#they could have easily just cheaped out and charged $10 for like a new spell set or something

[angeltannis]

Finally started In Tanta We Trust and ngl it makes me a little nauseous that this world with SO much interesting and thought-out lore is most likely just gonna rot in IP hell forever because gamers are racist

#ughh that’s the thing about hidden gems I GET SO SAD AND MAD ABOUT THEM… #Forspoken didn’t deserve to die in a ditch like this #SO MUCH LOVE went into this game you can feel it at every turn #hell the fact that it got a prequel DLC just to tell more of its story and flesh out the world even more!! #they could have easily just cheaped out and charged $10 for like a new spell set or something #but they wanted to tell the story! the writers clearly care SO much about Frey (and Cinta and Cuff etc) #it fills me equally with joy and grief

[enigma-im]

Third Day of Christmas...

Trope: Enemies to Lovers (NSFW) Relationship: Minotaur x Human Word Count: 4,025

It all started with a note on the door.

Imani didn't expect to find a letter taped to her door that morning, or any morning for that matter. For a good couple of seconds she feared it was from her landlord, an eviction notice of some kind. That went right out the window as she read the chicken scratched handwriting.

Dear apartment 23 resident,

I'd appreciate it if you would keep the noises to a minimum after 10 pm. The singing has kept me up well past midnight. The stomping at all hours has been less than appreciated. Also, I hate to point out that your dog hasn't been a saint either, barking every morning at 7 am. So if you would please, muzzle the dog and stop the late-night parties.

                                 Signed, apartment 15 resident.

Imani is confused for a moment, walking back into her apartment while rereading the letter. All of it is not true, starting with the singing. She does not sing, especially that late in the day. The neighbor on the other hand has a daughter who doesn't understand her own volume, blaring out BTS songs at odd hours. The stomping is a ridiculous accusation, almost typical in these situations. The only time she can admit that her walking would be loud is when she first gets home and hasn't gotten to removing her shoes. Besides then, she is as quiet as a church mouse. An hour after she gets home she spends most of her time lounging in the living room. so how can she be making noises if she isn't moving?

The woman drops the note onto her kitchen table, put off by the audacity. She looks over to her little dog, shaking her head as she thinks back on the next line. Her dog doesn't bark! He is as silent as can be, never even growling. The most this 'resident' can accuse her pooch over is his nails scratching at the floor. Even then that shouldn't even register through the floors.

With the morning turned sour, Imani quickly organizes her things and heads out for work. The whole day is spent thinking hard on her letter, thinking about what needs to be done. Should she ignore it? Pretend she never got it and go on with her life? That would be the easy approach, even kinder one, but she ain't that kind of bitch.

When she got home late that day she storms into the kitchen, making sure to stop with her shoes still on, and grabs a notebook. She jots down a little message for 'resident 15' with as much passive aggression as she can put into words.

Dear resident 15,

The bold claims you have taped to my door have been read. I'd like to take the time to inform you of your misguided claims. I, for one, am not the local American Idol star. That award goes to Tiny Tina in apartment 22. I don't know why you have such an issue with her music, BTS songs are a bop.

Next on the list is my 'stomping'. Excuse me for correcting you again, but I do not 'stomp' around my apartment. The minute I get home from work I am sitting on my ass watching television till it's time for bed. So I ask you, how can I be stomping around if my feet do not move off the couch?

Finally, my dog. My dog is a saint, for your information, he is the quietest animal I have ever owned. I haven't heard so much as a peep from him since he was a puppy. Maybe check around for other noisy pooches because mine isn't the problem.

With this all said, I hope you find a solution to your problem because bugging me was not it.

                                       Sincerely, resident 23

Signed, sealed, and ready to be delivered. The next morning on the way to work she tapes the little note to the numbers on unit 15. smug, she walks out of there with her head held high.

Feeling proud of herself even further into the day she isn't ready for the speedy reply taped to her door, along with a missing doormat. With a huff, she snatches the note and heads inside. She unfolds the sheet, reading:

Dear 23,

I am not mistaken, and I'm taking your welcome mat until you know how to be a proper upstairs neighbor.

                                         -15

She gawks at the letter, put off by the blatant admission of theft. Are they a child, taking away things as a punishment? This is completely idiotic! She should march downstairs and confront the fool who thinks this is a proper course of action. Well, she would if she didn't also want to get back at them.

Throwing the paper onto the coffee table she flops down on the couch to think. What is the best way to get back at them?

A floor below rests Church the Minotaur. He is getting ready to go on a run, sliding on his sneakers as he opens the door. Glance to the side he catches sight of a gaudy plethora of stickers and glitter, his door dressed to the 9s with rainbows. He is taken aback, looking at the decorations with ire. Above it all sits a folded up piece of paper taped to the door. He quickly snatches it, reading it.

15,

Return the doormat and I'll clean your door.

                                    -23

Church chuffs, grinding his teeth as he looks to the door again. He didn't think he was being unfair when he first gave them a letter. It was a polite way to ask them to shut up. He just wanted some sleep, was that too much to ask? He looks to the door again, apparently, it was.

Imani opens the door fully expecting the letter. With a bit of a pep in her step, she grabs it, reading it as she walks to her car. She snorts, crumpling the paper and tossing it in the trash.

23,

This means war

                           -15

The next few weeks are filled with pranks of varying variety. The two start small, Imani stomping around upstairs with her heaviest pairs of boots, Church banging his hand against the ceiling during the quiet hours of the night. Next with more glitter courtesy of Church, a well-timed package that exploded in Imani's kitchen. He swears he could hear her surprised scream from below. Imani gets him back with a similar package, one with a jump scare card.

It's a back forth of one-upping the other. Church orders Imani eight pizzas, forcing her to reluctantly pay for it when seeing the nervous kid trying to deal with the mix-up. Imani manages to hook her phone to his Bluetooth speakers, playing random screams at all hours of the night. Church gets her back by attaching an alarm to her door so when walked out that morning she was startled by a firetruck worthy honk.

It seems it’s the last straw for Church when he receives his own glitter bomb of confetti cocks. It gets caught on the carpet, sneaking into the couch cushions, and sticking to his clothes. Quickly dusting himself off he charges upstairs, reaching her door and banging on it. He taps his foot frustrated and angry.

The door clicks open, Church already ready with his rant. Imani is equally prepared, excited with the chance to chew him a new one. When the two see each other they stumble on the words, looking one another over with confusion. Neither of them expected the other to be anything but some angry middle-aged person looking for a fight. They hardly assumed that the other would be so…attractive.

"I, uh," church shakes his head," You! A damn dick bomb? Do you understand how ingrained they are into my carpet? I sent you a cheap one, something you can easily clean up but you couldn't even consider that!"

"What," Imani comes back to her own," those craft herpes were not easy to clean, I'm sure it's still in the kitchen now and staining my clothes. So don't you dare come at me with 'woe is me' look like you had any consideration at all for my floors."

"Well excuse me, I didn't hack into your speakers to play Halloween screams all through the night. I damn near had a heart attack at 2 in the morning because of you," he points to her, debating on jabbing her in the chest. She slaps his hand away before he gets the chance, scoffing.

"At least I didn't make you spend money on eight pizzas! Do you know how much eight pizzas cost? It was like seventy bucks. I'm just glad you didn't splurge on something more than a single topping pizza. But fuck you for making them all pineapple you monster," she bites back.

The two ramble on long enough for the neighbors to peek their heads out. Embarrassed, they close out their argument with a huff and a door slam. Church heads off to his apartment, falling onto the couch while grumbling to himself. Imani growls and mumbles in her bed. They both can't help the thought that ruins all their anger:

God, they were hot.

The pranks don't stop in their frequency. The two continue, using their frustrations at their traitorous thoughts to fuel their revenge.

Imani still plays with his speakers, using screamo songs to annoy him in the afternoons. Church booby traps her door again with more glitter, his preferred weapon as of lately. She takes up tap dancing, he pays the kid next door to blare BTS near the shared wall of her apartment. She puts a fake ticket on his car, he puts vulgar stickers on her's. the childish game goes on and on.

Imani sits in her room one night, frustrated beyond belief with the sexy minotaur. She can't get his face out of her head. Why did he have to be cute? It's not like it makes the little game they have going harder to do. No, it just makes it seem more than it is. She has to constantly catch herself praising his wit in some of the stunts he pulls. Scolding herself nonstop for wanting to stop by his place and yell at him some, just to see him. It's stupid, wanting to actually get to know him.

Church relaxes in bed, feeling more bothered than Imani. He has hit a bit of a dry spell in his sexual life, or his solo sexual life. He can't jerk off without picturing the little hellspawn upstairs. It would be easy to give in and just think of her but it would be too much. She is an enemy, not a potential interest. So what if she is one of the sexiest humans he has ever seen? Who cares if her ability to keep up with him in this little war is kind of turning him on? It doesn't matter, right?

He sighs in defeat, "I don't think I can believe that even if I tried," he grunts as he clenches his shaft.

Imani is at home setting up her next plan when someone knocks on the door. She looks to the clock surprised at someone visiting this hour. Confused, and cautious, she gets out of bed and walks to the door. Looking through the peephole she rolls her eyes at who she sees.

Imani opens the door," if this is about the folk music I'll tell you now I'm not changing it back."

"No," he growls," this is about the tap shoes. Metal on wood makes for some very undesirable sounds."

"Well, excuse me for trying to take up a new hobby. What about you paying off the kid next door to play her music next to my wall? I swear that little demon doesn't sleep," Imani scolds.

"Speaking of little demons, can you for the love of god shut your dog up. Every morning I hear his damn barking and I'm seriously debating calling someone," he takes a step into her space, scowling at the dog behind her.

"He doesn't bark," she pokes at his chest," I have never heard him even make a yelp since he was a puppy so I suggest you come up with a better lie than that."

"A lie," he shouts," your fucking dog barks, stop thinking he is some sort of mute."

"He does not," she shouts back.

"Does too," he steps closer.

"Does not," she raises her chin.

"Does too," he grabs her hips.

"Does not," she tugs at his shirt.

"Does too," he says, lowering closer to her. Before she can get her turn he quiets her with a rather harsh kiss, mashing his lips to hers. They grapple one another, pulling the other closer as they stumble into her apartment.

Church kicks the door shut as he fumbles with her shirt. She helps, parting from him long enough to cast the clothing aside. He tugs her back in for a sloppy kiss, delving his tongue into her mouth as she unbuttons his top. Thrusting his shirt down his arms while they bump into the sofa. Church beings unclasping her bra, uncoordinated as she sucks on his tongue.

The two fall to the couch, church not wasting any time with her freshly revealed tits. Imani gasps, petting down his chest to his pants. As he suckles on a nipple as she pulls him from his pants, holding his cock in her hand. He stutters in his attentions, panting heavily against her chest as she jerks him off.

"Oh, fuck," he groans.

"Like that big boy," she steals his attention, him looking at her cocky smile.

"Shut up," he reaches down to her pants, palming her through her jeans. She bucks into his hand, rolling her eyes at his smirk. He quickly discards her bottoms, tossing them away without a care. He watches her as he pets at her pussy, delving between her lips to feel how soaked she is for him.

"Am I wrong to assume this is all for me," he pushes a finger in. she clenches her jaw, groaning from the intrusion. He chuckles, feeling rather confident as she rides his hand. Not caring for his large ego she reaches for his cock once more, feeling him throb in her grip.

"Am I wrong to assume this is all for me," she mimics back smugly. He throws her an annoyed look, removing his fingers and slapping her hand away. Dropping a hand beside her head he leans down, looking between them as he prods his cock to her pussy. They both flinch, eager above all else. They both watch as his head parts her lips, poking at her clit with short nudges.

"You think I can make you scream like those damn Halloween recordings," he jokes as he grinds into her.

"No, I don't think you have the stamina," she jabs back, trying to stop the urge to buck against him. Church leans down and nuzzles against her neck, pressing a sweet kiss under her jaw.

"I guess we will just have to see," he grins, feeling less confident than his words suggest. His cock is damn near ready to burst with just his tip being coated in her sweet juices.

Church reaches between them, pressing his cock to her entrance. He guides his tip in, stretching his arm up to rest it beside her head. The only warning he gives her is a sultry smile before he shoves forward, both crying out at the suddenness.

"Oh, shit," Church whimpers beside her ear. Imani grabs at his arms, feeling utterly stuffed. He pulls back, thrusting forward quickly. Imani appreciates him not wasting time just pistoning into her. The need has been building up all week, the denial adding a new level of appeal to this want.

He rams into her, listening to her try to hide her cries of pleasure. He feels her body tell him what he needs to know, feels her walls pulling him in with every buck of his hips. She wants him as badly as he wanted her. It's satisfying to church to know this. To know that she needs this as much as he does. Not wanting to miss a thing he sits up, grabbing her hips as he does.

"Look at you," he groans," trying to hold back those little moans and whimpers. Don't fight it, babe, I wanna hear you." Imani startles herself with a cry, arching her back as his words add kindle to the fire. She wants to pretend this isn't happening, that she isn't getting fucked by her apartment enemy. But damn, does it feel fantastic.

Church watches her writhe on the couch, his stomach clenching as he tries to fight off cumming at the sight. Her tits bounce with each clap of their hips and it's driving him wild. Reluctantly he shuts his eyes, thinking about anything else to prolong this blissful torture.

Imani wails and whimpers as her insides are set aflame. As her orgasm comes rushing to the forefront she locks her legs around his waist, grinding like a madwoman into his thrust. She cries out her pleasure, utterly wrecked as she falls apart.

Church chokes on his breath as she clenches around him. He can barely think as she holds him in a vice grip. His hips go wild as he finds himself coming to an end. It's only half a thought that he undoes her legs and pulls out, grinding against her as he cums on her stomach. Imani watches in rapture as he tosses his head back and moans, the sound going straight to her already throbbing clit. She watches him spray out over her and she can't look away for even a second.

Church falls onto his hands, panting as he holds himself over her. He can't believe it. He got to fuck the cute hellspawn that has been tormenting him all month. At this moment he couldn't even think about the countless hours of sleep missed because of her little pranks. Right now all he can think of is holding her close and taking a much-needed nap. As he attempts the action he looks to her stomach.

Imani is bone-deep satisfied. Her body is relaxed against the couch and she feels like she's on cloud nine. She hardly notices when Church climbs off her, his footsteps fading away. When she does notice, it stabs at her heart a little. She watches him button up his pants, reaching to the floor to grab his shirt. I guess he's leaving, she thinks.

