• Last week, OpenAI demonstrated GPT-4o. AI voice assistants are getting super real, with features like laughter and sighs, very much like the movie Her (2013).
• It shows how far we’ve come: the present is catching up with the future and science fiction is quickly becoming reality.
• This is awesome for things like learning and tutoring, but we also have to be careful. What happens if we are spending too much time with AI?

I have been hyper focused searching this week but passively the last year, for a progression game. I am now in need of help. My wife has joined the search and not found much either. I have Epilepsy and ADHD so I can't play high focus for long periods of time but I still need some engagement ya know.
As concisely as I can put it I am looking for an engaging yet semi laid back progression game. I want to have goals and be able to unlock a broken god like status through a tech tree or upgrade system. I am hoping most for a top down buildecrafter sim with a combat or defense mechanism or a turn based RPG. I am open to any genre though. I'd prefer newish last five years or so and available on steam. I am considering RimWorld but am not sure about the graphics. Like a Dragon: Infinite Wealth seems good but I am not seeing much for weapon progression or skill/tech trees. I am really looking to capture the Skyrim progression experience in a builder or turn based. If I am being too picky LMK or if you have recommendations PLEASE help me.
List of past interests:

• All of the Final Fantasy titles
  • Skyrim
  • A ton of RPG titles action and turn based see list at end of post
• RTS games
  • Old warcraft/starcraft
  • age of empires
• TD games
  • Onslaught, balloons,
• Builder / God sims
  • Sim City, Theme Park, several tycoon games
  • Dragon quest builders
  • Terraria
• Open world crafting and collecting games
  • Grounded, Pal World, Valheim
• MMOs
  • Rune Scape, WOW, Final Fantasy 14, that other one my friend wanted me to play
• Mobile
  • Clash of clans, Survivor io,
• Other genres not related to my search

Non contenders:

• Titles listed above and below
• Manor Lords (playing with wife) also no EA progression
• Any MMO
• Sim City 4 or Civilization 6

Previous RPGs. Octopath, Ogre tactics, disgaea, Legend of Gaia, GTA 5, RDR 2, Breath of Fire, Destiny, God of War, Cyber Punk, Baulder's Gate
Much love gamers,

NB: If you prefer to read this article from Google Docs, with embedded Scryfall card images, follow this link: https://docs.google.com/document/d/1ipGx-NpPmVbRfnmiNpMlB4V6YA341UuZrBYQFSyyHrE/edit

INTRO

Hello! My name is GlosuU (https://x.com/GlosuUMTG). I'm a Limited MTG enthusiast with a humble portfolio: I qualified for and participated in the AC4 and AC5, and will be participating in PT Amsterdam at the end of June. In the AC5 I teamed up with Ryan Condon (AC5 runner-up) and Ethan Saks (Lord Tupperware), all 3 of us bringing Quintorius Combo as our Explorer deck of choice for the AC5. I was in a feature match versus the AC5 champ, Toni Ramis Pascual, where I lost my win-and-in to the top 8, and ended 12th out of 32. You might also know me for the "Ode to WAR'' article that I wrote and posted when WAR came as a flashback format some months ago: https://www.reddit.com/lrcast/comments/1bhpxb2/an\_ode\_to\_war\_of\_the\_spark/ . I'm not a content creator, but I do produce some stuff here and there when I feel like it (deep analysis of my AC5 matches are posted in my YouTube channel, I had Ryan Condon analyze them together with me - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Jhdl85xrunw&list=PLtfDMdAYlZqlVE-Bo_Gh5FsxujrFTEUyK&ab_channel=GlosuUMTG ). With my "credentials'' out of the way, I'm back with a new article, this time to praise IKO! We are getting IKO Premier Drafts on MTGA this Tuesday, so hopefully I can get you excited!
Disclaimer: WAR was my favorite set when I wrote the previous article, and I have to admit the flashback on Arena soured my experience of it a bit (Grixis colors were too open in the pods I felt, and the vanilla creatures in WAR stood out like a sore thumb compared to the FIRE ones). IKO is an all-timer for me and I'm really hoping the cycling deck will not be consistently open in the flashback pods, because that would be a bummer… Regardless, I do truly believe that WAR and IKO are amazing sets, and I hope I can convince you to love IKO in the same way I do, similarly to how I tried to convince you to love WAR!

My 17L tier list

If tier lists are your thing, I have no problem sharing mine with you: https://www.17lands.com/tier_list/dfdd3d0c69664a0b8ffbd7372848ab5f
NOTE: creating the tier list for IKO felt more difficult than for WAR. There are a LOT of cards that are contextually powerful, and it was hard to decide for me if I would P1P1 a Fire Prophecy (floor is extremely high, ceiling is pretty good too) or a Chevill (ceiling much higher, but gold card). Still, I did my best.

IKORIA: Lair of Behemoths setting

The main theme that inspired the IKO setting was giant monsters (Godzilla, King Kong, Mothra… you name it). Many of the mythics and rares had some silly Godzilla alt-arts, so if you are a fan of this genre, do NOT skip this set! The flashy new mechanic for the set was Mutate, which has some complex rules, but did its best to capture the flavor of beasts and creatures mutating into scary abominations. In opposition to the giant, wild monsters are the nimble humans that need to group together to stand a chance. Now, whenever the MTG team tries to design a battlecruiser-like format (giant creatures clashing with each other), it has been very difficult for them to balance it well for sweaty spikes. Most recently, we had BRO, where the theme was supposed to be giant robot machines clashing with each other, but the Prototype mechanic flopped really hard, and playing small, dinky creatures and getting value with Unearth was the way to go. Similarly, Mutate pales in comparison to the small humans and the cycling strategies, but I'm happy to say that it's still a viable strategy if open, it is much better than Prototype in BRO!
The set was also designed with wedges in mind (3 color combinations where one color and its enemy colors are present), but it was NOT marketed as a 3 color set. The big support is for the enemy color pairs, allied color pairs are just lightly supported with keyword themes. Do not expect to draft 3-color decks constantly like in KTK, but do expect to draft enemy color pairs (with and without splash) frequently. Colors are a bit loose in IKO anyway, since the focus is on archetypes and synergies.

MECHANICS

I. Cycling (and the Tier 0 RW cycling deck)

Let's start with the elephant in the room: the infamous cycling deck. MTG, as a card game, has variance baked in, especially with the mana (lands) system. The designers have made some mechanics that feel really good to play with because they smooth out your draws. For example: scrying, looting and… yes, cycling. Topdecked a useless card? Well, it's a great feeling to pitch it to redraw another card. Ask those who played with Blood tokens in VOW. Cycling has made its appearance here and there, and they made it a big part of IKO. But… they went overboard with it in this set. Not only did they design plenty and powerful cycling payoffs (which… honestly, does cycling need payoffs? Cycling is just a good mechanic, period, why does it need payoffs?), but they also put cycling in a lot of cards and, most importantly, they put SINGLE COLORLESS cycling in a lot of cards. This means that a dedicated RW cycling deck could be running an uncastable Memory Leak and still be stoked about it, because you don't ever have to cast the card, you just need to cycle it to trigger all the payoffs. Also for some reason many of the cycling payoffs have cycling themselves, so it's a no brainer to include them in your deck (sometimes you have to balance the amount of payoffs and enablers, for example the Chalk Outline/Insiduous Roots decks in MKM, but with cycling it's just easy mode). And yeah. Then there's Zenith Flare. Which is an uncommon. Which is easy to find in most games because cycling decks churn through their library fast. And they will dome you for 10 and you'll be left scratching your head. My personal rule to keep my sanity: assume the opposing cycling deck has only one Zenith Flare. If I die to a second Zenith Flare, I usually consider it a non-game, one of those you can't really do much about (like a deck with multiple bombs in OTJ).
Now, everything I said sounds dull and gloomy. And I'm sure that the designers would probably add a color requirement to the "Cycling 1" cards in hindsight, maybe make Zenith Flare a rare (or heck, a mythic). Nowadays they would probably make the triggered abilities trigger only once per turn. But… there's also good news! Personally, I think playing with and against cycling decks is FUN (especially if it's not a broken cycling deck, but a reasonable one). Cycling decks play like combo decks, where you try to set up during the first 3 turns of the game, and then watch the fireworks from turns 4+. Opponents can disrupt the key pieces, build their decks to counter the cycling plan (hello, lifegain!), and, most importantly, often cycling decks lose to themselves. Excusez-moi? Yes, you heard right. Because cycling decks skimp on lands (more on that in a sec), sometimes they will have an opener of 2 lands, 1 payoff and 4 cycling cards. That's a keep, but it's very beatable if the opponent answers the only payoff, and then the cycling deck cycles and cycles endlessly to find lands while falling behind on tempo on board. Cycling decks also mulligan badly, because one less card in hand means the cycling chain is more likely to brick. In a way, I feel like cycling decks are overall balanced in the format (!), as long as cycling is contested in the draft pods (as it should be!) and as long as non-cycling decks also pick cycling cards in their colors highly! You're in B? Please don't let that Memory Leak wheel! It's a good card in your deck too!
So why do cycling decks cut lands? I'm a big fan of Opt/Consider effects in Limited MTG. Increasing the consistency of your deck for a measly single mana draws you to your good cards more often and it also means less mana screw and flood. My general rule of thumb is that I cut one land every 2 Opts I have in my deck, as long as I don't go below 9 blue sources. Now, "cycling 1" cards don't scry like Opt, but they cantrip all the same. The general rule of thumb is to cut one land for every three "cycling 1" cards you have in your deck. And how low can you go? Some psychos have gone down to 12 lands, although I generally do like to have at least 13-14 lands. But if you run 17 lands in your dedicated cycling deck, you're gonna flood out A LOT. Enjoy cutting lands in your Limited decks for no reason? Try out IKO! 🙂

