Dunno, maybe I'm just venting, I'm just finding something... off, about the barbarians.
Finally worked up to Emperor difficulty and everything feels so stacked that it's just not enjoyable at all. One difficulty down and the game is... easy? It didn't feel challenging to win at all.
So the computers move fast, meaning I need to pursue settlements/research/growth simultaneously to not fall excessively behind and get steamrolled. Meaning I need to build things that aren't just armies and defenses. But since the barbarians match the highest tech player and respawn endlessly, I'm constantly outgunned on my borders.
Since they out-tech me, I need more troops to overwhelm them and hold the line, but I can't support having that many troops at every corner of my empire (not to mention I can't produce enough because attrition is so high). Since they're not everywhere at once, a camp can spawn two or three tiles away in the fog, have the scout sight me, run back and spawn a high tech invasion before I can move any amount of force to react.
Since they're higher tech, my city defenses can't knock them out without a few shots, meaning they just step in, take a hit... pillage, take a hit... pillage... a single unit just burns half my improvements in a city and then walks off. So now my town is knocked back, and I have to devote time to repairing the damage.
I've spent my entire game so far just trying to hold on, on a Earth-Huge-True start map on marathon. I even lucked out and had no AI players near me, and as Canada therefore have had free reign to settle (nearly) all of NA without any competition. But I'm barely able to hold it together and keep any pace because barbarians are ripping me apart everywhere. I've finally just decided that I have to say f*$% any other progression and just devote the entire continent to building defenses to JUST keep them from pillaging everything. I'm hoping that the defenses can hold long enough to even build an army that can survive any length of time.
Maybe I'm just not that good at this game. Maybe the random tech shuffle screwed up the progression. I sorta feel like a better balance with the barbarian behavior would be that they maintain their invasions but match the lowest tech players instead of the highest, so that it's a constant pressure that needs to be dealt with, rather than the friggin' backwoods campsite spawning a state of the art legion every twenty turns.
I enjoy the feeling of a challenge overcome, but after my fourth or fifth attempt at this, I'm just starting to get angry and feel like it's not worth trying to overcome. Even CKIII and Humankind, as cheap as the AI sometimes felt, didn't feel like every turn was a hand-crafted "%#$^ YOU."
I guess after writing it out, I feel like the balance of the game is punishing me for devoting any production to anything other than resisting barbarians.

I never replay games. I’m more of a one and done it kind of guy, but something about ATB’s gameplay and story compelled me to play it not once, not twice, but four times at the time of writing. It certainly helps that the game is short (although I think the universal praise of The Outer Wilds demonstrates that this isn’t a bad thing).
My latest playthrough clocked in at ~35 minutes at the time of writing in order to get the Toot Sweet achievement. Ironically, this exact pursuit of achievements led me to get the Librarian achievement and, ultimately, finally read all the story notes chronologically.
Notwithstanding, ATB is a nauseatingly haunting game on harder difficulties. The monster is deadly, the resources are scarce, the tone is grim, and the darkness encompasses it all. Above all of this, the story is worth telling and I posit that the game’s genre, coupled with the Amnesia brand being notoriously terrifying if PewDewPie is to be believed, will prevent a lot of people from playing it. That’s such a shame.
Without further obfuscation, I want to encourage you to play the game; immerse yourself in its world and discover its truth for yourself. Your appreciation for the story will only compound the more time you spend stalking the halls of the unnamed bunker it takes place in.
For those of you that don’t care to play it, but appreciate a good story, read ahead. SPOILER WARNING.
ATB’s story begins before the player ever takes control of the protagonist, Henri Clemont, a Soldier in the French Army at the Battle of Pozieres during World War I.
April 1916 – Toussaint Beaufoy – What Could Be Worse than War?
On 2 April, 1916, Henri’s embattled unit receives orders to dig their bunker deeper so that their chain of command can laud it as a symbol of French patriotism and eventual victory in the war.
The calamity of World War I, having already wrought havoc on the bodies and minds of Henri’s unit, is only intensified by these foolhardy orders. This bunker is destined to become “a rancid, stinking pit. A void, a hole. Full of men, scared and confused.”
Eight days later, on 10 April, Henri’s compatriot, Toussaint Beaufoy, pens a poem We Whirl the World that reflects on the grim events of the war and foreshadows the events of the game.

We whirl the world
The world we whirl
It all gets lost in a terrible twirl
Can’t see the sun for all the smoke
Can’t see the ground for all the dead folk
Can’t see the ocean, can’t see the trees
So I stay here down on my knees
We whirl the world
The world we whirl
It all gets lost in a binding twirl
A snarl in the dark
A sad day in the park
A stone reminder
A horse’s dirty blinder
A child’s empty hand
A friend’s stained armband
The news of the day on the stand
We whirl the world
The world we whirl
It all gets lost in a bloody twirl
What comes next around the bend?
Maybe it’ll be some kind of end
More likely another shrill, shrill whistle,
Magic that turns men into gristle.
We whirl the world
The world we whirl
It all gets lost and still we twirl

Henri’s unit begins digging and on 30 April, another soldier, Alex Noyer, extrapolates on why the unit has been ordered to dig: the bunker lay atop Roman ruins that extend towards the German lines. The command wants to use these prebuilt tunnels to launch a surprise attack on the enemy. However, Noyer’s interest lay more in the archaeological significance of the dig.
With the dig well underway, the other soldiers begin to experience haunting symptoms. Notably, Beaufoy, who witnesses some horror on the night of 5 May, that shatters his psyche. He refuses to discuss what he witnessed with anybody, yet he revels in it; “I want to go back to that place. I want to feel that way. I want the violence and the ecstasy and the pitch-black darkness.”
May 1916 - Alex Noyer’s Journal - Digging Up a Dark Secret
A week later (9 May), Noyer is presented with archaic texts uncovered during the digging. He begins to read them and discovers the texts are not of typical Roman writings. Rather, the texts are religiously significant repeating the phrase “to cross into darkness and beyond.”
These texts originated from a people that believed they found the key to immortality, a blessing bestowed upon them from some “other world… dominated by darkness… ruled by something…” These damned texts went on to describe this world as “full of spirits, monsters and that the air there was endlessly alive with cries of torment and the sickly rattle of souls near death.”
The tunnels that the men were digging were used by this ancient people as a portal to this “pagan hell.”
This manifested in our world as the need for the followers to commit sickening acts that appealed to the primal instincts of humanity; “blood orgies, of sadistic spirits, of the awful things these men and women would do to each other in worship of darkness” and a magical liquid that would grant the believer’s immortality in darkness.
Noyer enters the tunnels sometime on 14 May, and discovers more of the cursed history of the tunnels. “The Romans used these tunnels to hold sadistic bacchanals, great festivals of cruel combat, torture and worse... held in an arena over a great pit.” His command writes him off as paranoid, and Noyer resolves to enter the tunnels.
On 25 May, Noyer is recovered after screaming in the damp excavation sight until his vocal cords were annihilated – alive but utterly terrified.
June 1916 - Farber - Am I Out of Touch? No, It’s the Soldiers Who Are Wrong.
Noyer warns his brother-in-arms about the texts and truth of the ruins they are excavating. As the truth and panic spread, the Command begins punishing those who speak of the more sinister presence that is permeating the halls of the bunker.
Throughout the month of May, the soldiers are gripped with a waking terror that seeps into their dreams, all the while having to fight a war notorious for its brutality. Noyer writes, “we’re stuck between the Germans in front of us, high command behind us, and some other horrible force that seems to lurk in shadows all around us. I fear we are now truly beyond God’s reach.”
Rumors of the truth that Noyer uncovered begin to spread amongst the men. Despite taking the assertions of the malevolent presence seriously, the command chooses to contain the panic through force.
Incensed by Noyer’s ominous warnings, a rebellion is formed on 28 May with a soldier only known as “Farber” at its helm. The mission is simple: contain the evil of the tunnels by sabotaging the digging efforts with a cave in. Farber notes that each of the five recruits is exceptionally eager to end the waking nightmare, particularly Beaufoy.
Their efforts are successful and the soldiers experience a brief abatement from the ever-present fear, only to be discovered and subsequently tortured by their Commanding Officers, Reynard and Delpy. None are spared the persecution, save for Beaufoy, who is presumed to have been killed in the blast that undoes the dig. The last thing any other soldier saw of him was Beaufoy telling them he had “other work to do,” whilst pointing to his own eyes.
Despite the ordeal, no participant reveals Farber as the mastermind, and Farber is forever indebted to the brotherhood.
The officers of the unit do four things in the wake of this unthinkable act of insubordination: (1) abandon the tunnel, (2) punish the conspirators, (3) send the remaining men on dangerous combat patrols and (4) order more wine. No lesson learned, no warning heed.
Of minor note, on the evening of 30 June, after one such combat patrol, a German prisoner is captured. Small recompense for the men routinely thrown into the meat grinder of enemy machine guns and command tribunals.
July 1916 – Henri Clément – Buddy Fucker with a Conscious
Another such raid is ordered on 8 July, and Henri has a plan to not go. Henri and his best friend, Augustin Lambert, decide that the winner of a game of chance will not have to risk their life this evening and the other will go in their friend’s place. Henri cheats, rationalizing it as a harmless prank, condemning Lambert to endure the battlefield once more. Henri is sure Lambert will return, unscathed, and cannot wait to see the look on his face when he learns what Henri did.
Only, Lambert doesn’t return. As the dusk of 8 July turns into dawn, Henri is wrought with guilt. He resolves to recover his friend. It is here, that the player finally takes control of the protagonist.
Henri discovers Lambert at the bottom of a pit. Not a crater from artillery, a borderline incomprehensibly large depression. Henri makes his way down and renders aid to his battered, but alive, compatriot. Henri gathers water from the pit, and nurses his friend before they attempt to escape.

