training with the P90 and literally fell in love with it, the ambidextrous grip, top loading mag, and the over all length of it helped the fact that it was made to RIP armor into fragmentation made it all the better. However, before he could start training other soldiers with it, he was trampled to death when a mounted cop’s horse was spooked by a car back firing, his broken body resurrected via the Ghost Servo’s Phoenix protocols in order to have a outlet for it’s power.

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Well, I guess I should start at the beginning the majority of all stories tend to start. I was born in Detroit, Michigan in the month of June 1977. I was soon adopted and never met my biological family but have been told that I have two biological sisters, Karen, and Xinea as well as two brothers named Robert, and Jerry(perhaps Gerry I suppose). My mother is Patricia Bray, and my alleged father is Carl Ambers according to the adoption records that I found after the death of my adopted mother, Opal in 2001; I was a grown man by then. I was adopted by Opal and Frank Smith(we will say) in 1978. Somehow they knew my biological mother but that connection was never revelled to me. Opal was one of 17 children who grew up on a mountain somewhere in West Virginia. I was told that her father killed himself in front of her and her siblings when she was less than 10 years old. He was a coal miner and was injured in some type of accident and left unable to work with 19 mouths to feed; hard to fathom but for the love of God why in front of the children? Regardless of his reason this event left a lasting impact upon his 9 year old daughter that would ripple throughout space and time with the force of an atomic bomb; to this day that act and subsequent reaction linger. Opal was a devout Pentecost, Southern Baptist, or whatever similar religion she felt; not exactly sure. She was once a member of the People's Temple church in the early days when they were in Indianapolis (circa 1953-54). She left the church when the new leader, a man by the name of Jim Jones took over and began to allow people of other races into the fellowship; Opal being a woman of God as well as a devout racist left the church. They would later commit forced suicide in Ghana by drinking cyanide laced drinks at the end of machine guns. Opal was a small woman and she had many older brothers. She spent her developmental years fatherless, emotionally wrecked, and on a mountain with those brothers; I do not wish to even imagine what that must have been like, but one thing is for certain; she grew up mean and she knew how to fight, how to hurt a person, and how to use her 4' 11" 120lbs to do damage. Her temper was short and she was fast to react in a violent physical nature. She was married to Frank who was from Kentucky. Frank ran a laundry delivery service, smoked cigars, and loved pro wrestling. He was already in his forties when I was adopted as was Opal. Frank was amazing to me as a young child but as time went on he became isolated and didn't much bother with anything other than work. Looking back it is obvious he was terribly unhappy but that is unfortunately the theme of this story. I also had three adopted sisters that we shall call Kay, Mary, and Carry. All of whom were already 10 and older once I was brought into the household. The six of us lived in a two bedroom single bath home on the south side of Indianapolis. My earliest memory is literally the day that they brought me to their house; you may think that is crazy, a child less than a year old having a vivid memory but I swear to you I do. I remember being brought into the kitchen and being placed into a high chair with a pack of saltines....then a bath and to bed. For the first few years it seemed that we had a happy, perfect family. Frank made good money and so Opal stayed home and managed the house while watching me. I remember how nice she was at first but that would soon change, everything changed. The early eighties were a rough time economically and it showed. The stress of life really brought out the mean in Opal, she would fly off the handle in a millisecond flat. I was a very advanced child for my age and by pre-school I could count to 1000, read children's books myself, and I knew all my shapes and colors beyond the standard "circle, square, blue, red". My adopted parents were not very well educated and I think they were taken aback by the rate at which I absorbed information. It could not possibly be that this child simply has a thirst for knowledge and an ability to process things; it must be DEMONS...yep, folks, demons. From the time I was maybe 3 until I stopped speaking to Opal circa 1999 I was repeatedly told that I was "FULL OF DEMONS" as well as the everpopular"YOU ARE GOING TO HELL FOR _________" Now you can add whatever you wish to that blank up there because she sure did. I was going to hell for running in the house, catching insects, not going to bed on time, throwing rocks, playing with sticks, you name it, and he'll was fucking terrifying. I was taken to churches where people preached that the devil was not among us , but inside of us all!!! and as I watched them shake and scream and yell it honestly scared the shit out of me. Being a developing child and being told you are possessed by creatures from hell may have a lasting mental effect. Like many kids I began to rebel against and since I was full of demons I began to act accordingly. Things in the household spiraled downward like a toy boat circling an open drain. Opal was becoming aloof and isolated, coming from her bedroom only to cuss, complain, and rage. After the first few times getting my ass or face slapped up I learned to shut my mouth but unfortunately my older adopted sister Mary never got that lesson. She was about early high school age when I was adopted but I do not remember either of my two oldest sisters going to school at all. She like rock music of the time, she didn't dress appropriately, she was loud, and she did not listen to anything she was told. She was a typical teen girl in the 80's until she snuck out one night and some men snuck PCP into her drink. She had a bad reaction and seized, they just dumped her from the car onto a cold, dark Indianapolis street corner in the middle of a ghetto where she lay until found. She was rushed to the hospital where she died and was revived many time; luckily she lived, but she had went without oxygen and it left her with some mental impairment. She never really progressed past a teen mentality. I do not know if it was shame at her sneaking out with men and being discovered or the lingering mental illness but Opal had a fire for her like no other. They once had a shouting match over what Mary was wearing and after a few minutes Opal picked up an old golf wedge club that I had found and began to beat her savagely. I counted at least 30 shots before I got the courage to jump in from of her; I was maybe 8 years old. The following years would show a pattern of such actions with all four of us occasionally getting it but Mary and myself got the brunt of things...there were hot off the stove spatulas to bare skin, broomsticks, rake handles, and even the cast iron skillet with hot oil still inside. My father, having been introduced to Opal's violent nature knew better than to intervene, choosing to withdraw all together of the situation. Left to free rein Opal never missed an opportunity to abuse physically, or verbally. I remember being perhaps 9-10 years old and being as my parernts were way older I dressed like I was from the 60's,. Opal had since went to work at a metal polishing factory and I was left to the daily care of three teenage, adopted sister with no clue about basic hygiene so I smelled terrible and the stress of my violent home life had put weight on me other kids fucked with me hardcore. I had had a terrible day at school; my pants had ripped and all the other kids were laughing and calling me fatass and such literally all day long. So I get home finally and I totally break down into hesterical crying fits to which my "mother" responds to be yelling "BOY!!....WHAT IS ALL THE NOISE ABOUT!!?!" and through tears and in broken English I struggled to explain the events of the day and how all the kids said I "stink and that my clothes were trash and that I was too fat!!" and her caring response was to look me dead in my eyes and yell to me "YOU ARE FAT AND I AM NOT BUYING YOU NEW CLOTHES UNTIL YOU LOSE SOME WEIGHT!!" This event would truly cast a demon of hatred and anger deep into my soul that I would struggle to shake for the next 20 or more years. The next day at school, on recess a group of slightly younger children began to gather around me and began the usual verbal and physical harassment. As they had a few days previous they were attempting to set me up for that trick where one person gets down in a dog-like pose behind you while you are distracted and once in place the other push you over and everyone has a grand old laugh at your expense while you struggle to get your fat ass off the ground and get your wind back but that day I was not playing that shit and so when the little fucker ducked down behind me I immediately swung around with my right foot and landed a vicious snap kick directly to his eye socket; the sound of it breaking echoed the playground followed by painful wailing. It felt good to hear, it felt good to see the fear in the eyes of his friend's eyes, to send a message that I was no longer their victim or anyone else's for that matter. I started skipping school, vandalizing, petty theft, shoplifting, and anything other than wholesome which got me arrested for stealing CD's and Transformers from K-Mart. L.L. Cool J.....funny the shit you value when you look in retrospect. The ride home from the juvenile center on East 21st street was a long one and I was petrified of the beating that awaited me as new and different ways and items to beat the fuck from me danced in my head like those fucking sugar-plums from that stupid Christmas Song. When we finally got back to our house in Fountain Square I was directed into the kitchen where a length of 2/4 about 2 foot long waited on the kitchen table. Opal from behind me yelled out "BOY!!" which was what I was always referenced as as if I had no fucking name and when I did a 180 she belted me across my face with a hard right fist, but unlike every other time she hit me I did not scream out, cry, or even flinch from the blow. This further infuriated her and so she struck my face again to the same result, and again, and again until I firmly grabbed her right wrist at which point she immediately hit me with a hard left and I subsequently grabbed her left wrist. I was about 175lbs if not more and my strength overpowered her ability to strike me and when she realized that she could not move and seen in my eyes that this was not going to happen she began to scream "LET GO OF ME!!" to which I replied "I am going to let you go and when I do you are not going to fucking touch me in any way!!"...I let go, and defeated she walked away. After that she offered no real support other than a place to sleep. I began to steal clothing from people's clotheslines and after wearing the same pair of shoes for so long that my feet are literally deformed, I took a pair of Nikes off of someone's porch. Over the next few years I would have many more legal troubles, assaults, thefts, arsons until the State of Indiana stepped in and made me a ward of the state. I was sentenced and sent to a place called Glen Mills Schools in Concordville, Pennsylvania. It was supposed to be a fresh start and a chance to better myself and I was able to get my HSE, learn computer aided drafting, and I got to compete in powerlifting as well. It was the first time in my life I had seen a dentist even; I was 15 years old and finally I felt hopeful and happy; that would soon change.
If you would like to hear more please leave a comment or like. I also appreciate any feedback about my writing as I am not a professional in any way but always looking to improve my craft. If you made it this far; you are greatly appreciated.

Woven mail is great, it is truly the beating heart of strand
Void OS feels great with dr
And dr made resil great
Individually these sources of DR are not an issue, where they become an issue is when they are stacked together

I will use 2 examples here to demonstrate my point

1. Woven mail + Void OS + 100 resil

Woven mail: 60% dr
Void OS: 50%dr + 45 hp shields
100 resil: 30% dr
So, this is a bit harder to calculate, but here we go:
The full brunt of our DR is only present while we have our 45 hp OS up so let's calculate the EHP of this OS
DR: 0.4 × 0.5 × 0.7 = 0.14 (An 86% damage reduction)
EHP= 45hp/ 0.14 = 321EHP
Not we calculate the EHP for the normal guardian health with all DRs except for the OS
DR: 0.4×0.7 = 0.28 (a 72% DR)
EHP: 200hp/0.28 =714EHP
This means in this scenario the total HP of the player is 1035 EHP
For reference that is a 617.5% increase in effective health compared to NO DR
"YOU Can't GET WOVEN MAIL + VOID OS"
Yes you can
Either

1. Navigator + void subclass (this gives access to devour even lol)
   
2. Strand subclass + repulsor brace (with destabilizing rounds) for Void OS
   

But... hey sure, this is a hard set up
You know what isnt hard? Example number 2

1. Woven mail + 100 resil + 3 resist mods on master NF (resist mods paired with the threat)

The total DR here is: 0.4 × 0.7 × 0.7 = 0.196 (80.4% dr)
Considering that the element of our resist mods also has a 25% damage increase due to threats, this results in a total EHP of:
200/(0.196 × 1.25) = 816 ehp
"What about the other damage types?"
I gonna skip the math here since it is pretty simple.
For the other elements:
Dr: 0.28 (72%) Ehp: 714
To understand truly how much health it FEELS like we have in an activity like this, we an average out these values between the 3 elements
So lets assume in this hypothetical NF that each element is 1/3 of the damage you take.
Disclaimer: This is basically never the case where normally the threat damage is vastly more present, I did it like this to make the final result SMALLER than what it actually is so that people, hopefully, realize how broken this is
Average EHP in example 2:
AVG_ehp = (2*714 +816)/3 =748 ehp
This is, compared to base hp values, a 474% increase in HP

Why this is an issue

This is something I want to elaborate on, this isnt a matter of asking for nerfs for the sake of it... I am asking for DR to be looked at because it creates bad design on activities.
What do I mean? There are 2 ways to create challenging content with these levels of DR
1. Nullifiers: enemies with the ability to remove buffs and abilities from players. This is like the nullifiers fron warframe for reference... one of the most disliked enemies in that game... this would be even worse in destiny, where these enemies would LITERALLY be anti fun/ anti build enemies, how fun does that sound? An enemy whose mere presence throws your build out of the window.

1. Re balance game around DR: Remember when LF launched and people complained about content feeling too brutal? Like Neomuna and legend avalon and such? Imagine that, but rather than a bunch of tanky enemies, we have a bunch of tanky enemies that are balanced to 2-3 shot an 85% dr guardian... we call these one hit kills. We have already seen design similar to this in the Reckoning activity days, I am not making this stuff up, we already lived it.

Both of these solutions are anti-fun solutions, and even though they solve the issue they, literally, arent beneficial to either casuals or hardcore
For casuals, shit just becomes unnecessarily balanced towards min maxed builds.
For hardcores the game just becomes unbalanced and everyone will be running a SINGULAR build everywhere
No one wants these solutions, but all that is left is to nerf
If bungie wants to nerf it right, they need to future proof this dr system... rather than nerf woven mail (which is a whole other discussion) they can tackle the true issue
DR STACKING

Diminishing returns

Diminishing return in this case could come in many various ways, but I am gonna tackle it in a very specific way, because it is simpler to explain effects and understand the workings behind
DRV - Damage resistance value
P - Priority List
N - Number of DRV element in list P list
TDR - Total damage resistance
The system could work like this:
Your TDR would be equal to multiplicative stacking DRs divided by their respective N value, which is determined by an established P list
"Wtf did you just say?" Here is an example
When stacking Woven mail (60%) and max resil (30%) the game would set Woven mail as the priority, as it is the higher value, so, it is attributed as the firs ELEMENT of a list, the second element is of course the 30% from resil
Your total DR would then be:
Woven mail 60% divided by N; since it is the priority it's N = 1 so the DR is 60%
100 resil 30% divided by N; since it is the second highest value N = 2, so the DR is 15%
This way:
TDR = 0.4 *0.85= 0.34 (a total 66% DR)
On the previous system this resulted in 72% DR
This results in a ~20% reduction in effective health from previous to the "new" system
Following from the example, if we added some other source of DR (like a 25% dr source) it would be divided by N = 3, since it is the 3rd in the list of priority, so the actual DR is of 25%/3, so the total dr value is:
TDR = 0.40.850.92 = 0.3125 (68% dr)
As you can see, the more DR buffs we add the less it affects our total damage reduction

The positives

This would result in a couple of things...
Firstly and most important, absurdly high DR are much harder to achieve, but at the same time, this still allows high DR buffs to have value, and some other dr sources to have a place too, but the more you stack it the less effective it becomes
Secondly, it would allow for more diversity in mods
Chest mods are basically governed by resit mods in most high end activities, since well, 30% dr is insane to pass on
But in theory, if you have 100 resil and another source of DR the effects of the chest mods would become very minimal, and so could be swapped for something else allowing for chest mods to be more diverse
Thirdly, this is future proof, since no matter hoe many new sources of DR are added, the system is built to reduce their effectiveness as you stack more and more
Hope you liked the read
If you dont agree with this, please tell me I want to understand people's points of view
Be respectful

Introduction

This is part 2 of the research/discussion series on the wonderful article Why Are We in Ukraine? by Schwarz & Layne. This is a continuation of the previous post, which you can find HERE. Given the relative success in finding and sourcing most of that first portion, I'd like to continue with the series to the next section of the article. If you are interested in participating, please comment below with any relevant points of evidence that addresses portions of the article. I'll be regularly updating this post with points to help future visitors to better navigate the article and the discussion below.
I look forward to seeing you all in the comments!

Part 2: How To Poke A Bear

One early sign of this fundamental change was Washington’s covert, overt, and (perhaps most important) overtly covert interference in Russia’s affairs during the early and mid-Nineties—a project of political, social, and economic engineering that included funneling some $1.8 billion to political movements, organizations, and individuals deemed ideologically compatible with U.S. interests and culminated in American meddling in Russia’s 1996 presidential election. Of course, great powers have always manipulated both their proxies and smaller neighboring states. But by so baldly intervening in Russia’s internal affairs, Washington signaled to Moscow that the sole superpower felt no obligation to follow the norms of great power politics and, perhaps more galling, no longer regarded Russia as a power with sensibilities that had to be considered.
Moscow’s alarm over the hegemonic role America had assigned itself was intensified by what could fairly be characterized as the bellicose utopianism demonstrated by Washington’s series of regime-change wars. In 1989, just as the U.S.-Soviet global rivalry was ending, the United States assumed its self-appointed role as “the sole remaining superpower” by launching its invasion of Panama. Moscow issued a statement criticizing the invasion as a violation of “the sovereignty and honor of other nations,” but neither Moscow nor any other great power took any explicit action to protest the United States’ exercising its sway in its own strategic backyard. Nonetheless, because no foreign power was using Panama as a foothold against the United States—and thus Manuel Noriega’s regime posed no conceivable threat to America’s security—the invasion neatly established the post–Cold War ground rules: American force would be used, and international law contravened, not only in pursuit of tangible national interests, but also in order to depose governments that Washington deemed unsavory. America’s regime-change war in Iraq—declared “illegal” by U.N. secretary general Kofi Annan—and its wider ambitions to engender a democratic makeover in the Middle East demonstrated the range and lethality of its globalizing impulse. More immediately disquieting to Moscow, against the backdrop of NATO’s steady eastward push, were the implications of the U.S.-led alliance’s regime-change wars in the Federal Republic of Yugoslavia in 1999 and, twelve years later, in Libya.
Although Washington presented the U.S.-led NATO bombing of Yugoslavia as an intervention to forestall human rights abuses in Kosovo, the reality was far murkier. American policymakers presented Belgrade with an ultimatum that imposed conditions no sovereign state could accept: relinquish sovereignty over the province of Kosovo and allow free reign to NATO forces throughout Yugoslavia. (As a senior State Department official reportedly said in an off-the-record briefing, “[We] deliberately set the bar higher than the Serbs could accept.”) Washington then intervened in a conflict between the brutal Kosovo Liberation Army (KLA)—a force that had previously been denounced by the U.S. State Department as a terrorist organization—and the military forces of the equally brutal regime of Slobodan Milošević. The KLA’s vicious campaign—including the kidnapping and execution of Yugoslav officials, police, and their families—provoked Yugoslavia’s equally vicious response, including both murderous reprisals and indiscriminate military actions against civilian populations suspected of aiding the insurgents. Through a stenographic process in which “ethnic-Albanian militants, humanitarian organizations, NATO and the news media fed off each other to give genocide rumors credibility,” to quote a retrospective investigation by the Wall Street Journal in 2001, this typical insurgency was transformed into Washington’s righteous casus belli. (A similar process would soon unfold in the run-up to the Gulf War.)
It was not lost on Russia that Washington was bombing Belgrade in the name of universal humanitarian principles while giving friends and allies such as Croatia and Turkey a free pass for savage counterinsurgencies that included the usual war crimes, human rights abuses, and forced removals of civilian populations. President Yeltsin and Russian officials strenuously, if impotently, protested the Washington-led war on a country with which Russia traditionally had close political and cultural ties. Indeed, NATO and Russian troops nearly clashed at the airport in Kosovo’s provincial capital. (The confrontation was only averted when a British general defied the order of his superior, NATO supreme commander U.S. general Wesley Clark, to deploy troops to block the arrival of Russian paratroopers, telling him: “I’m not going to start World War III for you.”) Ignoring Moscow, NATO waged its war against Yugoslavia without U.N. sanction and destroyed civilian targets, killing some five hundred non-combatants (actions that Washington considers violations of international norms when conducted by other powers). The operation not only toppled a sovereign government, but also forcibly altered a sovereign state’s borders (again, actions that Washington considers violations of international norms when conducted by other powers).
NATO similarly conducted its war in Libya in the face of valid Russian alarm. That war went beyond its defensive mandate—as Moscow protested—when NATO transformed its mission from the ostensible protection of civilians to the overthrow of Muammar Qaddafi’s regime. The escalation, justified by a now-familiar process involving false and misleading stories pedaled by armed rebels and other interested parties, produced years of violent disorder in Libya and made it a haven for jihadis. Both wars were fought against states that, however distasteful, posed no threat to any NATO member. Their upshot was the recognition in both Moscow and Washington of NATO’s new power, ambit, and purpose. The alliance had been transformed from a supposedly mutual defense pact designed to repel an attack on its members into the preeminent military instrument of American power in the post–Cold War world.
Russia’s growing concern over Washington’s hegemonic ambitions has been reinforced by the profound shift, since the Nineties, of the nuclear balance in Washington’s favor. The nuclear standoff between the United States and Russia is the dominant fact of their relationship—a fact not nearly conspicuous enough in the current conversations about the war in Ukraine. Long after Putin, and irrespective of whether Russia is converted to a market democracy, the preponderance of each country’s nuclear missiles will be aimed at the other; every day, the nuclear-armed submarines of one will be patrolling just off the coast of the other. If they’re lucky, both countries will be managing this situation forever.
Throughout the Cold War, Russia and the United States both knew that a nuclear war was unwinnable—an attack by one would surely produce a cataclysmic riposte by the other. Both sides carefully monitored this “delicate balance of terror,” as the American nuclear strategist Albert Wohlstetter put it in 1959, devoting enormous intellectual resources and sums of money to recalibrating in response to even the slightest perceived alterations. Rather than attempting to maintain that stable nuclear balance, however, Washington has been pursuing nuclear dominance for the past thirty years.
Beginning in the early Aughts, a number of defense analysts—most prominently Keir A. Lieber, a professor at Georgetown, and Daryl G. Press, a professor at Dartmouth and a former consultant to both the Pentagon and the RAND Corporation—expressed concern about a convergence of strategic developments that have been under way since the dawn of America’s “unipolar moment.” The first was the precipitous qualitative erosion of Russian nuclear capabilities. Throughout the Nineties and Aughts, that decline primarily affected Russia’s monitoring of American ICBM fields, its missile-warning networks, and its nuclear submarine forces—all crucial elements to maintaining a viable deterrent. Meanwhile, as Russia’s nuclear capabilities decayed, America’s grew increasingly lethal. Reflecting the seemingly exponential progress of its so-called military-technological revolution, America’s arsenal became immensely more precise and powerful, even as it declined in size.
These improvements didn’t fit with the aim of deterring an adversary’s nuclear attack—which requires only the nuclear capacity for a “countervalue” strike on enemy cities. They were, however, necessary for a disarming “counterforce” strike, capable of preempting a Russian retaliatory nuclear response. “What the planned force appears best suited to provide,” as a 2003 RAND report on the U.S. nuclear arsenal concluded, “is a preemptive counterforce capability against Russia and China. Otherwise, the numbers and the operating procedures simply do not add up.”
This new nuclear posture would obviously unsettle military planners in Moscow, who had undertaken similar studies. They no doubt perceived Washington’s 2002 withdrawal from the Anti-Ballistic Missile Treaty—about which Moscow repeatedly expressed its objections—in light of these changes in the nuclear balance, grasping that Washington’s withdrawal and its concomitant pursuit of various missile defense schemes would enhance America’s offensive nuclear capabilities. Although no missile defense system could shield the United States from a full-scale nuclear attack, a system could plausibly defend against the very few missiles an adversary might have left after an effective U.S. counterforce strike.
To Russian strategists, Washington’s pursuit of nuclear primacy was presumably still further evidence of America’s effort to force Russia to accede to the U.S.-led global order. Moreover, the means that Washington employed to realize that ambition would justifiably strike Moscow as deeply reckless. The initiatives the United States has pursued—advances in anti-submarine and anti-satellite warfare, in missile accuracy and potency, and in wide-area remote sensing—have rendered Russia’s nuclear forces all the more vulnerable. In such circumstances, Moscow would be sorely tempted to buy deterrence at the cost of dispersing its nuclear forces, decentralizing its command-and-control systems, and implementing “launch on warning” policies. All such countermeasures could cause crises to escalate uncontrollably and trigger the unauthorized or accidental use of nuclear weapons. Paradoxically, mutually assured destruction provided decades of peace and stability. To remove the mutuality by cultivating overwhelming counterforce (i.e., first-strike) capabilities is—in another paradox—to court volatility and an increased likelihood of a grossly destructive nuclear exchange.
Since the nadir of Russian power in the decade and a half following the Soviet collapse, Russia has bolstered both its nuclear deterrent and, to a degree, its counterforce capabilities. Despite this, America’s counterforce lead has actually grown. And yet, U.S. leaders often act affronted when Russia makes moves to update its own nuclear capabilities. “From the vantage point of Moscow . . . U.S. nuclear forces look truly fearsome and they are,” Lieber and Press observe. The United States, they continue, is “playing strategic hardball in the nuclear domain, and then acting like the Russians are paranoid for fearing U.S. actions.”