Church grabs his shirt from the floor, bunching it up as he turns back to her. She looks surprised when he crouches beside her and mops up the mess on her stomach with his top. He wants to laugh at the shocked expression but bites his cheek against it. With her all clean he tosses the shirt away and crawls in beside her. The couch is rather small so he lifts her onto his chest, lounging on his back. He cradles her against his front, ready to take a well-deserved nap.

Imani is rather confused as she watches him fall asleep. She fully figured he would dip after everything, she surely didn't expect anything from this. They were still in a war. A truce was never called but she can't help but think this changes something.

Shrugging, she snuggles up to him, enjoying his soft fur against her cheek. This is a problem she will deal with in the morning.

Imani wakes up alone in her bed. She is nearly tempted to figure the night with Church was all a dream till she feels the subtle ache in her legs. Ride a bull, you should expect some soreness. She chuckles to herself as she dresses. Walking into the kitchen she prepares for a lazy day indoors while she figures out how to deal with Church and her's relationship. As she gets ready to feed her pup does she realize the lack of said pooch.

"uh, Giovani," she calls out. No answer. She calls out again, searching around her apartment frantically. Did he get out while the door was open last night? Surely she would have noticed if he managed to sneak past. She rounds the apartment again just in case before she runs to the door, throwing it open in a rush. Out of the corner of her eye, she spots something hanging on her peephole. She tenses at the sight, snatching it.

Imani I have your dog Church

Imani scoffs, crumpling the letter as she marches downstairs. She can't believe she let herself think that things would change between them. That this little prank war can be swapped out for an actual relationship, friendship or otherwise. Above all, she can't believe he stole her dog.

Rounding the corner and stopping at door 15 she pounds her fist against the wood. She continues pounding till the door opens, revealing a smirking Church.

"Hello, babe, what brings you here so early," he asks, leaning against the frame.

"You stole my fucking dog, I want him back," she snaps, no ounce of playfulness available. Church nearly stutters on his act, a little worried about her protectiveness over her dog.

"Now, I stole him for his own good," he explains," with his separation anxiety I figured it is best if he got used to my apartment since I'm going to take up training him."

Imani scoffs," Excuse me? My dog doesn't have separation anxiety nor does he need to be trained by some dog snatching idiot with horns."

Church deadpans," idiot with horns?"

"It's early, they can't all be gold," she rolls her eyes," doesn't matter, give me my dog back."

Church shakes his head, frustrated at her denial. Instead of answering her, he calls for the pup, leaning down to pet him when he comes trotting over. With the dog properly excited he takes a step into the hallway with Imani and shuts the door. Imani looks from him then back to the door.

"What are you doing," she asks.

"Just wait," he holds up a finger. They both stand silently, nothing happening. Imani opens her mouth to acknowledge the ridiculous of waiting in front of a door when her dog begins whining, yelping loudly from inside the apartment. Church looks over to her with a smug grin, "Told you he barks."

Imani flusters, gawking at the door and listening to her dog cry out. Church opens the door, the pup running out and jumping at Imani. Still embarrassed, she pets at her dog before picking him up and walking away. Church watches her turn the corner, not saying a word as she departs. He sighs.

It's a good day of nothing that picks at Church. Surely he didn’t push too far, he didn't really intend to keep her dog so it wasn't that mean. He just wanted to prove that her dog did bark, finishing the month-long war on a hopeful note. It wasn't meant as another attack against her. He really did intend to help by offering to train her dog.

Throughout the day he debates going up there and apologizing, to offer an olive branch of some kind so he can actually get to know her. Last night for Church was…amazing. It was something he wants to do again, to explore further. That may be a pipe dream now.

Late into the afternoon church gets a knock on his door. He jumps up, feeling rather stupid as he quickly answers the door. Expecting Imani he is left disappointed as no one is there. No one could have left that fast. He looks down the hall, left to right. Nothing. With a defeated sigh he begins to close the door. He stops when a fluttering piece of paper catches his eye. Excited, he snaps it off the door unfolding it swiftly.

Church,

Dinner at my place, 8 pm

                               -Imani

Church smiles to himself, refolding the paper and heading back inside to get ready.

#12 days of christmas #12 tropes for christmas #Enigma-IM #monster boyfriend #exophilia #enemies to lovers #minotaur boyfriend

[chiseler]

Public Enemy Number 1, No. 1

It was unexpected and unlikely at the time, and would be completely unthinkable today, but on April 7th, 1923, the venerable and dusty New York Times ran an editorial which opened:

Something Almost Heroical

It is getting very difficult to keep in mind the fact that Gerald Chapman is a thoroughly bad man, whose right place is in jail. The difficulty arises from the fact that in his battle with the law he shows qualities—courage, persistence, ingenuity and skill—which it is impossible not to admire. The result is that unless one is careful, one finds one’s self hoping that he isn’t caught...

Sadly, at least to those millions of Americans who’d found in Chapman a new folk hero, he was indeed caught and, worse, sentenced to the gallows. Even H.L. Mencken, in a 1926 American Mercury essay in which he unwaveringly defended the death penalty, had to pause and offer a tip of the hat to Chapman as a unique and admirable individual, a man of grace and character who’d undertaken his chosen profession with a splash of real style. He stops short of suggesting Chapman be spared the noose, but does quietly mourn the loss of such a charming rarity.

Chapman was a bank robber, burglar, bootlegger, safecracker and con man who spent two-thirds of his life either in stir or on the lam. He was also a darling of the press who became the first legitimate celebrity outlaw of the twentieth century, paving the way for the likes of John Dillinger, Al Capone, Bonnie and Clyde and Pretty Boy Floyd.

In the summer of 1887, Gerald Chapman was born George Chartres either in Brooklyn or on the Lower East Side of Manhattan (the details are a little sketchy). Like so many other youngsters in that particular time and place, he began practicing the criminal arts early, and pulled his first stint in jail when he was fourteen. From that point, he would spend most of his formative years in assorted jails and prisons around New York State.

In 1908, while serving a term for bank robbery in Sing-Sing, a 21-year-old Chapman was transferred to the more experimental Auburn State Prison, where he would essentially begin his graduate studies with the stylish bank robber, counterfeiter and con man George “Dutch” Anderson.

Born Ivan Dahl von Teler, Dutch Anderson came from a wealthy and respectable Danish family. He grew up knowing all the finer things in life, and attended universities in Heidelberg and the States, though he eventually dropped out of school in order, just for the thrill of it it seems, to pursue a life of crime. By the time he met chapman in Auburn, he was a seasoned professional who could sense in the unpolished street tough a youngster with smarts and a lot of potential. He would, in essence, play Henry Higgins to Chapman’s Eliza Doolittle, but in, y’know, criminal terms.

Of all the lessons Anderson taught Chapman at Auburn, the one that had the most impact on the fledgling crime boss was very simple. If Chapman could pass himself off as an educated, respectable and erudite gentleman of the highest order, it would help deflect any suspicion should some John Q. Public be looking to put the finger on a wanted criminal. Who would ever suspect some well-dressed, well-spoken gent of pulling off a cheap smash-and-grab?

Chapman took the advice to heart, and began reading voraciously to better help pull off that “educated” shtick. He also, with Anderson’s help, learned how to carry and present himself as a proper gentleman. To top it all off, he cultivated a British accent.

Both men were paroled in 1919, and promptly put Anderson’s teachings into practice. Noting that the passage of the 18th Amendment earlier that year offered a golden opportunity, they set up a bootlegging empire that operated out of New York, Florida and Ohio.

Another Auburn alumnus, seasoned wheel man Charles Loeber joined up with Chapman and Anderson in 1921. With Chapman posing as a wealthy British oil magnate, Anderson acting as his business partner, and getaway driver Loeber playing their chauffeur, the trio, along with overseeing their growing bootlegging operation, began pulling armed robberies and con jobs around New York.

Easily adjusting to his new role as Wealthy British Aristocrat, Chapman dressed to the nines and moved into a swank apartment in the swank Gramercy Park section of Manhattan, charming his neighbors with his impeccable manners and British accent. He became a familiar face at the city’s finest restaurants and nightclubs, as all the while he, Anderson and Loeber were plotting a big score.

After closely studying its route and schedule for several weeks, on October 24th, 1921, the trio used two cars to block  off Leonard Street in Tribeca, forcing a US Post Office truck to stop. They pulled their guns, pistol-whipped the driver, and got away with $2.5 million in cash, bonds and jewelry. It was to date the biggest heist in U.S. history.

The cops didn’t have a thing to go on, leaving the trio free to move their operation upstate for a spell, where they continued to pull bank jobs, though on a much smaller scale.

Chapman’s luck ran out eight months later, however, when he offered to sell a batch of Argentine gold notes pilfered during the Leonard Street heist to a stock broker, unaware the stock broker was actually an undercover postal inspector. 

He was taken into custody on July 3rd, 1922, and brought to police headquarters in Manhattan for questioning. His stature in the public imagination began to grow that afternoon, when The Count of Gramercy Park (as he would be dubbed in the press) made a break for it an escaped his interrogators. Chapman’s freedom lasted only a few minutes, however, as he was nabbed before he was able to find his way out of the building.

Anderson was arrested not long afterward, and both were found guilty of the postal truck heist and sentenced to twenty-five years in the federal pen in Atlanta.

In early March, 1923, Chapman—who had apparently picked up a few more skills along the way—escaped from the Atlanta prison, knocking out the power supply as he fled. Three days later in Eastern Georgia, he was shot four times as he attempted to evade a posse of 200 well-armed cops and locals. The wounds were not life threatening, so Chapman was returned to Atlanta General Hospital to recover before being slapped with a few new charges.

A week later, his bullet wounds sufficiently healed, Chapman escaped from the hospital, but was quickly recaptured and returned to his old cell.

After keeping a close watch on him for at least two or three days, on March 27th a couple guards were either dozing or taking a bathroom break, and Chapman escaped again, this time making a clean break of it.

It was during this stretch on the lam that Chapman’s legend really took hold, with newspapers—including the Times—building the myth of a new Jesse James. Along with “The Count of Gramercy Park,” various newspapers also dubbed him  “The Gentleman Bandit” and “Gentleman Gerald.” Most notably, however, after being added to the feds’ 10 Most Wanted List, one clever reporter tagged Chapman “Public Enemy Number One.” It was the first time the phrase had been used, and in short order law enforcement agencies at every level would co-opt it as their own.

Nine months after Chapman escaped from Atlanta, Anderson followed suit, clearing the prison walls on December 30th. It’s assumed the old partners in crime teamed up yet again, but even if they didn’t, it hardly mattered. Without a shred of evidence, cops in half a dozen states accused Chapman and Anderson of pulling off every unsolved armed robbery on the books. Meanwhile, Chapman’s status only grew in the public consciousness. After all, he hadn’t hurt anybody—all he did was steal money, which he did in a gentlemanly way.

All that changed in October of 1924.

Unbeknownst to anyone, Chapman had been on a bit of a crime spree in Connecticut with a new associate, another rich kid turned bad named Walter Shean. As the pair was holding up a department store in New Britain on October 12th, they were surprised by five local police officers who burst in, guns drawn. In the brief shoot out that ensued, Chapman shot and killed Officer James Skelly before escaping. 

The remaining cops arrested Shean, who, likely in order to avoid the gallows, quickly fingered Chapman as the triggerman. The funny thing is, though, that the cops didn’t believe him, and they didn’t believe him because they couldn’t imagine Public Enemy Number One bothering to spend any time in a dusty little burg like New Britain, Connecticut. And even if he had, there’s no way he could hang around town without being noticed. But in time other corroborating evidence materialized, and they put out an APB for Chapman.

Chapman, meanwhile, made his way to Muncie, Indiana, where he hid out on the farm of a man named Ben Hance for the next three months.

Apparently tired of sheltering a wanted fugitive who’d overstayed his welcome, on January 18th, 1925  Hance went to the cops and told them exactly where they could find Chapman.

When cops showed up at the farm, Chapman pulled a gun and began firing, but didn’t hit a thing. He was taken into custody and returned to Atlanta, where he still had most of that 25-year sentence waiting for him.

Now, historical accounts begin to diverge wildly here, at least as far as the timeline is concerned, but I’ll do my best to keep things straight.

Although the federal charges in Atlanta took precedence, Connecticut was understandably eager to try Chapman on capital murder charges, so in March of 1925 he was extradited to the Connecticut State Prison to await trial.

The trial got underway the last week of March, amid a courtroom packed with journalists from across the country and hundreds of citizens squeezing and craning to catch even a fleeting glimpse of the notorious Count of Gramercy Park.  

Over the course of the six-day trial, both ben Hance and Walter Shean testified against Chapman, and a ballistics expert reported the bullets which killed Officer Skelly matched Chapman’s gun.

Chapman, in his own defense, insisted he’d never seen Hance or Shean before in his life. He also insisted he’d never stepped foot in New Britain. Most curiously, he claimed he wasn’t even this “Gerald Chapman” everyone kept talking about, that some terrible mix-up had occurred.

The jury apparently found Chapman’s claims that he was not, in fact, Gerald Chapman less than convincing, and on April 4th, 1925, after deliberating eleven hours, returned a guilty verdict, sentencing him to death by hanging.

Upon hearing the verdict, Chapman reportedly turned to his attorney and quipped, “Death itself isn’t dreadful, but hanging seems an awkward way of ending the adventure.”  

As the appeals process began and until the very end, Chapman proclaimed his innocence, declaring repeatedly that what he wanted was “justice, not mercy.” The appeals made their way up to the Supreme Court, but were rejected one after another. 

His lawyers, in a last ditch effort, argued Chapman was bound by Law to complete his sentence in Atlanta before he could be hanged. That would give them at least 23 years leeway to start working on a new round of appeals.

Word of the ploy reached Attorney General Harlan F. Stone, who mentioned it to President Calvin Coolidge. After some careful deliberation, Coolidge granted Chapman a pardon.

Well, sort of anyway—he pardoned Chapman for the Postal truck heist, which ended his term in Atlanta and freed up Connecticut to hang him whenever they pleased, the sooner the better.

Think about it. Coolidge and Attorney General Stone were fully aware how dangerous it was, especially during Prohibition, to have this celebrity outlaw grabbing all the headlines—I mean, you can’t have the press and the general public cheering on a bootlegger, bank robber and cop killer if you’re trying to maintain law and order, now can you? Better to eliminate him as quickly as possible.

On April 6th, 1926, a year after the verdict was handed down, Chapman was delivered to the Connecticut State Prison’s death house, where he was confronted with an unholy contraption known as the Upright Jerker.