Patrol Report – 10 July 1916
Odd occurrences last night. Sdt. Lambert, thought dead after his patrol on the 8th, returned to the barracks in fine health. He carried with him Sdt. Clément – severely wounded from an explosion.
Lambert reports the following:
-That midway through his patrol on the 8th he fell into a deep crater and was unable to escape.
-Clément, his close friend, snuck out after him last night, located him in the crater, and carried him out.
-They were spotted and in the ensuing attack, Clément was injured by an explosion. It fell on Lambert to carry him back.
Very odd that Lambert was neither injured from the fall nor the explosion AND that he ended up saving the man who came to save him.
But battlefield luck is an odd thing. In every life, fate’s winds blow erratic.
Judging by Lambert’s description, the crater he fell into seems to have been located very close to the Roman tunnels we unearthed. It may have been a result of work down there.
Recommend a future patrol to investigate and make sure we have not opened a backdoor into our own bunker.

Henri remains comatose for ten(?) days.
July 1916 – Augustin Lambert – The Nightmare Is Only Beginning
Lambert, having dodged death, reflects on the events of his ill-fated patrol. His loss of hope at the bottom of the inescapable pit, and the angelic reprieve he received from Henri. He notes how the water Henri nursed him with “was cool and crisp, with a strange, sweet taste. Never has water felt more nourishing than that, administered by a dear friend’s hand.”
Despite surviving, Lambert’s survival is dampened by the loss of a toy he bought for his son – the toy he believes to be in the pit where he almost lost his life.
Lambert grows stronger by the day. However, with Lambert’s return, so do the haunts that plagued his fellow Soldiers. Scratching at the walls and an overt ghostly howling emanates throughout the halls at night.
July 1916 – Stéphane Joubert – Oh Yeah, The Murders.
The first to fall Reynard on 15 July. Hardly a loss after his treatment of the soldiers, but certainly a catalyst for even further distrust.
Stéphane Joubert, another officer, reflects on the evening of the murder in his journal. He had heard a commotion in the hallway, but assumed it be Reynard drunk on his secret stash of wine. No one was aware anything was wrong until they heard the screaming. He is concerned for the harshness in which his fellow officers treat the men, particularly in the wake of this death.
The remaining officers interrogate the men, after all, a murderer was so clearly amongst them.
Paranoia grips the men, who are the prime suspects due to their contempt for Reynard. But the brutality and sadistic nature of the murder was beyond the pale? The autopsy read:

Body of Sgt. Reynard.
Multiple lacerations. Chest cavity torn to shreds. Every rib cracked. Skull cracked open by repeated blunt force trauma.
Who could have done this to him?

Amid the violence, Farber, driven mad by the resurgence of the haunting presence, resolves to kill it himself to atone for being the only man left unpunished for the tunnel sabotage. When the evil presence, emboldened by the murder of Reynard, returns, Farber is there. He shoots the Beast and it retreats into the shadows.
But it did not forget. It returned ten minutes later and pulled Farber into the wall, “screaming… praying for salvation.”
The men note something familiar about the Beast as it continues to hunt them; like it knows who they are.
The officers abandon the men, escaping and blowing the entrance to the bunker behind them – condemning the soldiers to evisceration by an unkillable force. Joubert, the only bastion of morality amongst the officers, is among the escapees all the same He leaves the men one chance at salvation.

Fournier, our commanding officer!, cowers next to me now. He’s lost his mind to an abyss of fear…
He wants to run, to blow up the exit behind him.. Sealing the demon down here… The demon AND our men.
His constant refrain, it is getting to me… and that same void of terror… it is also overtaking me.
To any of my men who see this: once we’re free of this place, I will get the arsenal code from him. I will get it and I will radio it back to you.
Trapped down here with that beast, the arsenal may be your only hope. It’s all I can do. All I have courage to do…
Get to the communications room in the Soldier Quarters. Hide there. I’ll broadcast the code to you.
-Joubert

The men, responded to such hollow words:

The officers have abandoned us! They ran from the beast and blew the exit closed behind them. Even Joubert…
They called us cowards and traitors and worse… Hypocrites. Now they’ve doomed us.
Whatever hell we suffer now, it is on them. God will punish them for what they’ve done.