Stealth Kills & Silent Weapons:

• Pick off as many enemies as you can with silent weapons & skills before "going loud" in a combat encounter.
• Experiment with throwing glass bottles to distract enemies. Moving just one enemy can sometimes open up another 3 stealth kills depending on the scenario. You get a decent amount of these as loot through the game.
• Elvis has a silent skill called Glove Shock that deals good damage and can even stun a robotic enemy for 2 turns. Use this to silent kill a much stronger enemy than you could normally handle. Also, the 1st companion you get can have their skills spec'd to achieve an 85%+ chance of critical during ambushes, letting you take out higher health enemies.
• Remember to equip your damage mods on silent weapons in the early game as this will allow you to hit important HP benchmarks (like the 80 health saplings). You won't be able to rely on critical hits in stealth until much later in the game when you get more skill points.
• Some non-silent skills and items can actually be used in stealth without enemies hearing you as long as the enemy you are targeting is fairly far away from his buddies. For example, Diggs' Charge (knockdown) ability is NOT silent but its not as loud as normal weapons. Other enemies won't hear it if they are sufficiently far away. I believe EMP grenades work this way too, though I have not tested.
• Weapon Damage skills (like Flame Shot or Acid Shot) can be used with silent weapons when you need a little extra damage. The acid and fire damage over time ticks BEFORE the enemy can act, too!

General Combat:

• Low cover may as well be no cover for your team. It is better than nothing of course, but you WILL find yourself getting hit a lot if you are not utilizing high cover or high ground.
• Use you Miasma Powers. Miasma Powers are OP in this game; specifically the ones that can reposition enemies and the ones that can be used to stun groups of enemies. I found that opening up with Miasma Powers to reposition and then stun 3+ enemies at a time usually ensured I could finish the encounter without taking much damage or using too many items.
• Don't rely on power cell items to recover MP once you get past the early game. They are expensive and you don't get very many as loot. Instead, take full advantage of the regenerate MP skill that Elivs and Companion #2 can get. It recovers 20 MP every time you wait (take no action) on a turn. Near the end of a combat encounter, leave one enemy alive and try to stunlock them with EMP or knockdown skills. Then, abuse this skill to get yourself back near full MP before killing them. Companion #2 gets a skill that can give Elvis 60 MP every 5 turns. Finally, take advantage of mods that give MP back per hit - especially useful on shotguns.
• Speaking of, USE SHOTGUNS. Shotguns are the most OP weapon on in the game and its not even close. There are two reasons for this: only shotguns can hit multiple targets and Shotguns are designed around getting critical hits. The more enemies you are targeting, the higher your crit chance. Critical hits rule because obviously they do more damage, but also critical KILLS give you an action point back. Meaning if you set up the field right you can chain multiple kills back to back to back using shotguns. This goes back to my point about using Miasma skills to reposition enemies in way that you can stun and then melt them with shotguns.
• There is a Miasma Power you will get early on that may seem lackluster at first. But it actually is an amazing tool to heal your entire team without wasting med-pods.
• The rage mechanic is interesting. It is very useful but honestly it is hard to manipulate. I wouldn't worry to much about abusing it - just let it come in handy when it activates.

General Tips:

• The early game is disproportionately harder than the mid and late game. This is common in tactics games and certainly true in Miasma Chronicles. Your weapons are weak and you have no skills yet. Don't be discouraged!
• Explore EVERYWHERE, complete every sidequest, and solve every keypad puzzle. This will give you a ton of plastic, a ton of items, and also give you the best weapons and mods in the game. Note that there are a few secret areas too se keep an eye out for environments like bushes that stick out. You might be able to walk through them!
• Leveling up restores your health to maximum. Use this to your advantage. Absorbing Miasma Vortexes restores your MP to maximum. Use this to your advantage too.
• Don't buy any weapons. I can't think of any instance where buying a weapon is worth it (except the special weapon I note in the bullet below). They are very expensive, and the game gives you tons of better, unique weapons for free via exploring.
• Try not to buy many consumables/items either. Of course if you are struggling and run out of heals then go for it. In the early game, you might need to. But around the mid-game you will have the opportunity to spend 7,000 plastic for a very strong weapon that you will use throughout the rest of the game and the earlier you can get that the better. Afterwards go wild with your plastic - you won't need to save up for anything else.
• Every Keypad puzzle has a codex log (the orange glowing items) that gives a hint on the solution.
• The watchers and the weapon parts quests can be a little tricky. Some are easy to find but others are not. You should have three watchers done before you leave the first area. And it'll be completable once you get the quest to find some medicine for someone. The weapon quest will be completable once you find yourself in a casino-like environment.
• Speaking of the first area of the game: when you leave it will seem like you can never go back. This is not true. Once you progress through the story you will be able to return to any zone on the map.
• Enemies return to certain zones on the map. Even outside of sidequests. You can use this for some extra experience if you want.

And that's it for now! I will try to edit this if I think of anything else. Let me know your thoughts and if you have any tips I might have missed.