As the name implies, the Upright Jerker was the flip side to the traditional gallows. It was, in fact, a barbaric and notoriously unreliable Rube Goldberg device. Instead of a six-foot drop through a trap door, the condemned man had the noose placed around his neck as he stood on the ground. Then several counterweights looped through a pulley were dropped from the top of the scaffolding, jerking him into the air. The argument, of course, was the sudden jerk skyward would snap the prisoner’s neck, resulting in an instantaneous death. Things, however, rarely worked as planned, and more often than not the condemned was left struggling and strangling to death for several minutes.

Although there is no record of how well the Upright Jerker did or didn’t work in Chapman’s case, by the end of the day America’s first Public Enemy Number one was dead, though the improbable novel Gerald Chapman had crafted around himself wasn’t quite over yet.

Now, depending on who’s doing the telling, either three months after Chapman was convicted (August of 1925) or eight months after he was executed (December of 1926) , Ben Hance and his wife were driving just outside out Muncie when they were forced off the road by another car. Two men—Dutch Anderson and Charlie “One Arm” Wolfe, emerged from the car and unloaded their .45s into the Hances. Anderson and Wolfe quickly split the scene, with both men going their separate ways.

Although both Hance and his wife were killed, some stories have it that Hance remained alive long enough to tell responding officers it was Dutch Anderson who had exacted  retribution for Hance’s ratting out Chapman. Other stories have it Hance was already dead when cops arrived, but everyone simply jumped to the same logical conclusion. Walfe was taken into custody not long afterward and confirmed the story, and the hunt was on for Anderson.

Hoping to maintain a low profile and stay at least three or four steps ahead of the law, Anderson drifted around the Midwest for the next few months. Instead of robbing banks or setting up elaborate scams, he simply began passing counterfeit $20 bills. As seasoned a professional as he was, however, he made two mistakes. First, it had been a pretty sloppy counterfeit job, and the bills weren’t terribly convincing to anyone who was paying attention. And second, he spent a little too much time hitting stores in Muskegon, Michigan’s business district.

After word started to get around that someone was spreading funny money around the area, one sharp-eyed shopkeeper gave Anderson’s description to a passing beat cop, Charlie Hammond, who spotted a man fitting the description a few minutes later.

After trying to bluff his way out of Hammond’s sidewalk interrogation without much success, Anderson turned and ran, but made the mistake of ducking down a dead end alleyway. Hammond followed, and in the ensuing shootout, Hammond took a bullet to the lower belly, and Anderson was shot through the heart. Both men died.

Despite Coolidge’s best efforts to nip in in the bud, within five years, an American public long weary of Prohibition and now being battered by the Great Depression on top of it, were rooting for a new generation of bank robbers and bootleggers, and the high-class derring-do of Gerald Chapman, Public Enemy Number One, was largely forgotten.

by Jim Knipfel

[pbandjesse]

My ears are swolllen again. I hate that it keeps happening. It is unacceptable. I already was sick one day last week. No more!!

Its been a good and restful day. The overnight last night could have gone better. Like my group was wonderful. The kids were really sweet and the parents were helpful. Jordan and Jordan both had trouble staying on that schedule so I had to keep vamping and coming up with stuff for my kids. Eventually we were playing night in the museum in the Pearl Harbor room. Because I couldn't think of anything else. Thankfully the kids really enjoyed it and even asked if we could play it again in the morning. And because they were so good and they finish their breakfast we did go and play a couple rounds before they went and saw the gun mount.

But last night was pretty stressful. The parents in the one group were so mean to us. Particularly Tatiana and Maya. They were like snapping their fingers at them and calling them the wait staff. Which they are not. And it was just really really rude. And I'm pretty sure because they're both women of color it was also slightly racist. If not entirely racist.

But we ended the night and we were all glad to be done. I went down to the CPO and they had set up the tables to celebrate Jordan Brooks's new job. And I was like oh it's so cute. And then come to find out one of the tables was decorated for me. Because my birthday is next week. And then got me a card and candy and stuff. It was so cute. My also got me a wrap from Chick-fil-A which I just remembered I left in the fridge. So that's sad. But it was so thoughtful of them. The card also makes me laugh a lot because they all spelled my name wrong and so every single one of the Jesse has the I scribbled out in it. It was very cute and I was just very very appreciative.

Normally on overnights I'll go to bed around 11. But I was having such a nice time that I ended up staying with them in the mess hall until after midnight. My brother ended up texting me around midnight and I decided that that was when I need to go to sleep. I had a really good time talking to everyone though. Jordan finally cleared up what the line is between grave robbing and Archeology. Turns out it's 50 years. And then I went to go try to sleep.

Try is the imperative work here. I normally sleep with my headphones in. But because my ears have been so swollen I picked up a cheap pair of over-the-ear headphones from the clearance section at Dick Blick. They cost like $4. And while they work I sleep on my side. So trying to sleep with over-the-ear headphones on just was not working. So I was pretty uncomfortable. I was half asleep and half awake pretty much all night. I would wake up almost every hour. Which is pretty normal for me on overnights but it was still annoying. At least I was warm. Or warm enough in the pajamas that I wore.

My alarm went off at 5 and no one else in the room was getting up. And so I just decided to go wash my face put my sweatpants on underneath my work pants. Put a little bit of makeup on. And then I went and laid back down. I gave myself 15 more minutes and wait until I at least forever when I was starving. I did not want to be in charge of making all the food. But I also would feel like a jerk if I went up to the kitchen first and didn't start the food.

I was still the first one up there. I got the breakers on at least and then the girls came up and we all were tired and cold. But we tried our best.

We decided to do the morning where I would stay with the breakfasts all three of them. Jordan would do all the engine room tours and Brooks would do all the gun mount tours. And that was fine. The first breakfast was the group that was particularly rude. And we all kind of look down on that because that was also the breakfast where we had the most trouble getting the food done. The eggs would not cook. Mostly because it was so cold in the kitchen that the stove was having trouble getting hot. And the coffee wasn't finishing. And that parent that was sort of semi in charge was just so rude about it. Telling us how disgusting everything was. And honestly you have a bad attitude and I don't feel as bad as I normally would. I told him I agree with him about the food and I'm sorry that he had to deal with some less-than-ideal circumstances and here is a survey and you can totally write down all your complaints.

Thankfully the two other breakfasts went well. The eggs cooked way better or the girls had put them on the stove. Took them out of the bag is completely. Which is always risky but they knocked out of park. And everything went much better from then on. They ate nine boxes of cereal. And they all filled out their surveys. And besides a couple little pickups with the rudeness of the first group we finish strong. And we got some really nice compliments we were all very surprised by that. I'm not 5 by name compliments in the surveys. That is the most I've ever gotten. It was so nice to hear those. My group really liked me and it made me really happy.

It took a really long time for us to pull everything together. Clean up and all that. But we worked as a team and we got it done. James and Sam from over on torsk and they put all their stuff away and then it was decided that we would all go to IHOP.

Attend me James and Sam walked over. I have to get a small table. But then it took almost a 40 minutes how to get a table and then for Jordan and Tatiana to get over from Taney. I have no idea what they were doing. I think it was combination of mopping and finishing paperwork but still. I was very hungry and tired.

Food was good. It was nice being with James even though I could feel the tension radiating off of him. After we all ate we all went our separate ways. Me and James went upstairs to Marshalls. He got new sneakers which he desperately needed. Did not get new pants but the sneakers were very nice. We still cannot find him boots or sandals for that matter. But at least he has sneakers that are not falling apart now.

We went over to that make up section and I got new eyeliner and a heated eyelash curler. There's only $3 I'm fascinated to see how it works tomorrow. I also got a bicycle repair kit that was on clearance for 4 bucks so that was cool. It came in a nice little tin and it says established 1991 which I thought it was me because that's the year I was born.

Actually realized earlier this week that this year is a special birthday. Because I was born on to 2 / 17 / 91 and this year it's 2/17 / 19! Like I just think that's so cool.

After Marshall me and James said goodbye. We got our bikes and I had it on. It was a little bit of rough going. I'm in really bad shape right now. Between being sick and not stretching enough and it just being cold I am getting out of breath really easily. Something I'm definitely working on right now. I got home and it was around 12:30. I took a shower. I felt so much better after that. I am packed my bag and I fit sweet pea and then I laid in bed and watch TV for a little while.

I fell asleep somewhere around 2. It was pretty good rest. I didn't set an alarm. Because I didn't really need to be anywhere today. Didn't have to do anything. I technically worked a 10-hour day so I'm not going to feel bad about it. But I got up at 4:30. Will not up but I was awake. And I decided that I would stay in bed until the sun went down all the way. And then I would have to get up and do something. So I laid in bed for a while. Clean on my phone. And then I got up and I grabbed the fabric bag that just be from work gave me. And some paper. And I worked on selling some stuff. Working on a pattern. James is going to let me bring my sewing machine to keep it as apartment so that I can try to sew things there. But it was fun just sitting here and sewing for a while.

I made pasta sides for dinner. It was very nice. I made some outfits for the week and I played with sweet pea. I tried on the dress that I'm wearing for Valentine's Day and figure it out pain that I'm going to wear with it and what shoes I'm wearing. And I really just been hanging out since then. I can't believe it's almost 11:00. But the way my day was laid out I guess it makes sense. I'll probably go to bed in the next hour or so I can get back on a normal schedule. I'm hoping to wake up in the morning and do some yoga and go and run a couple errands. I want to make a PowerPoint for the kids. But I'm not that worried about that. I hope you guys all sleep well tonight and stay warm. Be kind to each other. Good night

#ootd #work #furby #tired #in progerss #sunday

[osmw1]

I Said Make My Abilities Average!   Chapter 5—I Am a Normal Girl I

Adele skipped dinner to learn more of this world. Since she is used to missing meals, it wasn’t a problem. More importantly, though, is what’s to come.

Adele, as of current, is poor as a church mouse. Her father did not allow her to bring anything. Her tuition was paid for in full, as well as breakfast, lunch, and dinner. Food would not be a concern, if she ate on campus every meal. On the other hand, she can’t afford snacks, let alone eating out. Adele could afford not a single thing. Not clothes, underwear, nor soap. Not even a notebook, a pen, or ink. … there is no way she can go on like this.

Honestly, what were my dad and stepmother thinking? While thinking that, Adele decided to visit the housemaster first thing in the morning and crawled into bed. Since there wasn’t anything else to do anyway. Falling asleep, thoughts crossed her mind: I’m going to live my life as a normal person this time. People always see me as special, always having too high of expectations for me. I’m sick of it all. I’ll be the same as everyone else, at equal status, and speaking as equals. And then—and then, it would be nice if I could make friends…

“Please give me a job!” “What’s that all of a sudden in the morning… Well, no, you’re right. I did say to come to me for work, but on the first day, eh?” “Currently, the money I possess is zero and I have but two pairs of underwear left. The exam is tomorrow, so if I don’t go out and make some money today, the next chance I would have to do so is on the weekend. And that would make things really tough for me…” The dorm mother pressed at her temple and grimaced.

“… work experience so far?” “None.” Adele doesn’t even have any part-time experience, and that is with her previous life included. “Follow me.”

Adele was brought to a bakery by the housemother. “Hello, Aaron. I have brought along with me a potential salesclerk, but what do you think?”

The housemaster explained the situation to the owner of the bakery. She explained everything truthfully and frankly—things like that how Adele is penniless, how she only wanted to work on her days off, how she had zero working experience.

“Nah, can’t go wrong with your referrals,” Said the owner, and then explained to Adele,

“We here have the important task of making the bread that goes on everybody’s table. That’s why we ain’t got the time to take a single day off. With that said, though, we ain’t exactly happy ‘bout it. So that’s why we were thinkin’ of baking only ‘til noon once a week. That way we get half a day off. Normally, we make once in the mornin’ and once after noon. So that’s why we were lookin’ for someone to be our store clerk once a week for us. Whaddya think? If you’re okay with it, why don’t you try working here? If something doesn’t work out later on, you can always quit there and then.”

For Adele, this was the ideal job. Remembering the price of bread wouldn’t even be a challenge to a 10 year-old girl. Plus, the selection here isn’t too different than a bakery in Japan. But even if there were a lot of variety, it wouldn’t take long for Adele to remember it all.

“I'll take it!”

With this, it seemed like she could live a normal school life.

In this world, there are six days in one week and six weeks in one month. Since there are 36 days in one month, there are 10 months in one year—360 days in one year. As well, there are the two days of “grief and thanksgiving for the passing year”, one day of “changing of the years”, and another two days of “welcoming and celebrating the new year”. With those five days included, 365 days in one year. It is convenient this way as weeks and months were easily divisible. And on one of those six days per week, it is a day of rest for society, with the academy included. It is on that day that Adele will work at the bakery.

Though Adele will have no rest days, it can’t be helped. However, as it is a school for children 10 to 13 years old, school wouldn’t be that tiring and there would not be homework either. There probably are people who would go back to their dorm to study on their own time, but for Adele, that wouldn’t be necessary.

It wasn’t the weekend today, but afraid of being of being thrown into the real deal on her first shift, Adele was left behind for training while the dorm mother returned.

Adele’s on-the-job training went well. In her previous life, Misato didn’t socialize much, if at all. It wasn’t because she was bad with people, but because “nobody would go out with Misato”. It was not the case that she wanted to be alone. And because Adele has Misato’s memories and the knowledge of Japanese customer service, playing the role of a young shopkeeper was simple and her customer service was extraordinarily good. In the evening, Adele went back to her dormitory. In her hand tightly gripped was two silver pieces.

This money is the first I’ve earned all by myself! Money that I can use however I want!!

Adele was on cloud nine. However, at that moment came suddenly a sense of anxiety.

Oh, no. What if I dropped this? What if it’s stolen from me? What if I get mugged?

It was extremely unlikely that there would be a mugger targeting 10-year-old girls, but Adele couldn’t help but worry. A reason probably why was that a part of her was still thinking that she is 18-years-old.

That’s right! The magic item box!

If she puts the money in the item box, neither would she lose it nor would it be stolen. Adele was grinning from this brilliant idea of hers and chanted the spell in her head.

The silver pieces that were once in her palm disappeared. Next, she tries withdrawing it. The tactile sensation returns to her hand. She immediately stores her money back into the item box. She was pleased by the success but suddenly comes to a realization and her face turns a little pale.

What if the magic item box had failed on me? My hard-earned money would have vanished! I totally should have tried it out with a rock or something first! Adele, you idiot…

Well, everything turned out all right so it was nothing to fret over. But she’ll be more careful next time, Adele reflected, and headed back home to her dormitory.

Incidentally, to think of it in terms of Japanese yen, one bronze piece would be 10 yen; one small silver piece would be 100 yen; one silver piece would be 1,000 yen; one small gold piece would be 10,000 yen; and one gold piece would be 100,000 yen. Compared to Japan, produce is cheap, meat and luxury goods are more expensive, while tools and jewelry are ridiculously expensive. Though it would be meaningless to simply convert the numbers, they would be appropriate values from the point of view of an average person.