July 1916 – Henri Clément – The Game Begins
The game begins with Henri awakening in the hospital bed from comatose state. He doesn’t remember the past, but that’s why we have spent about 2400 words going over that. The gameplay of Amnesia is self-explanatory – gather resources, avoid the monster, escape.
In order to accomplish this goal Henri has several sub objectives that, for convenience, we’ll cover in two parts: Get the Dynamite and Get the Detonation Handle. This isn’t a walk through, every playthrough of the game is different, but you learn the fates of several characters through extrapolating on the relationship between the notes and the game itself. Play the game and get stalked by the monster for the horror experience.
Get the Dynamite (Located in the Armory):
· Located in the armory, Henri first needs to retrieve a code to unlock said armory. The code, you recall, Joubert promised to broadcast to the soldiers. After solving the daisy chain issue in the Soldier’s Quarters and finding the requisite key, Henri makes his way to the communication room. Joubert is true to his word, he is still broadcasting the code. Henri can now retrieve the dynamite.
Get the Detonator Handle (Located in the Tunnels):
· First order of business is to recover a ratchet wrench that allows access into the Prisoner Control room in the Prison section of the bunker. The wrench is in Foreman Stafford’s locker, but you’ll have to find the code. Henri discovers that Stafford made his way to the Bunker’s Pillbox as a means of escape. However, the Pillbox is locked with the only key being in the bunker’s Chapel. Henri makes his way to the chapel to uncover an unholy display of twisted bodies – an achievement pops up revealing this is the Beast’s nest. In the confessional, Henri discovers the priest (otherwise insignificant to the story) nailed to the wall. He recovers the key and returns to the Pillbox. At the top, Stafford is there, a bullet through the eye from an enemy sniper – a grim reminder that you’re still fighting a war.
· The wrench is to help gain access to the Captured German Prisoner’s cell, left abandoned; Geneva Convention be damned. What we want in the cell is a pair of bolt cutters that had been used to torture the prisoner. Opening his cell alerts the monster, whom promptly murders the poor prisoner (although there is a slightly happier disposition in which you retrieve the bolt cutters before the Beast gets to him – are you quick enough to save his life? Do you even want to?)
· The bolt cutters grant access to the chained-shut tunnels. The haunted tunnels. The Pagan Hell. Ghostly apparitions due exist down here skulking the fog teasing you with the evil you’ve read so much about. Impossible rock formations alongside Roman statues and columns, this place is truly unearthly. But then you hear a voice, the first voice you’ve heard since the prisoner you couldn’t understand died. “We whirl the world…” Its Beaufoy, whom has gouged his own eyes out and roams the fog with a shotgun and homicidal intent – still more work to do. He will kill you, so you must put your fellow soldier down. Is it better this way? At least that shotgun is yours now *finger guns*.
· If you explore a little more, after finding the detonator handle, you’ll find a small tunnel that leads to the pit. The pit the game began in, the pit with the small rabbit toy Lambert lost. Shit, what happened to Lambert?
You retreat to the beginning of the game. Hook up the dynamite and blow it. Make your way to escape. You find yourself at a grand arena above a bottomless pit. With the Beast standing between you and salvation. Is there really a boss battle in this game? Winning it reveals the final truth.
Lambert is the monster. Your best friend, corrupted by the water you nursed into him to save his life. Presenting the toy to him prior to the final battle when he tries to kill you causes him to take it, run to his fucked-up chapel nest, and place it on a pedestal. There is still humanity there, and that’s why he recognized those he killed.
But this is a grand arena over a great pit, and losers go into the pit. Use the toy to hold the monster up on the destructible bridges and, while he plays with it, blast the bridge itself – pulling the literal floor out from underneath him – eternal darkness awaits.
Now flee, make your way to salvation. You see sunlight. You breach the rocks and roll down a slope into a pit of dead comrades. At least you’re free of that beast.
As you bask in the light you hear “SCHNELL, SCHNELL” and searchlights beginning to scan where you just fell from.
Fuck, you’re still in a war.
A grotesquely unsettling story of overcoming shitty circumstances and still losing. What’s that like an 8? Probably an 8.

I cant freaking win man. Sometimes its 1v1v1 and sometimes its every man for himself. How in the everliving fuck am i supposed to know when it is which?
The march before this particular instance that sent me over the edge was one of those “do whatever you want” ones. Even when we were down a team member they didnt have any qualms with 2v1ing one of us. Okay. Fine.
After that, we move into the next match. I come in and we split into 3 1v1s. I finish off my guy and go in to help out my team. I come in and get a heavy overhead on the guy. All the sudden, my team is acting like im a massive dick (i guess i am). Everything stops my teammates are staring at me and playing mean emotes and to be honest i felt kind of embarrassed that i didnt just automatically know that this particular group of people wanted me sit out the rest of the match.
So, not know what to do, i just threw my weapons at the guy on the other team and tried to go in with fists. (Weird, but made sense at the time.) When i inevitably got killed my teammates started cheering/smacking my body and i just felt like shit. Just closed the game and wrote this ig.
I know that these were two entirely separate groups of people, but this community as a whole needs to pick a goddamn lane.

if she sees this, it'll be a very awkward situation, but here goes.
i met this girl, alexandra, in a college debate tournament at upenn in the middle of february. for reference, i go to harvard and she goes to princeton. she was very good at debate. i was not. thanks to an odd series of unexpected wins for me and my partner, we got matched up against each other.
we were trolling, and so my partner spouted some bullshit about how the judge should vote for us because we were immigrants, even if we debated worse (i'm indian; alexandra is italian-american, a la tony soprano). somehow, the judge bought it, and we won, even though we debated the actual topic worse. i emailed her afterwards to gloat, one thing led to another, and we ended up talking all night (we knocked her out of the tournament; we got knocked out ourselves two rounds later). she complained about the shitty judge and how much she hated people like us who "made a joke of debate". we sent 42 emails that night.
after the tournament ended, we kept talking on email (about debate). eventually, i asked her for her snap (she was also, may i add, gorgeous). we added each other. we continued our conversation from email, at first, but eventually the long paragraph-style responses turned into just normal talking and snapping. she wasn't a big part of my life at this point, though; just another girl who was cute and interesting to talk to. i learned some stuff about her -- she's crazy smart, but has pretty basic music taste, but she's solid at dancing; i also learned all about her family and that kinda shit. the normal 'getting to know you' phase.
i think the kicker came during spring break (march 9th, around half a month after the tournament). i went back home to india for the break. while i was jetlagged and up at 4am, i ended up talking to her every night. those conversations made me fall head-over-heels in love with her. i don't really know how it happened, it just kind of did; at some point, all the love songs suddenly became about her. i had dated girls before, but i don't think i've ever loved a girl until her.we talked about our futures, and what we wanted to do and be, and just 2am deep conversation type stuff; in other words, it was a much more intimate friendship than before. we had the red heart on snap and everything.
i will note, however, that, while talking to her was great, around this time it went from a 50-50 balance to me starting around 70-80% of conversations. that made me anxious; as i fell more in love, and the prospect of being with her became more tantalizing, i became more and more preoccupied with each conversation, playing it over and over again in my head. vacation also messed with my head; i had hours with nothing to do, and i filled them in no small measure with thoughts, dreams of her.
i also used to flirt with her a lot over break. she always took it in stride; sometimes she flirted back, sometimes not so much. she used to talk a good amount about her exes though, and also about how cute she thought she looked.
it's so hard to tell how much of this was reciprocated, because she was honestly a pretty closed person. she's not very communicative about her emotions, about what she really thinks; i often had to cut through a dense layer of sarcasm to get to her real meaning.
but, at some point, things came to a head. i asked her to call me once; she responded by saying, "coffee?". like an absolute moron, i replied "i'm not a coffee guy personally." i didn't even realize she was asking me out to coffee -- i thought
she was asking whether i liked coffee or not. she screenshotted that, which tipped me off; but by then, it was too late.
a couple days later, then, i asked her out on a date myself. she did not reply to me for a day and a half. then, she said, "sorry i was really busy with work!"
i reply, "lol np i thought i scared u off"
"LMFAO no. fw the blouse? "
what the fuck? (she never replied to the date thing by saying either yes or no).
after that, i lay low for a while. just casual flirting, nothing crazy. im still madly in love.
you know what, i'll skip all the details of the next two months.
basically, we grow closer as friends, but then some other guy asks her out on a date. she doesn't respond. he keeps texting her for a week; she declines in the end. but this dude triggers my own insecurity about her. my own clinginess comes back with a vengeance, and i basically start spamming her hoping she'd reply. eventually, things blow up on the day before her birthday; i keep chatting her, she doesn't reply. i became super frustrated and text her phone number (which she gave me).
she asks why i felt the need to text her even after she didn't reply. i'll admit i lied here -- i said i texted her for some work-related stuff, in order to save face. she called me on the bullshit. i doubled down and then asked her how she knew i was the one who texted her (i gave her my number at some point, but i didn't remember it then). in response, she said she "couldn't deal with this" and unadded me on snapchat. i then texted her saying, "I get if u don’t want to talk but i like being friends w u and i don’t want to lose that."
she blocks me. then, as a last resort, i send this email:
dear alexandra,
i promise that this is my last time ever talking to you. i just wanted to say the things that i always left unsaid.first of all, just about our last conversation: yes, i was lying. i know i shouldn't have. i texted you because you weren't replying. i didn't realize you had my number. im sorry.
​
im practically asking for you to be mad at me. i know that. if i could take it back, i would, but i cant. and now you're gone for good.
​
you're one of the most amazing people i've ever known in literally every way. the most, probably. i still can't name something you're bad at (besides singing, in your own words). i know i joked a lot, with the 😍 emoji, about how 'perfect' you were, but every time i sent something sarcastic, i was basically just hiding a sincere compliment behind a joke. i meant everything i said. you really are perfect. i literally woke up every day and felt lucky just to know you. i used to smile every time i got a notification from you, for god's sake. it's funny how you can become so attached to someone you only met three months ago. but i guess that when the someone is you, it's hard to not.
​
and now i threw it all away because of my stupidity and inability to shut up. in a way, i guess it was bound to happen. where would we have been three months from now? six? an year? we wouldn't have been friends forever. well, i guess i'll never know what good times we could have had, because i threw any chance of ever talking to you again out the window.
​
you know, if the roles were flipped, i don't think you'd care half as much as i do. but i guess that's because you're at least twice as good as i am in every way. so don't read this and laugh, because i know i don't mean as much to you as you do to me, and i probably sound a little scary rn.
​
if there is any, any!, chance that you don't totally hate me and would want to talk, i'll probably be spending all of tomorrow waiting for any notification from you. probably most of monday too.
​
but if not, i know that someday you'll become someone brilliant and famous and i'll see you on TV one day, and i just hope that you'll remember me down the line. not as the liar who you blocked, but as the harvard guy who you had some good times with while it lasted.happy birthday. i hope you have a perfect day.
sincerely,
sikandar.
i get unblocked, but no actual reply. this was 20 days ago. i was drunk and sent her a joke on tiktok two days ago -- no reply, again.
i love her an unhealthy amount. i can freely admit that to myself. but if there's any chance of salvaging this situation in a way where she's still talking to me -- friend, girlfriend, whatever! -- does someone know how?
also, i really wanted to read a paper she wrote -- if nothing else, can i still ask for that?
thanks.

