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Here No Longer

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  1. Here No Longer
    There are some TV series that just seem to bring out nostalgia in everyone. They may not be as good as we remember them to be, but there's nonetheless a reason to why these shows are classics in our hearts. The Twilight Zone is one of those series for many fans of science fiction as well as those of the macabre and the strange. The writing is usually solid (I do mean usually, since even Rod Serling himself has written a few duds), and the pacing is usually done quite well. Most episodes have an interesting premise, and usually deliver on utilizing the potential to intrigue with heir episodes, with well-written plot twists at the end of episodes that shock the audience into a love of the series. This will be a list of the episodes that did what Twilight Zone does best with nearly flawless execution, and a very short review for each, that may be 2 or 3 lines long giving the gist of why they are ranked where they are.
    Before we start, let's go through the 6 Honorable Mentions (it was really hard to mention less than that) for this list: 
    These are "On Thursday We Leave for Home", "The New Exhibit", "Nightmare at 20,000 Feet", " The Masks", "Number 12 Looks Just Like You", and "The Invaders." These were all really good episodes, even if they couldn't make this list.  This wasn't listed in any particular order, but the closest to the list would probably be "Nightmare at 20,000 Feet." The episode was written extremely well. Probably would have put it in the list if I didn't have a slight bit of a bias against William Shatner as am actor. 
    THE TWENTY BEST EPISODES OF THE TWILIGHT ZONE
    20. "Twenty-Two"- This episode is very creepy, and entertaining. It also has a clever way of hiding it's most major plot twist by throwing in a small twist a few times in a way that just works so well with the episode itself. I'm not going to spoil the ending, but that really made it for me. It's amazing, and well thought out, even as Twilight Zone episodes go. 
    19. "People are Alike All Over"- This episode had an interesting way of sneaking in a premonition at the beginning, that sounded like it was meant positively, but, ironically, actually made for one of the most gripping, dark, and clever plot twists of the entire series. Of course, keeping this spoiler free yet again.
    18. "Nothing in the Dark"- As like "Twenty-Two", another very creepy episode with some clever writing, as well as probably some of the better acting in the series. At first we think the old lady is completely crazy (she really seemed that way), but, in another one of the great classic Twilight Zone plot twists, it's actually so revealed she wasn't quite as we thought.
    17. "Nick of Time"- Oh great, another good one with Shatner that would have been better if Jack Klugman or the like were in it instead. Nonetheless, the episode was intriguing to say the least, and it had almost perfect pacing and an extremely intriguing premise. But seriously, Shatner must have had an amazing agent to be in this many classics...
    16. "The Hitchhiker"- I was really amazed (and sort of but not really creeped out) with this one when I initially watched this one as a kid, and it still is very interesting to this day. Really, I must have watched this one 20 times and the twist ending still gets me. Though it's presented in such a way it makes sense once it's revealed to you. Almost as well paced as "Nick of Time."
    15. "It's a Good Life"- Classic and very creepy episode. But since I feel like I may get questions on why it's so low, I'll answer you this: the ending was in no way startling or surprising. I expected that sort of ending from the story considering the boy's powers as well as his narcissistic traits. Also, it was slightly too out there for me to like that much.
    14. "Will the Real Martian Please Stand Up?"- Another classic. Absolutely amazing episode, and the real plot twist was completely unexpected. I would never have expected the way it ended. It would be top 5 though if it were harder to actually figure out who the martian was. I hadn't watched it in years and knew who it was by the 5 or 6 minute mark.
    13. "The Midnight Sun"- Another intriguing Twiight Zone episode. Almost tired of using the word, but it's too much of a match for the episodes and Twilight Zone as a whole. Anyways, a big factor as to why this is above some of the classics everyone likes is how the ending actually turned out. I was legitimately SHOCKED by how it ended.
    12. "Where is Everybody?"- An episode with an amazing premise, and amazing acting that really did quite the job of complementing the situation. The ending was like the ending "The Hitchhiker" sort of. It's a twist that still sort of gets me, and it actually makes perfect sense of the entire episode when you think about it.
    11. "Eye of the Beholder"- This episode has certifiably the BEST ending of the entire series, that alone justifies it's placement here. But the seamless execution of the whole episode's premise reallt sealed the deal for its spot on this list. I'm actually having trouble not spoiling this one because the ending was so perfect...
    10. "And the Sky Was Opened"- This is an odd one out, there's no real twist or shocking ending here. Just an episode that's well paced (it is a tad on the slow side), that's a thrill to watch every time. . It is completely unnerving to watch what happens to the main characters over the course of this episode. Very creepy and weird, but in a good way I promise.
    09. "The Obsolete Man"- A cautionary tale against authoritarian government. A well-written masterpiece with an interesting premise, that Burgess Meredith executed almost flawlessly, as the librarian in this episode. What it ended up being is a classic that I've yet to see a bad word about, and after watching it, it's easy to see why.
    08. "Living Doll"- An unnerving cautionary tale against bad stepfathers, that borders the line of macabre. The great thing about this episode is that this is one time where a seemingly evil doll is actually acting out of good faith, or so it could seem like. The piece was paced well, with acting that fit the story very well.
    07. "Long Distance Call"- This was a weird one to say the least. No real twist at the end, but nonetheless satisfying. Sure it was one of the six episodes done in videotape, but quality scripting and the execution of the script in itself more than accounts for it. Won't spoil anything for you here, and considering there'd be spoilers very early on, can't say much more.
    06. "Walking Distance"- A weird episode that involved some timey-wimey things, and a very strange visit of a 30-some year old man into the town of his childhood. The episode was presented fairly well, and the situation presented very well. Literally the only issue keeping it from trumping a similar episode later on is that the pacing could have been a little bit better.
    05. "The After Hours"- One of the most creative  and properly paced episodes of the series, that has perhaps one of the best endings. I will not spoil it for you, here however. I will just say this: the woman you follow in the story is not exactly what she appears to be, and the 9th floor of that department store is, for all intents and purposes, the Twilight Zone. 
    04. "To Serve Man"- An absolute classic, and it is not hard to see why. It is the best written episode in the entire series, bar none. The episode also has a very nice twist at the end (that at least SOMEBODY should have been suspicious of all along), that was nonetheless a little bit predictable (why it's only number 4 on this list).
    03. "A Stop at Willoughby"- This was the episode I was talking about earlier on in the list. This is basically a better version of "The Walking Distance" with improved pacing, a miserable woman that never deserved the main character's affection, and an ever-so slightly improved premise. I debated where to position this one, I was initially going to put it second actually.
    02. "Time Enough at Last"- This episode is considered one of the show's absolute best, for good reason. The plot flows extraordinarily well, and all of the several twists and turns feel highly impactful to the episode's progression. I'm also not spoiling the ending, but after the twist at the end, I feel particularly sorry for the main character of this episode.
    01. "The Monsters are Due on Maple Street"- Bar none the best episode in he entire series, that is the best representation of Rod Serling's writing genius, and it has definitively the best acting in the show's entire 156 episode run. This episode is so close to flawless I might as well just say every facet is flawless and among the best in the series.
     
    I will end on this note, that this series deserves all of the praise it has gotten over the years. Even with all of the duds in the show's run (JESS-BELLE), the show is in general an absolutely fantastic venture into the unknown that will likely leave you wanting more and wishing it hadn't ended so soon after watching all of the episodes. The show is just about as much of a masterpiece as I remember it being. An impressive show that's probably about a 9/10 in my book, because the stellar outnumber the terrible MASSIVELY. I would have a hard time making a list half this size talking about terrible episodes, and with this list, I had to take some greats out and not even mention them, episodes like "The Dummy" that was absolutely stellar (To be honest, if I had to rank it it would probably be somewhere between 27 and 30). More A+'s than D's or lower, surely. Absolutely wonderful series that I couldn't recommend enough to fans of 60's television, the macabre, or science-fiction.
     
  2. Here No Longer
    Well, I've really been recently thinking a LOT about love. Why? Well, because I've been having the feeling that I need a man to love. A man I can depend on, a steady shoulder to lean on. I know that I'm not the best candidate for a lover, and I never have been. I'm definitely not a looker for sure, and I have my fair share of issues. But here goes, a description of my ideal boyfriend, by how important the specific traits are to me... I know I already posted most of this in a thread before, but I'm going to get into other things I didn't get into there.
     
     
    NECESSARY
     
    He has to love me for who I am. I know it's nice to be able to find a guy who also likes my appearance (well my lack of a decent one may make that a little bit of a challenge...), but it's much more important that he is really fine with dating an absurdly skinny nerd that has almost no dexterity, is more than likely autistic, and has anxiety and depression issues. He has to be at least 16 years old at the moment. I don't want to have to deal with parents that are too concerned if they're dating another dude that's more than 5 years older than they are... Even 16 is iffy though...      
    GOOD TO HAVE
     
    He and I should share a few interests. My interests include: Cartoons, particularly Steven Universe, MLP, Rick and Morty, and We Bare Bears. Also I'm really enjoying Hazbin Hotel as of now. Video Games, particularly Super Smash Bros., Mario games, Paladins/Overwatch, and Borderlands/Fallout. Tabletop arena games, like Heroclix. I'm developing my own, you know!   Science Fiction, including things like Star Trek and the Twilight Zone. Music. I personally played the Tuba in band for years... So you know I'm more than capable   (I'm sick...) Pixar movies. I'm sorry, but if you don't like Finding Nemo or Toy Story, you more than likely won't like me. He should respect my space. I'm extremely introverted and at times I just have to be away from people. Even people I'm really close to...  He needs to have a good heart. I couldn't date an intolerant jerk, because I love people that love me. It's just the way I work. He's got to be a little bit perverted...   Trust me when I say that I'm very much that way... though it's been getting tamer recently. It would be great if his viewpoints were similar enough to mine. I don't want to have an argument about stuff every 5 minutes. I mean it is nice to disagree on a couple of things, but that definitely has its limits. I'll tell you that I'm a bit left on politics and my viewpoints on things are far from conservative. Although I share some viewpoints with conservatives. He needs to be able to start a conversation with me. I have huge issues with starting a dialogue with other people. It helps if he can make me laugh sometimes. I know that I don't have much of a sense of humor, but I like being humored to a degree. He has to have some level of intelligence. I think that I have an IQ of around 135-140, so I'm not sure I could handle a dope well...       PREFERRED PHYSICAL ATTRIBUTES (Not that important)   A few inches taller than me (around 6' maybe). I don't mean to seem racist, but I prefer white men. I had a crush from a video game for a little bit who happens to be black, though. Not overly muscular. or fat. Neither looks that good in my opinion. Yet again, I'll say this isn't too important so... Yeah. I don't have much of a preference for age, but I'd like a man around my age. Like teens or early twenties.  
    So there it is, I guess... I don't know what else to say here, other than I'm still open to the idea of an open relationship, it's not a must anymore I don't think.
     
     
     
  3. Here No Longer
    I have a feeling that a top X blog post has been overdue for me for a while. Well, I guess this must be the equivalent of me going to return that library book I couldn't find until I managed to locate it under the couch cushions.   All I can say is it got there somehow and really I have no idea how it would be possible for a book to be in that position.
     
    Anyways, I've been waiting to do this for a while. Cartoons have been a great source for inspiration for some people, me even included in my line of 'work' (if you somehow didn't know, I'm sort of in the works for creating a tabletop game that I hope will hit its mark and see ample success) if you want to call it that. Heck, they can even inspire people to adopt a whole different look on life. Some of these characters have done just that for me, though most of them on this list have really just been characters that I find appealing, well-written, relatable, or a mix thereof. This WILL also include characters from upcoming cartoons, so you know that you should expect them on this list.
     