II. Companions

From controversial deck to controversial mechanic: Companions! Only 10 IKO cards had this mechanic, and they were all rares… how impactful could it have been? Well, so impactful that Constructed formats were broken in half and WotC had to errata the mechanic: to cast a Companion from the sideboard, you first had to pay 3 at sorcery speed to put it in hand. Drannith Magistrate, the Companion hate card, was left looking silly. Turns out that getting an extra card in your opener, a card you also had built around, was one way to break the game. While Companions were really bad for Constructed, they were AMAZING for Limited. Why? Because picking up one early and building around it made for very unique drafts! Many desirable cards would need to be foregone to meet the companion requirement, whereas other less desirable cards suddenly skyrocketed in your pick order. And who hasn't built around one sweet rare only to never draw it and your otherwise sketchy deck go 0-3, all your dreams crushed? Companions fixed that, since you built around them and you always had access to them. Some were more powerful (ahem Lurrus, Gyruda), others were usually not worth it to companion them (Yorion, Zirda…), but regardless they were all high picks because even in the maindeck they were great (and balancing the tension whether to companion them or maindeck them was really skill testing). Companions came back in the bonus sheet in MOM and they were as fun as they had been in IKO, leaving many of us wishing that they would come back more often, because they really improve the draft format they are in. I personally would also love for WotC to print new companions, but of course seeing how they broke Constructed in half, they probably would need to be super careful about them. 🙁 WotC, if you're reading this: bring more Companions!
Ethan Saks (aka Lord Tupperware) is quite well-known for his love of Companions, so if you want a deeper dive on them and what makes each of them tick, here's a video you can watch: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rmmOWYVAzbw&ab_channel=LordsofLimited (DISCLAIMER: this video is for the Companions in MOM, not IKO, but most of the stuff still applies)

III. Mutate (and the UG Mutate deck)

Mutate was the new flashy mechanic for IKO and supposed to charm the Timmy players out there by voltroning a creature and creating an unfathomable monster. Mutate creatures can be found in every color, but are most prevalent in U and G, where there's also payoffs for mutating. In essence, a creature with Mutate could behave like an Aura on an existing creature (keeping the stats of one of the two creatures plus all the abilities of both creatures) or a creature by itself. While you can't blow out a creature mutating onto another on the stack (killing the creature on the battlefield means the creature on the stack still resolves as a standalone creature), putting two creatures together does mean a big tempo swing if the opponent removes the mutated stack. For example, playing a Thieving Otter on T3, then mutating a Dreamtail Heron on top of it on T4 and getting in, drawing 2 cards… All of that sounded mouthwatering great in spoiler season (a flying Scroll Thief? Who doesn't like that?). But, when you assembled that in a game, and the opponent then removed the mutated creature, that meant that with one single spell they had removed both your T3 and T4 plays, so even though you had accrued card advantage, you could be very behind on board.
Was Mutate as bad as Prototype in BRO? Thankfully not! If open, a good UG Mutate could be a great deck, and stacking mutates on top of each other, each of them accruing incremental value, was a lot of fun when it worked. In essence, Mutate decks were A + B decks, with a good balance of A and B (A = 1-2 mana creatures you were happy to Mutate on, e.g. Essence Symbiote, Pollywog Symbiote; B = mutate creatures, preferably strong ones like Archipelagore or Auspicious Starrix). Playing a mutate payoff on T2 followed by a mutated Migratory Rendhorn on T3 was key to ramping, fixing and getting on good footing in the game (since you would also splash some powerful Mutate rares in other colors usually). Since A + B was so tight and you'd rather not include stuff that wasn't one or the other in your deck (to improve consistency), ideally your interaction would come in the form of Pouncing Shoresharks. But you'd still usually squeeze some space for some removal.
Mutate cards are also not unplayable outside of UG, but be mindful of how many non-human creatures you have in your deck and what creatures you are happy mutating on top of. Forbidden Friendship was great at providing some Mutate fodder in non-UG decks, for example, and you would be happy mutating a Cloudpiercer on top of it on T4 (you got a mana discount and a hasty 5/4 rummager, sweet!). BTW, do not confuse Forbidden Friendship with Cathartic Reunion, the arts on those cards are too similar!

IV. Keyword Counters

IKO was the first time that we got keyword counters. Apart from mutating, you could still build monsters by giving your creatures extra keywords. Some IKO tricks look like traditional tricks we see in Limited, but the counter hanging around can be quite important! For example, Unexpected Fangs creating a big lifelinker could be game-swinging. Be mindful of these tricks when having a Heartless Act in your deck, since you can get blown out very easily if they respond by giving a counter to their creature, and your removal will fizzle. Also, always roll Hexproof counter on a T3 Crystalline Giant - if you don't, you need to get better at MTG! (thank goodness Covid was around when IKO came out, imagine Giant in a paper MTG game)

FORMAT OVERVIEW

There's tons of draft guides out there, so I'll try to keep this brief. We already mentioned that a nuts RW cycling deck can be considered Tier 0. A reasonable RW cycling deck is still Tier 1-2, so it's definitely worth getting into if you get enough of the good cycling payoffs. UG Mutate is like Tier 2-3, so what other decks are out there?

I. Tier 1: Black, Humans and the Mardu Wedge

When cycling is not absurdly open, I have a strong bias to end up in a Mardu-esque deck (any of the color pairs, with or without splash). I love B in this set, even though it's not a cycling color. IKO has my favorite common ever printed: Bushmeat Poacher! The card doesn't look super strong at first glance, and 4 mana for a 2/4 is quite bad these days but… it resists a Fire Prophecy, for starters. And once you see the card in action on the opposite side of the battlefield, you're going to understand how ANNOYING it is. You'd be surprised how often the engine of Durable Coilbug + Bushmeat Poacher can grind out games in this format. Block, sac, gain life, draw cards, rinse, repeat. Honestly, it's as annoying as Cauldron Familiar in Constructed or Lampad of Death's Vigil in THB. And let me remind you that you gain life equal to the creature's toughness. Wanna remove my Honey Mammoth? Well, that will cost you your removal spell, and I gain 6 life and a card, thank you very much! One of the things I enjoy most in Limited is making opponent's removal look bad, and boy, oh boy, does Bushmeat Poacher do that!
So yeah Poacher might be my favorite common, but B has even better stuff to offer with Blood Curdle (that menace counter is super relevant) and Whisper Squad (which also combos nicely with Poacher). And Memory Leak should be taken as a great B common, I've mentioned this already.
Mardu decks can be built in a myriad of ways and synergies. There's the straight forward Human go-wide and pump your team theme out there. There's sac synergies. There's go-wide Mutate synergies: Forbidden Friendship is a premium R common in most R decks except for dedicated RW cycling decks ("Rally at the Hornburg"-lite is still very good!), and then you have stuff like Regal Leosaur. There's menace + removal synergies… And you have some sweet buildarounds like Weaponize the Monsters, Bastion of Remembrance and Offspring's Revenge. All in all, I love getting into Mardu decks in this format, and the aristocrats gameplay speaks to my heart.