I’m sure this is common, but one in particular today was really annoying, this joker would tbag every single second in neutral and taunt 5x w every stock he took but he was seriously really good at the game and read absolutely everything I did. I played 3 games against him and only managed to take out one stock. Like deadass he would just camp me out, tbag and spam taunt, and then just knew exactly how to deal w me when I tried to approach or bait him. He didn’t fall for any bait and literally it felt like I fought against a TAS. I get kinda tilted easily but it makes me especially mad because like i just want ONE good interaction where where my momentum doesn’t stop but he played disadvantage extremely well too.
It just pisses me off people play like this and need to taunt every 5 second. And tbag all the time. Like we get it, you are good at the game, stop acting like an asshole. I’d love to save replays from this guy and learn from him but I don’t even wanna because of his shitty behavior. It was an arena and every match I spectated w him, he did the same thing to all his opponents and didn’t lose a single game.
I don’t even mind t bagging when it’s mid match and my opponent got a well deserved kill or sick play. I usually tbag back with them. It’s the assholes who always tbag like crazy as soon as they can at the beginning of the match. or they play normal and as soon as they knock you off stage and believe they got the kill they tbag like crazy. And ofc, it’s always some dumb projectile character that can just press b or side b and win the game. I just wish I was much better at the game so I don’t fall for easy punishes or other people just don’t check me as easily.

Just, title, really. I seem to be the only one in the entire playgroup who gets visibly upset when every spell I cast that could put me in a better spot than I am ends up getting countered, and it's always at cost reduced too, so it's not like I'm capable of keeping up with the Baral's counter.dec level of interaction. I try to play izzet, and since I'm a storm list, any Displacer Kitten targets get countered. Yes, I get visibly salty.
I can't have a working, functional deck if all the spells counter other spells and I don't do anything else. I have to try to resolve things relevant to my plans, don't I? I don't understand. I'm sincerely turbo-jaded about the last game against a Baral player. He's just there to make sure nothing I cast resolves, and if it does, it's because he feels sad for me or I pouted or he doesn't have an answer to something the other two guys got through.
Seems his eyes are always closer on my stuff than others, yet he says he has to throttle himself when he plays against me to prevent me from getting too salty and doing virtually nothing - he always brags about what he can do, could've done, and always forecasts a spell in his hand that can deal with things by cardname if he's threatened with attackers. Well, I think it's lame af but it works for him, so even though he spends his resources to stop me, he dies because he made sure I don't win, but not that he doesn't lose.
That isn't enough. I want to win sometimes with him in the pod. I don't see him as a nemesis either; he's just a filthy Baral player and all he does is counter stuff and take extra turns till he combos out. I just don't know how to combat the idea that nothing I cast is going to resolve if he doesn't want it to.
Yes I am currently mad. I apologized but he still claims he throttles himself to play against me. Big sigh.

I (22M) don’t know what to do, I’m waiting for a diagnosis but I think fixing me is too late. I’m behind in life and all my friends. I’ve been unemployed for well over a year and I failed college. And with all my credit card spending in college, my debt is in collections and my credit score is the lowest it can be. If I ever get the meds I desperately need, I’ll be pushed back by several years and things are gonna get way worse before they get better
I’m too dumb for employment and I can’t relate to much people here because everyone drops in the fact that they have a degree or something if the sort. But I have nothing, no accomplishments and no skills.
I have friends on fb who graduated and are living professional independent lives, there is a friend of mine with ADHD and I was supportive person of them and she just graduated and got a job, and I can’t pass part time college classes or hold a job at a grocery store, or have anything from high school, I was a D student and despite the IEP I wasn’t accommodated
I have accepted the fact that starting a self sustaining life and career and adult stuff is just fantasy to me, and I can’t realistically envision myself with such luxuries.
I don’t want a career anymore, I don’t want to go back to school, even if I tried I can’t because my credit score is too low for assistance. I will never get to the stage of buying a car, or a house, or finding an SO. And I’m so fucking mad at this moment I just wanna rip my bomb site of a room apart more
I honestly have no interest in getting my life back together. I’m in too much mental pain, I can’t call hotlines because I have no phone plan
All of this could’ve been prevented if I got a proper DX when I was little
I wanted to graduate and a get a good paying job and follow my dreams and travel the world, now I’m a hopeless knob who’s stuck in a low income house with my dad and everyday is pain, depression, and darkness
I’m too young to have ruined my one shot at life
I give up
Give me one good reason why I shouldn’t

