#this analysis is based purely on high-honor choices

[rdr2gifs]

''the morning light, when it comes to me, it was there but I could not see''

Arthur’s life was profoundly shaped by his self-hatred, lack of self-worth and disbelief in the existence of kindness in a seemingly dark and cruel world.

I strongly disagree with the statement that Arthur only became a ‘’better’’ man after being diagnosed with tb. His struggle with his true/inner self is apparent as early as chapter one. ‘’You are not who you think you are, sir… which is lucky’’

He has lived a rough life, raised by criminals and surrounded by violence ever since he was born. It was installed in him early that his value lied within being a violent enforcer and he has lived this life since, knowing nothing else. As a highly aware person, Arthur's actions weight heavy on his soul. He accepts that his actions have consequences. He knows that a person who has caused so much suffering is not meant to have happiness in life. His way of life has caused him to believe that he is not worthy of love or redemption. He doesn’t want to believe that a person like him could be capable of any good. (a thing to note here is that imo, Arthur’s actions near his death weren’t attempts at redemption but rather a strong desire to do right and possibly be his true self.) This is why he keeps living as he does as it’s the only thing he’s ever known, it’s the thing that brings him profit, praise from the person he looks up to and he is already damned so he might as well continue living this life anyway.

The internal problem Arthur faces is that this violent, cruel way of life doesn’t align with what I’d call his true self/ideals. He is torn between the harsh reality he has known and an unconscious yearning for righteousness/love. To be able to carry on with his actions he must enforce certain ideals within himself, such as: I am bad, ugly, nasty, ignorant, mean etc. He also decides to see the dark side of reality, telling himself that the world is a grim dark place and this is just as things were meant to be. This is why he feels so uncomfortable being complimented for his good deeds, because a bad rotten person like him should not be able to do good. It breaks the image he has built for himself and he doesn’t want that happening. This can be seen a lot during the ‘’Money Lending and Other Sins’’ missions where he is unusually mean (even for his standards) to each of the debtors. Imo, he acts this way because he must truly convince himself of being a terrible man to be able to carry out a job which revolts him so badly. In the last debt collecting mission with J. John Weathers, it can be seen in his face/expressions how much he is struggling to put on a tough, uncaring, heartless act. He needs to maintain a ruthless persona to survive in the world he knows. He must convince himself of his own cruelty.

''Forgive me, but that's the problem. You don't know you.''

Contrary to Arthur’s beliefs, he is a naturally kind-hearted person who is unconsciously drawn towards kindness. And yes, even before he was diagnosed with tb. This can be seen in the people he respects the most and, in his willingness to help strangers (notice how he often does unnecessary acts of service for total strangers such as: carrying their things, holding out hands etc. even though they had already troubled him). Despite the life he has lived, Arthur does not enjoy violence, he does not enjoy hurting people. He doesn’t want to dominate over others. He thinks mostly about others and not about himself. This fact alone is very telling of his character.

He writes about Charles, a man who he truly respects: ‘’He’s a better man than me. He does not need to think to be good. It comes naturally to him, like right is deep within as opposed to this conflict between GOOD↔EVIL that rages within me.’’ A man who is not struggling with his inner self would not have written this. To me this clearly implies an inner desire to be a better man. He writes about his mentors: ‘’I love Dutch like a father, but in many ways, I love Hosea even more. He’s kind and fair and like a human being. Dutch is something else.’’ Clearly showing a preference for Hosea who is of a more gentle nature and shows genuine kindness. Unsurprisingly, these are the people who see through his dumb/though act and encourage him to drop it.

When he comes across Brother Dorkins for the first time, he writes: ‘’(he)was one of those innocent people who make you feel better about human beings and about yourself a little. Must be odd to see all that goodness in the world. Place always seemed dark and brutal to me.’’ Expressing how he does not see goodness in the world, implying lack of good examples/kindness/good experiences in his life. Yet, the monk leaves an impression and imo, this encounter (seeing genuine goodness) disrupts Arthur’s perception of what the world truly is. ‘’Just as evil begat evil your whole life long, so good may begat good’’ (what strengthens my belief in this, is the following, symbolic scene of Arthur realising the consequences of his actions right after picking up a crucifix. He was aware of them before sure, but is unable to truly ignore them now having seen it right in front of his eyes). If only Arthur was presented with more examples of goodness in his life.

''You have it in you... I can tell!''

His desire to do as much good as possible after realising he won’t live long is instant. This would not be the mindset of someone who did not already possess kindness in his heart. ‘’Know glory and forget about shame.’’ Arthur’s shame and self-loathing caused by his previous actions were what was holding him back from allowing kindness into his life. Knowing that he has limited time left has not made him into someone he wasn’t before. The diagnosis was a catalyst, allowing him to embrace that love/goodness truly does exist and accelerate the process of chipping away from the persona he has made for himself. This was a newfound understanding for him as in the past he was rejecting any notion of kindess. In himself and perhaps the whole existence of it. ‘’You keep hidden all that matters, even from yourself.’’