    Honorable Mentions:
    Rawhide- I really like the sort of wide-eyed, but a little gritty concept of what Rawhide's character seems to be like, and how it contrasts with the setting of the show. 
    Panda Bear- I honestly think he's adorable, and very hard not to like in some way considering his mannerisms as well as just how sweet he can be.
    Sandy Cheeks- Well, yeah she did become a sort of 2-dimensional after season 3 or 4, in her glory days it felt like she had a real identity, and it was a likeable one.
    Samurai Jack- I feel like his character design was actually rather intuitive and a great contrast to Aku, who will be in the list if you don't already know.
    Craig (South Park)- I feel like he's really the only actual voice of reason in South Park, and it's made him my favorite character in the show.
     
    15. Gir- Honestly, Gir is the entire reason this is a top 15 and not a top 10 instead. I couldn't not mention him on the list. I feel like he needed to be mentioned here because of just how freaking adorable he is, with his little green dog costume and his mannerisms and everything else. He also serves as a pretty obvious contrast to the rest of the show's tone.
    14. Rarity- Rarity to me seems like one of those characters that's a lot more complicated than she seems. She does have this sort of detail-orientation that really helps her in her line of work, but she is also (usually) able to see the bigger picture. She also seems dainty, but as has been shown throughout the series she can be quite brutal as well. Those are just two examples of that.
    13. Morty C137- Or was it Marty McFly...? Oh whatever. Morty is written quite well as a sort of awkward teenage boy with a lot of, erm, puberty-related issues. I find him relatable in the sense that he's an anxious, nervous wreck with self-esteem issues like myself. Though unlike me he's still naïve enough to just go along with stuff.
    12. Fluttershy- Yes, another MLP character, and she's not the only one. I like Fluttershy because of a few things. She goes out of her way to be very kind to others even when it serves her no purpose, she has a relatable lack of social skills, and she retains this sort of personality without feeling two-dimensional with her occasional anger and assertion.
    11. Toffee- I think there really need to be more villains like Toffee in animation. He's a great and evil schemer, with a lack of empathy and more intelligence than any of the other villains that have been in the show thus far. I also like him because of how his name conflicts so blatantly with what kind of character he actually is being that in real life it is actually a dessert.
    10. Pearl- In the show's long and horrendous first season, I found Pearl to be bossy and overly obsessive-compulsive. Though, like most of the cast, her depth was tapped into later. It turns out she has a side of her that lacks confidence, a side of her that shows genuine concern for the people of Earth, and even a side of her that's even a little edgy. And that's only three of many.
    09. Discord- The MLP equivalent of Star Trek's Q. I think he's not been treated quite the way I would wish for him to be receiving from the writers, but nonetheless Discord is a shining example of a trickster. He does whatever he wants, however and whenever he wants. It makes him a bit of a wild card, even after being reformed. He still plays tricks on the mane six from time to time.
    08. Angel Dust- Is it wrong to say that I want to be a little (and I do mean a little) more like a gay prostitute spider demon that gets high on, well, ANGEL DUST? Well, it probably is, but I legitimately feel that way about Angel Dust. I wish I had his sass, and his freaking getup. Nonetheless, I do like him for other reasons as well. I like his generally nonchalant and sarcastic attitude towards bettering himself. He really just doesn't give a f*** about becoming a better and less morally questionable spider demon. Though he really has this attitude in general.
    07. Steven Universe- Steven in the first season was, admittedly, an immature and obnoxious specimen. But afterwards as time went on and on, he matured and gained a lot more compassion for everything and everyone. Aside from of course things that do hurt everything including flies, he really wouldn't hurt a fly. I also find him to have become a very mature character, maturing even beyond his father's years. Honestly, I'd think from what I've seen Steven would actually make a great therapist. I'm not kidding, he's talked people out of a lot of the show's conflicts.
    06. Squidward- Squidward, in my opinion, is what made SpongeBob the great cartoon it once was before he took the path of just becoming a grouch. Before that, Squidward seemed to be a rather well-written and designed character that a lot of us SpongeBob fans who are adults now can really relate to. I bet you've encountered plenty of kids that act like SpongeBob all the time. I know I have and more. He counter-acted the silliness of the show by being the more serious of the characters in the show, but nonetheless, engages in some of it himself.
    05. Aku- Aku is basically one step up from Discord. Another fun-loving master of chaos, Aku spends his time tormenting Samurai Jack in his playfully malevolent manner and ordering EXTRA THICC henchmen (to do what with, I'm honestly not sure). I mostly just like him for the same reasons I like Discord, being that he's a trickster that does what he wants, when he wants, and how he wants to do it. He's also a great villain in the sense that he took control of the world for thousands of years, until Ashi and Jack went back in time to finish him off.
    04. Ice Bear- Polar Bear... I mean, Ice Bear is sort of a bad@$$. He can engineer, cook, fight, sneak... Really, he's a jack of all trades. But his ability to converse with other people is so stunted that he only speaks in simple sentences and in the third person and even then he only does so when really necessary. He also has a relatable aversion to coffee, albeit for different reasons... Like he becomes a violent, hyperactive maniac when he drinks even a little bit of coffee (I just find it a wee bit too strong, and I could start bouncing off of walls, but nothing like that). 
    03. Moondancer AND Twilight Sparkle- I put them both in the same spot, because I like them for very similar reasons. They're both the nerdy/geeky types with plenty of anxiety to boot. I mean sure I don't read books like they do, but I can definitely relate to how they geek out about things. If it were just this, than Moondancer would be better to me than Twilight, but I like what Twilight has become. She's become less of a bookish geek and more of a teacher, as well as more of a . She even does this without losing a ton of what made her likable in the first place, with all of her twilighting that she does and all, she's still just as relatable as ever in her personality and feels not even remotely close to a Mary Sue. But, that only makes it a tie I can't decide between.
    02. Rick C137- Or was it Doc Brown...? ANYWAYS... Rick is a character I also find to be well-written with a lot of nuances that really lead to what kind of person he is. His nihilism can be attributed to his ability to travel to multiple different worlds in different parts of space and even different timelines altogether (but the latter is rarely utilized) and realize how insignificant even he is in the grand scheme of things, his occasional playfulness can be attributed to his own attempts to counteract a long-seeded depression, and his depression stems from well, his nihilism as well as his past traumatic experiences. I also like Rick because I find his attitude towards the universe at large rather relatable, and his seeming insincerity to me is actually charming in it's own way.
    01. Garnet- Garnet is my favorite cartoon character of all time. Why? Well, she's went from just being like an overprotective and overly strict parent to being a powerful, compelling character with more nuance than you could have ever imagined back in season one of the show. I think it probably wasn't a secret that she's actually a fusion, but she's one of the few fusions that occurred because the two gems were in love. She's also proven herself to be a total bad@$$ in combat with the mental capacity to do things, like, PREDICT THE FUTURE. She's also developed her own personality as a fusion, that really allows her to be the roundest character I've ever seen in animation. It also helps her that the love fusion was of a lesbian couple, considering my own sexuality.
     
    Well, I suppose that's it for that. Not good at endings.
     
  4. Here No Longer
    Note for this list I'm only putting in characters that are not characters that I absolutely do not want to be in the game, like Minecraft Steve, the TF2 Heavy, and Master Chief (sorry but neither of them belong in Smash, particularly the Chief and the Heavy) and also characters I don't really particularly know of or know of any interest of being in the game. This list also includes a couple of characters I would want in the game that have had zero discussion about them (Cecil Harvey and Rabbid Mario (though Rabbid Peach has been discussed, and frankly Rabbid Mario would be a better idea)). Also NO FREDDY. Please NO FREDDY.
     
    S [What I really want to and think should get in]: Geno, Cecil Harvey (Please Sakurai), Marx, Lloyd, Shantae
    A [What I would be also happy with getting in]: Rabbid Mario (One can only dream), Crash Bandicoot, Bandana Dee, Phoenix Wright, Eggman, Shovel Knight
    B [What I would be a bit meh for getting in]: Hat Kid, Paper Mario, Rayman, Doom Slayer, Tails, King Boo
    C [What I wouldn't care to or sort of don't want in]: Shadow, Dixie Kong, Funky Kong, Waluigi, Dante, Sora (Think of who else this would allow in for a second)
     
    Please don't come to my house with torches and pitchforks
     
  5. Here No Longer
    Well after recently watching one of the best TV episodes in all of television, I really feel positive. I feel like expressing that positivity into what I see for 2019. The potential for maybe something good to happen to me for once. Maybe it will be the best year of my entire life. Although I'll be the first to admit, the opposite may once again be true, and if it were bad enough it could be my last year of life (You know what I'm implying here), I'm really looking forward to a year in and of itself for the first time, quite literally ever. I know this is about 3 weeks late, but I'll dive into it here. Why exactly do I feel cautiously optimistic about 2019? Well here are a couple of reasons.
     
     
    ~What's coming out in 2019?~
     
    There are some AMAZING things coming out this year. Among them being Toy Story 4, Borderlands 3, Hazbin Hotel, and Long Gone Gulch. Toy Story 4 seems, so far, to be on its way to being a phenomenal ending place for the series (Here's the summary that says so). I really feel the hype on this one. As for Borderlands 3, I'm REALLY excited. It's another Borderlands game, what do I have to say here? As for Hazbin Hotel, it's been shaping up to be among my favorite adult animated shows of all time (I DOUBT it will beat out Rick and Morty and the older seasons of the Simpsons, but I think it will be up there). But nonetheless, definitely loving the dark creativity. And for Long Gone Gulch, the character concepts and the blending of genres are both QUITE intriguing to me. I see it being perhaps among the best of all time with the potential shown by Rawhide's character. I'm sure there's more to be excited about, but these are the main things. Like yes, the Bowser's Inside STory remake is a thing, and yes so are things like Infinity Train. But these are the things that REALLY make me feel like there's hope.
     
     
    Maybe a Chance at Love? <3
     
    I think it's ACTUALLY possible I'll find him. You now, the one. I know it's been a struggle in that department with you know the fact I as of now have a whopping 3 ex-boyfriends at the age of 21, but I've began to become hopeful in recent times I might find the fourth and maybe they'll revise that saying to "the fourth is the charm." But I have hope for a three reasons. Firstly, I have made my own blog post citing what I want in that department, and I'll link it right here. Secondly, over those 3 failed relationships, I gained a better understanding of how to make them work, or at least I'm led to believe so. And last, but not least, the potential move may help out a LOT here. If I moved in with my brother I'd be moving into the second largest city in the state and the seventh largest city in the country (San Antonio, Texas). By my math (and admittedly a few assumptions), that leaves me in that city alone... Just about 10,000 possibilities. Yes, 10 THOUSAND (for a male looking for a relationship with another of the same sex, that's an awful lot of possibilities). At least 1 ought to be compatible? Of course this is all me trying to be positive. The realism of this is still... a bit shaky at the very best.
     