II Tier 2: BG Reanimate, UR spell matters, Ultimatum decks

BG Reanimate is probably my favorite deck of the format. If I start B, and then see Mardu being contested (as it should), but G dummies coming to me, I'm very happy to jump into BG. We've seen that Back For More is still great in OTJ, but whereas in that set you only have Spinewoods Armadillo to easily combo with it, this set has several big dumb uncommons that cycle. Back For More is even better here in IKO! Getting back a Tytanoth Rex with it can usually net you a 3-for-1 (fight something and ambush something in combat, Rex still surviving). It is also the perfect home for Honey Mammoth (that card was a surprising overperformer back in the day, since then we know how good this style of cards can be for G decks looking to stabilize and turn the corner). Also, Bushmeat Poacher gaining you tons of life when opponents try to remove your big dummy creatures is very satisfying.
UR spells can also be powerful when open. Sprite Dragon can get out of hand quickly, and T3 sequencing Forbidden Friendship into Of One Mind feels super good. A key roleplayer for the deck is Spelleater Wolverine, and PSA: you can meet the condition by cycling instants and sorceries to the GY too, no need to actually cast them! Wolverine can fit other decks too if you get a good amount of instants and sorceries (e.g. in Rakdos with cycling and removal spells). I'm not super high on U in the format and thus don't get into UR spells often, but if you start R and U flows, it's a possible path to get into. There are also UJeskai cycling decks with Ominous Seas as the payoff.
Finally, a word on the Ultimatums: they are more powerful than they look! With the exception of Emergent Ultimatum (which has an important failcase: drawing your single-color big spells before it), resolving any of them in the late game will often put you in a winning position. Think of them a bit like Cruel Ultimatum in OTJ: fun cards to draft early and build towards the late game, prioritizing the dual lands in order to cast them.

III Tier 3: Allied color pairs/Keyword decks

With the exception of RB, which is a good deck, all other allied color pairs feel weaker. UB Flash and UW flyers can be a thing if you draft the rares that support them, but don't expect them to be super powerful. I do want to mention the WG Vigilance deck, because it is one of the counters to the cycling deck. Get a couple Alert Heedbonders, put some big butts on the board and laugh at your opponent trying to Zenith Flare your face when you're at 40 life! 2/4 also survives Fire Prophecy, so cycling decks often have to point a Flare to one of the Heedbonders, which is sweet! RG Trample is not really a deck, if you see the RG rare, it's a good card, but you can just splash it in any G deck. Beware also of the Wedge buildaround enchantments at rare, except for Offspring's Revenge, they are all generally quite bad!

SAMPLE DRAFTS AND TROPHIES

It has not been easy to get "clean" 17L trophy logs: 17L was in infant stage when IKO was the main format, so no game replays back then, and during the IKO flashbacks Arena pushed some log updates that made 17L struggle to log everything correctly. Still, thanks to some friends, I have gathered a few:
TROPHY 1 (courtesy of Sheesh): https://www.17lands.com/draft/263832207ed749b7947e7a40149f7380 - a typical RW cycling trophy
TROPHY 2: https://www.17lands.com/deck/ac08eb9f76874eafb67c4e201a5bb21e/1 - Lurrus Companion (this quick draft trophy got me into Mythic for the first time back in the day!)
TROPHY 3 (courtesy of TripleB): https://www.17lands.com/deck/c7fb935d7ac443b4bb895f43622accc7 - BW Humans, some games missing
TROPHY 4: https://www.17lands.com/draft/19b4a66cbec5484d8d3b0acd54f61787 - Golgari Reanimate/grind, sadly only shows the first two games
TROPHY 5 (courtesy of TripleB): https://www.17lands.com/deck/d0d77324997f45478a7b853067a0f438 - UR spells/mutate, no game replays available since it was a Traditional Draft from when IKO was the main format
TROPHY 6: https://www.17lands.com/deck/96ffb9ab71144753bb87496e33e32545/1 - UB Flash/Mutate, also a Trad Draft

CLOSING THOUGHTS

While I think I covered most of the format, I feel that there's a lot of things I didn't have space to cover. I truly believe that this format plays and feels amazingly well, just as long as the RW cycling deck is contested enough. Sweet buildarounds, companions, all-in synergies, Mutate, and a load of other nonsense. This is a Dave Humphreys set you really don't want to miss! I am stoked to spam it and (hopefully) see it hold up after all these years!

Scrolling through the OST there are some really cool themes that i’ve just never heard. How does the game decide which theme to play? is there a way i can change the theme i use?

I’m currently using zen market but there’s an issue with its ability to load listings, the site uses an infinite scroll to browse on but it can stop loading listings not even that far down the page so I wanna see what other sites people really like purchasing Japanese auctions from, thanks ✌️

Intro
I'd like to start by stating I didnt have high expectations for this game. The initial trailers made me think this game was going to be a shallow experience focused on the main characters sex appeal with some flashy visuals to back it up. Im happy to say this game exceeded my expectations.
Positives
Combat
The combat is easily the games strongest aspect. It is extremely to grasp and has enough depth to keep a player interested for the entire run time. It felt like a mix of Sekiro (focus on parrying and a balance meter, that most enemies, which is similar to the posture bar), Devil May Cry and GOW 2018/Ragnarok (Ability usage).
The sound and visual feedback was also fantastic. The perfect parry is the best example of this. Getting one of these, especially when parrying a full combo from a boss, was incredible. The various Beta Skills and Burst Skills were wonderful additions, each with their various uses and visual panache. The Blink and Repulse abilities were also nice additions, keeping the combats momentum.
I also loved how the game allowed me to lean into particular builds with its exo-suit system and the various gear one could equip. I loved my Beta Skill focused build which allowed me to gain Beta energy very quickly and spam Beta skills non-stop. The Trance mode perk on the exo-suit I used was just the cherry on top as it allows infinite use of Beta Skills while you are Tranced.
The ranged combat was surprisingly effective and well designed. I initially thought it would be a gimmick, to be used in niche situations but two particular missions (Altus Levoire and Abyss Levoire) convinced me that it close to, if not on par, with the design of the melee combat. Speaking of the two missions, they were so much fun. They felt inspired by Dead Space with the more claustrophobic level design, the effective jump scares and the necromorph-esque enemies seen.
Traversal
The traversal was solid. Eve felt smooth to control. Climbing was basic, follow the yellow-painted-assets which I don't mind. The less I have to look for discreet ledges, the better. I did notice that Eve would sometimes go through climbable ladders and ropes. While not super frustrating, it was a noticeable annoyance.
I loved the super sprint feature. It made traversing the larger worlds (Great Desert) much more enjoyable and replayable. I would love more open-world games to have this feature. However, if the super sprint activated at the edge of a ledge or ladder, Eve would not grab said objects but launch herself off them resulting in me taking significant damage. It never happened more than twice, but I did find it funny.
The biggest gripe I have though is thinking I'll make a jump, watching Eve go slightly past a platform, then trying to compensate by changing direction only to miss it again. This resulted in some annoying deaths.
Enemy Design (Bosses and standard enemies)
Every single boss was incredible. I rarely say this about most games as usually there are a few duds or boring ones (to compare it to Fromsoftware games, Dark Souls 3 is my favorite souls-like and even that had Halflight and Crystal Sage). Every single boss (Elite and Alpha) had distinct designs, and readable animations which made them a joy to fight. My top 3 bosses were Karakuri, Unidentified Alpha Naytiba and Tachy.
The same is true for the standard enemies. There was a great variety of them, each with there own move-sets. (the hardest one was definitely the Battle Droid). The two I hated however, were the Harvesters (I felt they had too much HP for their job as a path obstacle) and the Guard Turrets as whenever they were present, I knew the sequence would be annoying.
Music
Overall, the music was great. It definitely felt Nier Automata inspired, especially with the more dreamy like soundtracks. Two highlights were the Flooded District in Eidos 7 theme and the Raven boss fight theme.
Performance
The game ran flawlessly. I noticed no obvious frame drops. I did encounter one bug which prevented a door in Matrix 11 from opening (A naytiba is supposed to burst out of it but it never did).
Negatives
Story
The story was very boring until the last 5ish hours. I blame the boring characterization of the two main protagonists, Adam and Eve. The voice performances were flat. Major revelations barely affected Eve. I think the lore was more interesting with all the collectables found while playing. Each gave a bit more insight about the various aspects of the world which I liked. Some of the side quests were more interesting. I found more emotion in the Su and Enya side quest than the main story. Lily is the definite outlier. I liked her a lot as she had an actual personality.
The side-quests were a standard affair. Talk to an NPC/Bulletin Board, go to a location, find and item or kill a naytiba and come get the rewards. Yet they were quick and snappy which made them fun. Plus the rewards were always worth it.
Overall, I would say the combat and boss encounters more than carry the game (especially the final boss rush, which was just incredible) as the story unfortunately was not memorable. I have already started a New Game+ just for the boss fights, new outfits and skill unlocks.
Some other topics I wanted to talk about include:
The game's art style was fine. It gets the job done but doesn't stand out. The character models looked good but I did notice some obvious low-resolution textures on assets that a player could get close too. I think the latter half of the game is more visually interesting especially the Orbital Space Elevator. The naytibas are definitely the most visually intriguing parts of this game (and Eve, wink wink)
I loved that the developers gave us all the unlockable outfits for free. It really incentivized to find as many as I could and play dress-up with Eve. Fingers crossed for a 2B outfit since it just makes sense (maybe as a boss-rush reward?)
To conclude, Stellar Blade is a stellar game that I would highly recommend playing.
I would love to hear all your thoughts as well. Thanks for reading.