A normal worker with a family would earn about three gold pieces in a month. Since there are 30 working days in a month, it would be equivalent to earning 10,000 yen per day. In comparison, Adele earns two pieces of silver in a day, equivalent to 2,000 yen and an hourly wage of 250 yen—sufficient for a child tending a store. Extrapolating to 12 silver in a month—equivalent to 12,000 yen—would be plenty to buy necessities. Though it is nowhere enough to buy her own clothes, Adele could just stick to wearing her uniform. In order to maintain a sense of dignity, the school will also repair any damage or exchange ill-fitting uniforms, free of charge. Not that it costs nothing, but that it is prepaid through the tuition fees. Undergarments are at Adele’s own expense. Fortunately, a brassiere would be unnecessary for her, making it more economical. Not that Adele finds the fact fortunate though. In any case, Adele is able to escape free from the danger of not having any money.

From now on, on the days Adele works, the master of the bakery will come in before day breaks. He will start making bread for people from the neighborhood, coming for his freshly-baked bread for breakfast. Any workers who still have to work on the weekend will come in to buy bread for their lunches. The master will keep on making and baking until afternoon, when Adele comes in to tend the store. Then he can have his half day of rest and take his family out somewhere. The master is able to escape free from both the dangers of overworking himself and the discontent of his wife.

Previously: /ch001/ /ch002/ /ch003/ /ch004/ /ch005/ (full list of translated chapters)

#ISMMAA #I Said Make My Abilities Average #私、能力は平均値でって言ったよね #osm #light novel #web novel #online novel #ln #wn #on #ラノベ #ライトノベル #オンラインノベル #英訳 #翻訳

[roxywashere]

Neon

Sequel to “Eighth Wonder”

Rey Walker recuperates after an intense battle.

Rey Walker’s first fight as a member of the most prestigious superhero group in the world had been a hard-fought victory. Though there had been considerable civilian loss of life, the death toll had been a mere fraction of that of the last time the group, much younger and unprepared then, had faced this same villain. Once the Demon King had been hauled off by the Archangel to be imprisoned somewhere beyond the bounds of this world, Astra’s League had immediately transitioned to providing disaster aid to the people of New York.

Rey wasn’t very good at this part. Her plasma-manipulation based superspeed had no real use outside of a fight. Her friends Hilda and Shailene, on the other hand, were very useful. Hilda, who could duplicate herself and anything she holds effectively infinitely, and Shay, who had an almost unparalleled telekinetic strength and skill, were very easily proving their utility to the League, by shifting debris and caring for injured survivors. Even Elle, with her fulgurkinesis, found use stop-gapping broken electrical lines and keeping the power on in the area.

Rey sat on top of a building and watched as the rest of the 42-person Superteam did their work.

One of Hilda sat next to her, futily trying to comfort her friend. “Look, Aradia tells me that her father was never of much use during the clean-ups either, and everybody still loved him anyway.”

“Aradia’s father? Isn’t he the one who mysteriously disappeared and everyone assumes died?”

“Uhhh...” Hilda stalled while one of her other bodies asked Aradia. “Yeah...?”

“Shows how great he was.” Rey sighed. “I’m gonna head home.”

“What, you’re just gonna fucking walk all the way back to Danesville? You’ve never even gone a fifth that in one go before, you’re gonna completely wipe yourself out.”

“Don’t worry, I’ll stop to catch my breath when I need to, maybe grab a drink somewhere.”

“Well, be careful. Call me if you don’t think you can make the whole trip, I’ll ask Aradia to swing by and take you home.”

“You’re not my mom.” Rey activated her plasma-propelled superspeed, and ran down the wall to what remained of Times Square. She looked around, tried to orient herself, and then ran south a couple blocks, and then west until she hit the Lincoln Tunnel. She followed the highway west for fifteen minutes, and by then she was well into Pennsylvania.

She was also, as expected, exhausted. She pulled off to the side of the road, panting. She looked around at nearby signs, illuminating the late night with her rapidly depleting collected plasma, and saw one advertising a quaint roadside dive a few miles down the road. Rey shook off the sluggishness, and slogged the short few seconds it took to get there. It was still open, fortunately, a flickering neon sign advertising this fact.

Rey pushed through the front door of Baby’s Diner and saw a retro-styled red-and-white tiled interior, and for a second wondered if she had stepped 140 years into the past, to the 1950’s. She slumped into a booth, the neon sign hung up in the window next to it, and picked up a menu. She stared at it idly for a minute, before looking around the restaurant, wondering where the staff were. She spotted an old-fashioned plasma screen TV in a far corner, showing a news report of the fight back in New York, and spotted glimpses of herself in the footage they were showing on loop.

She realised something, and then then patted herself down looking for her phone. She pulled it out of one of her pockets, and quickly scrolled through her contacts. When she found the one labelled “Mom”, she double tapped it.

Rey silently cursed when the call went straight to answering machine.

“Hey, this is Trip’s phone, I’m obviously not here right now, but if you wait a while I might pick up before you’re done leaving a message.” Beep.

“Hey, ma. I don’t know if you’ve seen the news yet, but in case you did and saw me I just wanted to make sure you knew I was fine. Um... speaking of news, I’ve got some pretty big to break to you. I was inducted into Astra’s League, about an hour ago, and I’ve already helped save the world. So, that’s pretty cool. And it wasn’t just me. Hilda, Shay, and Elle were inducted too. Aradia Furst called me to her tower, and all of the League was there when I got there. I...”

Rey was interrupted by her mother picking up. Without even saying hello, she immediately asked “The Archangel, did she see you?”

“The- wait, what? How do you even know about her?”

“Did she see your face, Rey?!” Trip demanded.

“Well, I mean, yeah.”

“Goddess be damned...”

“Mom, what’s wrong? What’s going on?”

“Now she knows we’re here, Rey. I risked my neck escaping her wretched clutches and you went and handed yourself to her on a golden platter!”

“Mom, what the fuck are you talking-” Rey was interrupted by her mother hanging up on her. She stared at her phone in confusion and incredulity. “What the hell was that all about?” She put her phone down on the table, frowning. She looked around some more. “Where the hell is the waitress?” She sighed, and glanced towards the neon “Open” sign, which was still flickering. She briefly activated her power, and traced her finger along the tube that was flickering, until it returned to a strong, stable glow, though in doing so she drained herself of the last of her plasma, making her powerless until she could restock. She quietly smiled to herself.

A woman wearing a disheveled uniform walked out from the back of the diner. “Well I am so sorry,” the woman, whose name tag read Debbie, apologized. “We didn't hear your car pull up. How long have you been sitting out here?”

Rey peaked past her into the kitchen and saw another woman with a pocket mirror cleaning up her noticeably smeared lipstick. “Just a couple minutes. Did I interrupt something?”

“Hm?” While Debbie merely feigned ignorance, the woman in the kitchen scowled at Rey. “Would you like something to drink?” Debbie asked, forcing the conversation forward.

“A Sprite’ll be fine.”

Debbie turned to the other woman, and motioned her towards the soda fountain.

The other woman grumbled and stopped fixing her make-up, and then went to pour a glass of Sprite.

“Would ya like anything to eat?” Debbie asked Rey.

“A burger will be fine. Just cheese, I like them plain.”

“Comin’ right up.”

Debbie went back into the kitchen to start making the burger, and the other woman walked up to the booth with Rey’s Sprite. Her nametag read Felicia. “I was gonna get laid tonight,” she whispered. “I hope you’re happy.”

Rey pulled out her wallet and counted out a $10 advance tip in ones. Felicia raised an eyebrow. Rey counted out $10 more. Felicia subtly nodded. Rey handed over the wad of ones and took her Sprite in return. She had also slipped in a scrap of paper with her name and phone number on it, one of many she kept in her wallet so she could hand them out like business cards.

When Felicia double checked how much she had been tipped, she scoffed at the forwardness of the gesture.

“Just, keep it in mind,” Rey explained. Felicia shook her head and walked back into the kitchen. Rey’s phone started ringing, and she answered. 

“Great, you're still alive,” Hilda said.

“Did you expect me to have died walking home?”

“Honestly, I never know with you, Rey. You're always pushing yourself harder and harder and I always gotta be there to carry your unconscious ass home. Anyway, Aradia said she's going to be holding a press conference in Danesville right after the new year ticks over there, which, need I remind you, is in like ten minutes.” 

“Shit, really? I'm definitely not going to make it back by then.”

“Ya don't say. Where are you, Aradia is just gonna cast a portal and pick you up.” 

“I don't know, somewhere in the middle of Pennsylvania, just off of Interstate 80, called Baby's Diner.”

“Alright, she's casting the spell, she'll be right there.”

Rey glanced out the window, and saw the glowing sigils indicating an incoming portal appear in the air in the middle of the parking lot. They were shortly followed by the portal itself, a circular rip in space outlined by a dark violet glow. Aradia stepped through it as soon as it opened, and it closed as soon as she did, only having been open for a second total.

She walked up to the diner and silently pushed open the door, and smiled warmly at the old-fashioned stylings of the place. “So,” she said to Rey, “You ran out of plasma, didn’t you?”

“I used the last of it to make the open sign stop flickering,” Rey told her, indicating said sign.

Aradia took her seat in the booth with Rey. “How kind of you. How far does a ‘full charge’, for lack of a better term, get you?”

“I don’t know, actually. I’ve never been able to reach ‘full charge’. I don’t know about you, but it’s pretty hard for me to get my hands on large quantities of high-quality ionized plasma. Cheap stuff, sure. I got a supplier that just just ships me tanks of gases that I can pump through electrodes and ionize myself, but it’s real low-quality.”

“Well, that’s where I think I can be of great use to you. Because, in fact, I do have a source of high energy plasma. The Archangel is a divine craftswoman of the highest order, and she has built for me fusion reactors that consume no fuel and are small enough that they can be carried in a backpack. If you were to have such a device, I believe your capacity would become effectively infinite.”

“I want to say such a thing is impossible,” Rey started, “But that’s a dumb thing to say in this day and age, so I’m not gonna. But I will ask: What’s the catch?”

“All that I ask of you is that you keep in close contact with me. Keep me updated with the goings on of the street-level crime, and keep fighting it.”

Rey considered the offer for a moment, and then held out her hand to shake on it. “Alright. Let’s make this happen.”

Aradia shook Rey’s hand, and at the same time Felicia walked out from the back with Rey’s burger.

“Oh, my, god,” Felicia exclaimed. “Deb, get out here, Aradia Furst is in our diner!”

“What?” Debbie replied. She poked her head out of the kitchen and likewise exclaimed “Oh, my god.”

“Would you either of you like a photo?” Aradia asked. “Or an autograph perhaps? Both, even.”

“Yes!” Felicia said. “Could you sign my phone? I know it’s not the latest model, but you make them so reliable I haven’t needed a replacement in like 7 years.”

Aradia, summoning a gold sharpie from seemingly nowhere, replied “Never a finer endorsement than one from somebody who hasn’t needed to buy everything I sell. What's your name?”

“Felicia Kyle.”

Aradia took Felicia’s phone and signed it with one of the most ornate and complicated signatures Rey had ever seen. “Now, don’t worry about it wiping off, this ink is specially formulated to bond perfectly with the material of the phone. The only way it’s coming off is by belt-sanding the entire back of the phone off.”

Debbie then stepped in with her own (non-FursTech manufactured) phone, and took a quick selfie with herself, Felicia, and Aradia, with Rey in the background.

“Now, I believe Rey and I have a press conference to attend,” Aradia said.

While Aradia started casting another portal, Rey dug in her wallet to pay for the burger, pulling out $7 and slapping it down in Debbie’s hand, and then taking the burger from Felicia and slamming the rest of the Sprite.

“You two,” Rey told Debbie and Felicia, “Keep an eye on the news.” Aradia finished casting, and a portal into a dark room appeared. Aradia stepped through it, and beckoned Rey in after her.

Rey stepped through, and the portal shut. Rey heard only a low rumbling, and then Aradia snapped her fingers. Holograms started appearing across dozens of workstations, showing gauges and binary status lights, and then a spotlight illuminated a metallic orb bristling with copper pipes, sitting on a pedestal.

“This,” Aradia explained, “Is a recreation of the first Holy Device the Archangel ever built. She called it The Heart. Unfortunately, I cannot give this to you, because it is too delicate in its ancient state to function. However...”

Aradia turned to a human-sized flat disk of gold embedded in the wall. With her finger she traced upon it a wide circle with a pentagram inside it, and inside the pentagram traced the Kabbalah Tree of Life. The disc on the wall split into seven fragments that irised into the surrounding wall. Within this vault was shelf upon shelf of stacks upon stacks of large golden coins, and in the middle of the room was another pedestal with another orb on it, except this one was a plain sphere glowing from within with a powerful white light.

“This Heart is sturdy enough to be worn, even by a superspeedster.”

Aradia then used her metallokinesis to draw from the golden coins, and constructed a backpack around the Heart, and a coil of flexible metal pipe.

“Go ahead, put it on.”

Rey hesitantly walked into the vault, and up to the backpack, and slowly slid it on. Aradia walked up behind her, and slid the pipe under her collar and down her right sleeve, coming out just below her palm.

“Do you feel the plasma, writhing within its containment?”

Rey shut her eyes, and focused, and felt the dense mass of energy on her back. She tried to draw from it, and she felt it snaking its way through the pipe, until she felt the bare heat of it in her palm. She opened her eyes and saw the bright white sphere of plasma, and then absorbed it into her veins.

She had never felt so energized in her life, and struggled to keep her superspeed from activating on it’s own, her fingers twitching and the rest of her body vibrating slightly. She clenched her fist, and stilled herself, halting the overcharge from overtaking her.

“I think I found my practical full charge level,” Rey confided. “It’s not a hard limit, and I’m sure it will go up as I gain mastery, but I think that’s it for now.”

Aradia summoned a small hologram of a clock, which indicated that it was a handful of seconds from passing midnight in Danesville. When the New Year ticked over, Aradia quietly said “Happy New Year yet again, Neon. Now, we must be getting to that press conference.”

Aradia cast yet another portal, and the pair stepped into the front lobby of one of the four FursTech buildings across America. But Rey noticed that they weren’t in the Danesville FursTech building.

“Why are we in New York again? I thought you said the press conference was in Danesville?” Rey looked back at Aradia, who had silently cast one last portal and stepped through it.

Aradia turned to Rey, and said “I did indeed. I’ll be introducing you in about five minutes. I hope to see you there!” Before Rey could snap out of her bewilderment, Aradia gave a small wave goodbye, and closed the portal.