  6. Here No Longer
    I never figured I would write a Part 2 to my original blog post, but I got inspirations from a status written by @Kyoshi mentioning the need to leave home because life f***ing stinks, and it angers me to know it's my dad's fault.. Wrote a post of my own in reply (I meant not to impose, it did kind of sound that way, my apologies), and this will be the long version of it. At my house, it's gotten so bad that soon enough I'll have no choice but to move away from my dad. I think I could explain it like this: My dad is making things WORSE for me than they would be otherwise (aside from if I were homeless, but even then in a town of a couple thousand like S_____ where I live, being homeless doesn't necessarily happen because of the people).
    He's a big part of the reason I have less than $200 to my name right now, and even then most of that was from helping out my grandma with sorting through my great uncle's belongings (which yes, he was there also), or other things to that effect. I've only been able to hang on to it for so long because at least he's not that horrific at keeping himself afloat that he's going to take (technically not stealing, because he's the representative payee on the bank account) the rest of my money. I've been led to believe that in the first year since I graduated, he spent $10,000 of my own money, and it sickens me. Sure, it's understandable to have spent part of it to help me out, but... ALL OF IT? Where does it GO? Oh, yes. It goes towards his pigs, which is what I believe he spent my money on (most of which was from my mother's inheritance, which was INTENDED to buy clothes and groceries)... Now there's no internet, no air conditioning (which in Texas, is a NECESSITY in the summer months), little food to eat, nothing to drink except the tap water (that nobody else will drink because it makes them SICK), and an infestation of pests including mice, wasps, and spiders... 
    He's had his pigs for 10 years now, and by my calculations, the pigs have somehow put him and everyone around him (including me) behind a grand total of $45,000, and that's just the PIGS... I never once saw any reason to really have faith in it, honestly. I knew better even as a kid than my dad did in his adulthood. He should have known that he was going to just put himself in serious debt, because he builds this elaborate pen for them, feeds them (which is a pretty huge operating cost) and they only get him about $300 a piece when he sells them.  You can probably see the problem with that, considering he only sold a couple a month on a really good year... Which compares not to the amount of money he F***ING WASTED. Oh and he doesn't waste money, either. He also is FANTASTIC at wasting time, his and mine alike.
    He doesn't stop bothering me. He'll always be saying he needs to do something, but actually be doing nothing but harassing me and making stupid juvenile humor at my expense. This wastes my time because I can't work on what I need to be, and I'd probably have gotten my project stuff done at least a month sooner, if not longer. He always likes to start stupid discussions about Trump and how everyone lies about him. He's got a point, but it applies to BOTH sides. The side who hates him can't stop bashing him, and the side who will never be made to dislike him can't stop doing the opposite. And both constantly LIE for the sake of their respective agendas. This leads me to another problem I have with him: we're extremely incompatible.   
    He and I are dissimilar people to such a degree that it makes him hard to live with. I like gaming and cartoons, while he has dumb reasons for hating both. He's a farmer (a bad one as I previously stated), while I don't really care much for farm work. His political views are far right, but mine are definitely a ways to the left (problem with somebody like my dad that can't listen to the other side of anything). He stays up until the wee hours of the morning watching TV and sleeps in front of it, but I usually prefer to sleep around 10. He likes the taste everything he grows in his garden, while there are a good few things I would prefer off the menu.... You get the picture. We are in (almost) no way compatible. 
    All of this has been feeding my emotional and financial woes for a while now, and I'm getting sick of it. I really can't stay here. If I do, I'm more than likely going to kill myself. This is no threat, just an eventuality. My situation will get so bad, so hopeless, that I'll steal 40 or so Acetaminophen pills from the cabinet (that he takes for what are likely rheumatoid arthritis pains) and take them all. It would hurt other people's feelings, yes, but it would end the pain. It would end the suffering. It would end the feeling of being a burden to everyone else... It would end everything, and that would be much more preferable than dealing with this torment. 
  7. Here No Longer
    I had an odd idea after watching a video of somebody playing some ROM game called Card Sagas Wars where Etna was a playable character. What if she were in Smash Bros. as a sort of Disgaea rep? This is the rabbit hole my ideas led to (of course it isn't a complete look at how they would function, doesn't mention end lag, frames are just ideas, etc.):
     
    ETNA (Disgaea)
     
    WEIGHT- 97 (for reference, that's the same as Luigi's)
    SPEED- Average (Both Ground and air)
    Movement?- Double jump, no other movement options
     
    Neutral- Etna performs a quick, long range spear jab [frame 3]. (2% handle, 5% edge)
    F-Tilt- Slower version of her Neutral, more knockback [frame 5]. (3% handle, 7% edge)
    Up-Tilt- Etna thrusts her spear upwards, skewering her opponent [longer hit-stun, frame 7]. (7% handle, 5% edge).
    Dash- Etna thrusts her spear low to the ground, knocking enemies up a fixed distance. [frame 10]. (10%)
    F-Smash- Impaler- Etna skewers hit opponents and throws them forward with her spear [longer hit-stun, comes out frame 14, charges up to frame 18]. (Uncharged- 13% handle 9% edge, Charged- 19% handle 13% edge).
    Up-Smash- Etna throws a prinny slave upward, where they perform a whirl attack with their daggers before dropping down where Etna catches them (and say “DUDE!”) [can be thrown as early as frame 10, as late as frame 15] (Uncharged- 7 hits each dealing 1% on hits 1-6, 5% on hit 6, Charged- “” 1.5% “”, 7%“”).
    Down Smash- Asteroid Drop- Etna throws herself upward, impaling her spear into an asteroid that explodes upon impact with the stage. [Starts up as early as frame 10 (hits on frame 20), as late as frame 18 (hits on frame 28)]. (Uncharged- 10% sour spot (handle) 20% sweet spot (explosion), Charged- 14% sour spot (handle) 28% sweet spot (explosion)).
    Neutral Air- Etna spins her spear clockwise around herself (similar to Palutena’s Neutral Air, slower, comes out on frame 7). (1.5% on hits 1-3, 4.5% on hit 4, reduced knockback).
    Forward Air- Etna twists her spear like a screw and propels herself forward (similar to Meta Knight’s Side Special, except less distance and less hits, comes out frame 18, increased hit stun). (Deals 1.5% on hits 1-4 edge, 5% on hit 5 edge, 2% on hits 1-4 handle, and 7% on hit 5 handle).
    Back Air- Etna performs a counter-clockwise somersault with her spear, hitting enemies behind her. This attack spikes. (Comes out frame 16) (Deals 10% handle and 20% edge damage, has increased knockback).
    Down Air- Plunges spear downward (Almost identical to Link’s, except no bounces, comes out on frame 15 (hitbox lasts until frame 20), deals only 12% on handle and 20% on edge).
    Neutral Special- Prinny Toss- Etna throws a prinny forward on frame 18, that speeds up with distance (speed stagnates at 30 units), dealing massive damage [Prinny screams “DUDE!” upon throwing”]. (Deals 24% damage on collision, 18% damage to characters, self (9%), in blast radius).
    Side Special- Beauty Beam- Etna fires a heart-shaped beam forward on frame 13, dealing tics of light damage on hit to enemies in a line front of her. (Total of 26 hits each dealing .6% damage).
    Down Special- Beauty Bounce- Etna throws a prinny under her on frame 12 that she then detonates with the blunt end of her spear, dealing a light amount of self-damage and knocking her far upward. Uses jumps. (Self-Damage- 5%, enemies caught in it- 15% (significantly less KB)).
     
    Final Smash- Dead End Chaos- Etna targets an opponent close in front of her, rallying five prinnies beside her for one final, beautiful attack where she launches nine spears at her opponent and then several prinnies, dealing 6% per spear hit and 14% per prinny detonated.
     
    Grab- Etna grabs characters by their legs. Grab range is short, but characters that escape the grab slip (putting them in hitstun), and they get dealt 6% damage.
    Up Throw- Etna squats and then throws her target upwards, hitting them with her spear on the way up. (4% damage on the initial throw, 5% damage from the spear)
    Forward Throw- Similar to the way throwing works in Disgaea, Etna throws the target forward. (4% damage, huge distance for percents)
    Back Throw- Etna turns around and then throws the target in the direction she’s now facing. (6% damage, goes decently far)
    Down Throw- Etna slams her target into the ground beneath her. (7% damage, decent length hit stun after colliding with the ground).
     
    ... Needless to say, there's a few things here that I'm not entirely sure about that may need to be nerfed. Her neutral B is absolutely crazy, giving her what is essentially a K. Rool blunderbuss shot
    but better in every possible way, having a blast radius, hitting more reliably, and it's even probably a frame or two faster. Her Back Air also has similarities to K. Rool's back air, but if you decided to
    merge it with the properties of Marth's sword (in her case it's a spear). Her down smash is an absolutely insane kill move, dealing almost 30% in the sweet spot when fully charged. For reference,
    the percent it would deal is about the same as a Falcon Punch. Oh and let's not forget that the added distance on her forward throw makes it really good as a kill throw. She also has a lot of hit
    stun, which will help her chain a bit more. Which is good considering she's got some moves that hit like a truck (*cough cough* Asteroid Drop *cough cough*).
     
    But she also has some downsides. Her back throw is pretty much her forward throw if it were bad, she doesn't really have any moves she can put out that quickly except her nair.
    She also is going to have a big problem getting back to stage at lower percents considering her down B operates better as a vertical recovery at higher percents, and every time she recovers
    vertically she deals a little damage to herself... Her grab range would likely be about 65-70px, which is not really much (roughly the grab range of Little Mac or Meta Knight). Her jab also kind of
    sucks outside of jab locking, being that you'll likely only get 4% used twice after probably 5 or 6 frames (accounting for end lag, which isn't listed here yet. Just wanted to describe what kind of
    moves they'd be. Frame data is kind of conjecture at this point...).
     
    I will note her F Smash is COMPLETELY different from the ability that the name is referencing from the Disgaea games, and also this post is absurdly long. But there's a lot of moves on one
    character in Smash, so that's to be expected?
     
  8. Here No Longer
    Borderlands 1 v Borderlands 2 v Borderlands 3
     
    Category [Max Possible]
    Borderlands 1 (RM)
    Borderlands 2
    Borderlands 3
    Aesthetic [20]
    [18]
    [16]
    X [19]
    NPCs [50]
    [42]
    X [48]
    [33]
    Playable Characters [30]
    [24]
    X [26]
    [24]
    Story [50]
    [38]
    X [49]
    [37]
    Gun “Feel” [30]
    [28]
    [27]
    X [30]
    Weapon Variety [70]
    [58]
    [62]
    X [66]
    Skill Tree Design [70]
    [57]
    [63]
    X [64]
    Weapon-Based [30]
    X [30]
    [20]
    [23]
    Farming [50]
    [41]
    [30]
    X [45]
    Skill Design [50]
    [42]
    [43]
    X [44]
    General Fun Factor [50]
    [44]
    [46]
    X [48]
    Total [500]
    422
    430 [X]
    428
     
    Aesthetic- Really the graphics don't matter all too much, but Borderlands 3 is the game that takes it here for sure. The guns particularly probably have the best design of all three games quite easily. Borderlands 2 ends up the worst of the three because it's visuals now are starting to seem dated in comparison to the new visuals with quite a few noticeable differences. But this is no biggie.
     
    NPCs- Anybody who's played these games should really be easily able to see how Borderlands 2 takes the cake here. Handsome Jack is quite easily one of the best, well-written, video game villains of all time who's hilarious in his own right even in a game series devoted to a violent sense of humor that leaves the audience maniacally laughing. This is unfortunately where Borderlands 3 falters most though. Ava is straight up terrible, and the lack of many favorites from Borderlands 2 leaves there more to be desired, even among more humorous NPCs and Bosses like Captain Traunt.
     
    Playable Characters- Anybody who knows a little about my preferences will know the answer to this one. Axton single-handedly allows Borderlands 2 a victory in this category, even if I also really liked Krieg (because I do like OG Mordecai and Zane). The other two just don't have anything like the handsome, gorgeous husbando that is Axton... Seriously, he's quite something. No wonder he appears semi-naked in adult magazines inside of Moze's mech...
     