This isn’t a shitpost I swear. Sorry it sounds so ridiculous.
I really want to find all the cat themed art that the Art Store has. I’ve found two or three so far… just by randomly digging and scrolling through the prestated categories… and by cat I mean domestic cats not like lions or tigers or wildlife lol.
Is there a search function?

Hello, I have a view that returns the images and templates. I have a second view for pagination that returns other remaining images in paginated form. Now I want to add infinite scroll with htmx ? How can I add it ?

 {% for image in images %}    {% endfor %} 
 I want to append images inside this container on scroll. def gallery_images(request, slug): theme = get_object_or_404(Theme, slug=slug) all_images = theme.galleries.all()[12:] # Get all images from the 11th index onwards paginator = Paginator(all_images, 2) # 2 images per page page_number = request.GET.get('page') images = paginator.get_page(page_number) image_data = [{ 'url': image.image.url, 'alt': f'Gallery image {image.pk}' # Use the image's primary key or any other identifier for alt text } for image in images] return JsonResponse({ 'images': image_data, 'has_next': images.has_next() }) 

Hello! Usually I use Elementor for building pages and posts by any templates, but now I have a task to add some sections with something that seems to be custom animation or maybe there is an elementor add-on for this that I don't know about? Also can you recommend any elementor plugin to help me create a row of containers with text to be horizontal slider with infinite loops?
I will write below the examples I need to do from 2-3 sites. Also if you go without plugins, how do you add custom animations including an external js library? Using html widget, adding the source, enqueuing the js and adding the js?
Here are the example sections: 1. https://boardmix.com/#workflow - here we have some tabs on the top and lists (maybe?) on the left, that are going with a timer one by one and changing the images. I thing this is pretty much custom made animation.

1. https://www.bigchange.com/#w-node-_4e9625aa-86a9-c04b-d702-85c01c2af5ca-c966f566 - here when the user reach this section, the video on the left stays static and the right part keeps scrolling its content till the end, after that the scroll continue to the next section of the page.

Thanks in advance!

Evil Within Base Kit

• Buff: Stalk speed is no longer based on the distance from the Survivor.
  
• Nerf: Increased the required time spent stalking to reach Evil Within II and III to 8 seconds (was 6 seconds)
  
• Note: With the removal of stalk speed reduction based on distance, the two changes listed above result in a net buff for the Shape, as he will now be able to earn his power at a faster rate on average than previously.
  

 

• Buff: Movement speed while passively stalking increased to 3.2 m/s (was 2.76 m/s)
  
• Buff: Movement speed while actively stalking increased to 1.2 m/s (was 0.92 m/s)
  
• Note: We are buffing these movement speeds to make the Shape feel less sluggish without his movement speed add-ons. On top of that, we are reworking his movement speed add-ons entirely in order to streamline his gameplay.
  

 

• Buff: The Stalk Point Reservoir on each individual survivor now slowly regresses over time
  
• Note: Previously, the Shape had a hard cap on his Stalk Point Reservoir, set to 10.1 per survivor, for a total of 40.4 across the Trial. This meant that the Shape was the only killer in the game that was capable of running out of his power entirely with no means to replenish it. We are removing this hard cap by making survivors regress their Stalk Point Reservoir when they are not being stalked or chased (to disincentive unsavoury gameplay tactics). We will not be disclosing the regression rate for the time being, but know that we will be closely monitoring it to ensure the Shape can reliably use his power while still feeling some downtime in play.
  

 

• Quality of Life improvement: Updated the Evil Within description to now correctly state that the increased lunge is granted upon reaching Evil Within III, rather than Evil Within II.

 

• "New" mechanic: Reintroduced the sound effect that plays when the Shape is close to reaching another level of Evil Within, but only for Evil Within III.
  
• Note: This is a feature we did away with long ago in order to keep up the surprise factor of the Shape. However, we realise that this surprise factor is only really relevant for reaching Evil Within II. After this point in any given trial, that surprise factor isn't as important. Therefore, we are reinstating this mechanic to add flavour and make survivors a little more paranoid. To add onto this, players would often find themselves frustrated when facing the Shape when on the receiving end of the Shape being close to reaching Evil Within III. This mechanic will double up as a fair warning to all survivors to pay extra close attention to their surroundings when the Shape is close to reaching Evil Within III.
  

 

Evil Within Add-Ons

Blond Hair

• Buff: Increases the threshold to reach Evil Within III for the first time by +16% (was +50%)
  
• Note: We are changing the Blond Hair, Hair Brush and Lock of Hair add-ons to now grant proportional bonuses to their downsides. As the Hair Bow add-on already granted a proportional bonus, it will remain unchanged.
  

 
Boyfriend's Memo

• Buff: Increases the reach of lunge attacks while in Evil Within I by +75% (was +50%)

 
Memorial Flower

• Nerf: Increases the Shape's stalk rate by +10% (was +11%)

 
Tacky Earrings

• Old mechanics removed
  
• New mechanic: While in Evil Within III, the Shape gains a +25% action speed to picking up and dropping survivors
  

 
Hair Brush

• Buff: Increases the threshold to reach Evil Within III for the first time by +33% (was +50%)

 
Jewellery

• Old mechanics removed
  
• New mechanic: While in Evil Within III, the Shape gains a +25% action speed to breaking pallets and walls, and damaging generators
  

 
Reflective Fragment

• Buff: The auras of survivors are revealed to you for 3 seconds after stalking them for at least 1 second while in Evil Within II (was 2 seconds)

 
Judith's Journal

• Rarity changed to Uncommon (was Rare)
  
• Nerf: Increases the Shape's stalk rate on the obsession by +25% (was +40%)
  

 
Dead Rabbit

• Remains unchanged

 
Glass Fragment

• Rarity changed to Rare (was Uncommon)
  
• Old mechanics removed
  
• New mechanic: While in Evil Within I, the aura of the obsession is revealed to the Shape beyond 16 metres
  

 
J. Myers Memorial

• Nerf: Increases the Shape's stalk rate by +20% (was +25%)

 
Jewellery Box

• Old mechanics removed
  
• New mechanic: While in Evil Within III, the Shape's stun duration from pallets is reduced by -50%
  

 
Mirror Shard

• Old mechanics removed
  
• New mechanic: When Evil Within III expires, the aura of the survivor furthest away from the Shape is revealed for 5 seconds
  
• New mechanic: The affected survivor suffers from the Oblivious status effect for 30 seconds
  

 
Hair Bow

• Remains unchanged

 
Lock of Hair

• Buff: Increases the duration of Evil Within III by +60 seconds (was +40 seconds)

 
Tombstone Piece

• Old mechanics removed
  
• New mechanic: Start the Trial in Evil Within II
  
• New mechanic: At the start of the Trial, the audio cue for the Shape reaching Evil Within II is played
  
• New mechanic: The Shape can no longer stalk survivors to gain Evil Within. Instead, hooking each survivor for the first time grants the Shape a token, up to 4. Upon reaching 3 tokens, the audio cue for the Shape being close to reaching Evil Within III is played. Upon reaching 4 tokens, the Shape enters Evil Within III for 60 seconds, and is granted the ability to kill one healthy, injured or dying survivor by his own hands
  
• New mechanic: Upon killing a survivor by his own hands, this add-on is deactivated for the remainder of the Trial, removing the Shape's ability to kill any more survivors by his own hands, and granting him the ability to stalk survivors like normal
  
• Quality of Life improvement: This add-on can now be used to kill survivors in the dying state
  
• Note: A common complaint with the Tombstone Piece and Judith's Tombstone add-ons is that they alter the gameplay on a fundamental level, and as such often feel unfair to play with and against. These changes aim to prevent these frustrations, while keeping the theme of the add-ons, allowing the Shape to kill survivors as he sees fit, but more within the rules of the game. On top of this, we're also combating the common trick survivors have utilised involving lockers and other interactible objects that force the Shape to grab them instead of kill them by allowing this add-on to work on survivors in the dying state. We'll be monitoring the Tombstone Piece and Judith's Tombstone add-ons closely to ensure we've achieved the best of both worlds.
  

 
Scratched Mirror

• Remains unchanged

 
Vanity Mirror

• Remains unchanged

 
Fragrant Tuft of Hair

• Nerf: Increases the threshold to reach Evil Within III for the first time by +400% (was +200%)
  
• Note: With the overall buffs to the Shape's base kit, a nerf for this add-on is required to ensure things don't get out of hand, placing the time to stalk from Evil Within II to Evil Within III at a consistent 40 seconds. We will closely monitor the performance of this add-on. Fret not, Tombstone enjoyers, as this add-on will still be usable with the Tombstone Piece and Judith's Tombstone add-ons for infinite Evil Within III with the ability to kill one or more survivors respectively.
  