Rey, half seething and half laughing, shook her head. “Well, let’s see what a full charge of top-quality plasma does for me.” Rey activated her superspeed and bolted through the city, feeling a rush of speed that she hadn’t felt since she first started experimenting with her power.

#Astraverse #superhero literature #superhero #writing #short story

[aion-rsa]

Power Rangers Beast Morphers Season 2 Episode 10 Review: The Evox Snare

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This POWER RANGERS BEAST MORPHERS review contains spoilers.

Beast Morphers has been in real danger of being one of several Power Rangers seasons that might only be remembered for having a team-up. It’s happened before with Wild Force, Operation Overdrive, Super Megaforce, and Super Ninja Steel. These were all seasons that were heavily critcized by fans so the team-ups, whatever their quality, easily took all the spotlight. To this day those seasons usually only come up in discussion because of their team-ups.

With all the news of returning cast members for Beast Morphers, especially the original Red Ranger, it could be very easy for this season to fall into that category. However, unlike those other seasons I mentioned, Beast Morphers has an overall higher quality. Sure it has some issues but there are a lot of bright spots so it’s very possible it won’t be eclipsed and this episode gives me a lot of hope.

For starters, we aren’t confining the team-up to one episode. We’re slowly laying the seeds for the eventual big Dino Rangers reunion but it’s being weaved into Beast Morphers story. We aren’t just dropping everything so Jason can show up to be cool for twenty minutes. We actually follow-up on the climax before the break of the Rangers discovering Devon’s dad has been taken over by Evox. 

Devon is angry that no one can help him and we get some genuine conflict between the team. Power Rangers as a whole has suffered from a lack of conflict in recent seasons so it’s always great to see scenes like Devon getting mad at Nate for not giving him an instant fix for saving his dad.

Devon’s anger and helplessness inform all the best scenes of this episode. This is a plot that, while it could have been developed more, still works because the relationship between Devon and his dad has been properly established. We feel Devon’s pain so when he actively seeks help from other dimensions, it doesn’t feel like a cheap ploy to get fan service. It feels genuine and honest. 

It also subtly does a lot with Beast Morphers’ connection to the wider Power Rangers universe. Fans love to talk about continuity and trying to tie every season together. Most of the time this means characters returning or directly following up on plot points. I’d obviously love to see that done well but the scene here between Devon and Dr. K? If we had more small things like this it would be a lot to make this universe feel richer.

I’m sure some people are already debating how Grid Battleforce got all this information from Dr. K or why they even need it, but I don’t need it all spelled out. For one we might get it in an upcoming episode but also it’s kind of nice for their to be an implied connection that fans can work out for themselves. 

The writers of this episode, very smartly, knew that kind of techno babble/continuity check list wasn’t relevant to the scene. What mattered was Devon finding a way to save his dad.

I love him looking up the events of RPM to try and accomplish that. It’s very proactive for this show and despite Dr. K dismissing his plan, it still felt like a logical idea. Her suggestion about utilizing the Split Emitters from Dino Charge was another great nod to past events that actively tied in to Devon’s predicament. It isn’t a throwaway reference; it’s perfectly tied into a plot we’re invested in.

While Dr. K didn’t get much time to shine and her dialogue was nearly all exposition, I’m mostly happy with it. I’m glad the episode didn’t stop dead to give her a ton of focus that wasn’t relevant. They kept it short and to the point, as Dr. K would normally be. Yes it’d be nice to learn more about what she’s been up to or how she’s developed but her intermittent contact with Grid Battleforce does at least give us a rough idea that she’s been working with other dimensions in some fashion. Hopefully we get to see a little more as these episodes go on.

We then get the vault. First off, it’s just a delight to see all those old props. It looks like Hasbro just sent over everything they had on display at the last Power Morphicon! I think it went on a big too long but if you’re going to have a moment of fan service this wasn’t a bad place to put it. Thankfully the scene is still largely driven by Devon’s drive to save his father so it works.

I wonder why Grid Battleforce has all this tech. Why is it stored here? By tapping into the morphin’ grid for Morph-X does that mean Grid Battleforce has become a kind of archival site for past Ranger weapons and gear? No idea, but I’m so glad we get to ask these questions and have a genuine hope they could be answered. Not sticking all of this in one episode let’s these ideas breathe.

Plus that means we get to see the Rangers actually be really clever and smart! The way they tricked Scrozzle was genuinely surprising and the way Devon activated the Split Emitters was the best use of the transportation technology in Beast Morphers yet. On the flipside you have Evox being legit threatening! When he caught that arrow and said, “You think this little STICK will stop me?” Chills!

As much as I’m focusing on all the references to the past the reason they all land so well is because they’re augmenting Devon’s story. They feel natural and make the fight with Evox feel bigger because he’s got to go back into Ranger history to find a solution. I wish it would have taken at least one more episode to free Daniels because it did feel anti climatic after all the build up in the first half of the season but at least that means we won’t be dragging it out. Or who knows, maybe Evox will find a way back into him!

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For now though we can move on to the next big plot and start laying more seeds for the team-up. I hope the other episodes of this arc are just a solid as this one because I haven’t been this excited for Beast Morphers in awhile. It isn’t because of the returning cast members or references, as exciting as those could be. It’s more because this episode proves it can do these callbacks well and not forget about the plot of Beast Morphers. Thanks to that, Beast Morphers has a real shot at being remembered not just for having a team-up but some great characters and stories all on its own.

The post Power Rangers Beast Morphers Season 2 Episode 10 Review: The Evox Snare appeared first on Den of Geek.

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#aion-rsa #Den of Geek

[eldradii]

February Tournament

So for this tournament I played the above army. It was a while ago, but I think I should go through it properly in the light of all the recent changes, it helps me understand my games. 

The list was a bit weird, somewhat due to inexperience. Ulthwe Battalion with Eldrad, Warlock, 20 Guardians with a single platform, 10 guardians, 5 avengers, 8 reapers (tempest launcher) and triple serpents with triple cannons. Then a Black Heart battalion with 2 archons, 3x5 warriors, 2 double cannon venoms, two razorwings. Finally an aux support 6 strong reaver squad with cult of red grief so they can advance and charge.

My thinking with the bikes is to be able to tie up anything on turn one with their amazing speed. I justified it as worth a command point because you’d spend a couple CPs to get to advance and charge with Eldar bikes anyway. 

I will try keep my thoughts under headings, first is Takeaways, which means what I think about it going forward and to adapt with; second is Updates - which means how I think about this game with the context of the new FaQ and Ynnari rules. 

Game 1

I played game 1 against Death guard with Mortarian, some terminators, cultists, some plague marines and a bunch of the flying flamer drones. 

I believe this was about midgame. I started off killing what I could, he killed a razorwing. To be honest I don’t remember the details of this game very much. I didn’t really understand what Mortarian did and he sniped my warlock and a couple other things. I believe he killed a plane as well. However midgame (so turn 2) I got to really turn it around as you can sort of see in this picture.

Fired millions of shuriken catapults with doom, planes, reapers, extra dire avengers and the guardians, to shoot him down. It came down to the last FNP roll that he tried to reroll and I just had to vect it. The rest of the game was a bunch of tying up and my usual recon, but finding all these daemon engines hard to shift in addition to the very tough infantry. We ended up pressed for time and finished on a 16-16 tie. 

Take aways: Guardians will kill or really help kill anything with the support of psychic and strategems, and wave serpents were very tough. Mortarian has a line attack. 

Updates: Doom not working cross faction means the razorwings legit take a hit, as they’re hard to keep in Writ of the Living Muse range as well. 

Game 2

Game 2 I played against a ton of big tyranids including a big blob of genestealers and the broodlord. I deployed to one corner with the bulk of my force, and so he deployed mostly opposite. My bikes did a great job getting into his hive guard and stopping them from shooting, plus forcing stuff to deal with them. I move blocked him with the flyers (sacrificing both in the process as they had to fly off the board once he blocked them) and it gained me an extra turn of shooting them before they hit my lines. After that I fed him venoms as my frontline so he couldn’t get into the dark reapers who at this point were comfortably picking off one every turn. A couple fortunate 6 up feel no pains gave me some units that survived; Then it came down to heroes to clean up as is a common trend for me!

Here is the whole gang charging into the swarmlord, only just killing him. I think the guy allocated his fight in death attacks to Eldrad who of course lived just fine. Later he had to deal with the wave serpent in the middle. The guardians clear out genestealers and do a screen job, tying up a couple beasts in combat when they charged in. By the time old one eye made it in I had killed the swarmlord so the characters went in for a second fight:

It’s quite interesting that the venoms survived just fine most of the game. I also believe my reapers stayed alive, but they became less relevant as the end game was just running around trying to clean up his forces to table him. I ended up using the guardian bomb to hide on the other side of the battlefield. It’s a bit after the fact but I do remember the game fondly. Some cool moments with characters. I believe this is when I fell in love with Eldrad!

I ended the game as a slight victor 20 points to 17. I think we got 4 turns in, just not sure why it was so close now I describe it, but I believe we matched kills and holds a lot probably so I was looking at 12 points for my secondaries and then 2 for each turn. 

Take aways: Eldrad is a beast! Really liked him. Archons did some good work too. Looking back, my good friend has pointed out to me that Wyches would suit my playstyle a lot more than warriors because I am often quite aggressive, and wyches are often a little more resilient than warriors (they’re all pretty flimsy outside of venoms) but have a ton more utility. Flyers move blocking was critical - if they’d have been craftworld flyers they would not have been sacrificed. It was good to tie up the hive guard with the bikes. If I had had more reapers I think this game would have been even easier. I don’t take that much away from this game because I anticipate that most tyranid lists like this (even those) would have flying hive tyrants and more genestealers. Guardian bomb is very versatile.

Updates: With the flyer block nerf this kind of tactic would be hard. Furthermore, not being able to use Doom + Poison is a hit. Ynnari guardian bomb in addition to the other bomb is quite interesting as this game I mainly used them to secure a corner of the battlefield by clearing out a cheap unit that was holding an objective, then keeping them there to score me my points. Having two would be nice.

Game 3

This was a game agains the usual Guard + Castellan list. I believe I just ignored the castellan all game. Instead I targeted the Hellhounds and tried to clear out as much infantry as possible. My planes flew around picking off squads and his castellan really struggled to have a major impact. I believe my guardian bomb deep struck on the flank of his deployment closest to the camera in the above picture. I don’t remember losing any critical units, and I was able to easily tie up the carpark of wyverns and basalisks just with the reavers and then seal the tie up with venoms. 

It’s actually quite nice to see how easily this matchup went. Castellan is untouched but really struggles to efficiently deal with a bunch of 6 up feel no pain -1/-2 to hit models. He was splitting fire and it was going poorly which is what happens sometimes with the -1 or -2 with invulnerable saves. 

He was just on the back foot and my reapers were completely safe. The game ended with an 18 points to 13 win for me. A low point win mainly because the game finished around turn 3 or 4 I believe. I still believe I would have won with turn 5 too, but it would have been closer. 

Take aways: No point going after Castellans really, with this army he has to devote a lot from it just to kill a venom or something, can’t really shoot at two things reliably. Meanwhile you just shred the infantry, fly around and score the easy points. 

Updates: Honestly in this matchup since you’re not shooting the castellan the loss of Doom isn’t that big of a deal. I don’t think I got in range to jinx the castellan anyway either. However now the Castellan is at best a 5++ versus jinx (since they cannot rotate to counter the jinx)

So going into day 2 I am coming 6th which is pretty cool! I am exhausted. I find out that I am playing against pure knights + loyal 32. So Castellan, Crusader, two gallants, a loyal 32 with some mortar teams.

Game 4

This photo about sums it up; I did my job and killed as much infantry as I could. My opponent blew my mind by just staying out of doom range and staying in his corner all game. I’ve had it pointed out to me since that if he doesn’t do that I pick off a knight every turn, which also blows my mind, because I was trying potshots with the reapers into non-debuffed knights and barely getting anything done. I did the right thing with feeding gallants venoms and kabalites while scoring as much as I could. I made a mistake trying to hide my reapers with their fire and fade from the various knights and realise on this table there wasn’t really anything I could do to keep them out of LOS. So I just cast protect on them and then lightning fast reactions to try keep them alive. I got caught out by a couple rules involving charging people behind walls with knights, so lost Eldrad and it all went downhill from there. To be honest I went in with the mindset that I probably wouldn’t win, made several mistakes, and my opponent played the better game and won because of it.

Takeaways: Other than the rule interactions, I’m much more partial to having a backup quicken for Eldrad or perhaps a Skyrunner farseer. I’m now of the thinking that you really want two farseers in Eldar lists. Simply because Doom and Executioner are powerful close range spells, and Guide and Forewarned are very good reasons to sit next to your dark reapers. You can’t really do both of these things. I’m also now a bit more optimistic about what I can do against knights - Two razorwings, 7 reaper launchers and 9 shuriken cannons can actually bring down a knight with Doom and perhaps Jinx. 

Updates: Obviously the lack of Doom to team up with the dissie cannons on the razorwing is a big hit. With the flyer nerf it will be harder to get that one turn of blocking the drukhari flyers can do. With Ynnari changes losing the ability to possibly double shoot with reapers is a blow. Positive wise, if I ever decided to go for killing knights, Jinx became a lot better against them. Showing up with a hemlock, doom, and a bunch of reaper launchers seems very strong now. This way I could sit back and kill the gallants in the first couple of turns, then work on the crusaders another time. Feed them venoms to keep them off the reapers. 

We talked out the rest of the game and he ended on talked out 37 points to my 19. Realistically I also picked bad secondaries - should have picked stuff like behind enemy lines and deep struck behind terrain to just get my guaranteed points. 

Out of contention for a placing I believe, I was happy to play against a regular opponent from other tournaments I played. 

This game was pretty fun. The list is pretty much all on the table there - Mars Battalion with rangers, 6 Robot unit, two dunecrawlers with icarus; then a Stygies battalion with the new Manipulus who gives +1 advance/charge I believe, and has a nasty flamer type weapon, 10 + 9 priests, and two drills. 

The bikes did their job of charging the robots, however their scenic bases meant that my opponent got to intervene with cawl into them and pick them up. His bots killed one thing a turn usually. I kept trying to silence them with venoms and other nonsense but it didn’t really work. I did however get good board control and my razorwings annoyingly were staying alive really well. His turn one drill charge I believe forced the reapers to stick out of the transport and end up dying. Eldrad had his hands full mopping up electropriests - I also unfortunately lost my Archon to mortal wounds from the electropriests! 