This is a letter I wanted to send myself around half a year ago but didn't maybe because of what a bad place I was in (and still am), maybe I just needed to get some of the things out of my system. Today I found it and it reignited some things in me, and I wrote some more words about what is currently happening to me. I changed the names and some other things to remain anonymous. It's long and all over the place and I don't expect anyone to read it all honestly.
TRIGGER WARNING: Suicidal ideation, Suicide, Depression, Recklessness, Rejection
As before, I wonder what's going on in your life right now, because, honestly, I don't even feel like writing this letter at this point. Things are really bad, and today I have a good enough day to write something up but I don't feel well at all, and it doesn't seem like things will get better, if ever. Part of me knows that things always change and there's a chance that they will change for the better, but from my experience it doesn't usually work out, I seem to be switching from one issue to another, be it writing a thesis, finding a job, or my current state. I really can't seem to catch a break and for once be at least somewhat happy and satisfied with where I'm at in life.
I'm gonna tell a little bit about my situation and refer to some of the things you said in your email. Most of it will be about my "relationship" with Amy, and how much it affected me mentally.
I moved in with Amy and things are bad in ways I can't even describe. First thing is that over the beginning of the last year I fell in love with her and really, badly wanted to matter anything to her and be important to her, and for her to show that somehow for me. We went together on a trip to mountains and generally spend more time together than ever before. I really felt the chemistry between us, i thought we got a long really well. We talked at the fireplace party and she said she's too fucked up to date me, and that she would never do this to me. Since I moved in with her as a flatmate there were some things that bugged me about the way she is, like careless about a lot of things (mainly her safety and well being), horribly under eating in the name of some fucked up "diet", not listening to my guidance about most things, like not taking breaks at the gym, and other minor things that really bugged me and kinda felt conflicting because she doesn't seems childish, in fact quite the opposite, but some of those behaviours certainly felt like that at the time. But generally things were good, at least most of the time, we spent time together, went to gym, watched shows, threw a few parties etc.
As the time went on, things got worse, and I don't even remember every bad situation that happened over the last 5 months. Some early days she cried a lot, but it's this kind of stiff hopeless cry that really gets me. She doesn't feel emotional, she feels empty, her eyes are really scary sometimes... One day she got really drunk, I think it was an anniversary of her best friends passing, I was really anxious, because she didn't seem like she was controlling herself at all, and I don't know, seeing people just empty, hopeless, out of control, careless and drowning themselves in alcohol ALONE just affects me in a really bad way mentally. When we drove the next day to get her a bookstand (which she was really obsessed with getting this exact day) she was acting really manic and on the edge, I was so nervous that I shook her one time when she said something especially deranged (idea of driving with the complete bookshelf in the public commute), I don't know the last time I felt so much out of control of the situation and shaken, even though the whole situation is seemingly so fucking innocent. One day she threw away a line about how it's so stupid that suicide is a sin. We complain a lot about our lives and make dark humor jokes in our group, and yeah, there is always something real beneath them, I sometimes do have dark thoughts, and I feel like I have a lot of issues as well, but this is all heavy stuff that I wouldn't talk about freely and lightheartedly. I didn't thought then how serious she was, well I kinda did, because I asked her the next day about this, and she laughed saying "Are you serious right now? xD" And she said "Yes, of course I was serious". Before that she talked how she was so tired she was barely able to drive and see other cars, which worried me so much that I can't even describe it, and she didn't say it in a worried tone, just like she wanted to brag or something, I don't know why (she does that A LOT). And I don't know, but it was REALLY traumatic for me to hear her say those things like this, I couldn't sleep for days after this, I was in an especially bad place then. She said she first was going to do it when she was a teen, then once her mother dies, and right now since she knows it's a sin and she wants to see her family and friends she has to live to 50, thats how long she expects to live without killing herself. I said that she still has people here, do we not matter to her at all?, and she said that in the afterlife she has more of them. I said that doesn't she care anything about her health?, because she do goes to doctors and stuff, and she said she only does so because of her mother, she never went to a doctor because she wanted to. She said that she doesn't understand how atheists don't kill themselves immediately. She said it all without blinking an eye about how fucked up what she's saying is, it wasn't like confessing, more like explaining basic facts, and that's the thing that I think fucked me up the most, because if I were to say those things I would be shaking and having difficulties with every word, not throwing this stuff this carelessly.
I am writing wild scenarios in my head about how fucked up things she did in her past, in the parties etc. and they make me really anxious and depressed that she's like this and not much more innocent as I usually pictured her (and still sometimes do, because she's not acting toxic or deranged 100% of the time, she actually shows a lot of care for certain things, she loves every kid and animal etc., she never even smoked a cigarette), because she never seemed so much like a typical club party girl that gets into trouble a lot, well I knew she partied and drunk a lot, but she always seemed kinda different from that. Most of the time she's not like that, she can behave with a lot of compassion most certain situations. She talks about all the speeding tickets she got (and got out of by sweet talking the policemen), she texts all the time while driving, she admits to driving recklessly when alone, she lies to her mother all the time about how well mentally she is, how much she's drinking, like she were silently going on all fours between bedroom and bathroom bc she was so drunk, sometimes she even lies about having passengers when driving to the city we live in because she's so unwell she drives alone and makes stops along the way to make it, she lies about how long it took for her to drive. Sometimes I feel like everything is fake because of some of these things, like I am loosing the touch with reality.
One time we drove back to our hometown, and like halfway through she started to get really sleepy, I could see by the corner of my eye that her head was going down for a fraction of a second. I wanted to switch to drive, but she was having none of it, saying that she already planned to drive home herself and if she planned it then it will happen. I started to get really anxious and frantically started to think of the ways to do something, I stupidly suggested that I will drive my car after her once we get to my home, and she said "You really ARE fucked up xD", because she would still be inside her car and how that would help? And I know it wouldn't, but I panically tried to find something, that's just something that I came up with on the spot. I just told her to text me immediately when she gets home (and she did), but the whole situation was just so fucking stressful for me, I even then told my mother about what's happening but without darker details.
She seems to have a problem wich alcohol, although certain situations can prevent her from drinking extensively, like seeing the kids in school the next day. It's kind of scary how much she can drink and then be sober the next day.
One time she was on her period (they get really bad for her) and she wanted to drink some alcohol because of the weekend, but she was on her first week of antidepressants and all those things caused me not to go to my friends and stay with her to look after, she became really tired after a while, she was barely staying on her feet, when she went to take a shower before bed I asked her to not lock the door and she didn't. I went to clean the dishes, and I think I heard something but I didn't pay attention or anything, but later she was in bed and clearly trying to hide from me that she collapsed under the shower. She was okay, but the fact that she didn't want to admit it to me made me really anxious and depressed. She was so out of energy that I had to hold her the water bottle to drink from. I felt so bad, I don't think I could sleep that night.
She doesn't let me drive because once I drove with her when being really nervous and weren't like the best at it, it kinda angers me because it's double standard as fuck, not letting me drive when I'm nervous, but driving when you're almost sleeping. And I don't consider myself a bad driver, apart from once loosing control when going to friends wedding I have never have an accident. She also gets really mad if I'm going to drive after drinking single beer and waiting like 4 hours after it, and that's NOTHING compared to the things she does.
Sometimes I'm hesitant to tell her some of the things I think, partly because it't pointless, and partly because her response would just make me more triggered, angry, anxious and depressed.
Sometimes I don't know what to do, telling anyone about those things (like her mother) seems like breaking her trust, and those are personal things that I really shouldn't tell my friends about, hence I tell them to my therapist.
What's scary and fucked up is that depression is not only hopelessness, sadness and lack of energy, but for some people also being mad about everything, saying really hurtful things to people that love you, hating on and judging literally everyone, becoming really sickly, strongly obsessed about something, behaving carelessly and recklessly. And every attempt at trying to address those things is responded with some hateful, poisonous comments or "I'm just like that", one time I said to her that she should care less about something, and she responded with a lot of hate that I should just stop "shaking my hands when I'm nervous, can I do that? can I?" I feel so fucking bad sometimes, because part of me wants to scream into her face about the things she does, and at the same time:
I know that it's an illness, and I don't know if that would be bad of me to be angry at her about anything
I'm worried about things she would say to me back, she sometimes seems to revel in hurting people emotionally or at least being really good at it and constantly looking for topics when arguing with someone, and I'm really fragile, sensitive and easy to hurt, for some reason especially to things she says to me
I don't feel like I can have any influence on her actions, although she does comment a lot of the time that other people do, like her mother of her one female friend etc. so sometimes I feel like it contradicts itself, although she does say that she needs to be controlled in some way to do what it said, like being yelled at or being put in the position with no choice, and I don't want to be like that and I don't think I have the strength of character to be like that, and never will
She sends a lot of memes about depression to our group chat, and I personally don't think they're helpful, at least for me, I'm not feeling like someone is going through the same thing as me and it helps, it's more like everyone is trying to drag each other down, some of those memes are as hopeless as you can get, making fun of therapy and psychiatrists, never having any happiness (dementors can't do anything to you), missing yourself and thinking its too late now to regain it, generally memes about not being a human anymore and never being again etc., being put into a mental hospital if you tell your therapist everything, about hating and despising other people. There's this friend that she says is way worse than her, and that he doesn't even want help unlike her, that he's so used to it he almost likes it, I honestly don't know if that doesn't also affect her. One time we drove to our hometown, 5 of us with him and a few others, and they were talking about suicide, and some other friend said this cliche line about suicide being the most egotistical thing a person can do, and even though he was quiet the whole ride he just said "Yeah, right" from the back. I don't know, I guess it depends on the person, but for me surrounding myself with this topics would make me feel worse and not understood. She also has a lot of kids in school with mental issues, she has a kid who is supposed to be after a suicide attempt (that's also one of the things that froze my heart, when she said that she knows he and his parents are bullshitting because he would be put to the hospital for 3 months, but how would she know that?), or generally kids that are on SSRIs and that one time kid told her justifying himself that he took the double dose of antidepressants and she was holding herself not to say "me too!". They had a movie night and they played UNO, and she said that out the 3 kids she played with, all of them were in a psychiatric hospital.
One time at a party in front of everyone she said she thought about jumping out of a window, but being crippled her mom would have to deal with that so she wouldn't do it like that. Other time she said she changes the mind when she loses the energy, she would try to hang herself but would become tired and not do it. Once also we talked about unrelated topic, and I said as a trivia that dead bodies can produce sounds like exhaling, and she said she knows that because she know a lot about dead bodies, and she reads a lot about that... Once she said that she doesn't understand that atheists don't immediately kill themselves when someone close to them dies. Once she said something about there not being anything left of her inside. Once she said that her mother was worried she would be locked up in a psychiatric hospital, but she had to assure her that she knows how to mask everything, and she's not dangerous to others so that wouldn't happen.
Am I too innocent for these topics? Sometimes I feel like a kid listening to adults, and that I don't know and don't understand them and I feel small and worthless.
I think there are a lot of different ways to direct that recklessness and negativity through things like exercise, media escapism, music etc. and not things like hard partying, drugs/alcohol, reckless driving, acting angry etc.
I think that deeply believing that chemical imbalance is the cause of depression is very hurtful, because it's not completely proven and might turn some people off from forms of treatment that could potentially help them.
Escapism is a big thing for me, and I think that it helped me cope with a lot of things. Books, movies, music, I spend a lot of time looking for new music and artists.
I'm becoming very nosy and kinda controlling around her (well not actually controlling cause that's impossible with her, but just very nosy), I want to eardrop her conversations with her mother, to always know what she is doing, to know how well she is all the time.
There's no appreciation for me being around, even more so, saying that you don't matter that much, and what do even have or experienced together to be close. And that she can't really be close to people that don't immediately say what they're thinking (like me, she said, even though when i asked if she thinks I'm a fake friend she said no but I'm not honest), but part of me feels that it's bullshit, everyone hides something and only lets a part of themselves out, although it's true that sometimes I act more quietly and like I'm obviously hiding something. I feel inadequate and really bad because of that because the things I experienced in the last months were big for ME, and definitely changed me, but I guess they were nothing to her.
Sometimes she talks about how it's weird to her that normal people have dreams about having homes, vacations etc. One time she said how when she was little she said she never would be boring and bitter like adults, and then depression hit her. Recently she said she finally has a dream, to be able to rent a studio apartment to finally live alone. It kinda affected me, because I DO live with her (apart from others), and that would mean that she wants to get out from me too. One time she said that she hopes someone lively and fun will move in with us once our current flatmate get out, and that would mean that she is bored with me and my character, and she much preferred the previous one.
With the whole moving out thing, she sometimes talks about things getting better, like closer to spring she will renew the gym subscription, we will decorate the balcony for parties and hanging out (of course she said something about sleeping drunk in there...), and generally some things like that. It does make me wonder, do those lower points happen especially in autumn/winter ? I mean, I know there's even a disorder for that but I can't imagine there being such a huge difference.
When she started school, she became really overwhelmed with the amount of exercises she had to do before lessons. Most teachers don't have everything done beforehand but she said she absolutely needs to, and because of that she spent most of the time just doing them or resting, she was so obsessed with doing them she wanted drop out of our mountain vacation trip because she would be too much behind, and she got angry at me for saying that she needs a rest and that my talking doesn't help anything.
Over a month after the school she started the meds, and it doesn't feel like they helped her, at the beginning they only made her really sleepy and out of energy. In some ways i think that they made her worse, or maybe she just didn't have the energy to hide some things. I remember her reading the drug leaflet and noticing loudly that it may strengthen suicidal thoughts, i then read it myself because I was worried. It's honestly a bad thing that she had to check with the psychiatrist only after 2 months and not sooner because it wasn't helping her. On the second visit the doctor was surprised that it didn't help her (which I think might be a bad thing from her since it reinforces the thought that nothing will help her), and decided to up the dose for next 3 weeks to rule out the drug, and mentioned another stronger drug that she will prescribe her, and Amy asked her is it's a drug that is used in a psychiatric hospitals because she wanted to know, and apparently yes. I'm kinda scared what might be happening when she starts it, because the upped dose of current one doesn't seem to change anything. One time she asked me if I think they could lock her up if she caused an accident while driving while on this drug (if its not allowed to drive on it, because she admitted she would anyway), which again messed with my head a lot. The doctor also said that she might be more immune to various drugs than most people, and she said that it's probably true because a lot of the drugs she takes are quite strong, and she takes A LOT of them, hormones for acne and her very strong and long periods, inhaled steroids for asthma, antidepressants, drugs for sleep. Sometimes she ignores signs of some of her illnesses, like anemia. She sometimes offers people prescription drugs like antidepressants or antibiotics, which makes me really angry because those shouldn't be given around like candies, but like I said earlier I never told her it makes me angry. She also said that she only counts on the meds to work, if they won't, she would off herself
I joked a few times that we could get a cat here, I know that it's no cure but animals can certainly be a help for people who are going through rough times. She really took the subject seriously some day and convinced everyone, including our tenant and flatmates, that we should get a cat. She really wanted to have this one specific cat about 2h hour drive from us, so we drove there, but the cat got away from our car, and we couldn't find it. Few hours later when we got home she was convinced that we killed that cat and started asking everyone if they want anyone dead, because she can arrange that, because everyone around her dies, and she didn't want any cat at all anymore. But we eventually took Luna, and the missing cat was found later. After a few weeks with the cat, our flatmates started complaining about about the cat being in the apartment and not only our rooms (WTF?) and about its litter box and food. Amy was already really annoyed by them, especially this guy who is a little dumb, talkative and annoying, but this whole situation took it too whole another level. She almost couldn't control herself with how much they got on her nerves, merely hearing them walk on the corridor would make her furious. One night in the middle of the week she started going to the kitchen to get drunk to be able to sleep because of them. I obviously couldn't ignore that so I went with her to just be there. She changed topics every few seconds, talked about something that its a good thing our knifes are not sharp, she was generally acting very ill, which usually makes me extremely anxious and quiet. I feel like she was noticing that and she said "why aren't you talking with me ? X and Y always had gossips with me in the kitchen...". Then she went to sleep, texted me a lot about 100 different topics, and then went back to drink some more, then when she went to sleep she texted me something that made me feel like my brain is being fried. She send me a receipt of her drug and it said that overdosing it might cause heart problems and even death, and she added "if I found out that suicide is not a sin, or something changes, I already know the way <3". I didn't know what to do with myself for a good few minutes. My mind was racing and frying, my heart was frozen, and it took me a good while to calm down. Eventually I just took our cat and took it to her to sleep with, but didn't bring the subject, I just couldn't, I was too weak.
Next day she started being obsessed with moving out of here, far away from them, she started looking for available apartments and firstly I wanted to move with her, but the more I thought about this, the more I thought I just couldn't handle all of these things mentally. She was pushing me to define my stand on this, and just said "fuck it" angry at me for not being decisive," I'm gonna move with another guy I know", but I don't think that worked out since she eventually started looking for studio apartments for herself. Eventually I went to her and said that I think I want to live alone, that i feel kinda unstable mentally myself, and I wanted to let her know that I'm not wanting to let her go, but she was just like coldly "I'll be fine" without much emotion behind that. I then started to pour out my things about her (at first she said she didn't have the energy for that, but asked her to listen), how sometimes I felt like she has something negative about me that she doesn't tell me, that's she's colder to me than usually, she said that she's like that to everyone now, and I said that I felt like it was more personal, and she denied. I asked her if she thinks that I'm fake and she said "not fake, but you're not telling what you're thinking" and that she couldn't be close with people like that (or something along those lines). She said that I should have told her all of that right then. She always prides herself for always saying exactly what she means and being painfully straightforward. I also tried to confront her about being negative about my therapy, because I said to her I went to therapy, and she said "and you think it will help you ?" kinda ironically, and i was really hurt by that, she doesn't really believe in therapy and said that judging by colleges in our country her mother is a better therapist than most Ts here. She said then that she meant if I THINK its going to help me, not mocking, and when I said that I don't respond to "how was it?" is because I was worried she would mock me, she replied with "whatever , if you say so". I also said that I'm secretive because telling the truth would make other people hurt me, and she said "well of course".
To this day I don't know if I hurt her with that conversation, I'm not even sure if she understood that I'm very bad mentally right now mainly because of her. I felt really guilty about abandoning her, and talked about it extensively on a therapy session. I know that to save anyone you have to save yourself first, but I would be just proving that she's fucked up and everyone will eventually abandon her. On the other hand, I don't know if she cares AT ALL about me leaving her, maybe I really do am just a flatmate and not much else anymore.
Her mood massively affects mine, I could have the best day of my life and one sentence from her could easily ruin that. Sometimes I get anxious when I hear her walking on the corridor or when she gets back from school because I have no idea what mood she might come home with.
Most fucked up thing is that despite all of this is sometimes I'm still attracted to her. All it takes is one smile, one good day and I'm still rethinking if I would ever want to be with her. And there are also very good reasons for that, she can be very caring, lovable, funny and clever. I also fantasize about her sexually to some small extent. And the thing is that I never before found her very attractive and wasn't interested in her.
How does her mother fit in this ? I don't know but she lost her father as a child, she was taking her to therapists and psychiatrists since she was a child . Sometimes I feel like she can make her worse by saying certain things, like when missing cat was found and saying that it was bad and scary and that we could be taking this one right now. She might have been very overprotective (or might have good reasons to) but Amy was being rebellious and reckless anyway, which might have caused how many lies she tells to her.
When it comes to me, I've never been in such a bad state mentally, today is not the worst but the general period is without a doubt the worst time of my life. Even before all of this I was SURE I needed some help with my mental health, but everything that was happening, her darkness sipping into me, triggering me, listening and talking about suicide all the time for literal months can't be good for anyone although I think I try to show her it doesn't affect me that much, me internally reacting very very badly to her strange and sometimes deranged and reckless behaviours, feeling on the edge a lot of the time due to her, not being able to think about anything else, all that made me finally take the step and make an appointment with a therapist. I noticed in myself symptoms of depression, social anxiety and ADHD, I'm still not sure if I would be diagnosed with anything but I do know that something is wrong with me, especially since others don't seem to be so deeply affected by her despite being close to her for longer than me. There were days where I couldn't sleep, in which I had a strong feelings of hopelessness, depressing feelings about her, myself, my life and the whole world, I researched a lot about depression, and some places are really bad to get into because there is no hope in there, people just drag each other down and write that nothing ever worked for them etc. I even thought about reading up about some therapeutic techniques I could use on her, but now I notice how stupid that sounds.
I sometimes think if she realizes how difficult it is to listen to some of the things she says and does. And I'm not talking about her being difficult and with a quick temper, but just genuinely pouring this darkness on those close to her.
In terms of therapy, I'm still not sure if it can help me with anything. I'm not discounting the people that it did help, but I'm just not sure about me. I know that it probably takes time, I do genuinely feel better when someone listens to all of that (even if I feel like a fraud sometimes because there are surely others that come to her with heavier stuff) even if it lasts only some time after the session. I'm not even sure what would therapy do to me, like what exactly could it possibly change about me, will I care less, will I just cope better, will I change my personality, or will it just be something that I can tell myself that I'm doing without actually helping me
That's a weird one, I'm kind of angry at her for being the best or at least very good at a lot of things, that (when she wants to of course) she can befriend literally everyone and people adore her (like the kids in school, parents congratulating and being shocked how great the kids are doing at school), she had a lot of boyfriends and always seem to have some guys trying to get to her. She's shockingly charismatic, talkative and social when she wants or needs to be. I'm always complaining about not having friends and then she scoffs at me for that I don't know what I'm talking about, but I don't interact with 10% amount of people she does even though she ALWAYS ALWAYS talks how antisocial and what a b she is (meaning she's mean to everyone), she knows a shit ton of people, shocking number actually, especially when you think about her mental state
I really try to be a good friend, but that seems to not be enough. I try to help her with everything, doing the shopping, being with her and talking, asking how she feels, figuring out ways to maybe not help but at least show the support.
Right now we're still gonna live together and I'm gonna move in to the bigger room, and I plan to be in our hometown working remotely more to be better mentally, but I'm still unsure how all that is gonna work out...
Sometimes I feel like I'm fluctuating with how much this really affects me, It feels random, some moments I think all of it affects me less and am able to just go somewhere else with my thoughts, but not always.
==== 6 months later====
Some time has passed since I wrote those last paragraphs, actually it's already 6 months, and in some ways things are better, but in some they are much worse. She got better, not all the way she was before, she still hates being with people and is very mean, sarcastic and emotionally careless (she recently found out she'll probably won't be able to have kids and it didn't faze her at all), throws a joke or two about suicide but it doesn't seem so serious now, she got off meds as far as I know (because I don't know much anymore, but I'll get to that), she found a psychiatrist that first wants to make all kind of tests before prescribing her any drugs, she actually talks about plans for the future, is able to cook for herself, is more social, she's even going to a wedding with a friend she almost hooked up with a month ago (that's also a big thing that for me I want to write about later).
As for me, I'm much worse in a few ways. These things she said and did affected me very deeply back then and I wanted a way to cope with that, and I started to call my old friend Jane and tell her some of the situations that were happening here. I felt bad about it but I just couldn't help myself, I had to tell someone. That was before I got my therapist, and I'm mainly talking about everything with her now, but I was so caught up and messed up with everything, that even after starting the therapy I also talked about some of the things with my ex who is still my good friend, I mentioned she has depression and takes meds to one of my colleagues (without any details), and I mentioned that she has some problems and thinks about moving out to another friend, one day I also told everything to my parents (without the most disturbing details) because I was on a verge of a mental breakdown and just couldn't bring myself to come back here. I also once told our new roommate that Amy is very weird and obsessed about some things like loudly closing doors etc. without telling much else though. That's a lot of people and honestly I don't trust myself that I didn't say anything else to anyone although I doubt it as I don't have much friends or interact with people a lot. Not that it excuses me, but she wasn't really too secretive about it and seemed very open to talking about being depressed and hating life etc. I certainly broke her trust and I feel like shit for it, nothing really excuses me and I can't change what I did, which is slowly killing me inside.
She confronted me about it when I came back from my parent house after telling them everything and finally got the courage to text her about the way she treats me, about what I did wrong, if she thinks that I'm hiding something from her or that I'm insincere about everything I do. Because she's very different to me than she was before and it honestly kills me inside. She told me she regurarly catches me lying about irrelevant small things and she has no idea why but recently she doesn't even trust herself, let alone someone else. I don't think I ever deliberately lied to her but I might have unknowningly responded with wrong information so she doesn't get mad ex. who didn't do the dishes or something. The worse thing is that she said that she heard things, certain minor details about herself from people that should know absolutely nothing about her, and she doesn't want anyone to know anything about her. Of course she didn't specify what details (and if they were even something private, but I can only assume yes by her reaction) and what people (to not break their trust) and I've been thinking about it ever since. She said that I was never her friend, I never knew anything about her and she doesn't really consider anyone her friend since O died from cancer. And that you can't just take anyone from the street and befriend them, and that we can just normally live our lives separately and not get too involved with each other, which really, really fucking hurt me to hear from person that I cared so deeply for, that I tried so hard to show that she matters to me, and to which I gave up so much of my own mental wellbeing to the point of feeling mentally ill myself (at least much more than usual).
I of course haven't told a word anyone since that conversation, and not because I was scared someone might tell her again, but I realize what a huge mistake that was and I honestly hate myself more than ever for breaking her trust and being such a piece of shit and not being able to change what happened or even to make up for it.
Our relationship gets kinda better at times, she talks to me normally sometimes mainly about our cat, although never for too long and practically never initiates a conversation, she barely texts with me, ignores me a lot, she doesn't really talk to me about what is happening with her life and work etc. I mostly find out anything from her conversations with others when I'm present, she is a lot more social with her friends recently and when she sends some screenshoted memes on a group chat there's always someone she's texting with, she's online a lot despite not writing me back, she goes out drinking with her friends every few weeks and I'm never a part of it anymore, I never drive with her back to our town on weekends anymore, and all of that while she live behind a wall, and this actually real rejection is quite honestly making me feel actually suicidal at times, and it gets worse with time to the point that I'm worried I might do something to myself, maybe not now or soon, but in the future, and I even sometimes write vague scenarios in my head about it. Apart from still going to therapy (which still doesn't seem to help me) I signed myself up to a psychiatrist despite my therapist saying that she doesn't see anything clinical in me, with the main issue being an ADHD diagnosis, as that's what I thought most accurately explains my struggles (especially RSD), and I did get diagnosed but I feel like I might have bended the reality a little and not actually have it, I am on my 2 days of meds (upped the dose today) and don't really feel much apart from a very light headache and dry mouth, so I guess that won't fix me after all.
When we were on a mountain trip a month ago I was feeling very bad, because while I was still a part of it and went with everyone, she treated everyone completely different to me, she was laughing, joking with them, being nice and talking to and being interested in them, and the others are not really my close friends so I was feeling a bit alone and isolated. The last night of the trip she and one of the guys (the one with which she's going to the wedding) went for a walk in the middle of nowhere together completely drunk, pissing everyone off for being irresponsible. But while everyone was scared and angry, I was depressed and I guess suicidal, I still have feelings for her despite everything, and seeing that she can go out into the night kissing some guy and after everything can't even hold a conversation with me or tell me anything nice was honestly doing very bad things to my head. And I remembered when a year ago she said she can't be with me, she's too fucked up and couldn't do that to me, but she knows this guy for almost 2 years now and considers him a colleague too so how's that different? I don't even smoke but I smoked like a whole pack of cigarettes that night...
When we came back from the trip I was in a very bad place mentally and said that I wanted to talk, I told her that I can't do this anymore and that I can't control the envy that I feel and that I'll probably have to move out even though I don't want that, and I don't want to leave her alone with our cat, she gave me an impression that she wants me to try, she mentioned my ex that's still my friend and that I got over her, and I told her it took me literal years to get over her, and she said that "so it's possible", we talked some more, maybe the most we talked in weeks if not months about various things, and I felt that things were going to get better, But they didn't. A few weeks passed and I feel just as rejected as before.
I can't disinvest emotionally from her, I can't stop thinking about what she thinks of me, if I'm fake and dishonest and always hide my true motives, and I don't think there is a point in confronting her again and apologizing and hoping for forgiveness, I feel like current state of my life will never change and even if we stop seeing and living with each other anymore, it will still take me years (if ever) to get over everything that happened in the last year because I'm not really better mentally when I'm home with my parents, I still think about it all the time. I don't want to leave this place, and I don't want to leave her with a cat she'll have to take care on her own, I don't know what to do anymore.