After being diagnosed, he writes: ‘’What kind of a man have I been? What kind of a man am I? What world is this we live in? A land of fury or a place of love? Am I being prepared for eternal damnation? Am I past any kind of saving? Is that all fairytales? Man ain’t got much good in him. I ain’t got no good in me… I don’t think and yet I see goodness. I see it. If not in me, in good folk. In Abigail and her love for Jack. In that silly monk. In Downes, I guess. Begging not for himself but for the poor, even though he was near starving himself. Maybe I don’t want salvation. Part of me has always longed for death.’’ This entry perfectly shows how deep Arthur’s self-loathing goes and just how much it has damaged him. As his journal allows a look into his true feelings, he truly does not see a single good thing about himself. He knew for a long time that the way he lives is detestable but he could not let go of it. Not because he didn’t want to, but because it’s all that he has ever known. He didn’t believe in anything else. This sudden acceptance of goodness has allowed him to see clearly, which was obscured from him before, and for the first time, enabled him to act free of past regrets for what is right.

⊹ ࣪ ⊹ ࣪ ⊹ ࣪ ⊹ ࣪ ⊹ ࣪ ⊹ ࣪ ⊹ ࣪ ⊹ ࣪ ⊹ ࣪ ⊹ ࣪ ⊹ ࣪ ⊹ ࣪ ⊹ ࣪ ⊹ ࣪ ⊹ ࣪ ⊹ ࣪ ⊹ ࣪ ⊹ ࣪ ⊹ ࣪ ⊹ ࣪ ⊹ ࣪ ⊹ ࣪ ⊹ ࣪ ⊹ ࣪

Arthur’s redemption is not about becoming a good man. It is about finding the strength to change and recognise your true self despite a lifetime of self-loathing and breaking free from destructive beliefs of the past.

In Arthurian legends a stag is a symbol of the unending quest of spiritual knowledge/enligtenment

#this is my own personal interpretation of arthur's redemption #i could expand so much more on this #the orange quotes are by blind man cassidy #please don’t even interact if you think arthur was just a killer incapable of goodness before he was diagnosed #the ironic thing is that so many people could see behind arthur’s front but he was blind to it #arthur morgan #red dead redemption 2 #rdr2 #this analysis is based purely on high-honor choices #i don't care if your arthur shoots up entire towns this analysis does not take individual open-world gameplay decisions into account #i did almost cry thinking about this #text post

[cowboymater]

controversial opinion maybe:

I KNOW. i know. hear me out

i saw a couple edits on tiktok of mcspirk to soldier poet king and like. i’m not putting anyone on blast but good lord some of those choices made my head hurt. it’s taken me a couple days to synthesize my reasoning for the superior choice (as pictured above), but here goes:

the problem with assigning characters to soldier poet king comes when you take it at face value, flattening the paradigm to angry-sad-tired or violent-artsy-authoritative. if we want to get down to the root of it, the song is based on the threefold office of christ as priest (soldier), prophet (poet), and king. like i’m not christian, but on a textual level it gives us context: the concept that as prophet jesus gave us counsel and words of wisdom, as priest he sacrificed himself to redeem us, and as king he provides for, defends, and forgives us

maybe the most famous priest/prophet/king (& thus soldier/poet/king) allegory in all of literature is frodo, gandalf, and aragorn. frodo bears the burden, though he wishes he did not need to; gandalf offers words of wisdom and mercy; aragorn is a born leader, on the front lines with sword in hand, ready to die with his men if he must

KING: capt. james t. kirk is the easiest one to place. it is a burden and a privilege, an honor and a horror to have the lives of so many depend upon you to make the right call under fire. he makes the call. he leads the landing parties, he puts himself at the head of the charge because by god he is not about to send his men into a battle he wouldn’t fight himself. he leads—with heart when he can, steel when he must—and people follow him. bones and spock are always right behind because they believe in what he believes in, and more than that they believe in him

POET: bones serves as kirk’s emotional sounding board, his moral peer review. he lends an ear, and the word of an old country doctor who’s seen much and understands more. man has ascended to the heavens, to hurtling through the void in a glorified tin can, and it would be no great hardship to forget that our place in the universe is not that of higher life—we are not as quasi-gods, moving pieces on the great three-dimensional chessboard, but flesh and blood, and we must attend to each other. bones tempers the pure logos and rationality offered by spock; he offers grounding in this age of technology that wrinkles the fabric of reality, offers the kind of emotional intellect that cannot be taught, and has always been sorely needed