    Story- Borderlands 2 hits this category out of the park. The story of the second game is not only a masterpiece, but a demonstration of the potential of a Borderlands story arc. Roland's death hits the player HARD and really impacts them in a way they won't soon forget. Also the motivations of Jack are VERY well put out there. As for the other two games, Borderlands 1 has a very barebones story... It works, but it's nothing spectacular. Just an adventure to the Vault. Borderlands 3 on the other hand is a bit disappointing here, but I actually won't spoil it, thus the lack of spoiler tags.
     
    Gun Feel- Borderlands 3 simply takes this category and RUNS with it. The guns feel powerful and impactful like you're really firing a gun. The other two simply don't have this, and 2's in fact just feels like you're just using a bullet hose instead of a real gun in comparison.
     
    Weapon Variety- Borderlands 3 also easily takes this category with it's ABSURDLY high number of legendaries. You've got stuff as simple in design as the Crossroads that's essentially an SMG version of the old Conference Call, and then you have really unique weapons like the Duc that's essentially what happens when a Jakobs revolver meets a Torgue gun. Borderlands 1 is a clear loser here because there's so many far too similar legendaries that don't differentiate themselves (Looking at you, Tediores).
     
    Skill Tree Design- This is a close one, but Borderlands 3 takes it for its level 2 Action Skills, even if I have some gripes when it comes particularly to Fl4k's skill trees, because he's just overtuned and there's also some bad design with his ability to make weapons that should never crit able to. Borderlands 2 is a VERY close second particularly with the design of Krieg's skill trees. I absolutely adore the care they took to design a character that just rampages into battle, damaging himself but absolutely destroying everyone in his wake. Borderlands 1 is a distant third, thanks to Roland's skill trees being $#!+.
     
    Weapon-Based- This category was made specifically to tell you the thing I miss most about Borderlands 1 that ISN'T in 2 or 3. GUN PROFICIENCIES. I totally loved this mechanic, and instead of refining it further what do they do other than introduce one of the worst design choices in Borderlands history, the Badass Ranks (not censoring because that's just what they're called). Small buffs you get for seemingly no reason that apply to EVERY character... Guardian Ranks in 3 are better designed, but just please give us back our gun proficiencies (and our broken BL1 Shotguns).
     
    Farming- Borderlands 3 easily takes this category as it allows you to choose how you want to farm your legendaries. Whether you like farming one boss or you like Borderlands 2's style (which is the inferior way by the way, just saying), you can farm them up how you like. Now for BL2's way of farming, I HATE IT. It's tedious, long, and just ridiculous for some legendaries, and that's not even MENTIONING pearls. That's easily my LEAST favorite part of BL2 and it's biggest problem.
     
    Skill Design- Nothing really to say here except they just got progressively better at what they already were doing since the start, and that is to create interesting and diverse playstyles for each character. Still missing the Truxican Wrestler class mod though, and also the greatness that was Pistol Mordecai.
     
    General Fun Factor- Really just a category for anything I left out, and Borderlands 3 does it all the best of the three.
     
    Overall Winner- Borderlands 2, but barely. The problems with 3's story and NPCs are just too difficult to ignore, even if the gameplay is an improvement in every possible way.
     
    Also, republishing so everyone can see this. Shame on me.
  9. Here No Longer
    Rick and Morty Episode Tier List (Apparently not remade?)
     
     
    S: Tales from the Citadel, Rixty Minutes, Total Rickall, Rick Potion #9, Mortynight Run 
     
    A: The Ricks Must Be Crazy, The Rickshank Redemption, Rest and Ricklaxation, Rattlestar Ricklactica, Meeseeks and Destroy, Look Who’s Purging Now, One Crew over the Crewcoo’s Morty 
     
    B: A Rickle in Time, Close Rick-Counters of the Rick Kind, Pilot, Edge of Tomorty: Rick Die Rickpeat, The Whirly-Dirly Conspiracy, Rickmancing the Stone, The Old Man and the Seat, Pickle Rick                       
    C: M. Night Shyam-Aliens! (not how it's spelled, but how it should be spelled...), Morty’s Mind Blowers, Something Ricked this Way Comes, The Wedding Squanchers,                                                       Big Trouble in Little Sanchez, The ABC’s of Beth 
     
    D: Auto-Erotic Assimilation, Interdimensional Cable 2, Raising Gazorpazorp, The Rickchurian Mortydate, Lawnmower Dog, Get Schwifty 
     
    F: Claw and Hoarder: Special Ricktim’s Morty, Anatomy Park, Vindicators 3: the Return of World-Ender, Ricksy Business 
  10. Here No Longer
    Stages: 1 (No evolution, Legendary)
    Type: Psychic/Water
    Abilities: Madness*
     
     
    Base Stats: (Total- 600)
    Max HP: 140
    Attack: 60
    Defense: 100
    Sp Atk: 120
    Sp Def: 140
    Speed: 40
     
    Learnset:
    Lv. 01- Confuse Ray
    Lv. 01- Confusion
    Lv. 01- Whirlpool
    Lv. 09- Bubble Beam
    Lv. 16- Rain Dance
    Lv. 22- Water Pulse
    Lv. 28- Nasty Plot
    Lv. 34- Calm Mind
    Lv. 40- Stored Power
    Lv. 47- Psychic
    Lv. 55- Hydro Pump
    Lv. 62- Psyshock
    Lv. 70- Sanity’s End*
    Lv. 79- Future Sight
     
    ABILITY:
    Madness- Makes moves of the same type have a chance of applying confusion based on power (1% per 5 power), up to a cap of 30% added confuse chance. Moves that already have a chance have that percentage added to their current chance. "Whenever the Pokemon uses a move of its own type, it gains an added chance to confuse the opponent."
     
     
    UNIQUE MOVE:
    Sanity’s End-
    PP: 5
    Power: 90
    Accuracy: 90%
    Attacks the opponent with a mental onslaught of dread, has a high chance to inflict confusion (30%).
  11. Here No Longer
    Before I begin just listing them off, a quick reminder. These are OPINIONS. Don't waste your time trying to say I'm wrong because I'm not saying anything as fact. If you want to post yours here, I suppose that is also fine, as long as you aren't trying to cause a ruckus with a s***storm. With that out of the way...
     
    Video Games
    Goldeneye 007 is (I hate to say it, but it's deserved) severely overrated. It has a myriad of issues that are acknowledged... Legend of Zelda: Ocarina of Time was not a masterpiece. It was a pretty good game, but it has... issues. Medal of Honor: Warfighter is the best Medal of Honor game ever released. Grand Theft Auto games are boring. Severely so in fact. One of my favorite games of all time just happens to be a licensed game, not telling which. Paladins is quite a bit better than Overwatch, and more balanced as of the moment.  Super Mario Bros. 3 does not deserve most of the praise it gets. I have a huge problem with the mechanics. Super Mario Bros. 2 is, quite easily, my favorite 2D Mario platformer. Nintendo 64, as a console, had poor design and didn't do much to leap ahead of the SNES. Cynthia was not that hard of a Pokémon Champion in Diamond and Pearl. You have to have a diverse team, but other than that...  Generation 2 was, easily, my least favorite Pokémon generation. Difficulty curve problems, the worst balancing ever... Aside from Whitney, the hardest gym leader for me was Wattson in Gen 3. I don't like Elder Scrolls as a franchise. Half of the time it feels like the game is cheating you. Fallout 3, as a game, is pretty mediocre. It feels really, really incomplete. Fallout 4 is actually designed just right. Not too shooter oriented to be honest. Final Fantasy VII: Dirge of Cerberus was better than the original game. The original Borderlands was better than Borderlands 2 in almost every respect. The Wii U was a better console than the original Wii, and had a better library of exclusives. Movies
    Marvel movies in general are severely overrated. They're no better than DC movies. If anything, they're worse. I. Hate. Disney. They ruined Pixar, they're ruining Star Wars... I bet the list doesn't and won't end there. Frozen was pretty meh honestly. People singing "Let It Go" off-key soon after it came out still haunts me... I didn't like Despicable Me. I found the movie, how should I put it, a brain-rotting experience. Phantom Menace was not that bad. It wasn't good, but it surely wasn't that bad... Dark Knight Rises is just as solid as the rest of the Dark Knight trilogy.   Not everything with Adam Sandler remotely involved is terrible. "Grown Ups" is actually a really funny comedy, with some jokes still hitting even after watching it several times.  
    TV Shows (Including plenty of MLP)
     
    Scootaloo is one of the least likeable ponies in MLP. Rarity was at fault for the conflict in "Honest Apple." "Somepony to Watch Over Me" is one of the best MLP episodes ever aired. "The Washouts" was a TERRIBLE episode for RD, who I frankly think was less mature than Scoots there. I also don't see this "growth" I've heard as justification.  I have yet to see a bad DC Universe show, even if the movies are bad. Even Arrow was really good, and Legends of Tomorrow was 9+/10 before they killed off Snark. Deep Space Nine is easily the worst Star Trek series. Nobody was likeable whatsoever. Star Trek: Enterprise is underrated. Sure it had a bad end to its run, but so did TOS. Will Shatner should never have played Kirk. Chris Pines' Kirk is much, much better. Captain Janeway is the worst Star Trek captain ever. Even over Captain Decker that was written to be a terrible captain. Phineas and Ferb as a show is a disgusting pile of trash, aside from the platypus. He's fine. Big Bang Theory is a heaping pile of garbage filled with offensive lowbrow jokes that are unfunny. The new Magnum P.I. is miles better than the original series. Star VS the Forces of Evil isn't a bad show yet (it used to be really good), but it's definitely sinking fast with the increased Starco focus... The Walking Dead lost its luster after around season 1. All the drama ruined the show.  TV has gotten progressively worse over the past 3 or 4 years. Bull is actually better than Law and Order: SVU.  
    That may not be it, though. Expect to see edits in the future.
  12. Here No Longer
    Well, here it is. I haven't actually played the game since early Season 7 (Can't believe it's been almost 2 years), so my opinions may be a little outdated. Nonetheless, this is also partially based on other tier lists, so there is something to this aside from what I think. Nonetheless, it is mostly what I think from watching a few league games, combined with my opinions and my knowledge of changes since I actually played the game, so it could be a little off.
     
    Top Tier: Sion, Darius, Viktor
    Strong: Irelia, Urgot, Garen, Teemo, Jax, Yasuo, Riven, Akali, Aatrox, Camille, Kled, Fiora, Renekton
    Decent: Yorick, Pantheon, Illaoi, Cho'Gath, Nasus, Shen, Rumble, Gangplank, Singed, Poppy, Swain, Jayce, Kayle, Wukong, Quinn, Vladimir
    Usable: Kennen, Jarvan IV, Pyke, Lissandra, Dr. Mundo, Tryndamere, Nautilus, Heimerdinger, Rengar, Maokai, Ekko, Cassiopeia, Karma, Trundle, Vayne
    Weak: Gnar, Ornn, Talon, Xin Zhao, Graves, Galio, Olaf, Mordekaiser, Ryze, Tahm Kench, Fizz, Lulu, Leona, Vi, Lee Sin
    Bottom Tier: Zed, Blitzcrank, Thresh, Udyr
  13. Here No Longer
    I have absolutely had it with people who, when you make an ATTEMPT to have a meaningful discussion with them on an issue, pretty clearly have their own agenda and then lie and say that they don't have said agenda. I've seen it too many times on this forum to count alone (especially that one place that I wish I would stop posting in altogether because what I have to say, however much it's basically common sense at this point, deserves a bashing by somebody with a blatantly obvious and generally absurd agenda, political or otherwise). This type of garbage is intellectually insulting as well as completely and utterly uncivil.
     