First I will start with the good: After playing the new maps for over 10 matches EACH, as both a Commander, an SL, and as regular infantry, I have to say I LOVE both the new maps, they're beautiful, they play well and they play very differently from all the other maps in the game! El Alamein needs good MGs, Snipers, Tankers and AT gun crews to work, and the whole team needs to be coordinated and have a good grasp of map control to win! Driel I like just a bit less, as it feels a bit cheap to cross the water anywhere I want, but I guess that's better than Remagen... A system of pontoon bridges on one side and shallow water and island crossing on the other would be better I think, instead of being able to cross the river under the bridge where no one is looking! Also, some open houses with second-floor windows would be nice for Driel! Both maps do need some optimization, as they stutter a lot, and drop FPS in some locations and sight lines, but that will probably get fixed in a patch.
Now for the bad: Both the British and the Germans need at least 1 set of FREE desert uniforms! Anything else, you monetize, I don't care, so long as there's a single desert option like there's a winter one!
As for the gameplay itself, these are all possible options to balance the Brits (and Soviets) out and fix the other U14 issues (From a +1000h HLL Vet):

• You need to improve the sight design and strafe behavior of ALL British weapons to match other factions! Lower the flip-up ladder on the Lewis and just give it a V-notch, make the aperture and front post on Sten slimmer, also, slim down the Bren aperture a bit maybe? Lee Enfield No.4 has perfect sights, don't touch them!
• Give all Brits the Lee Enfield No.4 as the starting weapon, P14 should be optional or removed except for snipers! No.4 has absolutely GREAT sights and 10 round mag! Give them a Semi-Auto pistol (like the Browning Hi-Power) for MG and tanker classes, like you did for the Soviets, the Germans have 2 semi-auto options. Also, give them more Sten, less Lanchester! It should stay in for variety, but it shouldn't be the Brit's main SMG
• Give L-E rifles a RAPID bolt cycle rate like IRL (They don't have a semi-auto rifle like the Germans) and increase the range of all rifles from 200m 1HK to 250 or 300m 1HK, this will help a lot of people not feel cheated out of kills when they hit a target 201m away on the new very open, long sight line maps. Currently, if you hit someone with a bolt action once, they quickly zig-zag to cover, use a bandage and then continue on their merry way, zigzagging again making it impossible to hit them even once, let alone twice!
• Add a bipod to Bren and increase 1-Hit-Kill to 200m (or just 150 because you can aim it without a bipod deployed?) like rifles and other MGs, it fires a full-size caliber like them.Also, do this to FG42 (this will actually give us a reason to use an FG42 instead of the STG, as currently, it is inferior in every way: Sights, Recoil, Mag Size, Ammo carried) and BAR, but not STG44, it should stay 100m 1HK as it fires a much smaller caliber than Rifles, LMGs, and Auto Rifles! I, personally, would also love to see German MG get the option of an FG42 loadout, like the US has the BAR, but that's just me!
• Give the default Brits' ASSAULT loadout a DRUM mag Thompson, and a Sten for the Saboteur ASSAULT loadout, the Bren makes no sense with the Satchel! It's a very heavy, very wrong gun to run up to a tank with or storm an enemy compound and blow it up! The Bren should be an option for the AUTOMATIC RIFLEMAN and the MG, we don't need up to 3 Brens per 6-man Squad! This should also be done with the STG44 loadout for Germans, a satchel + most versatile gun in the game + grenade + 2 smokes makes no sense! Give German ASSAULT with a satchel the FG42, and move the STG44 to the other loadout!
• Add the Universal Bren Carrier for the British instead of the M2 halftrack, yes it has less troop capacity than the other ones, but no, that will not be a problem as nobody uses them as troop transports! Also, giving us a single halftrack instead of (or with) the standard transport truck @ one of the HQs at the start of each game would be really great, helping both teams establish a presence at the front immediately, if they use it correctly! Maybe even a jeep at one HQ at the start of the game, for the commander to use! They don't need to respawn like all the other starting vehicles, just let us use them at the start of each game, even if we have to spawn them in ourselves!
• Remove STG44 and FG42 (maybe even replace the G43 with a slower, 2x clip-reloading G41?) from maps that shouldn't have them! (El Alamein, Kharkov, Kursk, Stalingrad), especially as the Soviets & Brits have no equivalent (except for the SVT-40 on the Soviet side)!
• Give MG42 (and MG34) a realistic DRUM mag size of 50 (or 75 double drum for MG34) rounds instead of 250, as you did to the DP27 and Lewis, just 47 rounds in the PAN mag. Yes, Lewis also had a 97-round mag... This will have the added benefit of making the MG34 PART OF THE META, and not just an inferior MG 42 in every way, as it will use up that little drum of ammo much slower! MG mains (me) WILL complain, fuck, I will be really sad too, but it has to be done! The current system makes ZERO sense, realism for the bad LMGs, fantasy for the MG42? Also, a more realistic amount of ammo carried (6 drums of 50 instead of 250) by MG players would necessitate actually coordinating with the squads' Support or Riflemen for ammo more often, which is ALWAYS a good thing!
• The MG role could also choose between a drum fed and belt fed loadout, and if the belt fed is chosen, he could not hip fire the MG on the move, he would have to stop, drop a box of belt ammo, deploy the bipod, load in a belt and then AND ONLY THEN be able to fire! That way MGs on Omaha retain their 250 round belts without it being overpowered! If he wants to move position, he has to take out the belt, remove the bipod, pickup the belt ammo box and then he can move off to another spot! The British could get the Vickers K for this, the Soviets maybe the DShK or the Maxim?

Ok, now for the MOVEMENT:
A soldier who passed basic training could easily run MUCH FASTER than the current in-game speed (or than the average speed of a top marathon runner at the time), even with essential combat gear (which was not that much, between 15-25lbs or 7-11kg), for 100-500m, or in other words: 1/420th (NICE!) to 1/84th of a marathon-length, which is 42km! ALL HLL maps are just 2x1km!
Could he ADS so fast coming out of that run? NO! Would his aim sway a lot before he would catch his breath? YES! Could he change direction or "zigzag" with ZERO loss of speed? NO! Could he start and stop a sprint instantly, on the spot? NO! Could he dolphin dive and get back up to start running again instantly? NO! Could he maintain that speed up an almost vertical hill? NO! (Example)
These are all problems that need addressing (even if the old run comes back!), but the speed at which we run in the game is neither unrealistic, nor a major problem for gameplay if all these other problems are solved! Maybe the tanks should get a 10% boost too, I'm not sure about that, I don't tank enough to have an educated opinion on it, so I would love a tankers input!
I like that we are finally able to run and dive to cover, it feels like my soldier ACTUALLY CARES FOR HIS LIFE NOW AND IS SCARED OF BEING SHOT (That's why I will defend both the new speed and the dive to prone to death!), but you shouldn't be able to chain these moves to glide across the ground! I wouldn't be opposed to lowering the speed just a bit, back to 110% of what it was (or the new speed could work just for the first 100-200m after which the old one kicks in, and you have to stop and wait or walk before your quick sprint recharges), but the old speed should definitely not come back!
P.S. Where's the Crusader tank at El Alamein?

My coterie of independent fledglings is playing in a heavily modified Chicago by night setting (potential spoilers), and are just getting ready to start a REALLY dangerous political story arc, and I thought it was worth getting an outside opinion before we jump into the deep end.
The players:
A pissed off independent Lasombra who feels he and his clan are being wronged by the Camarilla with the move to be incorporated. Wants to use the forces of American Far Right extremism to shatter the status quo in the city and in the process weed out the Cam and start over.
A Brujah civil rights lawyer who is in deep with the Anarchs...at least she was until she frenzied in Elysium and got herself blood bonded to the Prince. Yes, it is a massive problem.
A Catiff investigator pretending to be a Ventrue, with a focus on Auspex. So far, he's gotten away with it, but it will again me a major problem at some point.
A Catiff book shop owner childer of a Tremere. Yes, he has blood sorcery. Yes, it's going just as well as you'd imagine. Our coterie has a 2 dot enemy Tremere.
A Tzimisce surgeon who is working towards the goals of his mysterious Methusala Mwala. All we know is that they don't align with any of the sects as they currently exist.
The situation:
After some early successes, we've gotten a reputation as reliable, discrete, and fast when it comes to finding information. This led to us getting two separate offers, more or less, at the same time.
First was a request individually to our fake Ventrue from the Senechal to work with the Malkavian Primogen to discredit his Sire, the head of a massive Ventrue run multinational corporation, so that he could assume control of the family business.
The Malk, true to form, treats the whole thing as a wonderful joke is anonymously blackmailing the Sire into publicly humiliating himself. Through some great investigating by our fake Ventrue, he discovered that the Primogen is threatening to leak his real identity to SI. Every single one of our characters agrees that getting SI involved over essentially a prank is a completely unacceptable and stupid move and justifies his death, one way or another.
A short time later, we get called to visit Mr. Fat Cat Sire at his office building, where we are hired to find whoever is anonymously threatening him, at the price of 2 minor boons to the coterie, or 1 major if we both find and eliminate the culprit. During the visit, a well-timed Premontion and a little sleuthing helped us discover that he was somehow involved in the werewolf attack that killed the last Prince and has been taking meetings from the group of Hecata which recently took over NYC at the end of our last Chronicle. Again, we all agreed that letting lose a pack of werewolves on the streets of Chicago was an action worthy of death. Plus, he's a despicable person who tried to make us sign a contract in blood enforced by the Tremere, and we don't like getting pushed around.
Lastly, we discovered that this guy is a MAJOR financial player, to the point that his death, if done poorly, has the potential to seriously destabilize financial markets.
The plan
We all agree that Mr. Malk and Mr. Money bags need to go. While some of us are on board for collapsing the global financial structure, we've agreed that we'd effectively be declaring war on all of Clan Ventrue if we were ever remotely implicated. That means someone needs to be able to come up with the ball at the end of all this, and the logical choice is the Senechal. (Our Lasombra and Brujah aren't happy with this and are looking for another solution)
We DO want to get paid somewhere along the line, and that means dealing with the Malk before the Ventrue. Luckily, our fake Ventrue has a meeting scheduled with him for his part in the "prank" and is going to wear a wire to capture the conversation on tap and try to incriminate him. Evidence in hand, we set up a hit on him, and Torpor Mr. Malk. Specifics of the hit are TBD, but the Brujah has an assassin Gangrel as a Mwala who might be interested for the right price. Premonition is a hell of a power, though, and we have no ideas how to get around it yet.
Ideally, we aren't implicated, but this next part is tricky regardless. We need to go to Mr. Fat Cat's place, show him the evidence, give him the Torpored body, collect our boon, more or less immediately cash it in, then somehow find actual evidence of the Werewolf/Hecata stuff, and scurry over to the Senechal to get his fat ass Blood Hunted.
Obviously, there are holes in that plan big enough to drive a truck through, but we figure that, in the worst case, we use the boon to get Mr. Fat Cat to cover us for the disappearance of the Malk Primogen and cut out losses there.
BEST case, which seems unlikely, everything goes perfectly to plan, Mr. Fat Ass gets taken down, and the Senechal inherits, we manipulate him into making a play for Prince with his newfound wealth, then get to take advantage of the internal struggle to topple the whole tower in the city, with the loss of the Prince, Senechal, a Primogen, and one of the largest bank rollers in the city.
So yeah...how screwed are we?

Lore: Ruby is a woman who was always able to contact with spirits, initially she used this power to help those whose family members had recently passed away, one day she got attacked and Balthazar, a spirit demon, protected her by nearly killing off her attack her. Interested she started talking and bonding with this demon, and she used it's power to help the defenseless, until eventually her embrace of the demon became her demise, in another time, where she got attacked, the demon possessed her body, killing of the attackers and healing her, but it never got out again. Her soul still remains in her physical body, but she no longer has control of it, only when Balthazar leaves her body to possess someone else for it's schemes can she regain temporary control, but eventually he'll just return to her and she'll just become a puppet with no control over her own body once again. She surrounded herself with a purifying salt while Balthazar was out of her body and had a friend of hers brought her food while she was looked inside the salt circle, until one day her friend stepped on the salt barrier causing the demon to enter her body again, kill her friend and to make sure to always lock Ruby and leave her in a place with no acess to this salt. Balthazar protects Ruby at all costs as it's its only vessel that he can stay indefinitive amounts of time, and now Ruby's soul stays in despair knowing she can't do anything about it as she'll never lock the demon out and the demon will never let her body die to release her soul either.
​
AttackSpeed: 0.67-0.94 AttackRange:550
Passive: Poltergeist: Your autos are non-projectiles and deal 100% of their damage as magic damage. In addition they deal 30% AP bonus Magic Damage on-hit, Convert 50% of your lethality into flat magic penetration and 75% of your armor penetration into % magic penetration.
Attack Animation: Ruby moves her arms like if she was scratching the air, at the same time, demonic claws will scratch the enemy. While possessed Balthazar will extend it's arms to claw the enemy.
Q - Malevolent Strike:
Cost: 40/45/50/55/60 Mana
Cooldown: 9/8/7/6/5s
Range: 1250
ProjectileSpeed:1750 ProjectileWidth:120
Active: Summon a demon arm that strikes everything in front dealing 80/120/160/200/240(+70% AP, +85% AD) magic damage and slowing by 20/25/30/35/40% for 1.5s as well as inflicting a Malevolent stack on the enemy for 6s. This abillity cannot pass through Salt Barrier, instead it'll split in 2 and circle around it, joining into a single projectile on the other side of the salt barrier. If cast while inside of the salt barrier, it'll instead damage every enemy within the area instantly. If a salt barrier is cast on top of an already existing Malevolent Strike projectile, the projectile will stop moving and instantly expand instead dealing damage to anything within the area and applying it's effects.
​
W - Salt Barrier:
Cost: 80/90/100/110/120 Mana
Cooldown: 15/13/11/9/7s
Range: 1000 Radius: 450
Active: Create a salt barrier in a circle around the target location for 3s.
While inside the salt barrier Ruby and her allies gain 10/15/20/25/30% tenacity from attacks that come from outside the barrier. They also gain a 70/100/130/160/190(+55% AP) shield against attacks outside the area. In addition Ruby also gains 20/40/60/80/100% bonus attack speed that lingers for 3s after the salt barrier ends.
Enemies within the salt area have their tenacity reduced by 10/15/20/25/30%. Enemies with a Malevolent stack cannot cross the salt barrier(Wether it's to enter or to exit) by any meants.
​
E - Impale:
Cost: 60/70/80/90/100 Mana
Cooldown: 15/14/13/12/11s
Range:1100 Radius:200
Active: Summon a sharp ghostly limb in an area that impales anything within dealing 100/150/200/250/300(80% AP) magic damage and knocking them up for 0.75s and stunning them for the same duration. Impaling an enemy within the salt barrier reduces their magic resist by 5/10/15/20/25% for 6s and heals you by 50/75/100/125/150(+55% AP,+70% AD)(+7/9/11/13/15% bonus Hp) Hp.
R - Demonic Possession:
Cost: 100 Mana
Cooldown: 100/80/60(-1 per Soul Absorption stack)s
Passive: Damaging an enemy champion/epic monster while in demonic form marks them with a stack of Soul Absorbtion for 5s. Getting a kill or assist on an enemy with a stack of soul absorption grants you a Soul Absorption stack. If the target has been possessed in the last 5s, it instead grants 2 Soul Absorption stacks.
Active: Ruby gets possessed by Balthazar for 10/12.5/15(+0.5 per Soul Absorption stack)s, empowering her abillities, gaining 5/10/15(+2.5 per Soul Absorption stack) Armor and Magic Resist, losing 150 Attack Range and allowing her to recast this abillity.
Q - Reduces the cooldown of this abillity by 5/10/15(+1 per Soul Absorption stack)(Max of 80% CDR on this abillity)%, and increases the slow by 0(+1 per Soul Absoprtion stack)% as well as the slow duration by 0(+0.1 per Soul Absorption stack)s but decreases it's range by 500.
Animation: The animation will now show Balthazar striking everything in front by extending it's arm.
W - Turns Salt Barrier into Demonic Berzerk:
Blink near target with a malevolent stack, upon completing the blink deal +100/150/200(+55% AP) bonus magic damage on your next auto. After blinking you also gain a 100/150/200(+50% AP, +10 per Soul Absorption stack) shield for 5s as well as amplify your current attack speed by 20/40/60(+5 per Soul Absorption stack)% for 6s.
Cooldown: 50/35/20(-0.5s per Soul Absorption stacks)s Range:1000 Radius(Around a target with a Malevolent stack):400
E - Increases the knockup and stun duration by 0.1/0.2/0.3s, will always shred magic resist and heal and increases Magic Resist shred by 0(+1% per Soul Absorption stack) as well as the heal by 0(+5 per Soul Absorption stack)% but decreases it's range by 450.
Animation: The animation will now show Balthazar sinking one of it's arms into the ground reapearing underneath the target and impaling them.
R2(Recast) - Total Possession: Launch Balthazar in form of a projectile that attaches to the first enemy champion it hits possessing them for 2/2.5/3s(+0.05s per Stack of Soul Absorption). During these seconds you can recast this abillity at any time. Upon using this recast you immediately exist the Demonic Form, losing all it's buffs, but this abillity will still mark the target with a Soul Absorption stack, as well as grant one Stack of Soul Absorption immediately if it hits.
R3(Recast) - Order the possessed enemy to auto-attack the selected target or move to a selected location.
Upon exiting the possessed target, Balthazar deals 10/15/20(+3% AP)% of the target's Max Hp as magic damage and reduces the target's stats by 5(+0.5% per Stack of Soul Absorption)% for 5s, granting them to Ruby for the same duration. If the target is marked as Malevolent, the stat steal will not expire until the mark expires.
Note: While in Demonic Form you cannot cross the Salt Barrier, enemies possessed by the Balthazar also can't cross the Salt Barrier. Demonic Form can't gain Salt Barriers buffs and loses them upon transforming. R can't be cast while inside the Salt Barrier.
​
​
Builds:
AP - Abillity caster. Builds stuff like RiftmakeLudens/Liandrys/Horizon Focus/Shadow Flame/Death's Cap/Nashors etc.
AD - Auto-Attacker. Builds stuff like Guinshoo's/Krakens/Shieldbow/Bloodthirster etc.
Hybrid - Abillity caster that can auto-attack, but is not as good as either in their respective domains. Builds stuff like Ludens/Guinshoos+Void Staff+Sorcerer's Shoes+Wits End+Nashors+Kraken's
​
​
Playstyle:
AP: Normal Form: Use E+Q to burst enemies. Salt Barrier is the most important abillity, use it after landing a Q to trap an enemy for 3s. Use it on yourself against poke Mages to outsustain their damage, use it on yourself against divers then use Q and walk away from it if you can. Using W on an already moving Q or on yourself before casting Q turns Q's piercing thin projectile into an Area attack. You can also use your Q on enemies and then use W on yourself, this way you gain W's buffs and make sure enemies can't cross the barrier to ignore your buffs. W+Q+E is your most effective burst as you shred their resist and then Q them, if you build nashor's you can even auto to maximize your damage. Always try to use R2, since if you kill them after landing an R2, you gain 2 stacks instead of 1 making your subsequent transformations stronger.
Demon Form: Land a Q in your Normal form then use dW(Demonic W) to blink onto them and gain a shield, and use E and spawm Qs. If you build attack speed, also try to auto-them. Without the attack speed build you can hold your blink for a while as diving a diver stronger than you can mean death. She has unlimited scaling but unlike other unlimited scalers it's locked behind a temporary form, so chose when to ult wisely.
​
AD: Similar to AP, except your poke deals low damage, you still want to use the same combos, but you want to make sure to auto your enemies after landing and E inside a salt barrier and trapping them with Q. In demonic form you just need to use dW and spam autos after using dE and dQ.

Everything in my inventory is up for trade. The most valuable items are listed here, the rest you can find in My Inventory

Feel free to Add Me or even better send a Trade Offer. Open for any suggestions: upgrades, downgrades / knives, gloves, skins / stickers, patterns, floats.

All Buyouts are listed in cash value.