I guess I'm writing this because people really fuckin hate Makiel for alot of good reasons and they feel that he is this unrepentant incompetent monster who deserved to die so that the great Ozriel who we love could live. I don't think that's right. I think that's a misunderstanding of what happens. If Makiel was this character, this vile stupid idiot judge then we would have a very different ending because if that's the version of Makiel you see guess what, he won. Ozriel and the mad king were dead, Oth'kimeth had fled, and he had the scythe. He had a perfect victory. He had everything that version of Makiel would've wanted, and he gave it all up to die. Because in my opinion, that version of Makiel never existed.
Fate is a funny thing, it can be manipulated, destroyed and hidden but even if you do all these things, it can still be seen by others manipulated by others and changed by others. Fate is like playing rock paper scissors, but everyone knows what everyone's going to choose. Which is why we see everyone who uses fate as a weapon hide their own intent, their own feelings. We even see them playing roles in their heads, doing the opposite of what we know they want. We see Lindon, Emriss Northstrider, everyone does this. They have to actively stop themselves from thinking about that thread of fate from wanting it while doing the actions they need to in order to see it happen.
There's no one greater at this than Ozriel and Makiel. It's said time and time again that with the exception of Makiel using the powers of the hound that Ozriel can see farther and clearer than anyone in the history of the Abidan. Their powers of sight are comparable and perhaps even the same. It says that Makiel sees the same fate that leads Ozriel to abandon his role as reaper. They both saw the same thing, they both had different solutions, and at the end, they both knew everything. Almost everything that happens in the cradle books can be seen as a direct result of either Ozriel or Makiels actions. From Makiel intervening directly with the fate of cradle several times to Ozriel abandoning his role and hiding the scythe to raise his own executors, causing the Abidans control over the iterations to collapse. everything happens because of what they did or didn't do, even seemingly a small deviation in fate that was missed or ignored by the hounds, a deviation that Suriel just happens to come across and fix.
“Li Markuth was not permitted to return to this world. His attack was a deviation from fate, which I have reversed. When I depart, it will be as though your festival continued uninterrupted.” (Unsouled, ch 11)
I think the game between Ozriel and Makiel was to see who's chosen fate would win out. I believe Ozriel wanted to save them all or die in place of Makiel, but Makiel chose to die instead. When Suriel reaches him before he finds the scythe Makiel says he would have to settle for an imperfect victory, an imperfect victory against Ozriel who despite losing still managed to hide the scythe from him directly under Makiels feet. I could go on and on with this theory and write five pages on it, but this is just my opinion, and you can choose to hate Makiel if you want but I believe in Suriels words
The weapon struggled in her grip, but she held it with a firm will. “Enough. He lent you to me, and I lend you now to my ally. The strongest among us.” Suriel, the Phoenix, met his eyes. “I have faith in him.” (Waybound chapter 5)
Ozriel reacts not with anger when he is revived, but with sadness, he already knew what Makiel was going to do.
“Makiel—” Suriel began, but Ozriel waved away the rest of her sentence. “I know,” he said. He gazed at the body floating in space, and Suriel saw the weight of ages and the sadness of the Reaper reflected in him again. “I know everything,” Ozriel said softly. (Waybound chapter 28)
I dont know. Everything Makiel does just doesn't make sense to me unless this was his goal from the beginning. Either way, the books were an amazing experience that I hope everyone enjoys. Thank you Will Wight for the story and for your years of work and dedication towards the world you made us fall in love with.

I got out of a messy three state 16 month divorce on March 11th, which I did finally win full custody of my son. All through the divorce she constantly called cps, police anyone and everyone she could find to try and take our son. Right after divorce ended I received several flash drives with detailed reports that her doctor and case workers at a local mental health clinic was pushing her for full custody and to keep the pressure on me by calling cps and or police. Now I have been diagnosed with PTSD, both doctors said that it was more then likely caused by the actions of my ex and her team at the mental health clinic. This has affected my self severely. Lawyers are very expensive and we are still very much recovering from the divorce, do I have a case against either the mental health clinic or my ex or both? Any advise is helpful.

I know this sounds crazy but my wife had an ex boyfriend come back into her life. He is a good family friend to her family and that’s how they met and ended up dating. While my wife was visiting her family in another state he found out that she was there and came over to their house. Long story short she said that he was attempting to win her love back and even brought an engagement ring with him to propose. She constantly assured me that there is nothing to worry about and that she will take care of the situation. However, I was in a different state and couldn’t be there physically. Since he was a family friend her parents told him to stay for dinner and she and him started talking. I was disappointed that she was talking to him and spending time with him while he was acting crazy and trying to win her back. My wife got mad at me for not believing her that she would not handle the situation and told me to stop acting jealous and insecure. Later on that night, she told me that she let him kiss her to see if there was a reason he came back into her life and to see if she should give him one more chance. Obviously I’m destroyed that she let him kiss her. What do I do? How should I approach this situation? Do I divorce her for cheating on me? She told me I was her forever and I can’t believe that she did this.

This is actually so fucking sad.
Why are you gloating that the people gifting you are predominantly single mothers?
You are encouraging them to hand you over money for what? Your own financial gain. And so openly and unashamedly.
There's a fucking housing and other social crisis situations happening all over and you are taking advantage of these people in a guise of being part of some fucking 'team'.
A team where no-one wins but you miss qweeeeen cunt.
You talk about 'so what I live with my mum, I'm going to own a house soon' yeah - after scabbing off people that are probably on single parent pension.
Lowest of low.
Enjoy your over priced ugly clothing, artificial claws and caterpillar lashes.

Hello everyone,
As the title says, I’m 24M (filipino) dating 20F (Latina)we were going strong from October to January when we took a vacation for new years in Denver. There she wanted a break from me on the last day of the vacation and we had arguments but fixed it. March comes by same arguments, she wanted to take a break from me and we broken up over me smoking cigars w the golf guys. She thought it was weed and I promised her I won’t smoke pot. But she thought it was pot so that was the first break up.
2nd break up after 2 weeks getting back together, was over me telling her roommate that we were back together bc she didn’t want people to know. 3rd break up is now, I had a hunch that she been distant and I checked on her iPad and she had a text from her best friend that she should just kick me off the curb, and she replies with, I want to but I don’t have a place to park my car. She had two car and she has the other one parked in my garage.
I contacted her mom how to go about this text I found that I feel being used and she’s only in the relationship bc she’s using my garage. Her mom tells her that I reached out to her and next thing you know she’s mad at me bc why would I say I feel used by her to her mom rather than telling her. But prior to that I told her same day today I’d like to clear things up but her mom mentioned it to her too quick.
She has blocked me on everything and stopped her location share. Looking back now each time we broke up the easier it gets because I started seeing her flaws and how she handles our arguments because it seems like every time we argue she tends to stop contacting me and ignore me.
Part of me is expecting that she’ll come back again because it’s always been like that how she handles an argument or situation like this. But I feel like she’s very immature to not be able to handle situation like this.
I honestly don’t know why I’m here but the thoughts of she’s not coming back haunts me, it’s both our first relationship and I thought we were serious how we were planning things out.
What do I do if she comes back?

Standing and moving still brought the Arbiter a lot of pain. But the Law’s grim enforcer couldn’t let anyone see that weakness. Especially not with the pirate before them and the very same assassin who had nearly killed them weeks before beneath that pirate’s foot.
The Arbiter had only just been cleared for light duty and decided to spend that time with the Officers in charge of watching the pirates Demon ship. They weren’t ADCU since those officers couldn’t be wasted on a simple stakeout. The Arbiter however had been assured the Officers in charge there were the best they had. But not two minutes within the stakeout tent the Arbiter had learned that the pirate Captain had slipped past the officers assigned to tail her. And more disturbingly that every pirate who left the Astaroth had slipped their tails with disdainful ease.

The utter lack of concern had further stoked their fury. According to the officer on duty every pirate that left eventually made a mess of something and stirred up a minor disturbance. And that only a few that left were unaccounted for. 