    This is intellectually insulting on the basis of a very well-known and generally true idiom: Actions speak louder than words. Indeed they do. A great example of such a thing on this topic is. Say, you think that people of all varieties should be treated the same, and you type out that opinion in a forum post. Then, somebody comments on it saying "well, these people don't because there's a bad apple among them." Of course, you, a reasonable person, make a post how that's a blatantly obvious logical fallacy in the form of a strawman (as it has nothing really logically backing it). Then they decide to totally backstep on what they just said, and then you call them out on that because of course they are lying for the sake of making themselves not seem anti-X (and also saying they aren't anti-X). But that idiom suggests (and anyone of sound mind can agree) that their earlier comments on the subject and the fact they even had to post them in response to something as well-meaning as what you posted are indicative of their TRUE feelings on the issue. In this specific example, the person you would be trying to debate with is clearly a bigot of some variety trying to hide behind a logical fallacy and words that mean quite literally nothing in context (Yes, this has happened to me. Actually, it's happened to me just like this example at least a couple of times). 
     
    This is uncivil because it makes it IMPOSSIBLE to debate with them and have an actual, meaningful discussion on the specific issue at hand. I mean the very act of them contradicting themselves so blatantly for the sake of making themselves look better is uncivil for obvious reasons. But the whole discussion is tarnished even not considering that. But then they'll act like you're trying to suppress them, which of course you aren't. You allowed them their turn to speak and you DID give them a platform, right? Well look where that got US! Anyways, it is tarnished because it clearly has no value to this kind of person in the first place. If it did, they wouldn't contradict themselves like this to try to go after you and make YOU sound bad because their agenda is more important than civility. Funny thing here is, most people like this will try to drag YOU through the mud and try to upset you to the point where your frustration starts to boil over for understandable reasons (and this can happen even if you have a good amount of self-control). I mean as I've stated previously the act of doing this is intellectually insulting, and depending on the issue at hand and how personal it is to you, it may also seriously hurt you on an emotional and even a personal level to see the $#!+ getting flung around. I mean seriously, if they try to personally attack you based on who you are (which depending on the topic, they might bring it up), it's obviously NOT a civil discussion! Even if they don't it's still uncivil to try to upset the person they're "trying" (NOT) to reason with nonetheless.
     
    I'll also note why I put the political tag on this: 90+% of the time this happens, it's a political discussion, about a sensitive topic more likely than not. In that case, you can more often than not add "tribality" to the mix of reasons why this shouldn't happen. It's generally indicative of such a mindset, because generally tribal people will not betray the tenets of a very specific belief system, and this is how they attempt to accomplish that in this case by making a discussion, which they've normally tarnished even before this, completely and utterly uncivil to the point where the only actions to be made are either personal attacks or just walking away from the entire thing. Which of course they will say validates their belief system. Which it actually doesn't, and that should be pretty obvious! If they have to take a step such as this, it's clearly them that's in the wrong and obviously "losing" the argument. If they weren't, they wouldn't take this step in the first place to try to nuke the whole discussion. If they were "winning", it wouldn't be rational to do this in any way because this whole act is an act of desperation to try to make themselves look in the right here when they so obviously aren't, even in their own eyes. I note that they also must think they're wrong as well because if they didn't, well, they wouldn't try so lousily to correct themselves. Seriously, in doing this it makes it so obvious that they know they've totally screwed themselves before this to the point that anything else they claim to think here is utterly moot. So, now that I think about it, they must also be really stupid too!
     
    I'll conclude on this note: this brand of nonsense doesn't belong ANYWHERE in any kind of "civil" discussion. It derails the discussion pretty much immediately, and it's indicative of a very closed-minded person that has no intention of actually listening to what you have to say. They act like this more often than not due to their tribalism telling them to do so, so they can attempt to salvage the argument. Well, we're laughing because new flash: IT ISN'T WORKING! I mean I've put four laugh emotes in this post because of  how freaking funny it actually is that these, well, morons, do this. It's infuriating in such a way that it much less irks me than makes me feel like laughing, because of just how ridiculous it really is! However in all seriousness, this behavior is toxic and shouldn't be allowed anywhere near an actual debate. Unfortunately, this is the same internet where opinions are treated like facts and the other way around.
  14. Here No Longer
    I decided to do an opinion list off of every Pokemon of my favorite type (I don't think it's a big secret that Dark is my favorite type, considering how I've basically proclaimed that to be the case multiple times). I will count Alolan forms, but not mega-evolutions or Hoopa Unbound for this list (Grouping them with what they are megas of in the case the original form is still Dark type).
     
     
    Alolan Ratata- Don't really care for it. (Neutral) Alolan Raticate- I didn't like the original form, this thing looks really, really ugly in comparison to the original. I think somebody needs a refund on their root canal. (Dislike) Alolan Meowth- Better than the original, but not much. Don't really care for either that much. (Neutral) Alolan Persian- Why does this exist? Regular Persian looks MUCH better than this ugly thing. IT'S HEAD IS SHAPED LIKE A F***ING WATERMELON! (Hate) Umbreon- Best Eeveelution, not only because it's Dark Type, or because it's unique among that type as a pretty solid support Pokemon, but also because the design is amazing. (Love) Murkrow- I like this pokemon to some degree, because of the design and there's even some humor in gen 2 involving it. (Like) Sneasel- Shiny looks weird (if the feathered parts stayed red I'd really love it though), but otherwise, kind of like it. (Like) Houndour- I kind of like the design, though I never really use it that much in playthroughs. (Like) Houndoom- Fantastic design, although the stats leave something to be desired. The Mega is a fantastic special attacker though. (Like) Tyranitar- I may not really like Rock types much at all, but this godzilla of a pokemon is an exception to that, and a big one at that. (Love) Poochyena- I'll just say meh. (Neutral) Mightyena- I don't really like this pokemon. I don't necessarily hate it, but I definitely don't like it. Stats are bad, and the design is really meh. (Neutral) Nuzleaf- I'm just going to say it. It looks funny, and ugly at the same time... (Dislike) Shiftry- I kind of like the design, and it's quite original to say the least. But it just doesn't do it for me. (Neutral) Sableye- I absolutely love this pokemon. Not just because of the design, but also because it had no weaknesses until gen 6, and their PMD2 appearances. Mega's great too. (Love) Carvanha- I get it. It's a piranha... Design is original and so is the name, but I don't really like it to be honest. (Neutral) Sharpedo- Interesting design, that sort of works for me. Also the mega looks bad@$$. (Like) Cacturne-Another pretty meh one for me. (Neutral) Crawdaunt- This pokemon is absolutely amazing. I love the design, and it's a really good physical sweeper, even if it is on the slow side. (Favorite) Absol- I really don't like the original form, outside of a couple of the pokedex entries... But I like the mega, so I don't exactly hate this mon. (Neutral) Honchkrow- Absolute bad@$$. Also, this pimp crow hits like a TRUCK with a crit moveset and Super Luck. Also my favorite Flying Type. (Favorite) Stunky- Absolutely, very ugly. It just stinks pun intended. (Dislike) Skuntank- Absolute @$$hole in PMD2, design is better than the basic version but I still don't really like it. (Neutral) Spiritomb- Cool Pokemon, and probably one of the most original to date. Design is absolutely amazing as well. (Love) Drapion- The design irks me slightly, but looks cool. Not entirely against using it to be honest. (Like) Weavile- A huge improvement on Sneasel's already great design. And the stats are so great, it doesn't even need a mega to be great competitively. (Love) Darkrai- Not my favorite legendary, but I absolutely love the concept and design of it and its power is frankly utterly absurd. (Love) Purrloin- It may be absolutely adorable, but I'd be caught dead using one of these on my team. It's so awful stat wise unfortunately. (Like) Liepard- Now this is how you do a cat version of Mightyena. Stats still are a bit lackluster, but it's OK. (Like) Sandile- Cute Croc?  I also name every female mon I get from this line "Bea" or "Beatrice" in reference to the Night in the Woods character. (Love) Krokorok- Cool Croc.  Also, when I get a Totodile, I always name it Krokorok simply because this evolutionary line is superior in every way. (Love) Krookodile- My favorite Dark Type and one of my absolute favorite pokemon ever. I absolutely love sweeping with this thing.(Favorite) Scraggy- Design could use improvement, and I wish it evolved sooner. (Neutral) Scrafty- When Scrafty evolves (at level 39...) it's somewhat worth it just to see this design. If only this mon were better competitively. Still really like it. (Love) Zorua- Interesting design, and I think it looks kind of cute at this point. (Like) Zoroark- Yet again, interesting design, but I don't entirely like the appearance of the evolved form. (Neutral) Pawniard- I don't know how they could possibly make a basic with this concept not look just off to me in a way I can't really explain. (Neutral) Bisharp- Defiant is a very powerful ability against defog, and it has a really cool design. (Love) Vullaby- Kind of ugly and really annoying to be honest, to battle in the wild and to evolve both. (Dislike) Mandibuzz- Much better design than its pre-evolution. Pokedex entries are bland AF though. (Neutral) Deino- 10/10 Creative name, Nintendo.  Also take all of my meh on this one. (Neutral) Zweilous- Naming based off of German numbers? I don't know whether I should find that interesting or uninspired. (Neutral) Hydreigon- Much better than both of its meh pre-evolutons. It honestly is a little dope. (Like) Greninja- Most overrated starter pokemon known to man and thanks to how popular it is, I moderately dislike it actually. (Dislike) Pangoro- Inferior Fighting and Dark type detected. I honestly find it really uncreative. (Dislike) Inkay- Okay. It is a thing that exists I guess. (Neutral) Malamar- Is it just me or does it look like it probably rapes people with its tentacles? Also take my meh. (Neutral) Yveltal- Cool pokemon, weird name. (Like) Incineroar- I can't lie, I like this cat, especially since Smash Ultimate came out. (Like) Guzzlord- Probably my favorite pokemon from Gen 7. He looks absolutely awesome. (Love)     
     
    (Favorite)- 3/50
    (Love)- 11/50 
    (Like)- 12/50
    (Neutral)- 17/50
    (Dislike)- 6/50
    (Hate)- 1/50
    (Despise)- 0/50
     
    Aside from a few bad representations of this type, I generally at the least like most pokemon of this type, and the only mon I hate here is the absolute worst Alolan variant that was made to exist. There are quite a few I'm neutral on, but I feel like this would really be the case for any type, even my favorite of the 18 types. I might do more of these in the future and get an overall assessment of what my favorite types are, but I don't know. This was pretty time consuming as it is. I can't imagine how long it would take to do Water type anyways... A solid few hours I'd imagine...
  15. Here No Longer
    My life has been really amazing over the past few months... It certainly has been, no doubt about it...
     
    No, it only has been compared to what it was before that. Before I met my boyfriend of about 3 months, I was extremely depressed. I think a lot of you may know the story here, but I was actually heavily considering committing suicide, in a way that would work unlike the last few attempts at my own life foiled by various things. But now I can comparatively say this life is pretty fantastic. At least my own self-esteem isn't that far down the toilet. It's gotten a lot better, but is it entirely better? No it isn't. 
     
    I made this post in the "How are You Feeling Thread" at one point fairly recently: "I feel very upset with myself... ". I made this post after my boyfriend was upset with me for not listening to his music (even though, yes I should have sooner than I did, that isn't the point). I think if I could post the entire conversation, which I can't find it, you'd see that the post in and of itself indicates that my newfound self-esteem is very fragile. It was set off by something as small as my boyfriend getting a little angry at me over a track of EDM music he finished making.
     