KNIVES

★ Butterfly Knife Freehand FN #1, B/O: $2500

★ Butterfly Knife Ultraviolet FT, B/O: $822

★ Butterfly Knife Scorched FT, B/O: $616

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★ Bayonet Tiger Tooth MW #1, B/O: $1300

★ Bayonet Autotronic FN, B/O: $1050

★ Bayonet Tiger Tooth MW, B/O: $629

★ Bayonet Bright Water FT, B/O: $326

★ Bayonet Safari Mesh BS, B/O: $233

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★ Karambit Lore FT, B/O: $1110

★ Karambit Damascus Steel FT, B/O: $840

★ Karambit Freehand MW, B/O: $784

★ Karambit Bright Water MW, B/O: $759

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★ M9 Bayonet Fade FN, B/O: $1801

★ M9 Bayonet Fade FN, B/O: $1801

★ M9 Bayonet Damascus Steel FN, B/O: $751

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★ Nomad Knife Fade FN, B/O: $1156

★ Nomad Knife Slaughter MW, B/O: $544

★ Nomad Knife Blue Steel WW, B/O: $318

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★ Flip Knife Marble Fade FN, B/O: $646

★ Flip Knife Doppler (Phase 4) FN, B/O: $574

★ Flip Knife Gamma Doppler (Phase 1) MW, B/O: $552

★ Flip Knife Case Hardened FT, B/O: $257

★ Flip Knife Freehand FT, B/O: $255

★ StatTrak™ Flip Knife Bright Water FN, B/O: $287

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★ Huntsman Knife Lore FN, B/O: $461

★ Huntsman Knife Gamma Doppler (Phase 4) FN, B/O: $436

★ Huntsman Knife Doppler (Phase 3) FN, B/O: $353

★ Huntsman Knife Autotronic FT, B/O: $212

★ Huntsman Knife Bright Water FT, B/O: $129

★ Huntsman Knife Forest DDPAT MW, B/O: $129

★ Huntsman Knife Forest DDPAT BS, B/O: $123

★ StatTrak™ Huntsman Knife Rust Coat BS, B/O: $127

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★ Bowie Knife Gamma Doppler (Phase 2) FN, B/O: $375

★ Bowie Knife Gamma Doppler (Phase 1) FN, B/O: $363

★ Bowie Knife Tiger Tooth FN, B/O: $269

★ Bowie Knife Crimson Web WW, B/O: $192

★ Bowie Knife Bright Water FN, B/O: $159

★ Bowie Knife Ultraviolet FT, B/O: $126

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★ Stiletto Knife Slaughter FN, B/O: $616

★ Stiletto Knife Crimson Web FT, B/O: $412

★ StatTrak™ Stiletto Knife Night Stripe FT, B/O: $227

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★ Falchion Knife Lore FT, B/O: $214

★ Falchion Knife Autotronic FT, B/O: $192

★ Falchion Knife Scorched WW, B/O: $105

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★ Survival Knife Crimson Web BS, B/O: $216

★ Survival Knife Case Hardened FT, B/O: $198

★ Survival Knife Scorched FT, B/O: $111

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★ Shadow Daggers Fade FN, B/O: $368

★ Shadow Daggers Doppler (Phase 3) FN, B/O: $228

★ Shadow Daggers, B/O: $201

★ Shadow Daggers Damascus Steel FT, B/O: $108

★ Shadow Daggers Ultraviolet FT, B/O: $105

★ Shadow Daggers Black Laminate FT, B/O: $99

★ Shadow Daggers Forest DDPAT FT, B/O: $85

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★ Gut Knife Doppler (Sapphire) MW #1, B/O: $1700

★ Gut Knife Gamma Doppler (Phase 1) FN, B/O: $223

★ Gut Knife Marble Fade FN, B/O: $203

★ Gut Knife Doppler (Phase 2) FN, B/O: $191

★ Gut Knife Case Hardened BS, B/O: $127

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★ Navaja Knife Doppler (Phase 4) FN, B/O: $199

★ Navaja Knife Doppler (Phase 4) FN, B/O: $199

★ Navaja Knife, B/O: $138

★ Navaja Knife Damascus Steel FN, B/O: $111

⎯

★ Classic Knife Urban Masked FT, B/O: $146

★ StatTrak™ Classic Knife Stained BS, B/O: $168

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★ Ursus Knife Doppler (Phase 3) FN, B/O: $476

★ Ursus Knife, B/O: $375

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★ Skeleton Knife, B/O: $1137

★ Talon Knife, B/O: $608

★ Paracord Knife, B/O: $305

★ Survival Knife Forest DDPAT FT, B/O: $97

GLOVES

★ Moto Gloves Transport MW, B/O: $204

★ Moto Gloves Polygon BS, B/O: $142

★ Moto Gloves Blood Pressure BS, B/O: $84

★ Moto Gloves Blood Pressure BS, B/O: $84

★ Moto Gloves 3rd Commando Company BS, B/O: $63

★ Moto Gloves 3rd Commando Company BS, B/O: $63

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★ Specialist Gloves Crimson Kimono WW, B/O: $1215

★ Specialist Gloves Tiger Strike FT, B/O: $672

★ Specialist Gloves Lt. Commander FT, B/O: $305

★ Specialist Gloves Lt. Commander BS, B/O: $140

★ Specialist Gloves Crimson Web BS, B/O: $137

★ Specialist Gloves Buckshot FT, B/O: $75

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★ Driver Gloves Crimson Weave FT, B/O: $359

★ Driver Gloves Imperial Plaid BS, B/O: $229

★ Driver Gloves Overtake BS, B/O: $77

★ Driver Gloves Racing Green FT, B/O: $48

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★ Sport Gloves Omega FT, B/O: $739

★ Sport Gloves Amphibious BS #2, B/O: $733

★ Sport Gloves Arid BS, B/O: $292

⎯

★ Hand Wraps Giraffe MW, B/O: $212

★ Hand Wraps Leather FT, B/O: $160

★ Hand Wraps Desert Shamagh MW, B/O: $101

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★ Broken Fang Gloves Yellow-banded MW, B/O: $185

★ Broken Fang Gloves Needle Point FT, B/O: $67

★ Broken Fang Gloves Needle Point WW, B/O: $59

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★ Hydra Gloves Case Hardened BS, B/O: $65

★ Hydra Gloves Emerald FT, B/O: $65

★ Hydra Gloves Emerald BS, B/O: $62

WEAPONS

AK-47 Case Hardened BS, B/O: $130

AK-47 Bloodsport MW, B/O: $79

AK-47 Fuel Injector BS, B/O: $76

AK-47 Fuel Injector BS, B/O: $76

AK-47 Bloodsport FT, B/O: $70

AK-47 Neon Rider MW, B/O: $60

StatTrak™ AK-47 Aquamarine Revenge FT, B/O: $72

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AWP Fade FN, B/O: $1039

AWP Asiimov FT, B/O: $139

AWP Asiimov FT, B/O: $139

AWP Wildfire MW, B/O: $95

AWP BOOM MW, B/O: $93

AWP BOOM MW, B/O: $93

AWP Duality FN, B/O: $81

AWP Asiimov BS, B/O: $79

AWP Asiimov BS, B/O: $79

AWP Chromatic Aberration FN, B/O: $60

StatTrak™ AWP Hyper Beast FT, B/O: $68

StatTrak™ AWP Hyper Beast FT, B/O: $68

StatTrak™ AWP Electric Hive FT, B/O: $55

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Desert Eagle Blaze FN, B/O: $623

Desert Eagle Emerald Jörmungandr FN, B/O: $241

Desert Eagle Cobalt Disruption FN, B/O: $81

Desert Eagle Cobalt Disruption FN, B/O: $81

Desert Eagle Cobalt Disruption FN, B/O: $81

Desert Eagle Printstream FT, B/O: $54

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M4A1-S Blue Phosphor FN, B/O: $434

StatTrak™ M4A1-S Bright Water MW, B/O: $55

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M4A4 Poseidon FN, B/O: $1465

M4A4 Asiimov BS, B/O: $55

M4A4 Hellfire MW, B/O: $50

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USP-S Kill Confirmed MW, B/O: $72

USP-S Printstream FT, B/O: $69

StatTrak™ USP-S Kill Confirmed FT, B/O: $139

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AUG Flame Jörmungandr FN, B/O: $234

P90 Run and Hide FT, B/O: $147

Five-SeveN Candy Apple FN, B/O: $61

Trade Offer Link - Steam Profile Link - My Inventory

Knives - Bowie Knife, Butterfly Knife, Falchion Knife, Flip Knife, Gut Knife, Huntsman Knife, M9 Bayonet, Bayonet, Karambit, Shadow Daggers, Stiletto Knife, Ursus Knife, Navaja Knife, Talon Knife, Classic Knife, Paracord Knife, Survival Knife, Nomad Knife, Skeleton Knife, Patterns - Gamma Doppler, Doppler (Phase 1, Phase 2, Phase 3, Phase 4, Black Pearl, Sapphire, Ruby, Emerald), Crimson Web, Lore, Fade, Ultraviolet, Night, Marble Fade (Fire & Ice, Fake FI), Case Hardened (Blue Gem), Autotronic, Slaughter, Black Laminate, Tiger Tooth, Boreal Forest, Scorched, Blue Steel, Vanilla, Damascus Steel, Forest DDPAT, Urban Masked, Freehand, Stained, Bright Water, Safari Mesh, Rust Coat, Gloves - Bloodhound Gloves (Charred, Snakebite, Guerrilla, Bronzed), Driver Gloves (Snow Leopard, King Snake, Crimson Weave, Imperial Plaid, Black Tie, Lunar Weave, Diamondback, Rezan the Red, Overtake, Queen Jaguar, Convoy, Racing Green), Hand Wraps (Cobalt Skulls, CAUTION!, Overprint, Slaughter, Leather, Giraffe, Badlands, Spruce DDPAT, Arboreal, Constrictor, Desert Shamagh, Duct Tape), Moto Gloves (Spearmint, POW!, Cool Mint, Smoke Out, Finish Line, Polygon, Blood Pressure, Turtle, Boom!, Eclipse, 3rd Commando Company, Transport), Specialist Gloves (Crimson Kimono, Tiger Strike, Emerald Web, Field Agent, Marble Fade, Fade, Foundation, Lt. Commander, Crimson Web, Mogul, Forest DDPAT, Buckshot), Sport Gloves (Pandora's Box, Superconductor, Hedge Maze, Vice, Amphibious, Slingshot, Omega, Arid, Big Game, Nocts, Scarlet Shamagh, Bronze Morph), Hydra Gloves (Case Hardened, Emerald, Rattler, Mangrove), Broken Fang Gloves (Jade, Yellow-banded, Unhinged, Needle Point), Pistols - P2000 (Wicked Sick, Ocean Foam, Fire Element, Amber Fade, Corticera, Chainmail, Imperial Dragon, Obsidian, Scorpion, Handgun, Acid Etched), USP-S (Printstream, Kill Confirmed, Whiteout, Road Rash, Owergrowth, The Traitor, Neo-Noir, Dark Water, Orion, Blueprint, Stainless, Caiman, Serum, Monster Mashup, Royal Blue, Ancient Visions, Cortex, Orange Anolis, Ticket To Hell, Black Lotus, Cyrex, Check Engine, Guardian, Purple DDPAT, Torque, Blood Tiger, Flashback, Business Class, Pathfinder, Para Green), Lead Conduit, Glock-18 (Umbral Rabbit, Fade, Candy Apple, Bullet Queen, Synth Leaf, Neo-Noir, Nuclear Garden, Dragon Tatto, Reactor, Pink DDPAT, Twilight Galaxy, Sand Dune, Groundwater, Blue Fissure, Snack Attack, Water Elemental, Brass, Wasteland Rebel, Vogue, Franklin, Royal Legion, Gamma Doppler, Weasel, Steel Disruption, Ironwork, Grinder, High Beam, Moonrise, Oxide Blaze, Bunsen Burner, Clear Polymer, Bunsen Burner, Night), P250 (Re.built, Nuclear Threat, Modern Hunter, Splash, Whiteout, Vino Primo, Mehndi, Asiimov, Visions, Undertow, Cartel, See Ya Later, Gunsmoke, Splash, Digital Architect, Muertos, Red Rock, Bengal Tiger, Crimson Kimono, Wingshot, Metallic DDPAT, Hive, Dark Filigree, Mint Kimono), Five-Seven (Neon Kimono, Berries And Cherries, Fall Hazard, Crimson Blossom, Hyper Beast, Nitro, Fairy Tale, Case Hardened, Copper Galaxy, Angry Mob, Monkey Business, Fowl Play, Anodized Gunmetal, Hot Shot, Retrobution, Boost Protocol), CZ75-Auto (Chalice, Crimson Web, Emerald Quartz, The Fuschia is Now, Nitro, Xiangliu, Yellow Jacket, Victoria, Poison Dart, Syndicate, Eco, Hexane, Pole, Tigris), Tec-9 (Rebel, Terrace, Nuclear Threat, Hades, Rust Leaf, Decimator, Blast From, Orange Murano, Toxic, Fuel Injector, Remote Control, Bamboo Forest, Isaac, Avalanche, Brother, Re-Entry, Blue Titanium, Bamboozle), R8 Revolver (Banana Cannon, Fade, Blaze, Crimson Web, Liama Cannon, Crazy 8, Reboot, Canal Spray, Night, Amber Fade), Desert Eagle (Blaze, Hand Cannon, Fennec Fox, Sunset Storm, Emerald Jörmungandr, Pilot, Hypnotic, Golden Koi, Printstream, Cobalt Disruption, Code Red, Ocean Drive, Midnight Storm, Kumicho Dragon, Crimson Web, Heirloom, Night Heist, Mecha Industries, Night, Conspiracy, Trigger Discipline, Naga, Directive, Light Rail), Dual Berettas (Flora Carnivora, Duelist, Cobra Strike, Black Limba, Emerald, Hemoglobin, Twin Turbo, Marina, Melondrama, Pyre, Retribution, Briar, Dezastre, Royal Consorts, Urban Shock, Dualing Dragons, Panther, Balance), Rifles - Galil (Aqua Terrace, Winter Forest, Chatterbox, Sugar Rush, Pheonix Blacklight, CAUTION!, Orange DDPAT, Cerberus, Dusk Ruins, Eco, Chromatic Aberration, Stone Cold, Tuxedo, Sandstorm, Shattered, Urban Rubble, Rocket Pop, Kami, Crimson Tsunami, Connexion), SCAR-20 (Fragments, Brass, Cyrex, Palm, Splash Jam, Cardiac, Emerald, Crimson Web, Magna Carta, Stone Mosaico, Bloodsport, Enforcer), AWP (Duality, Gungnir, Dragon Lore, Prince, Medusa, Desert Hydra, Fade, Lightning Strike, Oni Taiji, Silk Tiger, Graphite, Chromatic Aberration, Asiimov, Snake Camo, Boom, Containment Breach, Wildfire, Redline, Electric Hive, Hyper Beast, Neo-Noir, Man-o'-war, Pink DDPAT, Corticera, Sun in Leo, Elite Build, Fever Dream, Atheris, Mortis, PAW, Exoskeleton, Worm God, POP AWP, Phobos, Acheron, Pit Viper, Capillary, Safari Mesh), AK-47 (Head Shot, Wild Lotus, Gold Arabesque, X-Ray, Fire Serpent, Hydroponic, Panthera Onca, Case Hardened, Vulcan, Jet Set, Fuel Injector, Bloodsport, Nightwish, First Class, Neon Rider, Asiimov, Red Laminate, Aquamarine Revenge, The Empress, Wasteland Rebel, Jaguar, Black Laminate, Leet Museo, Neon Revolution, Redline, Frontside Misty, Predator, Legion of Anubis, Point Disarray, Orbit Mk01, Blue Laminate, Green Laminate, Emerald Pinstripe, Cartel, Phantom Disruptor, Jungle Spray, Safety Net, Rat Rod, Baroque Purple, Slate, Elite Build, Uncharted, Safari Mesh), FAMAS (Sundown, Prime Conspiracy, Afterimage, Commemoration, Dark Water, Spitfire, Pulse, Eye of Athena, Meltdown, Rapid Eye Move, Roll Cage, Styx, Mecha Industrie, Djinn, ZX Spectron, Valence, Neural Net, Night Borre, Hexne), M4A4 (Temukau, Howl, Poseidon, Asiimov, Daybreak, Hellfire, Zirka, Red DDPAT, Radiation Hazard, Modern Hunter, The Emperor, The Coalition, Bullet Rain, Cyber Security, X-Ray, Dark Blossom, Buzz Kill, In Living Color, Neo-Noir, Desolate Space, 龍王 (Dragon King), Royal Paladin, The Battlestar, Global Offensive, Tooth Fairy, Desert-Strike, Griffin, Evil Daimyo, Spider Lily, Converter), M4A1-S (Emphorosaur-S, Welcome to the Jungle, Imminent Danger, Knight, Hot Rod, Icarus Fell, Blue Phosphor, Printstream, Master Piece, Dark Water, Golden Coil, Bright Water, Player Two, Atomic Alloy, Guardian, Chantico's Fire, Hyper Beast, Mecha Industries, Cyrex, Control Panel, Moss Quartz, Nightmare, Decimator, Leaded Glass, Basilisk, Blood Tiger, Briefing, Night Terror, Nitro, VariCamo, Flashback), SG 553 (Cyberforce, Hazard Pay, Bulldozer, Integrale, Dragon Tech, Ultraviolet, Colony IV, Hypnotic, Cyrex, Candy Apple, Barricade, Pulse), SSG 08 (Death Strike, Sea Calico, Blood in the Water, Orange Filigree, Dragonfire, Big Iron, Bloodshot, Detour, Turbo Peek, Red Stone), AUG (Akihabara Accept, Flame Jörmungandr, Hot Rod, Midnight Lily, Sand Storm, Carved Jade, Wings, Anodized Navy, Death by Puppy, Torque, Bengal Tiger, Chameleon, Fleet Flock, Random Access, Momentum, Syd Mead, Stymphalian, Arctic Wolf, Aristocrat, Navy Murano), G3SG1 (Chronos, Violet Murano, Flux, Demeter, Orange Kimono, The Executioner, Green Apple, Arctic Polar Camo, Contractor), SMGs - P90 (Neoqueen, Astral Jörmungandr, Run and Hide, Emerald Dragon, Cold Blooded, Death by Kitty, Baroque Red, Vent Rush, Blind Spot, Asiimov, Trigon, Sunset Lily, Death Grip, Leather, Nostalgia, Fallout Warning, Tiger Pit, Schermatic, Virus, Shapewood, Glacier Mesh, Shallow Grave, Chopper, Desert Warfare), MAC-10 (Sakkaku, Hot Snakes, Copper Borre, Red Filigree, Gold Brick, Graven, Case Hardened, Stalker, Amber Fade, Neon Rider, Tatter, Curse, Propaganda, Nuclear Garden, Disco Tech, Toybox, Heat, Indigo), UMP-45 (Wild Child, Fade, Blaze, Day Lily, Minotaur's Labyrinth, Crime Scene, Caramel, Bone Pile, Momentum, Primal Saber), MP7 (Teal Blossom, Fade, Nemesis, Whiteout, Asterion, Bloosport, Abyssal Apparition, Full Stop, Special Delivery, Neon Ply, Asterion, Ocean Foam, Powercore, Scorched, Impire), PP-Bizon (Modern Hunter, Rust Coat, Forest Leaves, Antique, High Roller, Blue Streak, Seabird, Judgement of Anubis, Bamboo Print, Embargo, Chemical Green, Coblat Halftone, Fuel Rod, Photic Zone, Irradiated Alert, Carbon Fiber), MP9 (Featherweight, Wild Lily, Pandora's Box, Stained Glass, Bulldozer, Dark Age, Hot Rod, Hypnotic, Hydra, Rose Iron, Music Box, Setting Sun, Food Chain, Airlock, Mount Fuji, Starlight Protector, Ruby Poison Dart, Deadly Poison), MP5-SD (Liquidation, Oxide Oasis, Phosphor, Nitro, Agent, Autumn Twilly), Shotguns, Machineguns - 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So in Attack of the Clones he's captured and Dooku tells him there is a sith lord in the senate even though Obi Wan doubts him.
So after Obi Wan escapes from getting killed why didn't he tell Windu or Yoda or someone on the council "GUESS WHAT DOOKU SAID THERE IS A SITH LORD ON IN THE SENATE!"
Or did they already know this and was told? Was that why Windu said it was dangerous for Anakin to be too close to the senator or what did he mean by that? These guys are supposed to be Jedi's and couldn't fuckin put 2 and 2 together? Windu deserved to die then.