The complete lack of awareness for how shady and suspicious all that should have sounded baffled the Arbiter’s mind. They knew crime and violence didn’t come so naturally to other species as it did for the Arbiter’s human mind. But the failure to make such a basic connection that the pirates were creating distractions so that other pirates could do their work covertly, screamed at incompetence.
That led to the Arbiter learning that all the officers in charge of the overwatch operation were actually low level beat cops and file clerks. Looking into the system used to select these officers the Arbiter learned that they weren’t just incompetent, but so incompetent that the staggering number of negative reports had confused the filing system and had placed them into the highest bracket of trusted officers. The system was made to calculate negative values but couldn’t properly place such incompetent people into their proper bracket because there wasn’t a bracket appropriately low enough to place them into. So instead it simply went past the lowest level and placed them into the highest level.
And of course such poor officers couldn’t simply be fired because the officers workers union would make a fuss. Which meant the SS couldn’t replace these idiots with any slightly more intelligent sapients.
The bureaucratic idiocy was so infuriating that the Arbiter had lashed out at a nearby pole before they could think better of it. The pole snapped at the impact, fell over, and collapsed half the tent with it.
After that little outburst the Arbiter decided to take a walk and calm down. Only to stumble upon the missing pirate captain locked in a life-or-death battle with the very same assassin who had ambushed them just weeks before.
The Arbiter hadn’t been there for the start of the fight, but simple deduction was enough to reason that the assassin had likely initiated the conflict. They had mentioned Astarte’s name on the night of the attack. And the Pirate had no reason to seek out and attack the assassin.
During that fight The Arbiter had barely survived their encounter with the assassin. The assassin’s prosthetic modifications presented a gap in power that the Arbiter just couldn’t bridge. But despite fighting what should have been a one sided battle, the pirate was doing surprisingly well. In fact if the Arbiter was any judge, Astarte seemed to have a slight advantage.
Not in speed, power, or endurance. The assassin’s mechanical body was simply too powerful for a human to matchup. But in skill Astarte out matched the mechanical assassin.
Astarte dodged and weaved without effortless ease, getting past the assassin’s guard to strike at their, or her, mechanical body. If the assassin hadn’t been a machine then Astarte would have won by now, even with the gap in power.
Rachel felt slightly ashamed at her own poor showing against the assassin when compared to Astarte’s fight. The shame then quickly burned into anger as the Arbiter gripped the rifle at their side and pulled it out to try and shoot the assassin. Unlike the Arbiter had been that night, Astarte was wearing that ridiculous dark red armor and had a sword like she was some sort of space samurai. The Arbiter had done well that night, and their lack of superior weaponry had been their only flaw. One that had been amended with the addition of a more powerful pulse rifle.
They tried to line up a shot on the assassin that wouldn’t hit Astarte, when Astarte began to speak. “You wanna know the funny part. Greyson didn’t even care that you were gone.”
Wait, did these two share a past. The Arbiter guessed that old saying about birds of a feather was true. Who was Greyson? Some sort of man they had both known?
“Didn’t even question me about. Just said ‘Zera’s gone, now you will guard my back’” the pirate continued. “Then not even a week later I was second in command and got to sleep in his comfy bed.” The pirate gave her attacker a sloppy lascivious grin.
“And then you killed him like the deceptive whore you are!” the assassin spat, her attacks becoming sloppier with more openings.
Where these two quarreling over a man? The Arbiter felt bile rise into their throat. Two of the deadliest human women they had ever seen fighting over some man they had known. Pathetic. No man was worth that. Especially not whoever this Greyson bastard was given how quickly he had let the pirate into his bed after his first girlfriend disappeared.
Wait, Greyson, pirate, dead. Were they talking about the infamous human pirate, Byron Greyson? The one who had been a menace to the Femeri system, who was responsible for the disappearance of over thirty thousand humans and the deaths of many more? The one whose headless body had turned up one day aboard the drifting remains of the Black Saint? It couldn’t be, right?
But the rise of the Astaroth and Astarte had happened shortly before Greyson’s mysterious death. It seemed too coincidental.
“Of course I did, I refused to be the latest women he ruined and dumped into the gutter. Face it, your days were numbered. If it wasn’t me it would have been him.” The pirate said with a derisive sneer.
A bit callous and mercenary, but if they were discussing Greyson then likely not inaccurate.
The assassin however didn’t see that logic. “LIAR!” she screamed as she flew into a rage.
Then the Arbiter saw the reasoning behind Astarte’s taunts. This assassin was dangerously unhinged, and Astarte was using that to bait her into a trap.
The next sequence of attacks was too fast for the Arbiter to follow. A sword hilt to the face, followed by something launching out of the assassin’s arm. Then somehow Astarte had her other arm in her grip and flipped the assassin over a shoulder. With the assassin on the ground, Astarte quickly pressed one leg to their back, and with the arm in hand began to pull. The assassins sudden ultrasonic scream made the Arbiter vison darken at the edges, and maybe caused their ears to bleed a little.
Then the arm came out with a pop and the screaming stopped.
The pirate looked at the arm for a second, before lifting it above her head and swinging it down into the assassin’s head. The loud conk of metal on metal was enough to startle the Arbiter out of her awe and terror.
The barrel of their pulse cannon lifted up with Astarte centered in its sight “FREEZE!” the Arbiter roared with all their might.
Astarte paused mid swing, looked towards the Arbiter, and then raised both of her hands above her head. As well as the assassins severed arm. “It was self defense.” The pirate said quickly.
The Arbiter could have sworn they saw a flash of red. But it happened so fast that they weren’t sure if it was really there. And if it was then why would the pirates eye flash red?
The eye crossed by a gruesome scar. Did the pirate have a glass color changing eye?
No, her eyes were both clearly moving around and focusing on things like they should. Could it be cybernetic? Those were supposed to be impossible, too complicated to properly miniaturize with current technology.
It was something to investigate.
The Arbiter had been so focused on Astarte that they hadn’t been watching the assassin close enough. In a movement the Arbiter hadn’t seen the assassin threw Astarte off her back before popping up to her feet. Astarte went down onto the ground and the assassin lurched forward to attack her downed foe. But before she could reach the pirate three quick blasts from the Arbiters rifle stopped her in her tracks.
One had winged her side, another went wide. But the third had caught her right where a liver should have been. The assassin stuttered, but wasn’t dead. They dodged the next shot by ducking and then the second by somehow leaping ten meters into the air and onto a window seal. The assassin looked down on the two women and was clearly judging their chances at victory. But with an, admittable impressive, one-handed springlike flip Astarte was back on her feet, sword ready for another round.
The assassin’s strange mechanical face scowled before another impossible jump sent her over a nearby building and out of sight.
The Arbiter relaxed once the assassin was gone, but Astarte didn’t. The pirate turned, grabbed the Arbiters gloved hand, and pulled her into a jog down the open alleyway. “Come on, there’s an open lot nearby. Can’t jump us from there.” She said without looking back as she dragged the Arbiter along.
For a stunned few seconds Rachel stared at the strong hand grasping her own smaller one. But then the Arbiter saw the logic in Astarte’s worry and forced their hand to release the pirate and ran alongside her.
A few times the Arbiter had noticed a thin humanoid shadow leap between the buildings above them, but a quick turn down an alley from Astarte had them moving away from the incoming ambush from the assassin chasing them via roof tops. In no time at all they made it to an open loading dock for a nearby warehouse. Astarte ran into its center and scanned the roof tops, the Arbiter followed suit.
The Arbiter and the Pirate stood back to back, each searching for any signs of the mutual foe.
“There!” Astarte shouted while pointing her finger at a roof top.
The Arbiter stared up, but couldn’t see anything. But following the pirate’s direction they raised their rifle and shot at the edge of the building Astarte had pointed at. The blasts landed and then the crouched figure of the assassin rose up and backed away.
How had the pirate seen her? The Arbiter spared her a glance and saw a second flash of red before the pirate shifted her head.
“You should call for backup.” The pirate stated while still scanning the roof tops.
“To arrest the assassin?” the Arbiter asked before they could think better of it.
Astarte snorted. “Wouldn’t trust any SS to arrest a dead log, let alone Zera. But more witnesses might scare her off.”
Two things stood out in that statement, the assassin’s apparent name, and “SS, is that supposed to be short for station security?”
“Schutzstaffel actually, its just a strange coincidence they line up” the Pirate joked wryly.
The Arbiter scowled “You think the Station security are like the Nazi’s?” The Arbiter’s lessons about the various evil factions during Earths history had left her with nightmares for years. Crucifixion, death by a thousand cuts, blood eagles, and the like had disturbed their six-year-old mind. Their lessons had spent weeks on all the evils humanity inflicted upon each other, all the way until First contact.
“If the kinky boot fits.” Astarte said while examining the Arbiter’s own black boots.
The Arbiter swished their cloak to hide their boots, and the pirates gaze snapped back up to the rooftops. The Arbiter made the call, and the idiots in charge of the tent said they would need a few minutes to ‘locate’ their rifles and arm shields. Why they had to be located in the first place confused the Arbiter? They couldn’t be so incompetent as to not know where their weapons were, right?”
Tense minutes past before Astarte let out a sigh of relief. “I think she gave up.” she then shot the Arbiter an accusing glare “I almost had the bitch. If you hadn’t interfered we wouldn’t have to worry about her coming back.”
"You expect me to stand by while you committed murder?” The Arbiter growled, now stepping back from the pirate and reaching for a set of cuffs.
The pirate frowned, then glanced up as if recalling a distant memory. “I… ugh felt my life was in imminent danger, and feared for my life while facing down a clearly aggressive and violent deathworlder with a weapon. I used whatever objects I could find at the time…I carry no weapons and was forced to use ceremonial objects in crude, and ugh…unusual ways for self defense. I did not think retreat was possible so I acted to end the threat” she said in a bland staccato rhythm of everyone reciting words from memory. Her words obviously citing several different laws pertaining to self-defense.
The Arbiter felt an eye twitch. “The law pertaining to Deathworlder assailants was not intended to include Deathworlder victims.” The Arbiter said slowly.
Astarte shrugged “Union vs. Trevor Philips established that the enforcement of the law was done by the letter of the law, not the spirit. By that ruling and precedent I acted reasonably and was within my rights for self-defense. Any attempt to detain me would result in punitive measures from my legal representation.”
In all their time on the ADCU the Arbiter had never encountered a criminal so well versed in the intricacies of Union law. Some loop holes were well known, and easy for Officers to circumvent in order to attain an arrest. But the Arbiter hadn’t encountered something like this before.
The Arbiter looked down and noticed the sword she still held, red blood from the pirate running down its blade. “So that sword isn’t a weapon?” The Arbiter asked pointedly.
The feline smile that covered Astarte’s face sent shivers up their spine. “My dear officer, as you can notice I am of half Japanese heritage, a hafu if you will. I am dressing in the traditional fashions of my people. The armor, the katana, and the wakizashi are all hallmarks of the samurai I am descended from. None of these are worn for anything beyond cultural heritage. And for that matter, my crew wear the same to honor my ancestry.”
The Arbiter sighed. Astarte’s defense, though blatantly false, was airtight. Arresting her now would only give her ammunition to legally strike back. And with the recent backlash of the Deathworlder crack down the Arbiter could doom Judge’s career. It had been a celebrated move of the last chief, but the knock-on effects of it had resulted in several months of rioting, looting, and political discourse in the heart of the Union. The last chief was forced to step down and Judge took his place and was still trying to reverse the damages. Which was hard with all the precincts fighting him on it. Those officers had too many friends torn apart by Terran criminals to ever let that grudge go.
“Then you may leave the arm behind and be one your way.” The Arbiter ordered.
Astarte blinked, “the arm?”
The Arbiter pointed to the severed arm still within the pirate’s grasp “That is evidence in an on going investigation. LEAVE. IT. BEHIND” The Arbiter explained, growling out the last words slowly. Just because Astarte had likely saved the Arbiter’s life with some quick thinking didn’t erase the fact that she was a person of interest/suspect in the same case.
Astarte glanced down at the severed arm and blinked as if surprised she was still holding it. Then tossed it carelessly onto the ground. “All yours, make sure to check for bugs before plugging it in.”
“Bugs?”
“Computer viruses hidden in its OS. Thing could have all sorts of things hidden within.”
“And how do you know?”
“I don’t. It’s just the sort of thing I would do myself. Try loading it onto a separate server. Oh, and check for small explosives.”
“Danm Deathworlders” the Arbiter growled as they now considered the severed arm on the ground next to a small splatter of Astarte’s blood. She was right, Deathworlders were known for their tricks and traps. Humans especially. During one investigation a load of seized morphine from an illegal clinic had been stored next to an unstable chemical that reacted poorly to the jostling of the transport and destroyed the evidence in a fiery explosion.
Astarte chuckled “Glass stones Arbiter.”
“What?”
“Glass stones, it’s a human malaphor of sorts. I’ll leave the details for you to figure out. Good luck with tracking down Zera, I’d recommend starting with the prison records on Union Station Parox.” She said as she turned aways and strode off. Walking in the opposite direction of the arriving officers, half of which were missing their weapons or shields.
The Arbiter let out a sigh as she observed the most incompetent idoits she had ever seen strut onto the lot without a care in the universe.
“You called us Sir.” The lead Voral said.
The Arbiter took in a deep breath “Yes I did. Ten minutes ago.”
“It was a long walk.” The officer said defensively, no care for the Arbiters growing anger.
“Its only a few hundred standard meters. But that doesn’t matter I encountered an assassin in the midst of their crime. That’s their arm.”
The Voral looked panicked and began to look from side to side.
The Arbiter felt an involuntary eye twitch and clenched her fist. “The assassin is gone.”
The Voral relaxed “So you want us to secure the evidence?” he asked.
That had been the Arbiters plan, but now seeing them mill about aimlessly they changed their mind. “No, secure the area and stay out of CSI’s way. Understood?”
The officer looked offended. “Sir, its just an arm. We don’t need to wait around for CSI, one of my men can bag it right now.”
Patience wearing thin the Arbiter marched right into the Voral’s face. The fact the Officer loomed over her by two meters did little to diminish the Arbiter’s menacing aura. “AM. I. UNDERSTOOD?”
“Yes Sir.” The cowed Voral officer answered with a nervous buzz of his wings.
“Then go.”
Ten minutes later six medium shuttles from the CSI unit, and two small shuttles from the ADCU were on the scene of the lot and in the alley where the Arbiter had stumbled upon Astarte. Edict and Prosecutor began to jump along the rooftops, recreating the assassin’s movements and collecting more evidence.
The assassin’s arm, and the dried sample of Astarte’s blood was collected. As well as fragments of what looked to be a broken glass eye with a micro camera.
They lost the assassin’s trail after they ducked into the inner hull of the station and escaped across the pipes, wires, and support structure of Unity.
Thirty minutes after that they departed for the central precinct. The Arbiter within the darkened confines of the ADCU shuttle felt safe enough to take off the hood. Caleb and Bartolv did the same. They noticed her pensive mood and didn’t disturb her.
It wasn’t lost on her that Astarte knew exactly who this assassin was. And if she hadn’t left those pretty blatant clues about how to identify her then then Rachel would be trying to acquire a warrant to bring her in for questioning. But that still left her with a lot of questions.
And despite the answers she might get, she had the sinking feeling it wouldn’t be enough to see the whole picture. How big was this whole thing?
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What is IPF Classic Worlds?
The International Powerlifting Federation (IPF) is the largest international drug tested fed. “Classic” means the lifters can wear a belt and knee sleeves, but not knee wraps (or bench shirts, deadlift suits, etc). As with all standard powerlifting meets, the lifter with the best total (their best squat + best bench + best deadlift for the day) within each weight class wins.
When is it?
June 11-18
How do I watch? The IPF live stream page.
Find the full schedule here (times listed in Central European Summer Time), and the full roster and nominating totals here (men/women). Note that all the lifters discussed below will be in the “A” group for their weight class.
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Story lines to watch
Is Karlina Tongotea the new queen of the -76s?
Karlina Tongotea (New Zealand) came roaring into the international spotlight last fall when she totaled 600 kilos at the Commonwealth Games, and won the hyped “battle of the 76s” at Sheffield 2023, despite missing several lifts. Here she faces off again against reigning World Champ Jessica Buettner (Canada) and Equipped Champ (and the brief holder of the -76 total world record, until Karlina broke it) Agata Sitko (Poland). Karlina comes into this as the favorite; winning cements her as the premier -76 kilo raw lifter.
Check out the epic showdown between Agata and Jess at last year’s IFP Worlds here.
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The -63s, and the return of Carola Garra
Lya Bavoil (France) was the undisputed -63, but failed to make weight for the 2022 IFP Worlds. This opened the door for a fierce competition that ended in a three-way tie for best total, with Meghan Scanlon (USA) winning on bodyweight. With Bavoil moving up to the -69s, the favorite to win is Carola Garra (Italy), with Chiara Bernardi (Italy) and Scanlon likely fighting for silver. Garra last competed in Classic Worlds in 2019, where she won gold. Since then she's mostly competed in equipped, where she has been equally successful.
Bonus: Check out this podcast interview with Scanlon, where she talks about coming back to elite level powerlifting after giving birth to twins.
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Does Bonica Brown have a real challenger?
Bonica Brown (USA) has been the strongest 84+ for years. At Sheffield in March she broke the squat world record and total world record, and all of her lifts looked easy. However, Belgian lifter Sonita Mulah has been putting up monster gym numbers. She’s also got a big deadlift, so if things are close she has the advantage in that she’ll likely deadlift last. Brittany Schlater (Canada) is also worth keeping an eye on.
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Evie vs Noemie: The Rematch
Evie Corrigan (New Zealand) shocked everyone by cutting down a weight class to the -52s for Sheffield, where she shocked (almost) everyone and won the whole competition as a wildcard nomination. However, Noemie Allabert (France) was just a few kilos behind her. The battle is going to be intense and could easily come down to the last deadlift.
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The -93s
The men’s -93 class is absolutely stacked, and paired with the women’s -76s last year was one of the most fun sessions to watch. Even though last year’s champ Chance Mitchell (USA) won’t be competing, Jonathan Cayco (USA), Gustav Hedlund (Sweden), Emil Krastev (Bulgaria) and Gavin Adin (USA) are all legitimate contenders for gold (and would be even if Chance was there). Cayco put on a masterclass at Sheffield, coming in second, while Adin had a monster world record squat attempt that the jury ultimately declared a bad lift on depth (he placed third overall). Expect Adin to nail the squat record this time.
Highlights from last year's showdown here.
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This event is huge, so there are a ton of great lifters and awesome match ups I didn't have space to talk about. Use this thread to talk about what you're hyped for, discuss the competition, and ask questions.