The guardian bomb went for that L building at the top of the picture to secure me Behind Enemy Lines and that objective, clawing me back a lot of points over the game. I found the kabalites pretty useless this game to be honest. I’ll touch on this later.

The game was a super close 22 to 21 win his way! I don’t often talk about my opponent but it was a pleasure as always to play him. A pretty fun game to close out the weekend with.

Takeaways: Bikes tied up the bots, but suffered due to their big base size, and also losing a bunch to overwatch. I should have pretty much ignored the bots as much as I could and just stayed out of sight against this kind of army. In the future I might have been excited to take Haywire against the robots, but without Doom or double tap it’s much more of a mission, so I think the better thing would be to tie them up with bikes if possible, venoms, etc. This is where wyches would come in - charge the screen, don’t kill many, tie them up on a 3+ with a cp-reroll via the shardnet! Then on their turn I get to kill the unit then consolidate even further, and they’re much more resilient against stuff like random support characters from killing them, just due to the 4+ invulnerable saves. Eldrad was a boss as usual. 

Updates: Nothing really because I don’t feel like Dooming and shooting away at the bots is a particularly good choice for the Razorwings to get into. I never got in range to Doom or Jinx them anyway and I didn’t feel like that was bad for me either. With the Ynnari rules I’d get 2 cp advance and charge from reaver jetbikes, which is very nice, and the wyches being able to get melee doom off would come in pretty handy as countercharges to the electropriests or something. 

Overall thoughts:

When I finished the tournament I was pretty sure the bikes really could have been either smaller in squad size or another venom - not many matchups have many targets that are critical to tie up on turn 1, especially with such a low drop  count to make me go first, and also such a deceptively resilient army. 

I walked away with a huge respect for Eldrad, and a bit less respect for Jinx as I found it hard to connect with an opposing threat. I instead really enjoyed casting Protect on Eldrad! I enjoyed the resilience of the wave serpents and what they meant for my matchups - it was going to be hard for opponents to get serious kills as all my stuff is either chaff or wave serpents, venoms and razorwings, all of which are quite annoying to kill. 

Ulthwe performed just fine, I like it for exactly Guardian bombs, but for everything else it’s a bit of a meh proposition. The way I look at it now, compared to Ulthwe, you can pay 10 points to make your wave serpent both Alaitoc and Ulthwe which seems like a good deal to me, or to just keep them as Alaitoc. Multiple Alaitoc wave serpents is very powerful in playing the mission and their mortal wounds are quite well positioned in the meta.

I felt like Razorwings were always better than craftworld flyers just for their invulnerable save and how cheap they were but, they also aren’t as killy or useful and still are less tanky than craftworld planes. So if I am taking flyers in the future, I believe strongly, as well as because of the Doom nerf, craftworld flyers are better. They’re also better for your mental energy as you can pivot at the end and very rarely will you get in trouble with their positioning. While you’d prefer to play perfectly, not having to worry as much is a load off you during the game, and over a tournament, it’s important to keep your mental energy up.

I didn’t really like the mismatched random troops I had sitting around. I didn’t come up against stuff like 9 mortars and all that, and even then, I found the troops besides the guardian bomb quite useless. Kabalites I can forgive this, because they are 30 points. However I have never felt more resolved that even as wave serpent cargo random craftworld squads are borderline useless. As such, I believe unless it’s very tight for points, I’ll be playing either the full 20 man guardian bomb, or 5-8 rangers, per slot. The reason for this is that while rangers don’t accomplish anything in terms of damage, they can deep strike onto objectives, reinforce your screen, etc; and they do this while being quite resilient at -2 to hit and 3+ saves. If you are coming up to the endgame too, you can make them only be hit on 6s, which is like a second lightning fast reflexes, to blank two big units your opponent tries to kill something with. 

In ITC missions, having a unit of 8 rangers can do really well if you have the spare points, because 5 is not that unlilkely to die to a serious threat, but 8 will often survive on maybe 1 or 2 members most of the time. Then, you can auto-pass them, or perhaps have a fearless source, and then your opponent doesn’t score a kill point. As opposed to 5 dire avengers who will simply die to Mortars, or an Avenger Gatling Cannon. This means the list gives up far less points as the game goes on - what usually happens with the games is you can initially score a lot of points but once their hitters start to hit back, you start giving up more and more points now that you can’t hide in transports or behind buildings. 

I really like Venoms, cheap, mobile. I wanted more of them. It’s a bit hard to manage reducing the kill points you give up to the opponent with them, but if you park them next to buildings or out of sight for the first few turns, you can pile out of them out of LOS, to avoid giving them follow up shooting.   

FaQ and Ynnari in the context of this tournament:

Realistically not much would have changed. The Razorwings take a big hit not being able to do useful things against imperial knights, but they’re still quite good at killing infantry and doing light damage to medium tanks with their shatterfield missiles. That said, I don’t like the disintigrators on the platform that is forced to fly around with no buffs - I like the Crimson hunter exarch much more now, simply because it has its own buffs, and only needs a doom to be able to pitch in against Knights. 

Jinx nerf, not sure about this because I don’t think I ever got to jinx a big target. But it was nice to jinx something close to me and doom it, then kill it with poison shots. With this in mind I am quite firmly ready to at least try the switch to wyches for this kind of list. They shoot less which is fine (ironically they can output similar shooting with their plasma grenade against t3 poor save stuff, which actually makes up for the 5 less splinter shots) but have a lot of utility and also can get Doom from Ynnari, which means they could team up fine to take on threats that break my lines. 

Ynnari changes killed the main way this list would have moved forward, what with Yvraine and a bigger squad of dark reapers. It’s kinda a shame but I’m also hopeful, since just normal Dark Reapers without double tap were very good at shooting. I’m happy to invest a bit more psychic into them and make them Alaitoc too so they are basically invulnerable to mortars and if they’re forced to be shot at, they can be very hard to shift even if you got LOS to them.

The new ynnari rules mean that I’d probably take Yvraine instead of the second Archon, just because she can do some decent mortal wound output, and I’m tempted to just flat run the drukhari as Ynnari anyway, just with the wyches, the archon giving them rerolls easier, and the melee doom coming in useful.

Moving Forward:

I’ve already tried a lot of different lists since, but I thought to revisit the ideas and what worked well for me. So I’d start off by moving the reapers and company to an alaitoc detachment. I think now I drop the razorwings, and I will play an Alaitoc Hemlock instead. The main reason for this is because I like the idea of mobile Jinx, and while CHE is very good, I feel like the hemlock brings a lot to the table with auto-hit guns and I am not discounting the mindshock pod. I think to restructure the list to also include Eldrad and an Alaitoc Farseer, then move into more aggressive screening with guardians and wave serpent/venom with an Eldrad up in their face when the situation calls for it. 

Anyway, this has been good for me to go over. Hope you enjoyed reading!

[inlibrariusvenefica]

1. Are you solitary or in a coven?

Solitary for the most part, although I do meet up with a group for Sabbat rituals.

2. Do you consider yourself Wiccan, Pagan, witch, or other?

Wiccan

3. What is your zodiac sign?

Libra

4. Do you have a Patron God/dess?

Athena

5. Do you work with a Pantheon?

I find I gravitate towards the Greek Pantheon but nothing official

6. Do you use tarot, palmistry, or 
any other kind of divination?

Tarot and Oracle cards

7. What are some of your favorite herbs to use in your practice? (if any)

I don’t use herbs

8. How would you define your craft?

Mostly hearth/cottage witchcraft

9. Do you curse? If not, do you accept others who do?

I don’t curse, but I don’t have a problem with people who do

10. How long have you been practicing?

Coming on 9 years

11. Do you currently or have you ever had any familiars? 

Nope, no familiars

12. Do you believe in Karma or
Reincarnation?

Yes to reincarnation

13. Do you have a magical name?

Yes

14. Are you “out of the broom closet”?

Kind of, to certain people I know I feel safe with

15. What was the last spell you performed?

Pfft, I can’t remember

16. Would you consider yourself knowledgeable?

Sort of

17. Do you write your own spells?

Yes, when I don’t have a lot of things going on in my mundane life and I have the time

18. Do you have a book of shadows?
If so, how is it written and/or set up?

Yes, it’s kind of set up like how you do a bullet journal, just without the planner/organizer part

19. Do you worship nature? 

No, but I’m respectful of it

20. What is your favorite gemstone?

Sapphire

21. Do you use feathers, claws, fur, pelt, skeletons/bones, or any other animal body part for magical work?

Nope

22. Do you have an altar?

Yes

23. What is your preferred element?

Air

24. Do you consider yourself an Alchemist?

No

25. Are you any other type of magical practitioner besides a witch?

Nope

26. What got you interested in witchcraft?

I’ve been interested in general occult stuff since I was a kid, so it’s always been there, I just had to find my path

27. Have you ever performed a spell or ritual with the company of anyone who was not a witch?

No

28. Have you ever used ouija?

No

29. Do you consider yourself a psychic?

No, even though I’ve had a couple of premonition dreams

30. Do you have a spirit guide? If so, what is it?

No

31. What is something you wish someone had told you when you first started?

You don’t have to be super formal

32. Do you celebrate the Sabbats? If so which one is your favorite?

I do celebrate the Sabbats, my fav is Yule

33. Would you ever teach witchcraft to your children?

Don’t want kids

34. Do you meditate?

I should! But it’s just really hard for me to stop my brain from wandering

35. What is your favorite season?

Fall for sure

36. What is your favorite type of magick to preform?

Candle magick

37. How do you incorporate your spirituality into your daily life? 

I dedicate the housework to Hestia. It makes otherwise boring chores more meaningful

38. What is your favorite witchy movie?

Hocus Pocus

39. What is your favorite witchy book, both fiction and non-fiction. Why?

Harry Potter for fiction, but I don’t think I’ve read witchy non-fiction

40. What is the first spell you ever performed? Successful or not. 

I think it was a friendship spell and it was a little too successful, got warped thanks to some subconscious stuff on my part.

41. What’s the craziest witchcraft-related thing that’s happened to you?

Nothing crazy has really happened tbh

42. What is your favourite type of candle to use?

Chime candles

43. What is your favorite witchy tool?

Wand

44. Do you or have you ever made your own witchy tools?

No

45. Have you ever worked with any magical creatures such as the fea or spirits?

Nope

46. Do you practice color magic?

Yes, I pair it with candle magick

47. Do you or have you ever had a witchy teacher or mentor of any kind?

No

48. What is your preferred way of shopping for witchcraft supplies?

I prefer shopping in person, but the closest supply store never keeps to their hours, so I end up shopping online

49. Do you believe in predestination or fate?

Kind of in fate

50. What do you do to reconnect when you are feeling out of touch with your practice?

I read up on my practice, check out some blogs

51. Have you ever had any supernatural experiences?

No

52. What is your biggest witchy pet peeve?

I don’t think I have any

53. Do you like incense? If so what’s your favorite scent?

I like vanilla incense

54. Do you keep a dream journal of any kind?

Yes!

55. What has been your biggest witchcraft disaster?

My first spell going wrong, brought nothing but trouble

56. What has been your biggest witchcraft success?

I think it’s still in the works, we’ll see. But for sure in the past, I needed to get this lady to stop harassing me (pretty sure she didn’t have car insurance and was trying to get all she could get from me for a super minor accident). Did the spell, let the insurance company know about her contacting me directly. Poof, never heard from her again.

57. What in your practice do you do that you may feel silly or embarrassed about?

Nothing comes to mind

58. Do you believe that you can be an atheist, Christian, Muslim or some other faith and still be a witch too?

I haven’t really thought about it, but I guess so, if it works for some people.

59. Do you ever feel insecure, unsure or even scared of spell work?

Sometimes unsure

60. Do you ever hold yourself to a standard in your witchcraft that you feel you may never obtain?

Nah

61. What is something witch related that you want right now?

An athame

62. What is your rune of choice?

Wunjo

63. What is your tarot card of choice?

9 of Pentacles

64. Do you use essential oils? If so what is your favorite?

I did use lemon essential oil for DIY cleaning solutions when I rented a room from a relative for a year in order to be closer to my then work

65. Have you ever taken any kind of witchcraft or pagan courses?

I did start one 5 years ago but I didn’t have time like I thought I did so I dropped out

66. Do you wear pagan jewelry in public?

Only when I’m going to circle night

67. Have you ever been discriminated against because of your faith or being a witch?

No, I don’t let people know, as a rule

68. Do you read or subscribe to any pagan magazines?

No

69. Do you think it’s important to know the history of paganism and witchcraft?

Sure

70. What are your favorite things about being a witch?

Being in touch with the divine yourself and creating a relationship with them, as well as being in charge of your own beliefs and practice, and not having to be hovered over and being told what to believe by an “official” who acts as mediator between yourself and the divine

71. What are your least favorite things about being a witch?

The hostility from other people

72. Do you listen to any pagan music? If so who is your favorite singer/band?

No

73. Do you celebrate the Esbbats? If so, how?

Eesh I haven’t celebrated an Esbat in ages.

74. Do you ever work skyclad?

No

75. Do you think witchcraft has improved your life? If so, how?

I think so. It’s helped me figure out who I am and to listen to myself more for what I need in terms of self care

76. Where do you draw inspiration from for your practice?

Reading up from others’ blogs

77. Do you believe in ‘fantasy’ creatures? (Unicorns, fairies, elves, gnomes, ghosts, etc)

Not sure. It’s hard to say. But for ghosts, even though I’ve never seen one, it’s certainly possible for them to exist, human energy can do a lot of things.

78. What’s your favorite sigil/symbol?

Triple moon

79. Do you use blood magick in your practice? Why or why not?

No, not my thing

80. Could you ever be in a relationship with someone who doesn’t support your practice?

I don’t think so

81. In what area or subject would you most like your craft to grow?

Connecting to the God and Goddess more

82. What’s your favorite candle scent? Do you use it in your practice?

I like vanilla, but I also like clean scents (like linen or beachy scents). Nah, I use unscented candles for my practice

83. Do you have a pre-ritual ritual? (I.e. Something you do before rituals to prepare yourself for them). If so what is it? 

Just grounding and clearing my mind

84. What real life witch most inspires your practice?

Never thought about it

85. What is your favorite method of communicating with deity?

Just talking to them

86. How do you like to organize all your witchy items and ingredients?

I’m stuck at my parents’ house, so I got things hiding in the bottom drawers of my tv cabinet  and in cases I’ve bought at home goods stores. Hopefully, I’ll be in a new place by next year, then I’ll get like a buffet/sideboard to put things in

87. Do you have any witches in your family that you know of?

LOL no, they’re all Catholics

88. How have you created your path? What is unique about it?

???