SteelBooks for Sale
Continuing my sales thread to clean/remove my SOLD items from the listing and to move it on up the SteelBook Swaps sub-Reddit. The original thread can be found HERE (PMs and replies, along with confirmed swaps preserved for archival purposes):
https://www.reddit.com/SteelbookSwap/comments/13plyjl/us_va_h_selling_my_steelbook_collection_w_paypal/
SHIPPING COSTS WILL BE ADDITIONAL, AND BASED ON YOUR CHOICE OF SHIPPING (HAVING SAID THAT, MEDIA MAIL IS THE MOST ECONOMICAL METHOD…ADDITIONALLY, IT ALLOWS ME TO BUBBLE WRAP EACH STEELBOOK INDIVIDUALLY AND SECURELY)
First off, Blufans exclusives for sale:
-Captain America: The Winter Soldier Quarter Slip: $55
-Avengers Mondo Variant: $70
-Black Panther Double Lenticular Slip Edition (BE #48): $70
-Star Wars: The Last Jedi Double Lenticular Slip Edition WEA SteelBook (Blufans Exclusive #47) (3D+2D): $70 THIS SET IS STILL SEALED.
-Avengers: Infinity War Double Lenticular: $80.
Wide Release SteelBooks (Unless specified, J-Cards are included)
Marvel Studios
-Iron Man 2 (Best Buy 4K): $20
-Captain America: Civil War (Original Release, Blu-Ray and 3D Blu-Ray, No J-Card): $25
-Thor: The Dark World (Original Release, Blu-Ray and 3D Blu-Ray, No J-Card): $25
-Thor: Ragnarok (Best Buy 4K): $20
-Thor: Love and Thunder (Best Buy 4K): $20
-Avengers (Matt Ferguson Art): $20
-Avengers: Age of Ultron (Matt Ferguson Art): $20
-Avengers: Age of Ultron (Original Release, Blu-Ray and 3D Blu-Ray, Ultron Art, No J-Card): $30
-Ant-Man (Original Release, Blu-Ray and 3D Blu-Ray, No J-Card): $25
-Dr. Strange (Original Release, Blu-Ray and 3D Blu-Ray, No J-Card): $25
-Dr. Strange in the Multiverse of Madness (BestBuy 4K): $20
-Spider-Man: Homecoming (Best Buy Pop Art): $20
-Spider-Man: Homecoming (Zavvi 3D with Magnet): $20
-Black Panther (Original Release 4K): $20
-Black Panther (Second Release 4K): $20
-Black Panther (Zavvi 3D, Unopened): $20
-Avengers: Infinity War (Zavvi 3D): $25-Captain Marvel (Best Buy 4K): $20
-Spider-Man: No Way Home (Best Buy 4K): $20
-The Eternals (Best Buy 4K): $20
Other Marvel Films
-Spider-Man Legacy Collection (NOT 4K): $35
-Venom: $20-X-Men: Days of Future Past: $20
-X-Men: Apocalypse: $20
-Deadpool 2: $20
-Fantastic Four: $10
Star Wars
-Star Wars: The Force Awakens (No J-Card): $20
-Star Wars: The Last Jedi (Best Buy 4K): $20
-Star Wars: The Last Jedi (Zavvi 3D:): $20
-Star Wars: The Rise of Skywalker (Best Buy 4K): $20
DC Expanded Universe
-Batman Begins: PENDING
-The Dark Knight: PENDING
-The Dark Knight Rises: PENDING
-Justice League (Original Release with Jim Lee Art): $20
-Wonder Woman (Original Release): $20
-Aquaman (Original Release): $20
-Birds of Prey (Split Spine…can be repaired): $10
-Wonder Woman 1984 (Best Buy 4K and 3D): $20
-The Suicide Squad (Best Buy 4K): $20
-The Batman (Best Buy 4K First Release): $20
Animated DC Universe
-Justice League: The New Frontier Commemorative Edition (Animated): $15
-Wonder Woman Commemorative Edition (Animated): $15
Disney/Pixar
-Finding Nemo (Best Buy 4K): $20
-Finding Dory (Best Buy 4K): $20
-The Good Dinosaur (Best Buy 4K): $20
-Inside Out (Best Buy 4K): $20
-The Incredibles 2 (Best Buy 4K): $20
-Luca (Best Buy 4K): $20
-Toy Story 3 (Best Buy 4K): $10 (small dent on front cover)
-Toy Story 4 (Best Buy 4K): $20
-Turning Red (Best Buy 4K): $20
-101 Dalmatians: $20
-Aladdin (Best Buy 4K): $20
-Big Hero 6 (Original Target Exclusive Release): $25
-Cinderella: $20-Frozen (Best Buy 4K): $20
-The Nightmare Before Christmas: $20
-The Princess and The Frog (Best Buy 4K): $20
-Ralph Breaks the Internet (Best Buy 4K): $20
-Raya and the Last Dragon (Best Buy 4K): $20
-Sleeping Beauty: $20-Zootopia (Best Buy 4K): $20
-Aladdin (Live Action, Best Buy 4K): $20
-Beauty and the Beast (Live Action, Best Buy 4K): $20
-The Lion King (Live Action, Best Buy 4K): $20
-Maleficent (Best Buy 4K): $20
-Maleficent: Mistress of Evil (Best Buy 4K): $20
-Mary Poppins Returns (Best Buy 4K): $20
-The Nutcracker and The Four Realms (Best Buy 4K): $20
-A Wrinkle in Time (Best Buy 4K): $20
OTHER SteelBooks
-The Kingsman Collection (Best Buy 4K): $40
-Alien: Covenant (Best Buy 4K): $20
-The Hunger Games: $20
-The Hunger Games: Catching Fire: $20
-The Hunger Games: Mockingjay Part 1: $20
-The Hunger Games: Mockingjay Part 2: $20
-The Maze Runner: $20
-The Maze Runner: Scorch Trials: $20
-Mission Impossible: Rogue Nation (Best Buy 4K): $20
-Mission Impossible: Fallout (Best Buy 4K): $20
-Resident Evil: Retribution: $20
-Transformers: $20
-Transformers: Rise of the Fallen: $20
-Transformers: Dark of the Moon: $20
-Transformers: Age of Extinction: $20
-Transformers: The Last Knight: $20
-Zombieland: $20
-Zombieland: Double Tap: $20
-Rise of The Planet of the Apes: $20
-Dawn of The Planet of the Apes: $20
-War of The Planet of the Apes: $20
-American Sniper (Target Exclusive): $20
-Baby Driver (Zavvi Art): $20
-Blade of the Immortal (Best Buy): $20
-Bram Stoker’s Dracula (Zavvi): $10
-Bram Stoker’s Dracula 30th Anniversary Edition (Best Buy 4K): $20
-The Dark Tower (Best Buy 4K): $20
-Dredd (Best Buy 4K): $20
-Dunkirk (Best Buy): $10
-Elysium (Original Target Release): $20
-The Equalizer (Best Buy 4K): $20
-The Equalizer 2 (Best Buy 4K): $20
-Friday the 13th: The Killer Cut: $20
-Ghost in The Shell (Anime) (Mondo): $20
-Ghost in The Shell (Anime) (Best Buy 4K): $20
-G.I. Joe: Retaliation: $20
-Gods of Egypt (Best Buy, Blu-Ray 3D): $20
-Godzilla vs. Kong (Best Buy 4K): $25
-Gremlins (Best Buy 4K): $20
-Hacksaw Ridge (Original Target Release): $20
-Hell or High Water: $20
-Highlander (Best Buy 4K): $20
-The Huntsman: Winter’s War: $20
-The Hurt Locker (Original Best Buy Release in G1/DVD sized SteelBook): $20
-Interstellar (Original Target Release): $20
-It (Best Buy 4K, Original SteelBook Release): $20
-It (Best Buy 4K, Second Release): $20
-Jack Reacher: Never Go Back (Best Buy 4K): $20
-John Wick: $20
-John Wick Chapter 2: $20
-John Wick Chapters 1 & 2 Mini Digital Movie SteelBook (No digital copy included): $15
-John Wick Chapter 3 Mini Digital Movie SteelBook (No digital copy included): $15
-John Wick Chapter 3 (Target): $20
-Jurassic World: Fallen Kingdom (Best Buy 4K): $20
-Jurassic World: Dominion (Best Buy 4K): $20
-Kill Bill Vol. One: $20
-King Kong (Best Buy 4K): $20
-Kingsman: The Secret Service (Dave Gibbons Art): $20
-Kingsman: The Golden Circle (Dave Gibbons Art): $20
-La La Land (Original Best Buy Release): $20
-La La Land (Best Buy 4K): $20
-The Lost Boys (Best Buy 4K): $20
-The Magnificent Seven (Best Buy): $20
-The Matrix: Resurrections (Best Buy 4K): $20
-Midway (Best Buy 4K): $20
-Midway (Target): $20
-Mortal Kombat: Two Film Collection: $20
-The Mummy (Tom Cruise, Target Release): $20
-1917 (Best Buy 4K): $20
-No Time To Die (Best Buy 4K): $20
-Once Upon a Time in Hollywood (Best Buy 4K): $20
-Pacific Rim: Uprising (Target): $20
-Passengers (Best Buy 4K): $20
-Pirates of the Caribbean: Dead Men Tell No Tales (Best Buy 4K): $20
-Saban’s Power Rangers: $20
-A Quiet Place (Original Release): $20
-A Quiet Place (Best Buy 4K, Mondo Art): $20
-A Quiet Place Part II (Best Buy 4K): $20
-Rampage (Best Buy 4K): $20
-Red Dawn (Best Buy 4K): $20
-Red Sparrow (Best Buy 4K): $20
-The Revenant: $20-Saving Private Ryan (Best Buy 4K): $20
-Salt (Zavvi): $20
-Sicario (Target): $20
-Snatch (Pop Art): $10
-Snow White & The Huntsman: $20
-Spectre (Original Best Buy Release): $20
-Starship Troopers (Best Buy 4K): $20
-Star Trek Into Darkness: $20
-Sucker Punch: $20
-Terminator 2: Judgement Day (Best Buy 4K): $20
-13 Hours: $20
-Trolls (Best Buy 4K): $20
-Trolls: World Tour (Best Buy 4K): $20
-Warrior (Best Buy 4K): $20
-Whiplash (Best Buy Pop Art): $20
-Wrath of the Titans: $20
-Valerian and The City of a Thousand Planets: $20
Additional Zavvi Imports
-Avengers Assemble/Avengers: Age of Ultron (Zavvi): $20
-Thor Ragnarok (Zavvi Blu-Ray 3D, dented): $10
-Big Hero 6 (Zavvi Lenticular cover): $20
-Finding Dory (Zavvi Blu-Ray 3D): $20
-The Good Dinosaur (Zavvi Blu-Ray 3D): $20
-Alice Through The Looking Glass (Zavvi Blu-Ray3D): $20
-The Lone Ranger (Zavvi Lenticular cover): $20
Metal/Iron Paks:
-The Equalizer: $10
-Dawn of the Planet of The Apes (Original Best Buy Release, Blu-Ray 3D): $20
-Star Trek Into Darkness: $10
-Zombieland: $10

This post is going to sound like the ramblings of a crazed conspiracy theorist - the kind that everyone rolls their eyes at and pays no mind to. I’m going to ask you all for a difficult favor. Please hear me out first before writing me off as paranoid and insane.
​
You might be familiar with the airline SkyFly. For those that aren’t - SkyFly is an airline originating from Austin, Texas. It started out as a lesser known company, but within five years, it became one of the top dogs in the airline business. They’re also the worst.
​
If you thought United Airlines was bad for breaking guitars, or Delta Airlines for kicking passengers off of overbooked flights, you haven’t seen anything yet. SkyFly takes the cake. The CEO, Felix Thompson is a literal evil genius. He got away with first degree murder by masking it as negligent homicide.
​
Felix made it look like the oh so tragic death of Captain Gary Hurst was a result of cutting corners, instead of him being a specific target. I have proof of this. All you need to do is read the black box transcript from SkyFly Flight 49, which slammed into a field on May 29, 2013 due to a sudden mechanical failure. Captain Gary Hurst, Co-Captain Drew Baltimore, the four flight attendants, and all 250 passengers were killed on impact. There were no survivors.
​
SkyFly paid a good deal of money to keep that transcript discreet. You won’t find it on a Google search. You won’t find any news articles on it, either. This travesty was swept beneath the rug, and thoroughly stomped on to keep it there. What Felix did not anticipate, was for his own daughter to have enough of a conscience to betray him.
​
I’m leaking this transcript, because both customers and employees of SkyFly Airlines deserve to know the serious risk to their lives.
 

Start of Transcript

​
1549:49.3 [start of recording]
​
1549:50 Captain: Good morning everyone! Thank you for flying SkyFly Airlines! We expect to arrive in Boston, Massachusetts in six hours.
​
1549:54.8 [sound of click]
​
1549:57.7 Co-Pilot: I love the feeling of lifting off from the ground. It’s like in John Gillepsie’s poem: “Oh! I have slipped the surly bonds of Earth, And danced the skies on laughter-silvered wings…”
​
1550:14 Captain: Let’s hope this one stays in the air.
​
1550:22 Co-Pilot: What do you mean?
​
1550:25 Captain: You don’t feel that rattling?
​
1550:25 Co-Pilot: Shit. We need to return to the airport to get it looked at.
​
1550:27 Captain: SkyFly Airlines Flight 49 calling into air traffic.
​
1550:31 Air Traffic: Flight 49? What’s the situation?
​
1550:32 [Sound of click]
​
1550:34 Captain: We just took off and the plane is starting to rattle. The yoke feels stiff as well. Permission to return to the airport for an urgent landing?
​
1550:35 Air Traffic: [Captain], you have been flying for over fifteen years. You don’t need to make such a dramatic move over a little bit of turbulence.
​
1550:37 Captain: And as someone who has been flying for over fifteen years, I’m telling you that there’s something seriously wrong with this plane!
​
1550: 38 [sound of clicking]
​
1150:40 Air Traffic: You don’t need to return to port! Just keep flying! If it gets worse in the next hour, then we can discuss an emergency landing!
​
1550:43 Captain: Roger that!
​
1550:44 [sound of click]
​
1550:44.1 Captain: What a dick…
​
1550:45 Co-Pilot: Are we going to be okay?
​
1551:01 Captain: We can only pray.
​
1551:09.3 Captain: To be fair, things have smoothened out. Maybe I was getting paranoid.
​
1551:09.9 Co-Pilot: Why did you have such an extreme reaction?
​
1551:18.1 Captain: I keep getting put in broken planes. The first time, a failure in the elevators had this plane tossing and turning. The second time, there was a sudden explosion in BOTH engines. The third time, the plane literally stalled for a second. Thankfully I was able to land before anyone got seriously hurt, but this is not a lucky streak that I want to press.
​
1551:20.6 Co-Pilot: Let’s try not to let the worst case scenario impede on our current flight. A little bit of turbulence isn’t going to hurt us.
​
1551:36 Captain: What happened to agreeing with me to land the plane immediately and get it looked at?
​
1551:38 Co-Pilot: Air traffic made a good point.
​
1551:40 [the captain heaves a heavy sigh]
​
1551:42 [sound of rattling]
​
1551:50 Captain: Shit!
​
1551:58 Co-Pilot: What was that??
​
1552:01 Captain: I don’t know, but nothing good.
​
1552:02 [sound of an electronic hissing]
​
1552:31 Plane Warning System: Autopilot disabled. Autopilot disabled. Autopilot disabled.
​
1552:41 Captain: What did I fucking tell you?
​
1552:51 [Sound of click]
​
1552:53 Captain: Hold onto that controller like your life depends on it - because it does!
​
1552:59 Captain: SkyFly Airlines Flight 49 calling into air traffic. We have an emergency.
​
1553:03 Air Traffic: Flight 49? What’s the problem?
​
1553:08 Captain: The plane is shaking like an earthquake, and autopilot has suddenly disabled itself. Permission to make an emergency landing?
​
1553:09 Air Traffic: Just fly it manually! You know how to do that!
​
1553:10 Captain: Air traffic, I am telling you that this plane is going to fall apart before we get there!
​
1553:11 Air Traffic: Get a grip! Just keep flying manually!
​
1553:15 Captain: Roger that, asshole.
​
1553:17 Captain: Well, I suppose it’s good practice for flying manually.
​
1553:19 Co-Pilot: Is this safe?
​
1553:21 Captain: Not at all. But what choice do we have?
​
1553:28 Co-Pilot: If something else happens and air traffic denies the request to land, maybe we should just do it anyway. There are 250 lives at stake.
​
1553:35 Captain: That’s the plan. I’d land it now, but I’d catch too much shit for it.
​
1553:37 [sound of violent shaking]
​
1553:40 Captain: WOAH!!
​
1553:46 Plane Warning System: TERRAIN TERRAIN! PULL UP! TERRAIN TERRAIN! PULL UP!
​
1553:47 [sound of frantic clicking]
​
1553:48 Captain: Oh, thank god. I’m not ready to meet my maker yet.
​
1553:53 Captain: SkyFly Airlines Flight 49 calling into air traffic. We have a serious emergency.
​
1554:24 Air Traffic: Flight 49? What’s the problem?
​
1554:26 Captain: We temporarily lost control of the aircraft. We NEED to land before it happens again!
​
1554:32 Air Traffic: [murmuring] I guess we don’t have a choice but to let you land…
​
1554:33 Captain: Don’t have a choice?? What the hell is that supposed to mean??
​
1554:35 [sound of click]
​
1554:37 Captain: Oh shit! That was a scary pitch! I swear, it’s like these gears are covered in rust!
​
1554:50 Captain: Drew, why are you looking at me like that?
​
1554:51 Co-Pilot: Because I just realized that you’ve been put in broken planes for a reason…
​
1554:53 Captain: Air traffic control might be a dick, but they wouldn’t commit such an insane conspiracy with 250 other lives!
​
1555:00 Co-Pilot: I don’t think it’s a conspiracy. They just “don’t want to fix what isn’t broken.”
​
1555:00 Captain: What…
​
1555:01 Co-Pilot: I doubt these planes have had proper maintenance in a long time. Cutting corners is cheaper. If we make an emergency landing, SkyFly is going to have to pay to get the plane fixed.
​
1555:06 Captain: Why the hell would air traffic be involved in that?
​
1555:16 Co-Pilot: CEO’s know how to make friends.
​
1555:18 Plane Warning System: TERRAIN TERRAIN! PULL UP! TERRAIN TERRAIN! PULL UP!
​
1555:19 Captain: MAYDAY! MAYDAY! MAYDAY!
​
1555:20 Co-Pilot: [talking into black box] Melissa, baby, I love you so much. You’re the love of my life, okay? And it’s also okay if you move on and marry another man after me. I want you to be happy, okay? Don’t let this tragedy kill you too!
​
1555:24 Captain: IDIOT!! DON’T GIVE UP YET!! Yank on that yoke as hard as you can!!
​
1555:25 Co-Pilot: Roger that!
​
1555:30 Plane Warning System: TERRAIN TERRAIN! PULL UP! TERRAIN TERRAIN! PULL UP!
​
1555:31 Captain: MAYDAY! MAYDAY! MAYDAY!
​
1555:32 Air Traffic: Okay, Flight 49, you have permission to make an emergency landing.
​
1555:38 Captain: Let’s hope it’s not too late for that!
​
1555: 39 [sound of explosion]
​
1555:40 Captain: Air traffic, we just lost control of the vertical stabilizer!
​
1555:41 Air Traffic: Okay, what do you want to do?
​
1555:43 Captain: There’s nothing to be done at this point. We’re in an uncontrollable dive.
​
1555:45 Co-Pilot God have mercy on all of our souls…
​
1555:47 [sound of impact]

End of transcript

 
 
SkyFly Flight 49 slammed full speed into an empty field in Dripping Springs, Texas. There were no survivors. Just as co-pilot Drew Baltimore said, CEO’s know how to make friends. A further investigation would reveal that the air traffic control workers heard in this black box recording were being paid $5k check bonuses to keep these broken planes in the air.
​
Maintenance crews gave the clearance for the planes’ safety checks, but never did any real examination into their condition. It was a conspiracy, to be sure. But like I said in the beginning of this post, it was never about saving money. If it were a matter of frugality, EVERY SkyFly pilot would have been in a broken plane.
​
It was only Captain Gary Hurst that was assigned to these planes that were not suited for flight.
​
Captain Gary was such a good pilot that he could land a broken plane without casualties. When one busted plane was forced to go out of commission due to a successful landing, they’d put him in another one. I know you’re thinking that I’m making reaches. After all, why would such a conspiracy involve 250 other innocent passengers, 4 flight attendants, and another co-pilot?
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Simple: When a CEO commits negligent homicide, they get a $2 million slap on the wrist, and can carry on with their lives. If a CEO commits 1st Degree murder, they risk life without parole.
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CEO’s kill people everyday though human trafficking, exploitation of labor, negligent maintenance practices, and denying medical insurance to their employees. What’s 255 more in a simple plane crash? Captain Gary Hurst was always the target. The other innocent lives lost that day were simply a necessary collateral damage to get away with murder. I don’t know why my father wanted that man dead. I admit that I don’t have an explanation for a motive.
​
But only one pilot assigned to four consecutive broken planes? That’s not a coincidence. ESPECIALLY when air traffic control was trying to keep him in the air every single time.
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If you’re a pilot still working for SkyFly, RESIGN ASAP before you become next. If you have a flight booked with SkyFly, cancel it immediately. You could be the next target, or the next collateral damage to kill their target.
​

My father does not care if you die, as long as he gets to live well.

So my girlfriend broke up with me on monday, we were together officially for a little over 2 months but we had know eachother and slept in the same bed etc for closer to 6 months. She said she wasnt ready for a relationship and the commitment, and said we were moving too fast. Now i understand her point and its completely valid and i respect her decision. What makes me the saddest is how she never talked about it to me, even though i told her she can talk to me about anything and i will never be mad or judge her no matter what. And it doesnt help that she was the perfect girl, i mean drop dead gorgeous, perfect humour, we listened to the same music we even had our birthday on the same exact day and year and to make this even more perfect we both have adhd. Im fucking heartbroken i cant do anything without her, i have no appetite, i cant sleep, i cant listen to my favourite music and i feel constant guilt about enjoying anything, i just dont feel like i should be happy. She said she still wants to be friends and she still cares for me and doesnt want me to hate her or be mad, and im not i would take her back in a heartbeat if she gave me a chance. Im thinking about hurting my self or even worse but im too much of a pussy to do it and i couldnt imagine the pain i would put her through if she found out i killed myself because pf her. I dont blame her for anything and never will i just cant do anything without thinking of her and its really fucking up my personal and social life. We are both 17 if that matters. Im thinking im going to give her some more time and space and then talking to her and asking if we can try again and if she will give me another chance.