I have a friend I started talking in march and she stopped replying to my texts at end of april. so I was really worried. I still send her messages asking her about her whereabouts and wellbeing. I also thought she died because she was gone for almost two months (or maybe she thinks I'm annoying or she's in a relationship) and I didn't think I would get to talk to her anymore. But worries go away after she told me she was gone because of family problems (on wednesday). She also mentioned about not wanting to come back till she's ready.
That's not the first time she's suddenly stop replying to my texts because of family problems. I don't really expect anything from an online friend but because she promised so much (tho I know damn well those are lies I still stick w her) and I believe it, then I have to suffer alone. We're friends, a very good friends that act like we're in a romantic relationship w each other and I guess as someone who is mentally ill, her attention is very appreciated by me. I can never get enough. She always used to reply asap but its becoming more and more slow that I got impatient. I'm hurt because if someone's important to you why would you reply their text two/three days later? (I don't think I appreciate being called important but being ignored for days) I don't know if I'm overreacting. I started having a problem when she started doing that. I'm mad because she promised so much but barely doing it. But of course I didn't say anything because I didn't want her to leave me.
So, when she said if it's okay I'd wanna talk to you again. I told her I'm gonna delete discord because I don't think we're gonna be fun anymore like we used to but she ask me to give her some time and that her heart would be sad if I'm gone. Should I give her some more time? I kinda feel sick waiting and waiting like a dumb person. What if she's never ready for whatever this is and continue to ignore me for day?
ps: I told her we should focus on our own life for the better (smth like that) and that's when she hope to give her some more time. Truth be told if we were in a relationship she'd be one of my priorities but I'm sure I'm not one of her priorities.