    I'm still living most of my life in the $#!+hole known as my dad's (technically grandma's, considering she pays for EVERYTHING) house. The place has several problems that really prevent me from doing anything with my life. First one, is my dad. He will not clean up after himself. It basically makes the house into an extremely depressing environment with junk stacked everywhere. He also is such a man-child that helping him even with what I absolutely need to, is an absolute nightmare. It also doesn't help my ability to really communicate with him, that's already subject to my extreme introversion, but made worse by his stubborn inability to actually listen to what I have to say, instead making sorts of infuriatingly stupid jokes. Second one, is the environment itself. No air conditioning, no heating, bugs everywhere, NINE obnoxious dogs that won't leave me alone for five seconds when I go outside. My dad doesn't help this either, by constantly spouting off about how depressed he is and how the world is against him, and blah blah blah. Seriously, Dad, do you want to see me strung off the pecan tree, dangling by the homemade noose attached to my neck? I certainly hope not. It also doesn't help that there's no internet  aside from the internet on my "dad's" (when it's my grandma paying the bill in all actuality) phone, which he gripes about me taking all of the time. Yeah, I do dad. You know why? THE INTERNET HAS BECOME A LESSER NECESSITY, LIKE HEATING AND AIR CONDITIONING. I NEED them. Maybe not to SURVIVE, but to FUNCTION. Without it, I have no chance of survival. Period. I don't think my grandma wants me to run away from home because I have no chance there, so yeah, let me have it. All you use it for is looking at stupid $#!+ you find on Facebook and showing me your alt-right political memes that 9 times out of 10 are actually infuriatingly stupid (after you say you hate politics and offended people, you flock to both...).
     
    Also, I'm still QUITE unconfident of my ability to do anything for myself. Mind you, I'm weak, physically unfit, and by some definitions it is very likely that I'm actually disabled and should find a way to get that disability properly diagnosed so I can get disability checks. I have a lot of symptoms that suggest the possibility that I am on the autism spectrum (higher functioning, obviously). I mean I can't effectively communicate to anyone (yeah, even my own boyfriend, actually) due to a lack of social skills that also results in a lot of social anxiety, I had a LOT of developmental issues growing up, and believe me when I say that I am twitching like CRAZY right now. Only 3 of many things that make me think that there's a very high chance I'm on the spectrum. I am likely incapable of both the social and physical aspects of most any minimum wage job that I can get without references (and even then, it's actually really hard and getting harder and harder to even get THOSE without references.) This also means I can't effectively communicate with people outside of things that require no speech or eye to eye contact, and it also means that I can actually hardly do anything in a physical sense. Though the latter doesn't disturb me. I can just get my BF to do those things for me, even if it takes a little... convincing (and it seems I'm fairly good at that).
     
    BUT, is my life better? Of course it is. My self-esteem is getting better, I spend at least half of my days away from the House of Despair, and I have much more in terms of enjoyable experiences. I've been able to play Paladins again, and even a little bit of Team Fortress 2 (even though most of the time I try to play it online, my ping happens to spike ). I also have a little more confidence my tabletop game will go somewhere, and I don't feel as bad about myself. I don't see a noose in my future, also. I see... A small rented house on the outskirts of Houston, a lot of romance, a lot of my wants coming to fruition, and I even see a potential for personal success. No more of those self-help books that I just want to throw in the burn barrel. And soon enough, maybe no more living with my dysfunctional father. I just wanted to end this on a not-so-depressing note. I definitely do feel better, but it is a mistake to say life has suddenly become absolutely everything I want out of it.
     
  16. Here No Longer
    This should be the last one of this series, discussing autism. As has been discussed, I don't like the way that autism as an issue is handled today, but I think that with leadership, dedication, and initiative the autistic community as a whole could potentially remedy this situation, at least in my opinion. I understand that less than 1% of the population are autists with an IQ above the mentally retarded line, but hear me out here. Fixing this issue won't be a quick process, but it will actually be worth it when we get proper awareness to the issue.
     
    Kill Autism Speaks!
    No, I do NOT mean killing any person. I mean making the organization collapse. Making one of the largest and most prevalent hate groups in America just simply collapse is no easy feat, though. Especially considering how much money Autism Awareness Month pumps in for them. We would have to find a way to attack them in a way that would make the public think "wow these really are evil people aren't they?" Eventually over time this could lead to the intended objective. Killing them off once and for all would improve the awareness the public has of the autistic as individuals instead of their unawareness in thinking it's a disease and a plague. What they should instead be made to ultimately accept is that this is a unique trait of who we are as individuals., It also helps with the end-goal of this sort of operation for there to be more proper representation in media, in other words less Sheldon Cooper types being placed on the autistic spectrum by TV shows just itching to find a way to put an autistic character in a TV show. In other words, treat us like the disabled or dwarves (I don't mean the dwarven race of fantasy games, obviously).
     
    How to Effectively Treat It
    I understand that word could have a sort of stigma in this case, but hear me out. What I mean here is nothing like what Autism Speaks advocates for. What I mean here is to look at the harmful symptoms themselves and find an effective way to treat those symptoms, with medications such as anti-depressants or anti-anxiety meds. Also drugs like Seroquel and Zyprexa that are meant to treat schizophrenia and bipolar disorder also provide benefits to the autistic. There are others of these kinds of drugs, but they're either not potent enough, (such is the case with Risperdol) or have too many and too potent of side effects (as is the case with (such is the case with Clozaril. Of course, don't go around telling your doctor to prescribe anything to you though, that's their job (BIG PHARMA). Also, counseling can be important, considering how therapeutic venting about it can be (oh trust me I know, it's part of the reason I posted this series of blog posts in the first place). 
     
     
    Wow this one was really short, but hey it isn't necessarily that complicated to be honest... Just make the public aware of the real issues we face, and then try to combat those issues with the proper treatment, and also make them remember that we're people too and not just some sort of label.
  17. Here No Longer
    I've been aching to start a series of blog posts highlighting mechanical designs of specific games, assessing their problems at an in-depth level and giving critiques. It helps in my own pursuit of creating my own tabletop game (that will have balancing and the meta as a heavily emphasized component), and it's also informative to anyone actually playing the game itself. I will start with a game that's basically become my bread-and-butter: Paladins. I know it's a weird game to start with considering it doesn't have the popularity of games like Overwatch or League of Legends, but bear with me on this.
     
    Paladins: Champions of the Realm is a Hero Shooter with MOBA elements designed and published by Hi-Rez Games (Now, specifically Evil Mojo Games). It features four classes that each specialize in specific roles, an intuitive items system, and the ability to customize the playstyle of that champion in specific. The game's main game mode focuses on capturing an objective, and then afterwards pushing a payload to gain points towards winning a match. Each grants 1 point (and so do successful defenses), and the first to 4 points wins. A comment I already have, and a flaw I've noticed. Okay, so the game has a system that works like earned currency that allows you to buy items. Well, that currency system is different for each role. The flaw in this is that it A. discourages flexibility, and B. gives specific advantages to specific classes, particularly the Damage class that quite literally gets more credits than the rest... by dealing damage. Make credits even across all roles. It may seem like it would be counter-intuitive from a design point of view because it makes characters less graspable for new players, but seriously I hardly knew this EXISTED back when I started out. Plus, you can tell by their kits, their health pools, and even to a degree their movement speed what roles said champions play. 
     
    Now let's get into the nitty-gritty issues.
    Anyone who has played this game for a decent amount of time knows that tanks, well, tanks are very powerful. The problem is that a lot of these frontline champions are good both offensively and defensively, regardless of their talent choice. That is a problem. I think the obvious solution would be to design kits where it's obvious that the tank is weaker defensively and is better at zoning instead of taking objectives, and make some that are incapable offensively. This can be done with decisively placed nerfs and buffs in some cases to solidify what kind of tank they are. Whether they're more of an anchor tank or a main tank. I know that there are obvious examples of such, but the issue is that even those tanks are offensively capable. Take Inara for example. She may seem like she isn't a problem offensively, but confusion in her kit lies with her ability to go straight into an enemy's face, CC them, and then even kill them. You see the problem? She shouldn't be able to do that if she's a main tank! I know that certain people will say "but this will make double tank worse, because these bruisers wouldn't be able to tank." And I say that's a load of BS. These bruisers would be plenty capable of it. They'd just have to be more assertive and less passive about it. Take Ruckus for example, a tank that's basically out of the meta because he has no sustain. I actually think his sustain should be BUFFED, but I think that it needs to make him more of an offensive bruiser that gets in your face like he should be designed to function. Right now, he's basically a damage champion that's been misclassified as a frontline. He needs more sustain, but sustain that allows him to be aggressive. Like for example, I think that his ultimate should have much greater fall-off but also a built-in overshield as well as CC immunity. This would allow him to get into the face of enemies and use Hexafire without worrying about getting easily instakilled by the enemy DPSes. That's what is necessary here. On the note of Inara, I agree she needs mobility, but I say make it mobility that's designed with DEFENSE in mind. Like get rid of her stupid Warder's Field and put in an ability that allows her to cast a jutting rock that slows enemies in front of her and launches her backward in the target direction. That may sound like a comical ability, but it would allow her to get away and heal up while the enemy is affected by the slow that would be incurred. Oh, the issue of Cauterize. This card gives up to 90% healing reduction on-hit for 1.5 seconds. This is INSANE, okay. It's affected the game in such a way where healers need TONS of consistently overpowered healing to keep up during the mid-later stages of a match when the enemy DPSes spec into it, which they will early because of how INSANE it is. This NEEDS to be reduced PRONTO. I don't care if it ushers in a high TTK double support meta temporarily, but please NERF it. I say a quick fix would be to nerf the ranks to 25/50/75. But a more INTUITIVE fix would be to nerf it to 15/30/45 and then nerf the necessary healing abilities to compensate. Nerf Seris' heals, Nerf 'Damba's heals, Nerf Jenos' heals, and DEFINITELY nerf Grover's. I would not touch the healing of Grohk or Pip though. It would help them out massively and Pip may become a top tier pick because of it. Then I say nerf his CC and health pool. He has a lot of CC, and he has the smallest hurtbox out of every champion in the game (aside for his big freaking head), so nerfing those would balance him out. As for Grohk, he'd be likely a little powerful, but considering all Lo-Rez has put him through, it's more than acceptable that he becomes a high tier healer. I think I should also make a list of the unnecessary items and the simple fixes to all of them. Deft Hands- just buff 'Damba's reload speed a little, and Buck's plenty and it should be little issue. As for Dredge, yeah him too. Replace it with a card that grants max-health based TRUE damage based on the damage you deal. This would aid in eliminating the double tank meta that's been predominant in the game for a while now. Illuminate- Just nerf stealth mechanics, to make them more of cloaking mechanics. Where you can see a rough outline of them, it rewards those who are aware and punishes those who don't pay attention to it. Replace that for in-combat damage reduction to compensate for the other new card. This helps the newly formed off-class of bruisers a lot in their pursuit of meta domination. (Muahaha! Terminus will KILL YOU ALL!).  Buff most non-tank health pools so that way they also have a degree of sustain so that way tanks have yet another counter-measure and the TTK as a whole goes up to compensate for the healing and tank nerfs I would vouch for and help ESPECIALLY FLANKS. HOWEVER, nerf the F*** out of a few damage champion's bursts (Cassie, Lian, Drogoz, et cetera)… PLEASE? Please, for the love of this game, REWORK Torvald. Just, please. Decide whether he's supposed to be a support or a tank. If he should still be a tank, may I suggest making him tanky and defensive like he used to be until people stupidly complained about his lack of damage (which to be fair he DID have)?   
    With these changes, tanks would not be meta, supports wouldn't be left to sit on the objective unless you have a more offensive bruiser type tank like Terminus, Ruckus, or likely Ash, Damage dealers wouldn't be almost instakilled half of the time with little counter play by their own ranks, and supports would be just as good late as they were early. At least I think. Any recommendations to amend this list would be greatly appreciated. For now, goodbye and thanks for reading this first-of-it's-kind blog post. I hope to do another in the future soon on Team Fortress 2, so stay tuned for that.
  18. Here No Longer
    I am commenting to this video from one of the members of the Association of Champions, which is basically Hi-Rez's PR that instead of being part of the company are established, and mostly somewhat known members of the community.
     