Previous.
Admiral Shane stood in the room usually used for training, but had been cleared out so he could make the conference over holophone, and a larger room helped with the scale when they were addressing the entire Federation Council.
It had taken only about 2 ½ days to get to the Golden Egg’s position, as with their progress in the uplifting process - and the fact that they had access to FTL technology - they had been allowed to send a ship out into the Federation, albeit supervised. As such, they decided on sending a military ship, seeing as there was a much smaller chance of an interstellar incident happening with disciplined Marines.
The chamber was a semicircle, with the Chairperson’s seat at ground level, in the center of the floor, with each next row elevated slightly, so that the gathered Representatives were situated in a step-pattern, ascending to the top row of the chamber. He noticed that the ‘insectoid’ species all were situated to his right of the chamber, if he was looking out at them.
Beside him stood Admiral Ree’Scote, being his ‘escort’ into the Federation; Kyle, as the boots-on-ground witness; Officer Kit’Ahnj, being the Federation’s liaison officer; and Captain Vohr’Doe, as the commander of the vessel that found the planet. But of course, it was him that was currently the center of attention.
He had reviewed the team's video logs, and he agreed that whatever was on that planet was likely hostile; the sounds that came from that darkness - not to mention the fear he felt when looking into it - were so… wrong, he didn't feel any other classification would be right. And - after the testimony of Officer Kit’Ahnj, backing up Kyle’s report, and the video - the Council felt the same way; however, they were less inclined to destroy the planet. He was currently being addressed by the Council Chairwoman, a bipedal crocodile, whose title was Chairwoman Hahss’Chom, (which - when she pronounced it - was little more than a hiss, followed by her snapping her jaws shut.)
“We have ways to prevent… whatever this is - from ever being able to exit their system, even if they were to develop FTL technology.”
“With all due respect, ma’am,” he said, keeping his focus on her, and not the - obviously - judging races that surrounded him, all of whom represented different animals from Earth, each one the Speaker for their respective races, “We’ve dealt with a mindless force of nature that was only intent on killing…
“Europa was one of Jupiter’s moons, and was roughly 90% the size of Luna. When we began spreading out from Earth, the question of drinkable water became a problem. And while it's - relatively - easy to make it from its base components, Europa was almost entirely water, though not all of it was liquid.
“Once we had developed the technology to land there, we set out drilling to the ocean, which was located beneath a shell of ice that was estimated to be between 10-15 miles deep… We made it four miles before we lost all resistance. The drills were shut down, and new readings were taken; but by the time they realized what was happening, it was too late.
“At first, the teams thought that it was a geyser, which are - were - a fairly common thing, though there had been no signs that one was building up there. Well, they managed to get far enough away before… The ice where they had been working melted, but there was no geyser. What came out of the hole resembled, well, it most resembled a machine AI that humanity dreamed up as a monster in a movie. The one I reference here was basically a metal ball with countless metal tentacles from its ‘back’, and what came out of that hole looked remarkably similar.
“And it wasn't alone. About a dozen of those [‘squids’] came out, and made straight for our people. It was… a massacre; our weapons had no effect on them whatsoever. And after they were done killing everyone, they began dismantling and consuming the ships and equipment. And afterwards, they turned their gazes upwards, launching themselves from the surface of the moon with the force of their limbs, alone.
“Judging from the fragments of their bodies we were able to recover after encounters with them in space, we determined that they were iron of the Fe oxidized variety, so the metal of their bodies didn't interact with the water. They were also incredibly light, especially for how dense they were; it took several missiles to destroy each, and we had no other choice, as they were heading directly at the ships in orbit.
“We retreated to a tactical distance, and while we tried so many different ways to communicate, we found nothing. We even captured one alive, and still, there was no way to communicate. Every attempt was met with the utmost hostility. And throughout this process, they continuously sent out others from beneath the ice, most of them sent towards our ships, yet others were sent out towards the asteroids that share Jupiter’s orbit around the sun. We had no idea what they were doing with the asteroids, whether they were mining them for food, or using them as places to reproduce - or both - so we eventually decided to bombard them with munitions until they crashed into the planet. But this was after we had exhausted every possible avenue of communication.
“We eventually came to a decision - as a people - to destroy the moon, but we had to be smart about it. The Europans had already proven they didn't need to breathe, as they could survive the cold, irradiated vacuum of space without any external protection, which took blowing Europa up off the table.. So - after much deliberation - it was decided to create a ship that could use tractor beams to move the planet. For this, we converted another of Jupiter’s moons - Ganymede - into a ship, and once the construction was complete, we renamed it the Europa Contingency.
“From there, we caught Europa, and towed it to Sol, where we cast it in, to destroy the Europans, down to the last one… It's not something that we’re proud of - as a people - but it was what we needed to do, in order to survive.”
There was a resounding silence after he finished with his speech, and he allowed them the time to process what he'd just told them. He was suddenly very self-conscious, and he felt as if he hadn't explained their plight sufficiently. They were already classified as the most aggressive that their measurement system could register, what must they think of humanity after this. Finally, the Chairwoman broke the silence.
“Though it sounds as if you may have committed genocide on a sapient species… This Council can claim no better. While we have ways to contain FTL travel, this was only put forth as a possible avenue to explore after our predecessors had glassed multiple planets who had turned out to be too hostile to conduct civil interactions with. To have that threat in the same system as you, with no real barrier between your peoples, well, I don't believe any here could truly blame your people for coming to this decision… However, we can't be sure that we face the same threat. Nor can we order anyone to go into the darkness to find out.”
The suul’mahr representative, Grol’Rosh - a solid white coloration to his fur - spoke up, his voice playing out over the speakers, as he was sitting in the topmost row.
“We could send a probe into the midst of it; that could tell us what we're dealing with. And if they are entirely hostile, we could take a specimen up to the atmosphere, to see if it survives.”
He heard a strangled sound of protest, and he didn't need to look around to see the fearful look on Kyle’s face; he gently held up a hand to assuage the Ambassador, as he knew full well what his concern was.
“We believe that the contents of the darkness are… harmful to the generally accepted term of ‘sanity’. And not in the sense of ‘it would be dangerous to any non-human’; as in, to anyone. If - however - you should need a volunteer, then-”
“I will watch it,” Grol’Rosh cut him off. Admiral Shane merely looked at him, sighing lightly as he nodded once in acknowledgment to the suul'mahr. Captain Vohr'Doe stepped up at that point, calling to the hangar to release the drone, and to program it to enter the darkness just beyond the leading edge. A small communication satellite was set out after it to retain contact with the drone when the curve of the planet would render it beyond their scope of reach.
It took several minutes, during which Grol’Rosh inserted earbuds into his ears, and had his personal screen connected to the probe's camera. While he was watching the drone's progress, it was also taking its own readings, and sending them back as text. Which is how they knew when it was breaching the atmosphere, and when it encountered the darkness; Kyle had been right: it wasn't natural.
The reports coming back from the drone were confusing, to say the least; firstly because ‘the darkness’ was actually solid material, though ‘solid’ was used loosely here, as it was more like a ‘dust storm’. Except that it wasn't just dust - as there were readings of sand, and soil in the mess - because nanoscanners inside the drone determined that each grain of soil was coated in a thick, viscous material that absorbed all light that hit it.
The material was what caused the confusion, as when it was analyzed, it was determined to be… everything. There were traces of all genus of races, from canines, to felines, insects, to pachyderms; there was even all manner of aquatic animals, as well. There was no plant life detected in the sludge.
As imagined with readings like that, the drone had more difficulty descending to the surface of the planet than it normally would have, but strangely, not as much as one might expect; it was only when the craft sped up that they realized it was being pulled. The altitude of the drone continued to drop at a steady rate, until it was about 50’ from the ground, according to the readings from the expedition team, as it was heading for the exact location they had originally made camp. However, the drone was sending even more confusing information, as it was now reading the ground to be 25’ away, and moving quickly.
The drone was about 10’ from the ‘ground’ when Grol’Rosh began howling like he’d been stabbed. Looking up in his direction, everyone gasped in horror as he began clawing at his eyes, quickly rending his face, and entirely destroying the delicate orbs within. He wasn't done, however, as he then began clawing at his ears, his Gift obviously activated, as he tore straight to his skull in only a single swipe, the unnerving sound of claw scraping bone filling the room.
Two suul'mahr guards rushed towards him as soon as he'd begun clawing his eyes, and were almost to him when he reached his hands out to the sides, and brought them together - with his head still between them - with obviously tremendous force.
One of the guards - a dark gray specimen - leapt forward at the last second, tackling him by leverage of his left arm. That still left his right arm free, though it had only succeeded in a glancing blow, which still knocked him unconscious with a sickening /thud**. There was a stunned silence that followed that ordeal, until Chairwoman Hahss’Chom shakily gave an order for medics, who soon arrived, two kanfi’doe that - after stabilizing his wounds - quickly carried Grol’Rosh down the stairs, and loaded him onto a stretcher they had brought with them.
The silence reigned for a long minute after they’d wheeled him out, broken finally by the Chairwoman’s subdued voice.
“I call a vote: all in favor of allowing the humans to bring their ‘Europa's Contingency’...?” She tapped a few commands into the datapad in front of her, and there was a quiet flurry of movement as the rest of the Council cast their votes.
“It's unanimous: Admiral Shane, we hereby give the Europa’s Contingency permission to travel to this system, and then to return to Sol when the job here is done. Are we clear on this?”
“Crystal, ma’am. I can have the orders dispat-”
He was cut off as a keen'yohng appeared by his side.

Commodore Vah’Rin came out of subspace, his prey already in his sights. The eight other captains under his command confirmed lock-on status, and his communications officer informed him that they had an opening into their link, though it was protected by an unusually strong defense system.
“Well,” he replied, “We did intercept the report on humans; they have artificial intelligences. They probably have one with that cylindrical ship that has too many guns to not be military. Well, this certainly changes things: an a.i. would be by far more valuable than an entire hold of drahk'mihn. If we can capture it, and reprogram it to obey us, we could drop down far enough into subspace that we could make a trip of several months cut down to as many weeks… Patch me into their communication; I’m done hiding…”
He let a cruel smile play across his face as his entire bridge turned into the Federation Council Hall; his ship would project his image into their conversation, but not those of his crew around him. And there in front of him were the objects of his focus, as he was certain he appeared before them, wearing his black Commodore’s jacket.
“How nice of you to join us, Commodore.”
He turned to the owner of the cold voice that ‘greeted’ him.
“Ah, Council Member Toss’Vah,” he replied cheerily to her, “Good to see you again. How are things back home?”
She regarded him coldly, then almost spat,
“It was widely believed that you were still alive; I regret to have that theory confirmed.”
“What can I say?” he asked, smiling, “This ship was just too good to not take it. Give my regards to the president; this ship truly is state-of-the-art… But, I didn't break into this conversation to speak with you.” He turned to the humans, who regarded him with wary expressions, if his experience with the suun'mahs and kanfi’doe was anything to judge by.
“Greetings,” he began jovially - no reason not to be civilized, “I - as you may have gathered - am Commodore Vah’Rin, and I regret to inform you that you are under the guns of 9 ships, all of which are heavily armed. Now, this is normally the part where I tell you that if you cooperate, then we can get through this with a minimal amount of casualties - someone always has to try to be the hero, don’t they? - but I have a different proposition for you, today: give me you a.i., and we’ll leave this system - and your ships - without any hostilities. Refuse, and… Well, I think you get the idea.” He smiled a predatory smile that was more of a leer than anything.
“This is outrageous;” the current Councilwoman stated, righteous anger evident in every syllable, “We not stand for-” but he cut her off.
“We’re too far away from any Federation outposts, and the nearest suun’mahs patrol is… well, right here.” He gestured to Admiral Ree’Scote.
“So, no matter how this plays out, there’s really nothing that this council can do about the goings-on here. So - as I said earlier - I’m not speaking to you; this has nothing to do with any of you.” He turned his attention back to the humans.
“So, what is your answer? And might I remind you, while you may - or may not - be able to take on our ships at 3-1 odds, one of your ships is not only not made to fight, but is also filled with civilians; are you willing to risk all of their lives?”
“How about this,” the human who was obviously military began, “You choose six of your ships, and use those to square off against us; the other three can hang back, and guard the Golden Egg from leaving. If you win that battle, you can take the A.I. stationed there. If not, then your other ships have to leave us in peace.”
“I’m sorry, I didn’t get your name and rank.”
“Admiral Shane of the Sol Defense Force.”
“Ah,” he continued, “Well, Admiral Shane, I’m afraid it doesn’t work that way. It’s all, or nothing, which means that even if you feel comfortable taking on all of our ships at once, we will still target the civilian vessel. There is no other option; sometimes you only have bad paths to choose from, and you must take the lesser of the evils.”
Admiral Shane stood taller, and defiantly responded with,
“We of the Sol Defense Force cannot - in good conscience - hand over a single soul to slav-”
But he was cut off by the other human behind him, the one he actually recognized. Reaching into his pocket, he retrieved a small blue cube, which he held out as he angrily stated,
“You can have mine.”
“Ah,” he replied jovially, turning to the smaller human, “Mr. Redding, I believe?”
“It’s Ambassador.” The defiant little monkey at least seemed pretty fearless in the face of life-or-death negotiations, so he figured that he deserved at least that recognition; he certainly seemed to realize the value of diplomacy over fighting.
“Ambassador, then; good to see someone here has a level head on their shoulders.”
The cube reformed into a small human, as the Admiral rounded on his civilian counterpart; they both started talking at the same time.
“Excuse me?! You have no right to auction me off like some-
“... hell do you think you’re doing?! How dare you offer up a Sollian to a slaver?! I ought to knock the sh-”
But they were both cut off as Ambassador Redding simply stated, talking louder than both of them,
“Artificial Intelligence Override Code: JKJKLOL69!”
The small android stiffened up, and remained rigid, as if it were a simple robot, while the Admiral recoiled, raising an arm slightly as if to defend himself.
“How dare you?” he said with disgust to the Ambassador, “That’s only to be used in the event of a rogue A.I., this-!”
“This,’ the Ambassador interjected angrily, “Is bigger than all of us! I know what I’m doing.” He turned to address the Commodore,
“You will take it, and you’ll leave. In peace. Give me… 12 Standard minutes - I have to collect the memory core - and we’ll meet halfway between the 'civilian’ ship, and your group, ‘cause you sure as hell aren't coming aboard either of our ships.”
“That sounds acceptable; however, once the transfer is made, you will keep your shuttle in position until we have determined that the package is authentic, at which point, we will leave. If it is a fake, then I won't hesitate to blow your little shuttle to dust, and then I’ll take everyone I can get my hands on; and with 9 ships, we have more than enough space to hold you all. And we will both come unarmed.”
“I’ll be accompanying you,” the Admiral said sternly to the Ambassador, “I need to document everything that happens so I can send it back as evidence in your hearing.”
“Yeah,” the smaller primate answered testily, “You do that…”
With a vindictive smile, Commodore Vah’Rin motioned to end the transmission.

Kahv’Hosh sat in the pilot’s seat, having been chosen to transport the humans out to the meeting spot. They were both currently silent, and the air was so thick with emotion that you could cut it with a knife. They were already in place, and were currently waiting on the pirate ‘commodore’ to reach their shuttle, with an estimated thirty seconds until they made contact. With a solid /thud/, they were connected, and Kahv’Hosh equalized the pressure in the sleeve, and soon heard a slight knock on their door. Kyle and the Admiral had already moved to the door - the large metal cube with the interface screen sitting beside it - and Kyle reached forward to open it.
The keen’yhong walked onto their shuttle, and his eyes immediately fell to Kyle’s waist.
“I thought we agreed no weapons.” The man’s voice wasn’t as hostile as he would have expected, as he stared at the big gun on Kyle’s waist, and the smaller - but still obviously deadly - pistol on the Admiral’s.
“Yeah,” Kyle replied sarcastically, “Because you don’t have some hidden weapon on you…”
The ‘commodore’ simply smiled, and turned to the box.
“This is my a.i., I take it?” he asked, still smiling.
Kyle’s mood seemed to darken further as he reached into his pocket, pulling out the cube that became Kay’Eighty at his command.
“Begin downloading into the core, and commence factory reset.”
He set the cube down on top of an open slot beside the monitor, and a loading screen immediately came up. It only took a few seconds, but it was still a tense few seconds; soon, the box chimed, and Kyle removed the cube.
“I’ll be taking that, as well,” the ‘commodore’ replied, reaching a hand into his jacket; Kyle simply scoffed.
“No, you want to make your own mithril, then you figure out how to make it, yourself. You’ve already got the core, that’s all you need. And that’s all we agreed on. If you wanted the mithril, too, then you should’ve said so; not my fault you failed to specify that point.” There was no amusement as he said it, though it was obvious that he enjoyed that little stunt. And while the ‘commodore’ obviously had his hand on the handle of his gun, he wouldn’t be able to move faster than two humans; the two suul’mahr lurking just beyond the airlock wouldn’t be much help after he was already riddled with bullets.
The ‘commodore’ regarded him for a few moments, then began laughing a cruel, calculated laugh. He gestured behind him, and one of the suul’mahr - all-brown fur - came aboard, carrying the large box onto their shuttle. After he’d observed its successful transfer of the package onto his shuttle, the ‘commodore’ turned back to Kyle.
“As stated before: you will hold this position until either my flotilla leaves, or destroys you for trying to trick me. And this time, I expect you to follow my directions, because you’re already targeted by my lead ship… Well, until next time.” With that, he exited the shuttle, their airlock door closing behind him, both humans remaining staring at the door.
They finally turned away when the shuttle disconnected, moving to look out the viewport to watch the other shuttle go back to its ship. Finally, his nerves got the better of him, and he asked to no one in particular,
“Do you think he will truly spare us?”
“There’s a chance,” Admiral Shane replied, “Depending on what kind of pirate he is; they can have varying codes of honor. He does - however - self-admittedly sell people into slavery, so I don’t know how strong his sense of ‘honor’ may be.”
They were all quiet for a while as he considered this, until Kyle’s soft voice - filled with sorrow - broke the silence.
“I’ve never killed anyone before. I mean, the mahn’ewe were all in a fit of rage; and while I’d fantasized about it, I didn’t exactly plan it. Now, though - with all this time to stop and think about it…” He fell silent at that, watching the shuttle go, though Kahv’Hosh wasn’t sure he was actually seeing it. To his surprise, Admiral Shane reached up and grasped Kyle’s shoulder, his voice gentle as he replied,
“It’s never easy. And while the mahn’ewe can probably be overlooked by your conscience, this is - obviously - a different situation entirely. There’s a chance that you never truly recover from this, but just always remember the innocent lives you’re saving by doing this; they’re what’s going to get you through the low points.”
Kyle nodded in acceptance, and then his face contorted, and a predatory smirk lit up his countenance.
“Have you ever seen one go off?” he asked, not taking his eyes off the viewport.
“Well,” the Admiral replied, a mischievous note in his voice, “I have seen a number of tests; of course, there was that pirate faction that we traced to their base in an asteroid. One on each side, and it was history.”
Kyle let out a cruel snort of laughter, and - not taking his eyes off of the viewport - said,
“Kahv’Hosh, did you ever get around to reading about the women of Weinsberg?”
He wasn’t sure where this was going, but he decided to play along.
“I did," he replied slowly.
“And if you knew nothing else about humans,” Kyle began, a cruel smile on his face, “Would you have accepted that deal?”
He managed to take a breath in before something in his mind clicked. Something had seemed off from the beginning, but he couldn’t place exactly what it was. He’d been given clearance to review the transmission from the part where the ‘commodore’ broke in, and he had been replaying it in his mind ever since then, trying to figure out what was gnawing at his mind like a pup with a bone.
But nothing came out at first, as his mind struggled to form words; he managed simply to point out the viewport to the shuttle - that was almost to its ‘mothership’ - and to look back and forth between him and it, before he finally managed to spit out,
“Wh-... you-... why would the arti-... the ‘override code’: why would it be in Galactic Standard?!”
The smile on his face widened, and he was suddenly aware that he was on a small shuttle with two Class 12 aggressors. Kyle - however - merely pulled the cube from his pocket, and said,
“Kay’Eighty?”
The cube began to dissolve, reforming into the humanoid shape that was her android form.
“Yes, Ambassador Redding?” she replied in a distinctly… robotic voice. Kyle merely scoffed, however, and rebutted with,
“Aw, come on; it’s not like he gave us ample opportunity to talk: I had to think of something on the fly…”
She suddenly became much more ‘sapient’ crossing her arms, and looking off to the side as she sighed.
“Fine,” she replied, “Whatever; what do you want?”
Kyle snorted in laughter, and asked,
“Has he made it to the optimal range, yet?”
Kay’Eighty sighed again, and looked out the viewport.
“Just about, yeah.”
“Then I leave the honors to you,” he finished, holding her up for a better view of the viewport.
“Detonation in 5… 4… 3… 2… 1…”
Kahv’Hosh found that though he was sure this was going to be on par with their aggression level, he also couldn’t look away; like watching an asteroid impact a planet: he knew something bad was coming, but he just couldn’t bring himself to break eye-contact with the nine ships in formation, the middlemost one having already received the shuttle. And even as he watched, the ships seemed to draw closer together.
At first he thought that it must be his eyes playing tricks on him, but soon enough, not only were they drawing closer together, but they began to spin around the central ship, as if caught in the gravity-well of some insanely dense celestial body. He saw small explosions issuing from the sides. with little bits breaking off into the void of space, only for the expanding singularity - for that was obviously what it was - to suck the life-pods back into its center, where everything seemingly disappeared into nothingness. Soon, the ships themselves began breaking apart, still doing their destructive, tumbling dance around the spot where the ‘commodore’s ship used to be.
Piece by piece, the ships began to break apart, ‘falling’ into the center, where they were obviously compressed beyond what physics would normally allow. He tried not to think about the fate of the people aboard the ships, gravity increasing to the point that you were crushed under the weight of your own skin, having to watch - if they could even survive - as the ship around them broke apart, exposing them to the blackness of space.
He managed a quick look back at the humans, and was granted some small consolation in that the evil smiles had left their faces, and both had looks of somber determination gracing their features. And at that moment, he believed he knew what it was that set them so high on the aggression scale; even they were appalled by their actions - by their own weapons - and yet not even the prospect of becoming a monster would stop them from removing a perceived threat.
Soon, all pieces of the ships were gone, and about a Standard minute after that, the anomalous gravity readings disappeared. And suddenly space had returned to ‘normal’, as if nothing unnatural had just happened. Kyle broke the silence in a neutral voice as he said,
“Well, let’s get back to the ship; Cap’m’s gonna tear me a new one for this…”
[Next.] Patreon