89. Do you feel you have any natural gifts or affinities (premonitions, hearing spirits, etc.) that led you toward the craft? If so what are they?

Nah, no natural gifts or affinities led me. 

90. Do you believe you can initiate yourself or do you have to be initiated by another witch or coven?

You can initiate yourself

91. When you first started out in your path what was the first thing or things you bought?

Oh man, what did I buy? I remember a cheap chalice, a mini cauldron, a bell, and a metal cookie sheet to put candles on 

92. What is the most spiritual or magickal place you’ve been?

A lot of places in Britain

93. What’s one piece of advice you’d give someone who is searching for their matron and patron deities?

Research deities and find one you feel a connection to

94. What techniques do you use to ‘get in the zone’ for meditation? 

I don’t meditate, I try but it’s hard to turn my brain off.

95. Did visualization come easily to you or did you have to practice at it?

I used to be good at visualization when I was younger but now it’s pretty hard

96. Do you prefer day or night? Why?

Day, for no reason. I just do.

97. What do you think is the best time and place to do spell work?

For me, it’s at night at home with no one around to bother you

98. How did you feel when you cast your first circle? Did you stumble or did it go smoothly?

I definitely felt something powerful, but it wasn’t too intense. Surprisingly, it went very smoothly

99. Do you believe witchcraft gets easier with time and practice?

Oh yeah

100. Do you believe in many gods or one God with many faces? 

One God with many faces

101. Do you eat meat, eggs and dairy?

YES YUM

102. What is your favorite color and why?

Blue, it’s just so calming

103. What is the one question you get asked most by non-practitioners or non-pagans? How do you usually respond?

No one’s really asked me

104. Which of your five senses would you say is your strongest? 

Touch

105. What is a pagan or witchcraft rule that you preach but don’t practice?

Ummm.....can’t think of anything really

[theheavymetalmama]

Top Ten Characters Who Could Kick Saitama’s Ass

Ooh boy. Not going to make any friends with this post.

Full disclosure, I hardly ever watch anime anymore. Seems like everything new these days is either an ecchi, a harem, or both. Not that there’s anything inherently wrong with ecchis or harems, but when that’s all anybody wants to produce these days it gets old fast. And all the newest stuff that everyone says I should watch I just can’t get into. Attack on Titan feels like something that was never proof-read before production began, I find Kill la Kill obnoxious, and Monster Musume would actually be enjoyable if it didn’t milk tired roommate and girlfriend tropes for everything they were worth and if the male lead wasn’t such a terminally unlikable dumbass. Seriously, if Kimihito is supposed to represent the typical Japanese every-man then it’s no wonder Japan’s birth rate has dropped like a brick.

Having said all that, I fucking LOVE One Punch Man. It’s funny, action packed, and you can tell that everyone making it is just having the time of their lives. It has good animation, memorable characters, and the majority of the jokes land which is always a plus. The best way I can describe OPM would be if the people behind the Cornetto Trilogy made a superhero thing, and it’s every bit as enjoyable as it sounds. Seriously, check it out if you haven’t already.

What am I building up to? Well, when something gets popular it gains a fanbase, and that fanbase always gets more than its’ share of loudmouth assholes that not only make the rest of the fanbase look bad but also deter new fans from ever wanting to check it out. One Punch Man is no exception, and loudest and most vocal of these fans have decided to constantly get up in other people’s faces about how Saitama beats everyone because...one punch. Others say that Saitama is a parody and ergo typical rules about “Who would win in a fight?” type of discussions don’t apply to him. All the while stating again, again, and again that he’s completely unbeatable and nobody can even scratch him because he’s not meant to lose and one punch. But the most annoying of these fans are those who wave the banner that Saitama’s creator said that his power trumps the Big Bang and would win against characters like Goku or Superman easily.

No. Sorry, but no on all of those points. First of all, Saitama is awesome and a great and fun character, but he’s not unbeatable and he certainly isn’t invincible. In fact, both the anime and the web-comic repeatably make points that Saitama is still only human, and that despite his power he still needs to eat food, drink water, and breathe oxygen in order to survive. Sure, he has no specific weaknesses (other than the fact that he’s not the brightest guy around) but he’s still mortal.

Second, One Punch Man isn’t a parody. No, it really isn’t. Sure, it has plenty of funny bits and there’s plenty of superhero deconstruction to be found, but it’s not a parody. Freakazoid is a parody. Squirrel Girl is a parody. Captain Hero from Drawn Together is a parody. Duck Dodgers is a parody. One Punch Man is not. See, I compared it to the “Blood and Ice Cream” trilogy for a reason. Like those movies OPM is a comedy up-front, sure, but it takes the genre seriously. There are real stakes and risks taken, people do get hurt, and if somebody dies then they stay dead. It doesn’t rely on cartoon physics and real-world physics do still apply, hence there being no shortage of collateral damage.

Third, “The creator said Saitama is stronger than the big bang and can beat *insert powerful character here* so ha!” Yeah, the creator never said such a thing. For a while it was believed that it was a producer of the anime who said that, but while I could be wrong as far as I can tell nobody said such a thing and was something the fanbase made up and said it enough times that people started believing it. But here’s the thing. Even if the creator said so live on every major news outlet that Saitama can beat anyone ever, it doesn’t matter. Why? Because talk is cheap. “Because X said so” is not a valid argument and it damn sure doesn’t hold any water. What does hold water are documented feats of strength and power. Saitama has an impressive record to be sure...but he’s not number one. Hell, he’s probably not even in the top 20.

Now let me be crystal clear here. I’m not making this post as a disparaging or discrediting of Saitama or the anime One Punch Man. I think Saitama’s a great character and the show’s a ton of fun, and I’m not trying to make him look dumb or incompetent or whatever. This also isn’t a list of ‘fights to the death’ or anything like that, hence the title being “Kick his ass” and not “Kill him.” I’m making this post as both a form of catharsis AND a big middle finger from me to all misinformed fanboys about their caped bald godchild.

So, without further adieu, here are the top ten characters who could kick Saitama’s ass.

Sorry baldy. =P

10.) Doomsday

Doomsday is a character that’s every bit as iconic as he is one-note and boring, but while his usefulness never ventures beyond a plot device when the Justice League need a big scary monster to fight nobody can deny his sheer, raw power. The fact that he can go toe-to-toe with the likes of powerhouses like Superman, Wonder Woman, and even Darkseid is nothing to sneeze at, and short of destroying every single cell in his body there’s really no permanent way to keep him down. While I have no doubt in my mind that Saitama would ultimately win the fight, this is a case where it’s going to take WAY more than just one punch. Looking for a challenge? The monster that killed Superman will certainly provide it.

9.) Spawn

Icon or relic? Legend or has-been? The jury is still out on whether or not Spawn earned his popularity and cultural omnipresence in the early to mid 90′s or if the writers and artists at Image simply got lucky, but as far as power goes he’s still a god damned beast. Fueled by sin and Hell itself, Spawn’s powers go from crazy all the way to absurd. I don’t exaggerate in the slightest when I say that Spawn can use his hellish to do pretty much whatever the hell he wants. Slow down time to a crawl while he can move about freely? He can do that. Increase Saitama’s molecular density to such an extent that he becomes so heavy he plummets straight into the center of the Earth or so light he rockets into orbit? He can do that. Alter Saitama’s mind so that he believes he’s a sea urchin? He can do that. Look, the guy defeated both Satan AND God and reshaped the universe in his own image (heh heh...) so there’s really very little Saitama can actually do to hurt him. At best he can punch Spawn’s head off, but doing that would just Spawn back to Hell where he can recharge his batteries and come back with a vengeance. Seriously, Spawn’s literally walked out of Hell so many times it’s comical. Facing off against Spawn would be one hell of a fight for Saitama.

8.) The Juggernaut

Nothing can stop the Juggernaut. He’s completely and utterly invulnerable to all forms of both might and magic. Curses? Forget about it. Spells? They bounce right off him. Weapons? Please! You could drop a hundred nukes right on his head and he’d just laugh it off. He’s bested the Hulk multiple times, trashed Thor, manhandled the Sentry AND Hyperion, and let’s not get into the kind of grief and misery he’s brought upon the X-Men over the years. The only thing ol’ Juggy is weak to is telekinetic attacks, which is not only something that Saitama doesn’t possess but even then they can only hinder him, not kill him. The one thing you can do against the Juggernaut is find a way to use his own momentum against him and send him running the other way...but Saitama likes a challenge, so we know he won’t do that even if he does figure it out.

7.) The Flash

Saitama’s speed clocks out at supersonic, right on par with the world’s fastest fighter jets. The Flash’s speed puts the world’s fastest fighter jets to sad shame, capable of moving over a million times faster than the speed of light and can vibrate his molecules to phase through attacks and even turn invisible. Not only does the Flash have the speed advantage, saying nothing of the Speed Force, he can hit plenty hard as well. By vibrating his molecular structure to just under light speed, the Flash can use the Infinite Mass Punch, an attack with the same destructive force as a 100 megaton nuclear bomb. In the time it would take for Saitama to charge and unleash a Special or Serious Punch, the Flash can hit him in the face (and all over the rest of his body) with a thousand Infinite Mass Punches. Defeating someone in one punch is less impressive when you can’t hit your opponent.

6.) Yang Xiao Long

What happens when you pit a guy who can defeat anyone in one punch against a gal who can absorb attacks and kinetic energy and send them back to her opponent tenfold as if she were composed of living vibranium? You get a caped bald guy skipping across the Pacific Ocean like a stone and getting stuck up George Washington’s nose on Mt. Rushmore with a wavy-haired blonde laughing her tits off from the sight.

5.) Lobo

They don’t call him “The Main Man” for nothing. This fucking guy could very well be the most vicious character in comic book history, which is saying something in a medium where characters like Wolverine and Vegeta exist. Not only is Lobo meaner than a horny rattlesnake, he’s strong enough to match blows with Superman and has beaten him twice, he escaped the pull of a black hole, he shrugged off Darkseid’s Omega Beam, he can survive in space, and his healing factor is nothing short of completely absurd. Lobo can regenerate, I shit you not, from a single drop of blood. Basically nothing short of throwing him into the sun is going to stop Lobo for good, and he’s every bit as stubborn as he is ferocious. Remember; he single handedly wiped out his entire race except for himself when he was an infant. More to the point, of all the characters on this list so far, he’s the one who makes the most sense for WHY he’d fight Saitama. You don’t think someone would want Saitama dead and wouldn’t hire Lobo to do it?

4.) The Silver Surfer.

Power. Cosmic. ‘Nuff said.

3.) The Incredible Hulk

Contrary to what Death Battle claimed, if you tore off the Hulk’s head he’d just grow a new body in a matter of minutes with the off-chance of his headless body being taken over by one of Banner’s many, many different Hulks that inhabit his psyche.......comic books are weird, okay? Point is the Hulk is one of the strongest beings in all of fiction. He’s picked up a 150 billion ton mountain, held two tectonic plates together, destroyed a planet while fighting another world breaker, and while his healing factor can be overtaxed what everyone always leaves out is that anybody who does manage to punch the Hulk back into Banner always leaves Banner alone. Why? Well, remember that scene in the Avengers?

That wasn’t just a cool quote, stuff like that actually happened in the comics. You could walk up to an unconscious Bruce Banner and drop a thermite bomb right on his head, and before your brain can register that’s shit’s on fire the Hulk will be standing with his hand around your throat and scotched purple pants. Not only that, but with Banner no longer in the back seat, it’s a Hulk that’s completely unhinged and unrelenting, not to mention no longer vulnerable to puny human factors like fatigue. Loki once employed the Enchantress (no, not that one) to use her magic to separate Banner and the Hulk into two different beings in a petty plan to kill Thor, and in doing so the Hulk not only effortlessly plowed through Asgard and all of its’ armies and defenders, including Thor, he then did the same thing when he was sent to Hell. Yeah, you read that right. Not even Hela, who like Mephisto is basically Satan, could tame the Hulk, and in the end only putting Hulk and Banner back together was what calmed the Hulk down and stopped his rampage.

That’s not even the craziest part. Given enough time, the Hulk can recover from just about anything. One day the Maestro, a possible future version of the Hulk, was sent back in time and vaporized by the very gamma bomb that created the Hulk......and he fully recovered! Yes, the Hulk can fully recover after being turned into fucking ashes! Seriously, look it up! ...did I mention comic books are weird?

2.) Son Goku

I’ve made it no secret over the years that I don’t care for DragonBall anything. Look, I’m 31. I’m a 90′s kid, I was there when DragonBall really blew up in the US and became such a cultural phenomenon that you couldn’t get away from it, and I was sick to death of it long before shows like GT were even a thing. Still, franchise fatigue aside, I can’t deny Goku’s incredible skills and power, especially recently with DragonBall Super. Oh, I still don’t watch it, but this being the Internet you can’t get away from DragonBall anymore than you can get away from cat videos. Lists, paragraphs, and videos of Goku’s feats are easier to find than white bread so me listing them here would be all but redundant.

What I will talk about is that if Saitama wants a challenge then Goku is right up his alley. Who is and isn’t more powerful is a crapshoot because we don’t have a definitive measure of what either of them are fully capable of as far as raw power goes, but we do know that Goku is faster and his skills and finesse outweigh Saitama’s by a wide margin. While Saitama can track people moving at supersonic speeds, Goku can move much faster and the whole “lol, takes forever to charge his power” thing has been vastly improved on. Now it only takes a few seconds to charge up instead of three and a half episodes, spirit bomb not withstanding. Even if we do buy into the narrative of “Saitama beats everyone and anyone in one punch because ONE PUNCH”...well, death never stopped Goku before. He’s bested cosmic entities and gods that make the biggest, baddest villains in One Punch Man look like puny peons and is so tenacious that he always keeps fighting even if the odds are hopelessly against him; that’s kind of his whole thing. He goes up against people he’s clearly no match for, gets the Super Saiyan-snot beaten out of him, yet he still manages to come out on top. And given that Saitama is always seeking a challenge, a clash between these two titans would be inevitable. Maybe Goku will emerge the winner, maybe he won’t. What’s certain is that it’s going to take a lot more than one punch to put down the Super Saiyan.

But as strong, fast, skilled, and tenacious as Goku is, neither he nor Saitama can hold a candle to...

1.) Superman

While the whole “Goku vs Superman” thing is still going strong despite overwhelming evidence the odds are hopelessly against Goku, a new fanboy/fangirl and geek-culture kerfuffle riding shotgun to that is Saitama vs Superman and it’s every been as asinine. Not helped by the fact Superman has been in a bit of a rut on a cultural level whereas OPM is at the height of its’ popularity, meaning that the latter is going to win pretty much every popularity contest by default and thus fuel the fanboy fire on both sides. For whatever reason, anime fans seem to have a big hate-boner for Superman that they just can’t rub off.