    Torvald WILL Die. 100%. Field Study was literally the only thing that gave him something in this meta. Now it's nerfed into the ground. Stupid. Tyra Changes sound good, sort of. I have a feeling the Hunting Party change won't be enough and the other mark changes will just affect her other loadouts more, effectively killing her off, and making Hunting Party her only viable talent and at that only in niche situations. Their logic for not hitting up Luminary is total nonsense. What they did to Torvald might actually kill him, but they're worried about killing Jenos, the best support in the game? Yeah, I call BS. After all of these three changes, I have a feeling Jenos might actually become top tier, because Luminary and maybe Tyra's Hunting Party will be the only viable sources of damage amp. Dredge ult changes to me sound like they might end up being a nerf instead of a buff like intended, but we'll see. Still no CD on Broadside, so I give a thumbs down. Nerfing Khan's damage makes absolutely no sense. Seriously, he does LESS damage than every tank in the game right now with the sole exception of Torvald. No joke. Consider Khan dead. Also, they aren't nerfing Ruckus' so I guess that's a positive? But not really because his durabilty ends up making him deal mediocre damage anyways. Not fixing that, nope. How exactly will they nerf Barik's damage? One way might be a good idea, but the other possibilities I can think of would be terrible and just make it hard to play him. I have to admit, the ideas they have for flanks are pretty decent. But, they're keeping Buck and Talus dead apparently.   
    I have to say, I am so surprised this got POSITIVE feedback from the community. These changes for the most part are BAD for the characters they affect and might actually be bad for the GAME if they go too far with them. I do NOT like these ideas, not at all because some of the ideas are alright. Like the ideas they have for Moji are exactly what she needs. But other than that, I'm pretty negative about these changes. Hopefully they'll really think through them and their consequences before they make the changes.
  19. Here No Longer
    You know when there's something you can never stop talking about? This is it for me.
     
    My life is significantly less depressing for me now than it was only a mere couple of months ago. I mean you all know a big chunk of why this is, and if you don't, well, you haven't been paying an awful lot of attention to what I've been posting about said thing is over and over again. If you don't know, as of late February or Early March of this year (can't look because of inane forum drama), I have been happily in a relationship, one that has helped me out significantly.  
     
    Two months ago, I had a chance argument with a man who would later become my boyfriend. He was arguing about a post he made in regards to being depressed, he sounded like he was trying to force his sadness on other people. Then we apologize to each other, and then after that he begins to sound like the sad little puppy. Adorable, but definitely very depressed about life as a whole. I don't know what switch flips on in me, but I come to love him pretty quickly, and within a week, we've both said that we love each other. Though at first I admit I was a little unsure if I really loved him or I was desperate. But, after a while I come to realize, this guy, was in all ways but physically everything I ever wanted in a romantic partner...
    He's smart enough, and oddly civilized enough, for me to have intellectual discussions with. He has been immensely courteous to me, to the point it makes me feel guilty sometimes.   He's also presses the right buttons if you know what I mean , and if you don't know what I mean, well your mind isn't sick enough to know. He also shares interests with me, mainly in the areas of science, mathematics, a specific type of humor, and his musical tastes aren't really too different than mine. But when I saw him in real life a couple of weeks ago ( had a great time by the way, though it didn't quite go as far as I wanted ), I realized he was also a big cute teddy bear too, you know like the one that's begging to be cuddled with.   I'll also say that we slept in the same bed together and I nearly kissed him. Like I was inches from his face before I backed off, because he looks like a big chubby angel who's begging for a kissing.  
     
    But to what he's done for me.
    His complements towards me have helped me find a renewed self-esteem, as in I don't view myself as ugly anymore. I still feel like I don't deserve such high praise, but I'll admit I look pretty cute . He also helped me through a depression that was spiraling out of control, by giving me hope and love that I've needed for a long time. Seriously, I was quite seriously thinking about hanging myself from the pecan (let's pronounce that: pi' KAN (It's a joke most of you may not get about another couple)) tree growing in the backyard, but since him, they've been replaced with thoughts of cuddling, kissing, and everything else. He's helped me get along in the pursuit of my dream of making my own successful tabletop game. He has resources that are getting content from the current version printed off! That and he's really encouraged me to work on it. He's also made me realize that it is always good to appreciate what you have. On another philosophical tangent, he's made me realize that negativity is necessary for positivity to exist.  This is not the complete list, but only the list of what is the most impactful of these things.
     
    As for our future together, we're supposed to be going on our "second date" a week from now! We've also been planning about what happens when we really go the distance, and live together under the same roof. He's been planning to get his driver's license renewed, and he's been planning to save up for some sort of place to live for the two of us. We haven't discussed anything like legal marriage or anything yet, but I do fantasize about our lives together as one little bitty gay family of 2 (or 3 if adopting a kid is ever in the cards). I just hope it gets there!
     
    Sorry if I keep bringing this up almost non-stop, but can you blame me anyways? After all my life has improved dramatically since I and he have been together. I am not sorry.   
  20. Here No Longer
    Well, I've been talking about this some. Smash Ultimate as a game is easily the game I've been most excited for in at least a year, if not even earlier. The Smash Bros. franchise has been an important series to me, and this newest installment has me super excited. I wasn't initially when I heard some of the roster, but since then my opinion has changed drastically. Since I learned some of the mechanical differences between Smash 5 and Sm4sh, I've been interested, and a specific crocodile really made me hype ( no names ) since then. I feel a list is in order here.
     
    Yoshi- My Sm4sh main, Yoshi has been a favorite of mine for a long time do to his reliable combo chains, and the way his kit flows together. Also, of course, how annoying he can be to fight against with the right player playing him... I felt the need to mention him here, because I don't think that's changing. The game's speed increase is actually going to make me like Yoshi a lot more, because it will be easier to volleyball (term used for Down Air into repeated Up Airs) up into higher percentages and fair them off. Of course, that's just one example, but Yoshi will be even more fun to play than he already was for me. Really going to be a solid mid-tier character for sure this time around., maybe even upper mid possibly. Of course, I can't really say because there has been no gameplay of Yoshi because he wasn't in the demo for some weird reason... Disappointing, but I'll get over it I think... RIGHT? F***ING D*** IT SAKURAI!
    King K. Rool- You know I have invested interest in this character if you've really been looking at my posts. He's probably going to be the best heavy in the game, because he can easily rack up percentage and chain a lot of combos with his crown toss and his cannonballs. That's not even to mention the versatility of the blunderbuss ability as a whole. It's quite easily the most versatile projectile in the entire game. You can either just shoot it at them and do decent damage, or you can shoot it at them, suck it in, and then shoot again for insane damage. The suck in also works on other characters as per his trailer (when he did it to Kirby), so it's potentially possible to shoot them out and begin a combo that way. I just see so much potential for loads of insane combos here, that just makes me really excited, not even to mention I've really wanted a good heavy for a while that feels good to play (Well, Samus could be good for me also, but I'll get to her later).
    Young Link- FINALLY! The boy from Melee's BACK! There's some catching up I really want to do here. You know I like reliable bursty combos that do a lot of damage. Well, Young Link has those in spades. His Forward Smash does a huge chunk and is potentially chainable with enough speed, his Down A almost acts like Yoshi's (but I don't think it spikes)... Sounds just right I think. A big thing for me on Young Link is that (at least in Melee) he could rack up percentage really easily with two or three short bursts of damage. I've seen people say that Toon Link was a straight-up improvement... And I have to say that's totally wrong. Toon Link is lighter than Young Link and actually does less damage with combos than Young Link does. They both offer their own unique advantages, but I don't like Toon Link because I prefer characters closer to medium-weight generally (K. Rool and potentially Ike and Samus can be exceptions). I always preferred Young Link, so I like that he's back.
    Ike- I didn't like Sm4sh Ike a lot. He was a bit too heavy for my tastes, and very sluggish. He had a LOT of ending lag on his combos that was a huge issue when you ran him. I should know, my brother was an Ike main (and probably still is, I don't know) and I kept beating him because I could start combos between the ending lag on his smash attacks. But now with the new Ike he's a good bit lighter, and his ending lag was absolutely SLASHED. He went from probably a lower mid tier character to perhaps even high tier. He probably got one of the biggest buffs between Sm4sh and Ultimate out of the whole cast. His damage output is surprisingly close in consistency to Marth's and that's pretty shocking. I didn't initially have my eye on Ike, but after all of this, I think he'd fit me decently well. Just have to adjust to him a little (which shouldn't be that difficult considering I played him some in Sm4sh).
    Ness- I started getting into Ness when I started playing Ness v Villager matches (probably the lightest character I intend to play), and I really like his moveset. It makes for unique opportunities to damage opponents, but also to begin a combo or two with PK Fire's stun (it's short, but it can be enough to start something with a bat hit). Also, his recovery can be used to route an opponent into a direction (as it knocks enemies back further into it's path each time it hits). Also Ness' bat could be pretty important for blocking projectiles like K. Rool's Cannonballs, which is more useful in what I think the Smash Ultimate meta will have in store than it is in Sm4sh's meta (especially after Cloud and Bayonetta came out). I think though I'd more likely play this sometimes more than I would all of the time, because Ness is a character I'm decent with, but never could get good with (as mastering Ness is pretty hard).
    Samus- Samus is a character I would go to from time to time in Smash 64 and Melee, but I started to drop around Melee because she was too slow to really provide good damage output at about that point. In Smash Ultimate, she didn't really receive much of a buff in the general mechanics of the game getting faster, but there is one there nonetheless, and it makes me want to pick her up as a potential pick. I always liked her high damage neutral B as well as the damage she could output with her forward smash and her fair in particular. I still think she'll be lower mid tier as of Smash Ultimate, but I think that she can still be a viable choice potentially. Not like I'd want to choose her over K. Rool most of the time, but she does have a decent air game, and she can do a lot of damage in single hits. It also helps her that she's smaller than K. Rool is, and therefore a little harder to hit. Still would play K. Rool over her 90% of the time, but I'd still play her occasionally.
     
    I also have some interest in Wolf, Meta Knight, Simon, Pokémon Trainer, Pikachu, and Inkling, but the six I listed are who I'd likely play if I got to play the game, personally. 
     
     
  21. Here No Longer
    Even with how short it will probably be, yes, I do need to post this.
     
    If you somehow got here without knowing, I have been working on a potential design for a tabletop game. Now the game has technically been in development at this point for about 2 or 3 years. All I can reveal as of now about the game itself (I've revealed a lot of this already) is that it's a sort of hybrid between Heroclix and a MOBA with a post-apocalyptic setting (To address concerns about the way that may sound, it actually feels quite natural to a degree when you actually play it, the combination actually works quite well... Though it's had to receive a few tweaks on the way, I think it should work pretty decently right now based on my first impressions. Though, fair warning, there's plenty of things to keep track of).
     