 
Judith's Tombstone

• Old mechanics removed
  
• New mechanic: Start the Trial in Evil Within II
  
• New mechanic: At the start of the Trial, the audio cue for the Shape reaching Evil Within II is played
  
• New mechanic: The Shape can no longer stalk survivors to gain Evil Within. Instead, hooking each survivor for the first time grants the Shape a token, up to 4. Upon reaching 3 tokens, the audio cue for the Shape being close to reaching Evil Within III is played. Upon reaching 4 tokens, the Shape enters Evil Within III for 90 seconds, and is granted the ability to kill healthy, injured or dying survivors by his own hands
  
• Quality of Life improvement: This add-on can now be used to kill survivors in the dying state
  
• Buff: No longer reduces the Shape's movement speed while in Evil Within III
  
• Note: Unlike with the Tombstone Piece add-on, this add-on does not deactivate upon killing a survivor and can be used to kill multiple survivors within the given time frame.
  

 
Hi there! These are my ideas for reworking Myers into a stronger and more fair killer, buffing him overall where necessary, while bringing his more outrageous add-ons down a notch to deal with the more unsavoury play styles that are currently encouraged with his kit, all while making sure to keep his identity and uniqueness in tact.
I've done this previously, 2 years ago, though my opinions on how to fix the Shape have changed since then, and I'd like to think my ideas are much more refined now than they were then.
I would love to hear what you think of these proposed changes, as well as any ideas of your own. I always welcome the discussion. Just keep in mind that every nerf in this post is presented alongside a multitude of sizeable buffs, so please don't get too hung up on a single patch note and try to keep the whole picture in mind.
Thank you so much for taking the time to read all this. I hope you're having a good day.

Slaves to Darkness make visual sense. It's the old Warriors of Chaos aesthetic; you've got tyrannical dark knights who rule the wastes, calling on hordes of shirtless barbarians and mutated war-beasts to roam ahead of their legions. Lots of baroque, hellish ornamentation on brutal, hard lines, lots of barbarian warrior and foreign tyrant cues. It's all quite coherent, even when you put wildly different subsets against each other; Varanguard and Fellriders are very dissimilar, but even in isolation you can still see the links.
Maggotkin of Nurgle make visual sense. Everything is bloated and decayed and infested. Lots of round shapes, which makes the collapsed hollows or spiked growths stand out all the more. The armour is also rounded, with oddly-placed holes to suggest deformity. The war-beasts are all insects or molluscs, with fat abdomens and wriggling feelers. It's all very European apocalypse, the pestilential knights and plague victims shambling out of hell. The most divergent designs are the Rotmire Creed, who are a Warcry warband, and even they share the same spiked growths, ragged hoods, and plague-veils.
Hedonites of Slaanesh make visual sense. Everything is lithe and flowing and ostentatious. They have a very Orientalist vibe, taking cues from Western portrayals of "exotic" and "decadent" cultures like Persia, Greece, India, the Byzantines, the Arab caliphates, etc. From the armoured warriors to the near-naked archers to the giant cow-men, you'll find the same rich ornaments, elegant silks, and prominent plumage. The only things that stand out too oddly are the Hellstriders, and that's because they are ass old and barely part of the range.
Blades of Khorne make visual sense. They're pretty boring, but they make sense. Everything is muscular and hard, sharp and violent. They are a very straightforward rendition of the same Slaves to Darkness aesthetic, but more overtly macho and angrier. Chaos Warriors are here, but have bare arms and bulging muscles and angrier helmets and more axes. Marauders are here, but with bigger muscles and more spikes. Claws of Karanak diverge a bit from this, taking on more of a "barbarian reivemercenary" vibe, like the Roman image of the Visigoths, or mountain-dwelling bandit tribes, but they still fit in overall.
Disciples of Tzeentch don't make visual sense. Their core infantry all has a clear theme; the Tzaangors are buff satyrs with antelope horns, bird-heads, and faux-Grecian arms, armour, and loincloths. The Kairic Acolytes keep up the faux-Grecian armaments and dress, tossing in theatre masks, scrolls, eagle pets, and ridiculously sculpted muscles. There's a lot of overlap here, for better or worse, which gives a clear theme of... sinister bird cultist Greeks? Which works, honestly – setting aside the incredible workout routines on display, that's a visual language which evokes philosophers, knowledge-seekers, ancient occultism, and so on.
Except the instant you leave those kits behind, it falls apart.
Their non-Tzaangor heroes follow the Blades of Khorne approach, being essentially Slaves to Darkness characters with minor bird accessories, which results in a totally different style. A Curseling is an old Chaos Lord of Tzeentch. A Magister is an old Chaos Sorcerer of Tzeentch. The Gaunt Summoner is the same but with some feather decorations (good effort, I guess?), long robes, and a mutant head covered in eyes. They don't look like they're even part of the same army as Kairic Acolytes, much less their direct leaders. The Ogroid Thaumaturge ties in with Tzaangors reasonably well, until you get to his crude-looking staff and the fact that Ogroids are now firmly part of Slaves to Darkness. The Magister on Disc does better than most, but that's because he's just a Tzaangor Shaman with a breastplate, a mutant human head covered in eyes (interesting theme, shame it's found nowhere else in this army), and a random Gloomspite hood.
Their Warcry warband adds another, also totally divergent aesthetic. The Jade Obelisk ditch the vaguely Greek look entirely for a vaguely Mayan or druidic style, with thick, hooded robes over the whole body, laced with metal studs for an exotic coat-of-plates. They've got a heavy segmented cuirass and faulds, and a wildly different style of weapons, masks, and ornamentation. They're not spindly and fragile like the MagisteSummoner, or sculpted and buff like the Acolytes. The only commonality with the whole faction is a few bird-themed decorations and their bird-daemon familiar. Warcry warbands often stand out, that's fine, but these guys look nothing alike – it's as though the designers aren't sure what Tzeentch's shared language really is.
Meanwhile, the faction's daemons consist of exactly one evil robed wizard-bird with extra eyes on its head and book-staff (damn, hitting lots of buttons at once!). It's joined by... multi-armed blob-goblins, smaller flaming blob goblins, flaming mushroom monsters, and flying manta rays.
The Disciples of Tzeentch look like a mishmash of two, three, or even four factions with totally different visual approaches to Tzeentch's general themes. Are they spindly wizard-nerds with robes and loads of eyes? Are they buff Greek warrior-philosophers and beastmen? Are they armoured Chaos Warriors with feathers and extra arms? Are they shapeless blobs of tentacles and fire? What's the visual narrative meant to be, here?
I don't get it. This isn't a problem created by mix-matching old ranges, all of their mortal stuff is new and AoS-specific. Why are they like this? Why are they the only ones like this?

Hey everyone, this will be my first attempt at a serious post on this sub. I’m not exactly practiced in articulating my thoughts (I’m more of a fiction writer) so please bear bull with any mistakes and please correct me if I’m wrong. The last thing I want to do is spread misinformation, I’m not an expert (or a financial advisor) on any of this. I'm here to learn, not to teach.
This post will be the first in a series of me reading through the entire Diamond Handbook (2nd) and just commentating on points I find interesting or discussion worthy. I will be asking questions as well as giving my own personal thoughts based on my understanding of the events that have transpired. I became an ape right after the sneeze, and followed a lot of the discussions back then, but have been zen for a while so I haven't fully kept up with a lot of the new developments.
I haven't actually sat down and read DD in a long time, so I decided to give myself a refresher and actually look at the Diamond Handbook (2nd) for the first time. I had read a lot of these posts as they had come out, so I had never felt the need to look at the full PDF before. For the apes that haven’t read it either, I recommend giving it a read. You can find the full DD library in the pinned post of this sub, and the Diamond Handbook is the first one there.
As I have been reading it, I’ve quickly realized that some of the stuff is a little outdated. That can’t really be helped since so much DD has been done between then and now, but this brings me to the two reasons for this post. The Diamond Handbook is likely the first piece of DD a new ape will be recommended; I want to spark discussion to clear up some things that are misguided or outdated in this handbook. The second reason is more of a personal challenge. Whenever someone denies the legitimacy of the DD, an ape usually responds by saying something like “Well, read the DD and prove it wrong”. The average MOASS denier won’t do this though, in my experience they just think it’s ridiculous on a conceptual level, and won’t take the time to actually look through all the DD available and construct a proper debate. I can’t really blame them for this though, spending so much time on something you have no interest in doesn’t sound like a fun time.
But I have a lot of interest in this, and I am an aspiring author who writes 400K word fanfictions for fun. I’ve got the time and the writing willpower. I am very big into trying to understand how a reader will interpret a piece of my writing, so I’ll be looking through that lens and will be writing this with the assumption that you have already read the Diamond Handbook (2nd). Please take the time to respond/correct what I say here, I want to learn.
With all that out of the way, let’s get started.
​
The Mother of All Short Squeezes (MOASS) Thesis, Published on May 26, 2021, by u(slash)HCMF_MACEFACE
Before we even get into the meat of this section I already see a bit of an issue. A lot of the language implies that MOASS is imminent, take this section for example:

*“If you don't believe me, just look at the chart of GME which our DD (Due Diligence/research/analysis) has been forecasting for a while now. The below pattern has only preceded massive spikes in price, but this time, those on the other side of the trade are going to have a much harder time suppressing the price like they did in January and March. Thanks to the activity on 5/25, we have entered the end-game. The MOASS is beginning.”* 

I think most new apes will look at this, then look at the date of posting (three years ago), and think this is delusional thinking. They will say that MOASS did not ‘begin’ because it hasn’t happened yet. This would be pretty short sighted though, GME has always been a Deep Value investment, long positions are called long for a reason. ‘Buy and HODL’ is such a repeated mantra because that is the investment strategy most apes employ. Like most investments, it takes a long time to realize gains. Your retirement account will be growing for 40+ years before you cash that thing out, GME is my retirement plan so I don’t expect it to be much different.
Just because the sneeze happened in a week doesn’t mean MOASS will, in theory it should be a very long event as both the shorts and longs have a test of wills to see who caves first. However, the sneeze was the ‘beginning’ because it was exposed a lot of the fuckery that is going on in the market right now, I think that is the message that should be taken from this section.

*“These terms are key to understanding the theory and speculated value of a GME investment. Hyperlinks to Investopedia, "the world's leading source of financial content on the web", have been included for most market terms and concepts and it is recommended to check them out if they are not clear. We will be breaking down some of the more complex terms and concepts within the post and framing them within the context of GME.”* 

After the introduction, this post does a great job of explaining all the concepts of the stock market that are relevant to the MOASS thesis. However, I do wish it mentioned some other stock terms for the sake of new investors. Since none of the DD is supposed to be financial advice, I can’t really blame them for these omissions, but at the beginning the OP does say they wanted the post to be good for newer investors, so I think some more pointing in the right direction should’ve been provided. I do appreciate the link to Investopedia, but this DD is already a novel, and the average reader might forget about that link by the time they finish it. So an additional link should’ve been provided at the end.
The two big concepts I see missing are Options and Wash Sales/Stop-Losses.
Options are interesting because they create a different type of buying/selling pressure compared to just buying/selling stocks regularly. There are concepts like gamma ramps and stuff that can be relevant when discussing catalysts for price movement. However, options are pretty scary for most investors, I’ve only ever bought one, and forgot about it so it auto-exercised for me (lol), so it’s not a concept I would call essential. I just think it’s better to be educated than not.
The much more egregious omission is that of Wash Sales and Stop-Losses. Wash Sales are extremely dangerous to new investors who still make decisions based on emotions and are not used to the volatility that comes with GME.
If you are unfamiliar, a Wash Sale is when a person sells a stock at a loss, then buys the stock again within a short period of time. As an example, let’s say you bought a stock at $50, then the stock goes down to $40.00 and you no longer feel comfortable with your investment. You sell the stock at a loss. You lost $10.00 on this transaction, but it’s not all bad. When you go to do your taxes, you can report this $10.00 loss to the IRS. This is good because if you make a $10.00 profit off another trade, you now don’t have to take taxes out of that profit, since the IRS will see this as you breaking even in the grand scheme of your portfolio. You didn’t actually make any money, so they aren’t going to tax you for it.
A Wash Sale is triggered when you buy back the stock you sold in a short period of time, this can even apply if you buy a stock in the same sector. So if you buy a stock at $50.00, sell it at $40.00 then buy it again. That $10.00 loss you took can no longer be reported to the IRS as an actual loss. So when you make $10.00 on some other trade, the IRS won’t see you as breaking even, they will tax you on that $10.00.
For a stock as volatile as GME this can be very dangerous, I know people who brought in the peak, then as the price went back down they triggered a Stop-Loss (auto-sale you can program to trigger when a price falls), only to then buy back in when the stock dropped even lower, creating a wash sale that fucked their taxes.
We say “Buy and HODL” a lot, but I think the ‘why’ of it has been lost in the meme. I personally buy and HODL because averaging down is a lot better for me than accidently triggering a Wash Sale. I fucking hate the IRS and don’t want any of that smoke.

*“SPOILER: GME and \[Popcorn\] have tons of FTDs reported.”* 

I just kinda don’t like the mention of the Popcorn stock here, it has never been a deep value investment. If you are unfamiliar with the Deep Value investment strategy, please take a look at the old Roaring Kitty livestreams. In summary, Deep Value investing is defined by looking for stocks that are extremely undervalued and unpopular due to no fault of the company. These external factors that are making the stock undervalued can be anything, shorting, COVID, stuff like that. But what makes it a Deep Value investment is always strong management within the company. If the company is not mismanaged in any way, then it is very unlikely to go bankrupt, and will have opportunities to make a comeback. GME has Ryan Cohen leading, a proven successful businessman that has already taken precautions to ensure GameStop never goes bankrupt. Popcorn just doesn’t have that. It is very short-squeezable, but it’s not deep fucking value.

*“Short sellers must eventually close, or cover, their short position.”* 

Ok, but why ‘must’ they? This is another point I think has been lost in the memes. There are two problems with just saying ‘shorts must close’ without providing context. The first is the simple fact that there isn’t a due date. Unlike a common car loan or mortgage, a short position doesn’t operate on a time table. They can wait forever to close, unless they get margin called.
This next part I’m a little shaky on, I’m probably getting some things wrong here:
Ok, well how are they going to get margin called? The problem I see is that these Short Hedge Funds (SHF) are making a lot of money by selling naked shorts. It’s really hard to get margin called when they are literally printing money, and since they don’t have to report these their books just look to be filled with an infinite amount of cash.
So, there are a couple solutions to this:
1, Government regulation. If the SEC puts a stop to naked shorting, these SHF can’t print money anymore. Eventually the interest from their positions will eat them alive, and they will get margin called. Unfortunately, MOASS has the potential to destroy the economy like in 2008, so they probably aren’t too keen on just doing this without creating some kind of safety net. So I can’t really count on them to help, because the government has a vested interest in keeping MOASS from happening. It’s just not something I believe will be the catalyst. Although they might just do it on purpose given the right reason, like pinning the economic collapse on a scapegoat, or by GameStop forcing their hand by exposing the fraud somehow. I’ve seen a lot of apes hoping for one of these reasons to come to pass, but for me, I don’t see enough motivation from the participating parties.
2, A price run-up. If the price of the stock can unbalance the books of the SHF enough then they could also get margin called. I’m not counting on this either, since the price is manipulated by the process of naked shorting. Sure, they are digging a bigger grave when they suppress the price like this, but it can also help smaller SHFs with exiting their positions with OTC stuff. Over-The-Counter trades are trades made off the lit exchanges, historically it was intended to kind of simulate a transaction between two individuals, like buying a video game from a buddy off the books, no taxes, no regulation. Unfortunately, this is abused by institutions and can’t even be used by individuals, making dark pools of trades full of fraud and undermines the free market. Smaller SHFs that are more at risk of getting Margin Called due to their lack of collateral, can make OTC trades with the big naked-shorting market makers to ‘close’ their positions using fake shares. Of course, this only passes the buck so to speak, but it’s a viable strategy for them since the big SHFs that take on these ‘bucks’ are less likely to get margin called. A lot of historic short squeezes happen because a small SHF gets margin called, then drives the price up and causes a bigger SHF to get called, and so on until they’re all in the grave. This is why I don’t really give a shit if the price goes up to $80 in a week, it’s not enough, the buck has been passed. (To be clear, I don’t have proof that this is the reason for the uptick in OTC transactions, it’s just a theory. If a smarter ape than I can get on this that would be great.) But, even if a price run-up itself doesn’t cause MOASS, it may give motivation for the true trigger:
3, Interest Rates. Here is the big one that I look at, that I believe will be the true cause of MOASS. Now please, correct me if I’m wrong again, I am just an ape who dropped out of college. So, from what I understand a Short institution has to pay a certain amount of interest to the people they borrow the stocks from. This is the cost of borrowing and is how these Lenders make money. For a long time, the interest rate was at like 1%, this means that selling one naked short could cover the cost of the interest 100 times over. However, let’s say that the interest rate becomes 110%, sounds crazy, but this would mean that borrowing the share would cost more than the share. This would destroy the balances of the SHFs and ensure they get margin called. Why would this ever happen though? Because these lenders want to make money. These lenders are the real winners of MOASS, and they aren’t talked about enough in my opinion. Lenders can’t sell the shares they’ve lent out, their income is in the interest rates, there has to be a balance here between it being more profitable to lend the shares or to sell them. If Lenders start to think that lending their shares aren’t making them more money than the alternative, they will raise interest rates to make these profits until SHFs can’t pay them, then the SHFs have to return the shares, causing MOASS with the massive buyback, then lenders can just sell the shares on the way down. Lenders have a monetary business interest in causing MOASS, so they are the most likely cause of it in my opinion.