So, to each and everyone reading this who think Saitama can beat Superman.

No. No he can’t. Oh sure, Caped Baldy is going to make the Man of Steel work for his victory, but fact of the matter is that anything Saitama can do, Superman can do better. Has done better, in fact. Again, I’m not knocking Saitama or trying to discredit his feats. We’ve seen Saitama destroy a meteor as big as a mountain, crush kaiju-sized monsters and machines, survive being punched to the Moon, and parted a mass of clouds as big as a continent with one punch. All very impressive feats that nobody in his league is going to top any time soon.

And that’s just it. Superman isn’t in Saitama’s league; he’s up, up, and a WAY above it. His feats of strength, speed, and durability put those of Saitama to shame. Seriously, the differences between Saitama and Superman is like the difference between a high school track star and Usain Bolt. Superman has held a black hole, spent a week straight bench-pressing the weight of the planet and only broke a single sweat while out of direct sunlight, cleared 20 light years worth of distance (each single light year consisting of trillions of miles) in a matter of minutes, can survive in space, survived being tossed from orbit to Earth with such force that his impact devastated the planet and caused nuclear winter, flew through a red sun, survived multiple supernovas including one that made Kepler’s Supernova (the only supernova that could be seen from Earth by the naked human eye despite being 25 THOUSAND light years away) look like a sparkler, tanked a Source Wall explosion (basically the Big Bang,) split a moon in half, atomized a planet in a single punch, vaporized another with his heat vision, fought demons in Valhalla alongside Wonder Woman and Thor for a thousand years (yes, I know, this is starting to sound like a story the Cybernetic Ghost of Christmas Past From the Future would tell, but bear with me,) lifted both eternity personified and a book of infinite pages, was sandwitched between two colliding planets, and bested the likes of Samson, Atlas, Hercules, and even Zeus himself in strength and power. Superman has a genius-level intellect with a super brain that can process information thousands of times faster than normal humans, having read the entire contents of the Library of Congress within an hour. He’s only just SLIGHTLY slower than the Flash in terms of speed and agility.

And that’s not even the craziest thing.

One day, the forces of nature themselves, Earth, Water, Fire, and Wind personified, decided that they didn’t like humans anymore and sought to exterminate them and every other living thing with hurricanes, tidal waves, earthquakes, and erupting every volcano on the planet, taunting the Man of Steel that not even he could save the human race from such a calamity. Superman threatened that if they did that, he’d vaporize the ocean, burn every plant, freeze the Earth’s core, and finally destroy the Earth utterly and completely so that there wouldn’t be an Earth for nature to rule...and Earth, Water, Fire, and Wind folded.

No, I’m not making that up. Nature was going to destroy the human race and Superman told them to fuck off...and Nature fucked off! Look it up, I’m not kidding! And all that stuff I described? None of it was pre-Crisis. Pre-Crisis/Silver Age Superman would beat Saitama even faster. Not only was he strong enough to effortlessly carry a bunch of planets daisy-chained together, wipe out whole galaxies with a sneeze, blow out the sun like you and me would blow out a candle, travel through time by flying backwards (fucking really) and could make up brand new super powers right on the fly.

A battle between Saitama and Superman would be an epic spectacle without question, but in the end Superman would come out on top. Not only do his feats and accomplishments fly circles around that of Saitama, but even if the “Saitama beats everyone because he’s unbeatable” thing did apply and he truly was impossible to defeat...well, that’s what Superman is all about. He makes the impossible possible. He’s as strong as he needs to be. Superman isn’t meant to lose. Why? Because his story isn’t about being the best, being a hero for fun or profit, or even about whether or not he’ll win or lose a fight. Superman’s story is that he’ll always do the right thing, even when the right thing isn’t the easy thing, the smart thing, or the popular thing. If doing the right thing means taking on a caped bald guy looking for kicks causing untold amounts property damage because of his reckless if well-intended behavior and then putting him in his place, then Superman will do just that.

One more thing. To all of you arguing “Well Saitama is a parody, so he wins because of that!” Again, he’s not a parody, but even if he was the whole “Well he’s a parody” is exactly why Superman would win. Think about it. Who do you think would win in a fight?

The walking punchline...

...or the real deal?

So that’s my list. Again, not taking anything away from Saitama, I love OPM to pieces, but this whole “He beats everyone ever” is like telling a Chuck Norris joke without even the barest hint of irony. It does nobody any favors, it pisses people off, and it makes the entire OPM fandom look like assholes. Other than that, what did you think of my list? Anyone else you think can take on Caped Baldy? Let me know.

#One Punch Man #saitama #Doomsday #Spawn #Juggernaut #The Flash #Yang Xio Long #Lobo #Silver Surfer #The Hulk #Goku #Superman #DC #Marvel #Image #anime #comic books #Dragon Ball #RWBY #comics are weird #top 10

[richardmperry88]

How Much Does a Domain Name Cost?

One of the most important concerns for any business is increasing brand visibility. Among other things, this requires choosing a strong domain name.

But here’s the (not quite) million-dollar question: How much will it cost you?

There are a few factors involved, but it’s not hard to estimate what you can expect to spend on a domain name for your website. Being armed with this knowledge upfront is crucial to make sure that you’re getting a good deal and not overextending your budget.

In this article, we’ll discuss the most important factors to keep in mind when choosing and buying a domain name. We’ll also discuss how much you can expect to spend and how domain price relates to your web hosting service. Feel free to jump ahead to the section that’s most important to you.

What Is a Domain Name?

How Much Does a Domain Name Cost?

How to Register a Domain Name?

Domain Name FAQs

Let’s get started!

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What Is a Domain Name (And Why Do You Need One)?

To visit a website through your browser, you’ll usually enter an address that tells the browser where to go. It usually begins with “http” or “https”. Some popular examples of web addresses are https://facebook.com/ and https://www.google.com/.

However, what we’re interested in is the latter part of those addresses: i.e., “google.com”. That’s the site’s domain name, and one of the first things you’ll do when building a website is to register one. This is what makes it possible for people to access your site easily on the internet. A unique and professional domain name can even help instill trust in your brand.

You’ll usually start thinking about acquiring a domain name when you’re considering a new business idea or creating a new site. However, you could also buy domain names to hold on to them for future use or to resell them for a profit.

If you’d like a domain-extension deep dive, check out our beginner’s guide to domain name registration.

How Much Does a Domain Name Cost (And What Determines This Price)?

The cost of a domain name will be affected by several factors. These can include:

Your domain registrar (the company you’re buying from)

Your Top-Level Domain (TLD); options range from .com and .org to .inc and .club

The length of your contract with your registrar

Whether or not you’re also paying for domain name privacy

The popularity of the keywords included in your domain name (domain registries set the prices for popular keywords)

You can expect to spend around $10 to $20 per year for most domain names. This can go up to $50 or more for some new TLDs — think extensions .best and .bio — while high-demand domains with TLDs like .game can cost a few hundred dollars.

It’s also important to know that some web hosting services provide a free domain with the purchase of a hosting plan.

On the other hand, certain domains with broad single-word names, such as hotels.com, business.com, insurance.com, and so on, have been known to sell for millions of dollars. These are premium domain names and won’t be sold by every registrar.

Related: What’s My Domain Worth? How to Value Your Domain Name

How to Buy a Domain Name (5 Key Tips)

There are a few things to consider when you’re in the market for a domain name. All of these can affect how much you’re likely to pay, so it’s best to be prepared for the most common scenarios in advance.

1. What to Do If the Domain Name You Want Is Already Taken

If your desired domain name is unavailable, you’ll need to decide how much using it is worth to you. You’ll likely have to spend a lot of money if you’re determined to buy it from the current owner.

Because of the California Consumer Privacy Act and GDPR regulations from the European Union, it’s not quite as easy as it used to be to look up a domain owner’s contact information on the WHOIS directory. However, you can still use the directory to see the organization name related to the domain.

Even if the owner has opted for full domain name privacy protection, their domain registrar should be able to help you connect with the domain owner via a third-party company, such as Tiered Access. This helps to ensure privacy for the domain owner. You should expect the process to take several days.

Once you’ve made contact, the next step is to make an offer, either directly or through a domain name broker. For a fee of 15–20% of the transaction cost, a broker can assist in managing the negotiation process and provides protection for your money.

Of course, you have other alternatives as well.

You could use a different TLD, set up a domain lease, or search for a very similar name that is available. We’ll discuss some tips for doing that next!

Related: Domain Wars: The Top 5 Ugliest Domain Disputes

2. How to Find Available Domains

Whether you’re just starting to look or you need a replacement for an existing domain name, there are a few ways to explore your options. You might start by doing some brainstorming based on keywords that are related to your business or website.

You’ll generally want to keep your domain name simple, to avoid misspellings and confusion. A search tool can come in handy here. You can enter your ideas in our domain search tool to learn about availability and pricing. You’ll also get suggestions for related domains, which can be helpful when your first choice is unavailable.

This tool also enables you to move right on to the purchase phase if your desired name is available.

Related: What Is Domain Privacy Protection?

3. How to Choose the Best Domain Option for You

Some rules of thumb to keep in mind as you shop for a domain name are:

Buy a .com domain unless you have a good reason not to (for example, if the .com version of your domain name is unavailable or if you’re only targeting a regional audience). To learn more about your options, check out our guide to new top-level domains.

Short domains are generally best. However, short doesn’t always mean simple. You’ll want to strike a balance between length and memorability.

Don’t forget to research the domain name. You’ll want to make sure that your brand and domain names don’t infringe on any trademarks and that there isn’t a negative history associated with the domain. It’s also important to note that many registrars don’t allow users to register domains related to tragic events or disasters. For example, NameCheap restricted the registration of domains with COVID-19 related terms, such as coronavirus, n95, or covid, to combat fraud.

We used to caution against using symbols or numerals in your domain name, but several large organizations now successfully deploy hyphens and numbers in their URLs. Consider, for example, financial powerhouse deutsche-bank.com or 62.com, one of the largest domain registrars in China. Just remember: If you’re going to add a hyphen or numerals to your domain name, make sure it’s easy to remember.

Of course, it can take some effort to settle on the right option. However, this upfront investment of time can pay off with a strong domain that benefits your site and never needs to be changed.

4. Where to Buy a Domain Name

Buying a new domain, rather than one that’s already owned, will be the best option for most people. The domain registration and purchase processes vary a little based on what registrar you use but should be straightforward.

Domain registrars are companies that manage and sell domain names. There are standalone registrars, but most hosting providers also sell domain names.

For example, registering a domain here at DreamHost can be an easy and practical way to go. Since we’re both a domain registrar and a hosting provider, you can make your purchases together as a package.

Related: Didn’t Buy Your Domain With DreamHost? The Domain Transfer Process, Explained

5. Domain Name Fees to Watch Out for

When buying a domain name, you’ll need to watch out for hidden fees. Certain fees can be nudged into the dark corners of a registrar’s terms of service. These might include:

Transfer fees: This is the cost of moving your domain from one registrar to another. This type of fee was commonplace in the early aughts but is pretty unusual in today’s market.

Renewal fees: Domain name registrations typically work on a contract basis. For example, a registration may cover just the first year, after which the domain will need to be renewed periodically afterward.

It’s not uncommon for a registrar to offer a low price for the first year and then increase it upon renewal. And that’s not necessarily the registrar’s fault. For example, the price of .com is governed by the U.S. Department of Commerce, and domain registries, such as VeriSign, must obey the law.

Additionally, some registrars might offer discounts that only apply if your contract with them is long-term. This means you’ll need to ensure that your costs will remain relatively stable.

You’ll also want to be wary of registrars that offer domain names for unusually cheap prices. These might charge high administration fees or manipulate your WHOIS information.

Related: The Hidden Costs of Cheap Domains

Domain Name FAQs

Before we wrap up, let’s answer a few common questions about buying domain names.

Do I need more than one domain name?

This is more a business decision than a necessity. You only need one domain name for your website. However, you might want to buy multiple domains with spelling variants and redirect them to your site, just in case people misspell your main address.

You might also have unique domain names for different aspects of your business to help your users find what they need more easily. An alternate domain can also serve as an easier-to-remember variant of the original domain.

And if you’re in a business where the competition is stiff — say you’re running for elected office — it can be worth it to buy several variations of your domain (including ones that are not very flattering, ahem) so that the opposition can’t use them.

What are the best TLDs?

The best TLD is simply the most meaningful and appropriate one for your business. This means it depends on what you’re using your site for, as well as how much you can afford to spend.

For most sites, .com or another popular option will suffice. However, a company might use a .info or .help domain for its knowledge base and .blog for its company blog. Another might also use .promo for handling discounts, .design for sharing digital assets, and .dev for its developers.

How are domain names and Search Engine Optimization (SEO) related?

It’s important to start thinking of ways to make your site search engine-ready from the outset. Since keywords are used by search engines for ranking your content, you might want to consider including a relevant keyword in your domain name.

Keep in mind that Google’s algorithm is resistant to keyword-stuffing: the practice of cramming your domain name with keywords so as to rank higher than other websites. So don’t try to include multiple keywords in your domain as this can have a detrimental effect.

The good news is your choice of TLD will not affect your ranking on Google. The search engine’s algorithm treats new TLDs (e.g. .xyz and .online) and legacy TLDs (e.g. .com and .org) equally.

Related: The Top 11 SEO Best Practices for Domains

How many domains can I host?

You can host an unlimited number of domains on our Shared Unlimited and VPS hosting plans. You’ll also be able to create email addresses under each domain, set up forwarders to send emails to your main email account, and forward domains to existing websites. Our control panel also enables you to manage all your domains easily in one central location.

Can I use my domain name for email, as well as for another site such as LinkedIn?

Yes, you can set up email at your custom domain name and still have it point to sites such as Facebook, Twitter, or LinkedIn. Just as getting a professional domain name can help with your brand image, using it for email addresses and social media sites can do the same.

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Domain Pricing Made Easy

In addition to creating a hosting account, registering a domain name is one of the most important business decisions you’ll make. It offers you a way to maintain an online presence and increase visibility for your brand. However, it can take some effort to do the necessary due diligence, and ensure that you’re getting the best bang for your buck.

In this post, we discussed some key considerations to keep in mind when shopping for a domain name. These include:

What to do if the domain name you want is already taken.

How to find available domains.

How to choose the best domain option for you.

Where to register a domain name (consider your web host if they’re an accredited registrar).

Domain name fees to watch out for.

Ready to buy a domain name? With our domains, you can expect straightforward pricing, access to hundreds of unique TLDs, easy management, and more!

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