Hey guys!
Hope you enjoyed the episode last night! Just like last week, I wanted to give some very general and nondescript behind the scenes tea from the contestants you met last night!

• First off, I’m from Michigan, and was originally supposed to be in the Midwest region (I saw it on some documents), but I fought really hard to represent NYC because I haven’t lived in the Midwest for years at this point!
• I immediately tried to find all the gays I could, and found Trevor and Charles pretty quickly haha. Charles and I are both gay, Asian midwesterners, and bonded over shared experiences. Trevor found me on Grindr and we chatted for a while lollllll. These two were some of the people that could interchangeably go to each other throughout the experience ❤️
• Kev and I bonded over Michigan stuff - he’s from the east side of the state, and I’m from the west side. He’s one of the coolest, chilliest dudes ever, and the cameras really captured that.
• Sarah is an ANGEL, and that bubbly personality is exactly who she is. That laugh is also super infectious and caused us to be in tears laughing many days of filming, to the point we got shushed by production lol.
• Jonida was one of a couple moms that were always looking out for everyone. On the day of my audition filming, I had such bad anxiety I almost gave myself a panic attack. She made me a ginger tea and just sat with me 🥺🥺🥺
• Kyle was just a generally good human and absolutely hysterical behind the scenes. Him and a couple people you’ll meet next week created a friendship of #DoughBoys, which I’m sure they’ll share soon!
• Stink’s audition was really funny to watch, mostly because the reactions of the judges when they asked her name and she said “Stink” was so funny to see. She’s also a GORGEOUS person and watching her cook may have changed my sexuality for a minute haha
• Wayne’s audition was really impressive to watch. I was extra impressed with his skills in the kitchen. The cams don’t capture it, but he peeled entire vegetables in 2 seconds. It was phenomenal to watch him kill it every time he cooked.
• Grant (and his family) are genuinely some of the kindest people I think I’ve ever met in my life. After auditions are done, I’ll upload all the behind the scenes pictures, but me and him and his wife have a ton of really good photos. When we found out we made the filming auditions, Grant cried like a baby. This opportunity means so much to him, and I’m a huge fan.
• Kaimana’s audition wasn’t shown, but she made a pineapple pastry. She is the sweetest person, and I’m so sad she didn’t get airtime. Please follow her and send her love!
• I’ve kept in touch with most everyone from this region (and every region really, but the northeast is easy since so many of us live in the same city haha), but am the closest with Stink, Kev, Sarah and Trevor. We talk on a daily basis ❤️
• Just like last week, I can say with 1000% certainty that every single person who cooked, whether they got an apron or didn’t, definitely could have. The talent of this season is just incredible.
• Many people you saw who didn’t get aprons so far are talking about going back next season 👀

Follow these people - there are a lot of really cool announcements and opportunities happening for everyone you’ve seen so far!
@kevin_jerrell @mrssarahfry @tricksinthekitchen @kuhoppy @trevorivanich @charlescalvino @60minutechef @kaimanamiranda @grant_gillon @nicknamestink / @enjoyallthings

I think there is a missing part of sunny’s aspect which he has always had but doesn't know about which would make him more powerful. Perhaps this ability we are not aware of contributes to Sunny slow Class progression.

1. Why haven't we found out about this? How do we know it exists?
2. the Short answer is I don't know, but I have some ideas about how he can find out.

• Just like how we would've never known sunny can create Shadows out of echoes if he never got one, perhaps there's something sunny has an affinity with as a divine shadow that he simply never had to chance to interact with and is thereby limiting his strength.
  
• recall that Sunny is a rather cautious individual. Back when he was just dormant, we had no idea about him being able to Class-up at all. Neither did he, and because of this, sunny never put extensive effort into reaching a higher class until that point.
  
• this is similarly the case with Saint, sunny had no idea of his dire need for memories until he made a Shadow and found out what he could do with them.
  

1. So what are the clues? How can we really know that he is missing something?
2. I don't have anything concrete, but we can look into the past when he unlocked these untold skills, and perhaps see what progress he has towards future skills.

• ways we can see if he is progressing secretly towards an ability we don't know about yet can be listed through encounters with a unique situation. So far, these have been...

Making his first Shadow Soldier
Making the first step towards Shadow Dance and everything from it
Having a Shadow Bond
His Class-up
His Shadows which protect his soul sea from invasion
His class, and shadow bond were two things that definitely would've happened at some point, but some awakened never acquire a echo their entire lives, and unlocking your aspects Legacy as a Dormant is a serious achievement.
Sunny eventually got shadow dance from a dream in the dream realm and watching his own shadow. What else do we know from this?

• shadows, even his own, have a knowledge which he isn't aware of until he sees the details. Had sunny not been attentive, he would've never learned shadow dance, and thereby never realize that his shadows could throw hands better than he does.
  
• perhaps he can learn more of himself by manifesting his own shadow with [Shadow manifestation] and seeing another unique quality of them?
  
• a large portion of sunny’s weakness is knowledge, he cannot communicate with shadows despite being a [child of shadows] and even a [Master of shadows] later on. This limits his use of his aspect, as it is up to him to realize or come to a certain enlightenment, just like with Shadow Dance.
  

1. What if there's nothing to realize? There's only one legacy per aspect, so what more could he be missing?

• the aspect legacy he realized through his shadow is a unique example I doubt will occur again. Besides progressing Shadow Dance further, there may be more to find out in a different direction, one I simply don't know about.
  
• I believe a worth while consideration would be Shadows inside of his Soul Sea, and the fact that they actually moved before. They are not just a trophy case for sunless to gawk at like he did in the forgotten shore once, they are an actual defensive mechanism, but what else could they be? If he knew how, could he use these shadows within him for something more?
  
• in the chapters after sunless recent ascension, we come to understand that not all shadow are the same, some are particularly ancient and powerful, and are not willing to come to his aid.
  

What else could these ancient shadows express towards him? I have no idea, and neither does sunny, he didn't I'm even seem curious about how the fact that a shadow can willingly refuse or obey his command means that they are sentient, and sentient beings have knowledge. What reasons could they have towards him to not come to the aid of the Shadow once belonging to late Shadow God? These questions were never raised.
Just how much of sunny does sunny even know?

"I am not getting in a Death Cocoon" - Every Federation Species
"I am not messing with Humans who get in the Death Cocoon" - Every Federation Enemy Species
"5 Star Transportation and a Free Tour of many worlds, plus the view is great" - ODST Sponsorship Poster.
"Put me in Coach, and make me crash into a tank" - most scared ODST Trooper in recorded history
"If they sent us, that means the Democrats and Republicans agreed that you are a threat, and they want you gone in 12 hours" - ODST Operation Manual, Page 1, Section 1, "Why you are being Deployed as an ODST"
"There are 2 things assured as an ODST, a body bag or a medal, and if you are unlucky, BOTH" - ODST Proverb
"He who fears Death is consumed by it, He who does not sees Death as an old friend" - ODST Proverb
"A child wants Guardian angels to save them and their family, ETA 10 minutes" - ODST Proverb
"God may side with the best artillery, but the Devil told us to send his regards" - ODST Proverb
"It's not the heat of Re Entry that heats our pods, its the friction of our gigantic balls rubbing" - ODST Proverb, removed due to small dick jokes
"I fear two things in this world, My Momma, and disappointing my Momma, dropping from Orbit is a vacation from her" - ODST Oliver Dickens Smith Tanner.
"They say let Jesus take the wheel, but my drop pod got no steering" - ODST Truck, credited with killing enemy commanders with his drop pod, usually called "isekai-kun" by Asian ODST
"There is a certain peace when dropping from orbit, you don't know if the heat shields will fail, the enemy gets a lucky shot on your pod, or if you will not get lit up by enemy gun fire as soon as the pod doors open, all you feel is the exhilarating peace of knowing that right now, the gods are in charge of your life, AND THEY WANT THE ENEMY DEAD" - ODST Jacob Price.
"A meteor shower is considered a wonderful thing to look at, until the meteors start crashing in your cities and crazy humans pop out destroying your defenses" - Alien Warning when fighting humans.
"I Fear nothing, but those..."Things"......they scare me" - Chakalak Templar Warrior, asked what it feels like to deploy with ODST's
"Human Armies are deployed knowing they will win, ODST troopers don't know if they'll even survive the first hour, but they do it anyway" - Federation Commander on seeing the casualty rate of ODST Troopers during the Founding Wars.
"Our Goddess told us that winged warriors would save us from the slavers....she did not say we would not be afraid of them too...." - Former Slave Species Chickenaxi, when ODST Troopers dropped down and slaughtered the Pirate Slavers of Gizanti-12 '
"Of Course Humans would come up with this shit, we did the science and the science said it would work, nothing surprising" - Dr. Himeko, Head Federation Scientist when asked why Humanity even HAS ODST Soldiers.
"Feet first into Hell? You have not met the average Human Doctor, THAT IS HELL" - ODST O'brian, after his pod failed to slow down and nearly crushed his legs, currently getting cybernetic replacements

Another long one, prepare.
StitchlineGames is a theory I want to believe, especially with Tales being so directly linked to Security Breach that it feels like FF should be that directly linked to the rest of the games. But there's always things pulling me back.
The only confirmed stories in the Stitchline are:
The Epilogues
Into the Pit
To Be Beautiful
Count the Ways
Fetch
Out of Stock
1:35 AM
Step Closer
Dance With Me
The Man in Room 1280
Blackbird
The Real Jake
Hide-and-Seek
There's also other stories people have tried to link Stitchine to either through familiar named locations, unnamed characters looking similar to Stitchline characters, references to the MCI, etc but those have never been directly confirmed. (That's right, despite popular belief, Andrew is never actually confirmed in the Stitchline to actually be Golden Freddy in The New Kid, the story's canonicity is unknown).
The first one everyone jumps to critiquing is Into the Pit as it has a 6th child instead of just the typical 5 in the MCI. However, this is assuming it's actually time travel, which it may not be, it might just be memory hopping which we see happen in the Epilogues as Larson goes through Eleanor's memories of events that she took part in. We know Eleanor has trapped 30 people in the ballpit, if the ballpit can hop through people's memories maybe it hopped through the memory of someone present in the 1985 MCI. We also know these events can't be literal because Spring Bonnie goes after Oswald and ends up in the real world as an agony being that is seemingly controlled by Eleanor but it's confirmed in the Stitchline that William committed the crimes, not some agony monster. With that, we must believe these events aren't 100% truthful and the 6 victims might not be all from the MCI but could just be everyone that died at this specific location.
The next story, To Be Beautiful, is more disconnected from the games but because of that can't really be proven to not exist in the games timeline. I think at this point we are long past the days of thinking of robot kids as complete impossibilities and the past the days of saying Illusion Disks don't exist in the games.
Count the Ways is when things get...interesting. Firstly, the villain is Funtime Freddy who, in the games, seemed to only exist at CBPW and CBEAR, both being the same version of Funtime Freddy. We're led to believe these stories take place in present day, so late 2010s, but if that's the case, Funtime Freddy should be destroyed by now and merged with Ennard/Molten Freddy. There's nothing in the games to imply the existence of multiple CBEARs with multiple Funtime Freddys unlike Freddy Fazbear's Pizza where we know that at least more than 1 exists thanks to FNAF 3's tapes. Fazbear Entertainment was gone after 1993 and by the time of 2023 all of its stuff was considered "pre-historic" implying the company was gone for a while by the time of FNAF 3. There's also the fact that the way Funtime Freddy kills Millie isn't described in the games, he has a storage tank, sure, but nothing suggests he has all these ways to kill children.
Next is Fetch, while we were unaware at the time, this is our first meeting with Andrew, whose agony has infected Fetch. It may also be infected by William's agony as he is tethered to Andrew. We also meet Jake McNally which some think could be Jake from The Real Jake but 5 years younger. For reasons, we'll talk about later, if this is in the game's timeline it has be in after 2023, 2024 at the absolue earliest (although unlikely) meaning Jake would die in 2029, but that is just assuming this is the same Jake. This story doesn't contradict anything from the actual games, so this is fine. It's also important to point out that Freddy's is currently abandoned and no new Freddy's have popped up at this time since the search provides only information of the company closing down after an undescribed incident.
Out of Stock is the first time we actually see Fazbear Entertainment operational post-2023. This story must take place after FFPS as the Stitchwraith exists at this point as soon after this story he collects the Plishtrap Chaser. This means that Fazbear Entertainment is starting back up and doesn't seem to care for its problematic past by selling toys of their once banned Springlock Character.
1:35 AM doesn't contradict or give us really any new information.
Step Closer is the first time in the Stitchline we see a Freddy's location exists in modern day. Nothing in the games outright confirms the existence of Freddy's locations prior to the Pizzaplez but it certainly isn't impossible.
Dance With Me is weird as it implies Circus Baby's Pizza World must've reopened at some point. The original Circus Baby's Pizza World never officially opened and doesn't make sense for Circus Baby's to reopen anytime prior to FFPS as all of FNAF history was "pre-historic" by FNAF 3. This must've opened after the company started back up after FFPS, after Into the Pit and Fetch. This isn't impossible but nothing directly proves this point. Some might say that this is why Funtime Freddy is in Count the Ways but Funtime Freddy is described as being in a scrapyard for ages. Sure, something taking ages is subjective, but something just doesn't feel right there.
The Man in Room 1280 is the big one and honestly the only story that actually directly connects to the games. Andrew has attached himself with William and has been keeping him alive to torment him in his nightmares, no matter what the nurses or doctors do, he won't die. Sound familiar? TOYSNHK attached himself to William and is keeping him alive to torment him, no matter how many times they burn him. It's literally UCN. Some have said that Andrew is the kid with curly black hair inside Golden Freddy in The New Kid and while, yes, it's a possibility, it is an unconfirmed connection but would further strengthen the UCN connection. But the stingers also reveal that the second entity attached to William was Eleanor, who was actually responsible for keeping him alive. It's also important to point out that Andrew is wearing an alligator mask and some have suggested he could be the green masked kid in Happiest Day.
(This is just a side theory and likely incorrect but bear with me here. Is the reason that Vengeful Spirit sounds like Baby a lot is because she's actually Eleanor. Whether you like it or not, Eleanotand Baby are extremely similar. That is assuming the Stitchline is even canon which I'll get to. Just food for thought that someone probably already said)
Blackbird features the use of Illusion Disks again, using them to project fears and problems and turning them into horrible monsters. The stalking and nightmares only stops when Nole redeems himself. We also know Eleanor was behind this in some way and could even be Blackbird considering they both use illusion disks.
The Real Jake features a boy with cancer in a hospital named Jake who has a doll named Simon that his father talks to him through. Jake seemingly possesses Simon after he dies and Simon's mask becomes part of Stitchwraith. In actuality, Jake only possessed the mask while Andrew possessed the battery pack, explaining why Jake can see and Andrew can use the power of the animatronic. Again, Jake could be the same Jake from Fetch, placing this story in 2029 at the absolute earliest.
Finally is Hide and Seek which features Shadow Bonnie who here was either Eleanor, controlled by Eleanor, or created by Eleanor from Toby's rage. This also is in present day as Shadow Bonnie is accepted as a character by Fazbear Entertainment, something we see happening starting in Help Wanted. This also puts into question if OG Shadow Bonnie was controlled by Eleanor implying she existed all the way back in 1987 or if this is a new version of Shadow Bonnie.
As for the actual Epilogues, the question I pose is where did Eleanor even come from? When was she created? Is she possessed? To my knowledge, these are never answered, but her earliest appearance is attached to William in the Man in Room 1280. The actual story of the epilogues fits between FFPS and Help Wanted and can definitely fit there fine.
So, with all of this, what is dragging me back from StitchlineGames. Well, it's the fact that there are really only 2 direct links to the games, The MCI in Into the Pit (which is a warped memoey) and Man in Room 1280 (UCN from the outside). Here's the problem, that isn't enough, 2 of the 12 confirmed Stitchwraith stories actually being directly linked to the games is a small amount. Tales from the Pizzaplex is considered canon by most of the community because it has so many more directly connecting it to the games from the Epilogues to Storteller to Mimic to GGY to Help Wanted to Pressure. These all tell us events or details we all know to exist in the games. FF has 2 game connections, one of which is still debated in accuracy.
The thing is, Stitchline games works fine, I've seen posts and videos about how Stitchline doesn't work but I wouldn't call them definitive, it's mainly people saying "we don't know this to happen, so it doesn't happen" or "its parallels". But just like how StitchlineGames has barely any evidence against, it also has barely any evidence for it. The games do not backup the events of these stories, neither does Tales, the characters have never made game appearances, if Andrew is TOYSNHK it feels pointless when there's other characters it could've been instead of creating an entirely new character, and the fact that some of these characters feel like game characters but with different names. The main evidence I see for Stitchline is either people talking about the Man in Room 1280, people saying that characters from the games exist in books as if you couldn't say the same about the put of continuity trilogy novels, or Scott saying some stories were directly connected but not specifying which or what he means by connected.
This is why I have a hard time accepting StitchlineGames as in continuity because the actual evidence is very little compared to Tales which basically slaps you in the face with in-game events and details. It makes sense that it would be in continuity if Tales is in continuity as they share similar formats but it feels so disconnected from the games themselves. For stories that are supposedly directly linked to the games, they don't have a lot of direct links.