*“This is the GME MOASS thesis. GME is a stock that stands to hit an unprecedented price point due to the fact that manipulators of the market have failed to bankrupt GameStop thanks in huge part to the Legendary Keith Gill AKA* u(slash)DeepFuckingValue*, Ryan Cohen, and all of the GME investors who took part in this saga. It may not be today, this week, or even this month, but one day soon, these toxic participants have no choice but to buy the stock to close out their short positions.”* 

I don’t think this is necessarily inaccurate, but I think it’s misguided, and the language here is a bit to emotive for my taste. I think the reason the company didn’t go bankrupt is because of the strategic share offering made by Ryan Cohen to build up more cash than the company’s valuation (at the time). All the other stuff was just dressing, DFV and retail did not make RC do this, this move by RC is what ensured the company literally can’t go bankrupt, until then (and at the time this was posted) it was still a risk in my opinion. So this huge thanks feels kinda like a pre-cum celebration, and I've never really liked putting Keith on a pedestal, he's just an individual investor, just like the rest of us.
​
FAQ, Published April 12, 2021, by u(slash)BYE_TRIANGLE

*“Why does Holding do anything?”* *“They need your shares to cover their short positions! They got greedy. Thinking GameStop would fail, the short sellers started Naked Shorting the stock. Long story short they created synthetic stocks with their special privileges as Market Makers. But they can’t cover a short with a synthetic share. So because of the Naked Shorting, the Short Sellers, multiple large greedy money managers, and Hedge Funds need a total number of shares greater than the number available to purchase. THEY NEED EVERY SHARE, EVEN YOURS CONAN!”* *“aRe YoU GuYs MaNipuLatIng THe MaRKeT?!”* 

Holding does something else that I think is really important. It proves that retail is not responsible for the manipulation of the price. You see it in the mainstream media every time the price fluctuates, they say that retail and Roaring Kitty is driving the price up for the memes, and that the ‘meme stock craze is dead’ whenever the price falls, claiming that retail is selling. However, it quickly becomes clear to anyone with the willingness to research that retail holds. Holding doesn’t move the price at all, so they literally can’t blame this sub for the fuckery that happens.
Now, on the flip side, I know people on the old sub to buy and sell with these fluctuations, they did it during the sneeze and I’ve seen comments claiming to do it last week. I think this is why Roaring Kitty really had to speak to congress about this, because a legitimate-seeming argument could be made that retail was buying and selling at high volumes. The loss and gain porn on the old sub could be presented as evidence. Here though, apes hold, we glaze purple doughnuts.
So when MOASS does happen, the massive price increase will be only due to buying pressure from SHFs, so they are the only ones that can take the blame for what happens next.

*“No one knows how high the squeeze could take the stock price. The best rational reasoning says that these numbers \[500k per share\] are possible through the laws of supply and demand. Furthermore, it is likely that the Short Percentage is a lot higher than reported, with many suggesting that the short-sellers, cumulatively, need more than 100% of the float to cover.”* 

A lot of naysayers will claim people are insane for thinking that phone number prices are possible. They will cite that it would make the company’s valuation higher than the amount of money in the world, which is true. However, with the nature of fraudulent naked shorts being fake, the price is fake too, and the valuation of the company doesn’t necessarily mean that the whole float will be sold at those prices. Yes, it shouldn’t be possible, by all accounts it wouldn’t make sense, but it is possible due to the naked shorting. Also, institutions that own shares likely won’t HODL out for the phone number prices, they will sell when they think it’s safe, and when they won’t get in trouble with the SEC for destroying the economy. The infinity pool (the shares that will be sold at these prices) will be a small fraction of the total amount even among retail investors. So the argument that I see against the possibility of this doesn’t hold a lot of weight.
Keep in mind that even though ‘buying pressure’ moves the price up, someone has to be willing to sell in order for someone to buy. So as the price creeps up from $100 to $1000 to $100000 to $8675309 someone will be selling on the way up to get there.

*“Synthetic long positions could be used to disguise their short positions as well, the mechanisms behind this practice utilize the options markets and could explain some of the crazy options activity that we have seen in GameStop the last few months.”* 

So uhm… I don’t understand ‘Synthetic Longs’ at all. Could an ape with more wrinkles elaborate on this? From what I can extrapolate, this may refer to an institution purchasing a naked shorted share from someone else?

*“While at the same time they employed the use of social engineering to slowly depress the positive sentiment for the stock on Reddit and elsewhere.”* *“You may have been called a Shill for one of a number of reasons. This community is very inclusive and open to everyone, but because of the blatant attacks this forum has suffered a lot of people are understandably paranoid. (Myself included). Please, unless you really are a shill, don’t take it personally.”* 

I want to address this, because there is a lot of misconception about SuperStonk. A lot of people will claim that this sub is just an echo chamber cult that can’t handle anyone questioning the narrative. This may seem true on the surface, but I think the reality is just that we’ve become hyper sensitive to the social engineering the old sub fell victim to, and I remember this sub being attacked with that as well. So whenever we see a post that has extremely emotive language, we become skeptical and down vote it. Emotions have no place in investing, that is a common rule touted in even the oldest investing books, so posts that try to incite an emotional response are shot down. Apes aren’t about to be manipulated again. That being said there are emotive posts that still get upvoted, ones with positive hype-filled narratives. Since these get upvoted and the negative ones don’t that sometimes gives the impression of an echo chamber. This is because the facts do support the MOASS thesis, so a hype title and opening paragraph is just more agreeable with the facts-based narrative. Some people are just scrolling on their phone and don’t have time to read the whole post.
However, if you go into the comments of these posts, there are apes investigating the profile history to determine if posters are bots, regardless of the pushed narrative. If you look past the upvote counter, apes are very skeptical of any post that isn’t based in fact or harmless memes. The comments rule the post, and I have to say I’ve very proud of this sub for staying vigilant in the wake of Reddit restricting moderation tools.

*“Ryan Cohen clearly believes in Gamestop, to the point of announcing that he will be taking equity as compensation. In fact, as of writing this all of the new Gamestop board members are going to be taking equity as compensation. This is seen as an incredibly bullish sign of the company's future success.”* 

This is one of the principles of Deep Value investing, I wish this was elaborated on more of why this is bullish. This means that the board, and more importantly Ryan Cohen, is tying their individual self-worth to the company. Due to this tie, they will essentially ‘go down with the ship’ if the company goes down. This means that the board and Ryan actually have an interest in the company doing well, instead of having an interest in making money off the company. You may think this sounds like the same thing, but it’s not. If RC cared more about money than the company, then he could destroy the company to make money (this is what’s happening to popcorn), but by tying his worth to the shares, the only way for him to become richer is for the company to flourish.
I don’t really like the language being used here, stuff like ‘clearly believes’ ‘seen as incredibly bullish’ are all pretty emotive and doesn’t actually explain why these are positive growth signs for the company, they are just saying it is ‘bullish’, the average new investor isn’t even going to know what that really means. Even though GME is extremely manipulated, causing Technical Analysis to become increasingly difficult to depend on, the investment is still rooted in fundamentals of deep value.

*“Below is a shortlist of some of the potential catalysts people are speculating about:* 

-A Stock Split, or some similar move from Gamestop that recalls shares
-Gamma Squeeze
-Gamestop’s Q1 Earnings Call
-Some speculate Gary Gensler (Newly appointed head of the SEC), may make some move that sets things in motion
-DTCC rule changes taking effect
-Appointment of a new CEO”
Yeah… this feels bad man. I’ve talked about this already, but we can rapid fire down this list.
The stock split didn’t work out, since those in charge of distributing the splits did it fraudulently. Gamma Squeeze is the kind of thing that could trigger a smaller hedge fund to get margin called and cause a domino effect, but I’ve shared my theory of the OTC action. Earnings are nice, but public sentiment has always been more tied to the media manipulation than actual facts. Fucking Gary.
On the subject of bringing in new talent, I do feel like a big move will happen soon. We’ve already seen a lot of job offerings from the Corporate side of GameStop so this could be the next phase of the plan. I really think that RC has spent these last few years taking precautions to make sure the company can’t go bankrupt, the last thing he wants is to turn out like Toys-R-Us. A lot of downsizing happened, so now he can start thinking about upsizing again.
I’m not necessarily saying that these things can’t trigger the squeeze, but I am saying that depending on something to start it is just inviting disappointment. I think the ‘no dates’ rule has been sorely forgotten lately with all the hype and speculation around Roaring Kitty’s tweets and stuff. I am a zen ape, it happens when it happens.