Based on a previous post of mine, but with the rise in talk of Skyrim, I wonder how well the Skyrim Holds would be able to fair against these dangerous events.
Rules:

• The Skyrim Hold Capitals (Markarth, Riften, Solitude, Whiterun, and Windhelm) do not know when the invasions will occur, nor what they will contain, all they know is to be on guard and ready.
• Alduin, Harkon, and Miraak have all been defeated, and the Dragonborn has left to go on more adventures.
• Each Hold Capital has three days to prepare for the invasion.
• No intervention from Aedra, Daedra, or Dragons (really any godly entities are not allowed).

Events (In Order):

• Slime Rain (with King Slime at the end).
• The Blood Moon (Pre-Hardmode, lasts 12 hours).
• The Goblin Army (Pre-Hardmode).
• Frost Legion.
• The Blood Moon (Hardmode, lasts 12 hours).
• The Goblin Army (Hardmode).
• The Pirate Invasion.
• The Pumpkin Moon (lasts 12 hours).
• The Frost Moon (lasts 12 hours).
• Solar Eclipse (Lasts 12 hours).
• Old One's Army (Full-scale event, the holds must defend the Eternia Crystal from being destroyed, if they fail to defend the crystal, they lose).
• Martian Madness.
• The Celestial Pillars (Will spawn over Whiterune, Riften, Windhelm, and Solitude in random order, Moon Lord will not appear if defeated).

Rounds:

1. The Holds are held by the Empire with no outside help.
2. The Holds are held by the Stormcloaks with no outside help.
3. The Holds are held by the Empire with outside help allowed (if they can get it).
4. The Holds are held by the Stormcloaks with outside help allowed (if they can get it).
5. Dawnstar, Falkreath, Morthal, Ravenrock, and Winterhold all must defend themselves from the invasions alone.

Win Conditions:
Terraria Events; Kill the Jarl, the majority of citizens, destroying most of the Hold.
Skyrim Holds; Push back against all Events.