    The game right now is sort of on pause (until things get better enough to make it feasible to progress). There are several reasons why it is:
    I'm having SERIOUS financial trouble, so bad that the power at my house may be cut off in a few hours if my Dad didn't get on to paying the bill... If it's that bad, then i I don't have access to my own printer right now. I can get around this, but Dad will have to be off of his computer and I'll have to be proactive enough to put all the content on a flash drive so I can get it there to print. Which looks like it's not going to be quite that simple, but I can make it happen. I've done it before. This is important because I finished the current patch, but I'd prefer to do my own QA some before I really get it out there, so that way I can sort of judge for myself based on actual play of the game, and also so I can make sure it is playable and coherent. I've not been on the best terms emotionally. This has been the case for a long while now, but it's really compounding it nonetheless. I've had issues with anxiety and depression for a while now, and it's been getting worse because of my current financial situation. It's been causing a LOT of distress. As of now, I'm the ONLY person working on it and the only real interest I've had for the game has been from my older brother who play-tested an earlier version and @PoisonClaw. There have been people who have brought it up a couple of times, but what I mean here is that they show interest in a way that actually CONTRIBUTES to it and helps it on its way. I'll admit I only really NEED the printer and electricity (obviously) to get anywhere at all right now, but to really progress with it, I'll really need to address all of this, and it needs to be remedied somehow or this game is going to go into serious development hell in the near future. But I think that's not going to happen, so... Probably won't get too far after a certain point...
     
    But, hopefully, I might be able to get out the patch I actually finished about a week ago soon if things turn out. All I'd actually need to do is get on to printing all of the necessary materials, triple-checking it so that way it comes out as polished as a single person could possibly make such a thing. For now, I am also sort of working on ANOTHER side project that may become a sort of spin-off to this (but is starting to look like it has a better chance of getting scrapped instead, due to it more than likely being overshadowed by an EXTREMELY popular tabletop game that's been around for a while), and other than that just trying as hard as I possibly can to keep my stress under control before it pops by playing an excessive amount of Borderlands 2 and trying to farm every piece of legendary gear in the base game that I have any remote degree of interest in... -__-
     
  22. Here No Longer
    My lovely, my manly
    My heart pounds so gladly
    For you, my wondrous knight
    I lust for you all night
    If only t'were today
    but not another day   My lover, my precious
    You've been quite chivalrous
    Am I justified such
    From a man I love much
    you've taught me love once more
    couldn't be gladder for   My dear, my loveliest
    do you fancy me best
    I ponder that your mate
    is me not, do I rate
    better than I believe
    or should my nerves reprieve   My other half, my love
    I must be such a dove
    in your eyes at the least
    in mine eyes you're a feast
    I quite frankly love you
    more than you could have knew   He says it's good... But I'm not sure if it's because he's just being nice or it's actually good... -_- 
  23. Here No Longer
    (Great now I'm copying people again)
     
    NOTE: All mon-centric lists only have one Pokemon per evolutionary line. Eeveelutions work because each evolution of Eevee is in its own seperate line, branching from Eevee.
     
    POKEMON
    (Top 15)
     
    Dusknoir (Ghost) [IV] Grovyle (Grass) [III] Pikachu (Electric) [1] Rayquaza (Dragon, Flying) [III] Krookodile (Dark, Ground) [V] Litwick (Fire, Ghost) [V] Articuno (Flying, Ice) [1] Ampharos (Electric) [II] Infernape (Fire, Fighting) [IV] Crawdaunt (Water, Dark) [III] Azumarill (Water, Fairy) [II] Honchkrow (Dark, Flying) [IV] Umbreon (Dark) [II] Scrafty (Fighting, Dark) [V] Roserade (Grass, Poison) [IV]  
    GENERATION
    (Top 5 from each, except Gens 6 and 7 will only have top 3 as I've only played the games through Gen 5 at this point.)
     
    Gen 1- Pikachu, Articuno, Dugtrio, Clefable, Vileplume Gen 2- Ampharos, Azumarill, Furret, Umbreon, Espeon  Gen 3- Grovyle, Rayquaza, Crawdaunt, Breloom, Shedinja Gen 4- Dusknoir, Infernape, Honchkrow, Roserade, Starraptor Gen 5- Litwick, Krookodile, Scrafty, Bisharp, Snivy Gen 6- Sylveon, Doublade, Heliolisk Gen 7- Guzzlord, Palossand, Vikavolt Gen 8- Type
    (Top 3 from each)
     
    Fire- Litwick, Infernape, Typhlosion Water- Crawdaunt, Azumarill, Starmie Grass- Grovyle, Roserade, Vileplume Electric- Pikachu, Ampharos, Luxray Poison- Roserade, Vileplume, Scolipede Bug- Scizor, Vikavolt, Shedinja Steel- Bisharp, Lucario, Doublade Rock- Tyranitar, Lycanroc, Aggron Ground- Krookodile, Dugtrio, Palossand Fighting- Infernape, Scrafty, Lucario  Psychic- Espeon, Starmie, Gallade Dark- Krookodile, Crawdaunt, Honchkrow Ice- Articuno, Weavile, Froslass Ghost- Dusknoir, Litwick, Palossand Flying- Rayquaza, Articuno, Honchkrow Dragon- Rayquaza, DIalga, Guzzlord Normal- Starraptor, Furret, Munchlax Fairy- Azumarill, Sylveon, Clefable  
    Favorite and Least Favorite Types, Regions, and Overall Generations
    (All are Top 3)
     
    Favorite Types: Dark, Ghost, Electric
    Least Favorite Types: Rock, Bug, Poison
    Favorite Regions: Sinnoh, Hoenn, Unova
    Favorite Generations: Gen 4, Gen 5, Gen 3
  24. Here No Longer
    When I initially watched the first couple of seasons of Star VS the Forces of Evil, I had a very positive reception of the series. But, then just after the Battle for Mewni... The episodes took a SERIOUS nosedive in quality. It's a real shame, considering how good the series USED to be. Now it's become mediocre to the point that I can hardly even tolerate watching it any more. Well, the series has 3 main problems now that need to be discussed to answer the question of why.
     
    The Animation. It's not bad, but it doesn't fit the show anymore. The animation just had this looseness to it before that fit what was at the time a good, rather off-the-wall episodic show that built itself around following the characters around their lives rather perfectly. Now it's lost that loseness, and instead has become way less fitting to how I perceive the show should be. It's become a show with more computer-generated animation, and less of the earlier hand-drawn animation, which for a show specifically one like Star VS the Forces of Evil, doesn't really work... The Characters. I know that's not specific, but the characters in general are losing charm, and a lot of the enjoyable secondary characters are losing relevance as the show goes on. Star used to be a fun-loving, carefree teenage girl from another universe where literally everyone grows corn for some reason. Now she's become stern, and definitely not fun-loving. I honestly can't even really describe it much more than that, but it is a TOTAL turnaround from her original character, and it's BAD. As for Marco, I don't understand what's happening to him either. It's similar to Star except of course the opposite. He used to be a good counterbalance to Star's whimsical spontaneity. Now he's just becoming... A blank slate, who's actually lost a lot of his maturity... It really doesn't make sense at all in his case, because he aged 15 f***ing years in an alternate dimension... HE'S SUPPOSED TO BE MORE MATURE, NOT LESS!!! As for secondary characters, I don't even remember seeing most of the ones that were actually well-conceived. Instead we just get Pony Head. ALL THE TIME. And also some of Tom, but let's face it considering he's a demon, he's really, really bland... There's nothing about him that makes him interesting... We also have background characters constantly repeating bad, annoying one-liners more often... I swear I'll slap that... thing that keeps saying "CAMERAPHONE!" and taking selfies. IT WAS ANNOYING THE FIRST TIME AND NOW IT'S JUST DOWNRIGHT INFURIATING! The Plot. This is the most egregious part of all. Star VS was never centered around it's plotline before. The show mostly made it an afterthought until around mid-season 2. AND IT WORKED REALLY WELL! The series originally worked this way because the characters bounced off of each other so well that they could literally use that to make episodes that were absolutely amazing in their own right. They made a plot-based show work well for half a season, because the plot was an interesting one about Toffee's network of minions and stopping Toffee from getting control of Mewni. But now what is it about? SHIPPING? Trying to force Starco? F*** NO. IT WORKED FINE WHEN IT WAS A SUBPLOT. But now that it's the MAIN PLOT POINT AS OF EARLY MID SEASON 3 instead of... you know... ECLIPSA... But even then, that shouldn't even be emphasize on as much as the SHIP. Seriously, this ship as of far has been the main focus of more episodes this season so far than the ENTIRETY of the last season... And I only got a THIRD of the way through before I had to stop it...   
    It's really a shame that a 9/10 show became a 6/10 show so quickly, but it's no wonder that it fell so far. With the poor characterization, the plot becoming ABOUT a forced ship, and the animation not fitting the show as well, it's pretty different from how it used to be. Where did we go so wrong...?
     
  25. Here No Longer
    Well, I was originally going to vent here, but I got inspiration after watching a YouTube video to do something less simultaneously migraine-inducing and controversial. I'll just discuss some of my favorite characters to play as in video game history, and why I enjoy them so much. The only rules here are one per game. These are not in order.
     
    Barik (Paladins)- The Dwarven god among men himself. My main when I played Paladins, he brought me so much enjoyment playing the game that I can hardly contain myself right now with the literal nostalgia I have on the topic. I actually don't know why I enjoy him so much. Maybe it's my signature playstyle of plopping turrets wherever I see fit and destroying everyone? Maybe it's his emphasis on positioning? Maybe it's dashing in circles like a little madman high on drugs? Maybe it's even because I'm playing as the Paladins equivalent of Goldeneye 007's Oddjob? I really don't know. But he's so enjoyable that I managed to play as him in over HALF of all of my matches playing the game. Axton (Borderlands 2)- My recent obsession, Axton has become my favorite Borderlands 2 character to play as. Why? Only one line must be said here. "Have you met the misses?" Are you starting to see a pattern here? Turrets. I freaking like turrets. Axton's turret has great offensive zoning potential building an Engineer build, and it also gives you INSANE buffs to your damage output running the Battlefront skill. Combining this with weapons with high damage potential like the Unkempt Harold results in the DPS being taken to MAXIMUM overdrive. Sure, he has the worst melee in the ENTIRE GAME and I like playing melee builds, but his turret build is even better than Melee Zer0 for me.  Yoshi (Smash Bros)- Oh. My. Word. The. SPIKES. I've always found Yoshi a blast to play because there's just so many ways you can burst your opponent into submission. But the most fun will always be spiking straight into volleyball combos. If you're unaware, Yoshi has the capability to pretend you're a volleyball and smack you into the next ZIP code with a combo of chaining down and up airs. They keep saying Villager isn't the face of mercy, but Yoshi is RUTHLESS. He'll knock you into the next ZIP code with his tail, He will throw eggs at your face like grenades. Heck, he will even use his HEAD as a weapon of mass destruction. Seriously, that noggin has some serious kill potential.  Sniper (Team Fortress 2)- There's a good reason he was my go-to when I played the game. He's a great example of how a sniper class should be executed. He's got a surprising amount of versatility, and he's got a lot of ranged damage. Sure it's at the expense of close-quarters... but... IT DOESN'T HAVE TO BE! Take a Shahanshah. Sure it deals bad damage if you melee somebody at above half health, but when you get flanked, it's super useful because your health pool is going to get low enough to get the damage buff at low health. With that boost, those annoying scouts are history. Also, he's even got support options! Get a Sydney Sleeper and you can mark targets for your team to take down for you! Mordecai (Borderlands 1)- Note that I didn't say one per SERIES. Sure, Bloodwing is a bit of a subpar action skill without investment, but that's more than made up for running him with a Sniper or a Pistol build. Sniper builds on him are BETTER than Zer0 in all honesty. With skills like Trespasser that allow you to have up to a 100% chance to IGNORE SHIELDS and skills like Killer that allow you to consistently chain damage output, it's not hard to see what makes him fun to play but also really good. This isn't to mention his potential with pistols (especially revolvers) running the right build, especially with the right Class Mods along with skills that buff reload speed and DPS.  
    I may add a League of Legends character and a DotA 2 character later on, but this is it.
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