*“First of all, it is incredibly important to note your potential biases when determining if someone is just a shill trying to spread FUD. Not all FUD is invalid, someone may bring up a solid point against an otherwise great DD, and that could scare you. Remember that just because you do not like what someone is saying, doesn’t make it invalid. It is important users here work with constructive criticism to refine their theories.”* 

Damn, wasn’t I just talking about this? This critique isn’t going to just be wagging fingers, this is really good stuff that still applies today, and from what I’ve seen apes are doing a great job of distinguishing between FUD and legitimate criticism. I also want to take a second to thank the mod team, especially after their tools were restricted, they’ve been a great help.

*“…but since then retail investors have been buying on every single dip in the price… That's more than two whole months of buying-the-dip. Now, I will not speculate on numbers here, if you want to know more you will have to read the DDs on that.”* 

This is pretty outdated now. Apes have been buying for three years now, and with the advent of Direct Registering we have a much better idea of how much apes hold. I can say with confidence now that retail owns a floats worth of shares. Since there is so much naked shorting, a lot of institutions probably own their own floats too.
I glaze those purple doughnuts, yum.
​
Citadel Has No Clothes, Published March 14, 2021, by u(slash)ATOBITT
Ohhhh, this one is special to me, I read it when it first came out, first time I was there on release night. Let’s see how it hodls up.

*“TL;DR - Citadel Securities has been fined 58 times for violating FINRA, REGSHO & SEC regulations. Several instances are documented as 'willful' naked shorting. In Dec 2020 they reported an increase in their short position of 127.57% YOY, and I'm calling bullsh\*t on their shenanigans.”* 

58 times. I don’t actually know how much that number has gone up, but I’m sure it has. I am reminded of an old saying, that if the punishment for a crime is a fine, then it only a crime for the poor. The crime being done to GME is class warfare, it’s nothing less.

*“$295,347,948,000 of that is split into options (calls & puts), while $78,979,887,238 (20.52%) is allocated to actual, physical, shares (or so they say). The rest is convertible debt securities.”* 

This is why I’m skeptical that it’s even possible for Citadel to get margin called by a normal price run-up. Let’s do some math here. GME’s float is at 232 million-ish shares, let’s say they shorted 300% of that, just to be conservative (lmao), so that’s 696 million. To take what the first post said, Margins don’t get called unless an entities’ collateral becomes less than 80% of what they’ve borrowed. If they use their entire $384,926,232,238 portfolio as collateral, then GME would have to soar to a price of… divide by 4, multiply by 5… $691.32 per share. That may sound relatively reasonable, but I don’t think a normal catalyst would be enough for that. I really think interest rates are the key, think about it, if they have to pay like 30% interest on all of those shares, their portfolio will be reduced by that much (kinda) and we can find a much more reasonable midpoint. Now brace yourselves, I’m about to spend an unreasonable amount of effort on something that is probably wrong because I don’t know shit about fuck about margins or getting called (I have a cash account and I lack rizz).
In order to calculate that we gotta do one of those double equation variable bullshit things we all hated in school, I forgot what they were called but I remember how to do them.
So, we have a few variables:
C = Citadel’s Portfolio = $384,926,232,238
S = Shorted Shares = 696,000,000
I = Intrest = 0.30
X = Price Per Share
Y = Citadel’s new portfolio amount after paying interest
So, X and Y are undetermined, but we have two equations to work with
C – I(X*S) = Y
This one calculates how much money is going to be in citadels new portfolio after paying interest, we calculate the interest by multiplying the cost per share, by the amount of shorted shares, and multiplying that by the interest rate, then subtracting it from their total portfolio.
Y * 1.25 = X * S
This one calculates the total amount those shorted shares have to be in order for Citadel to get margin called, by multiplying their new portfolio by 5/4 and calculating the total cost of the shares.
X * S has a direct value; we can plug the left side of the second equation into the first to get
C – I(Y*1.25) = Y
Now we just gotta isolate Y on one side of the equation.
C = Y + 0.3(Y*1.25)
C = 1.3Y * 0.375
C= 0.4875Y
C * 0.4875 = Y
Y = $187,651,538,216.03
Now we gotta find X, we can just plug in the other stuff.
(Y* 1.25)/ 696,000,000 = X
X = $337.02 per share for shitadel to get margin called on 30% interest.
Holy shit, now that’s what I call reasonable. See how much interest can completely fuck a portfolio? They lost almost half of their portfolio value to a 30% interest to this. This is why the whole market will bleed red on the run up to MOASS, they will have to sell half of their portfolio just to pay the interest.
Citadel is probably not a good example of this, since they print the naked shorts themselves... so they would be paying interest to... themselves... when they borrow them? Citadel is so fucked up, I don't have enough wrinkles for this.
But hey, I think the concept of what I said is fine. High interest rates can reduce collateral and cause margin calls. Hey, just out of curiosity, how much is the borrowing interest rate looking now?
16.5%
SHF are fucked.
​
Anyway, I’m writing this on a Wordpad document so I’m not sure if I’ve come up on the character limit, but I think I’m getting close so I’ll end this part here. Please let me know what I’ve got wrong or any insights you want to share, I’ll be sure to talk about any interesting comments when I do a part 2!
TLDR: I am reviewing the Diamond Handbook (2nd) and seeing what has changed in the three years since it’s been compiled. I have a bias in thinking that high borrowing interest rates are what will cause MOASS, and that is shown here. This is not meant to be an impartial analysis, just my thoughts. Not financial advice.

I see a lot of people's post being frustrated with remix and that's sad to see, I am sorry to hear some people aren't enjoying it as much as expected, I hope it becomes more fun for them or gets fixed as they see fit.
For myself, I just hit level 70 this morning, the process felt fast, maybe not as fast as spamming time walking dungeons but it was a fun and accelerated leveling process that wasn't as mind numbing boring as spamming time walking. 100% bonus experience starting with alts is still 100% bonus experience (that will go up from there as you level), it might not be ultra fast immediate max level leveling, but again its an accelerated way to level in a fun fresh way, I plan on adding at least two more max level classes to my account with the event. The first character went fast for me, the next two will go faster, I definitely have the interest to do at least two more.
I haven't run into any scaling issues at all, I have been primarily focused on questing (completing whole campaigns by zone for achievements for bronze) and I've only done LFR, normal dungeons and scenarios. So I don't know if its because they have been hotfixing or if the scaling issue is just in higher difficulty group content? I am saving normal/heroic raids and heroic dungeons for post level 70 remix "endgame" so to speak. I plan doing a lot of them once I finish up the quest campaigns (hopefully by end of day), maybe I will get more frustrated with remix then and feel differently, but I am hoping by the time I finish the campaigns my character will be pretty scaled up.
Questing this much the leveling felt really fast to me and I did always feel OP. From level 10 to 70 I was chain pulling and my slew of tinker gems were popping off together killing enemies randomly. I don't know if questing helped with my gem pool compared to people focusing on group content but I hit level 70 with three legendary gems already and every tinker gem unlocked. I don't know if I have all the cogwheel and meta gems, but I have a lot and the two I want to use. From doing so many quests with the speed of remix and dragonriding I am drowning in the caches, I blink and and one bag completely full and I have to spam open them and managing gear upgrades. I got the Infinite power XII achivement and the toys for the wings effect shortly after hitting level 70.
TIP: To help towards feeling OP, no reason you shouldn't have all timeless scroll 1 hour buffs up at all times, I am drowning in the scrolls and use all six on rotation to make my character more powerful.
I am somebody who tries to collect a lot of transmog, so the bronze and slew of armor sets easily available is a big motivation for me, I am hoping to pocket most of them before the end of the event and some of the more cooler mounts. I have 40K bronze so far from questing and hiting 70.
Overall this experience has made me realize I really did not appreciate pandaria as much as I should have back in the day.
My biggest complaint is the gear and gem system UI is clunky, its getting old constantly having to replace gear, removing gems (even by scrapping) and resocketing gems manually, its slowing me down more than anything else. I wish they streamlined that a little bit. I got an addon that helps show which gems I have in a better UI, but it still feels a pain.
EDIT: I forgot one other complaint, spending bronze to upgrade gear is bad, it should be a separate currency, I shouldn't have to pick between cosmetics and better gear for the event.
My only other issue is I don't want to stop playing remix long enough to switch back to retail and finish up some of my weekly tasks.

I'm on chapter 8, and realized that the combat simulator battles offer up additional materia. I knew the summon ones existed, but ignored the rest thinking they were silly side content and challenges.
Then I scrolled down and realized there are combat trainings for each character... I have struggled to figure out how so many systems work in this game because I had NO CLUE these existed. Finally red xiii makes sense, aerith doesn't suck, and Jesus Tifa's chi system makes her INFINITELY more powerful.
Haha, I'm an idiot. Did anyone else miss these too?