SOLDIER: this is the one where you really get tripped up by surface-level analysis. yes, spock is reserved and collected. yes, vulcans are pacifists (as you may recall, so are hobbits, and yet frodo remains the soldier in allegory)

the thing about vulcans, though, is that despite the vegan pacifism, they are warriors. it’s tangled up in their history and their DNA. the koon-ut-kal-if-fee survived through centuries of analytical dogma for a reason; even now, they cannot wholly escape their inheritance of violence. their forefathers ran the sands of vulcan green with blood. they venerate logic and condemn emotionality so that they will not

your average high-achieving vulcan, probably on the path to kolinahr, commits their lifetime to the pursuit of knowledge at the vulcan science academy. it’s a measured, rational decision. a controlled environment, where there will never be any logical reason to resort to violence

spock joins starfleet

he joins starfleet, and pursues knowledge in the vast unknowable universe. there is reason for violence, frequently. and sure, the purpose of their mission is peaceful. it’s true that spock would rather resolution be reached without force. but a soldier needs not want to be a soldier. he only needs go to war

when it comes down to blows, he will match them. he makes the sacrifice play, jumps on the grenade, goes into the radiation-soaked engineering room alone. it’s only logical, after all

spock is there to pick apart the universe, unravel the threads of logic until it all makes sense. bones is there to stitch it up. kirk is the hand that holds it all steady, the gravitational field that binds the people of the enterprise to their purpose. soldier-poet-king, commander-doctor-captain. it’s a story old as dirt, and we’ll keep telling it, i think

edit: my bad vulcans have. green blood

#puts on my “no one understands these characters like i do” hat #spock. (raucous applause) #star trek #star trek tos #star trek the original series #jim kirk #spock #bones mccoy #character analysis #soldier poet king #the oh hellos #lotr mention #longpost #mcspirk #triumvirate #txt

[ichor-hunter]

Artemis

Artemis Blood Code Study- Mia Karnstein

"A blood code received from Mia. It holds a dauntless will to strive to overcome a cruel fate and liberate those who suffer. This code has high stamina and attack-type Gifts, but suffers from low endurance. It also features Gifts that boost drain abilities."

Introduction to Blood Codes and Mia

Blood Codes are the abilities imbued within a Revenant's Blood. Each Blood Code is unique to each Revenant that resides within the Gaol of the Mist. Once a Revenant has awakened from their slumber after the BOR parasite has been placed in them, the blood takes on a Code which I believe derives from the characteristics of that Revenant.

Mia is also a Third Generation Revenant. She awakened after the Queen was slain as seen from Nicola's memories. Mia is devoted to protecting her brother but as she meets MC and the others, she joins their cause to discover more about her brother's memories and helps to save the Successors.

Greek Mythology

Mia's Blood Code is based on the Greek Goddess Artemis.

Artemis is a Moon Goddess who is notably known for her being a huntress and a defender of purity. Most people know her for using a bow and arrow.

She plays a part in the Trojan War of Homer's Iliad and she was on the Trojan's side. Agamemnon, the king of Mycenae killed a sacred deer and dared to boast about his bloodthirst for war and also proclaimed that he bested Artemis herself. Now Artemis like the rest of the Gods and Goddesses was enraged and demanded the sacrifice of his first daughter Iphigenia would appease her. Agamemnon lied to his daughter that she would be married to Achilles but in reality, she was going to be sacrificed instead.

In the end as a protector of women, she took Iphigenia and transported her elsewhere. Artemis replaced Iphigenia with a Stag by the altar.

Artemis also relates to Heracles 12 labors.

In Heracles' third labor, he was tasked with capturing the Golden Hind (Stag) of Artemis. The main hope was for Artemis to be angered at Heracles for going after her sacred golden deer of hers, which is what ended up happening. Heracles begged her to forgive him and explained to Artemis why he needed to capture the stag. He was commanded to bring the stag to king Eurystheus to make the stag one of his pets. Artemis heard his pleas and forgave him. As long as he lets the stag go she won't harm him. Heracles brought the deer over to the king but knew if he gave the stag to the king, Artemis would harm him in some way. Quick on his feet, he told the king he'll give the deer to the king if the King comes out and gets the deer for himself. He agreed. Of course the minute the king walked to the stag, the stag ran back to Artemis.  

Similarities between Mia and Artemis

Artemis is a divine huntress, Mia is a Revenant that hunts the Lost. Artemis cares and protects wildlife, nature and women and children. Mia's brother Nicola is her life, and she was willing to steal blood beads from other Revenants to ensure his survival.

In Greek lore, Artemis and Hephaestus are in fact siblings. While there's not much interaction between them in mythology, it makes sense that Rin gets along with Mia so well since Rin holds the Hephaestus blood code. They're both close in age and this helps Mia transition better with the crew at home when she joins them.

A really intriguing point to mention is that Davis holds the Hermes blood code and Hermes in Greek Mythology is also Artemis' sibling. Sadly, they don't really interact in the game but it demonstrates how they would have a good friendship with each other. They both have a similar way of seeing things through so if these two were to interact, it would be in respectful terms.

"It holds a dauntless will to strive to overcome a cruel fate and liberate those who suffer." This connects with Artemis' compassion towards humans. Seeing how Artemis was willing to switch Iphigenia with a stag even though she demanded the sacrifice in the first place? Or she relented with Heracles pleas when he begged for Artemis not to slay him where he stood?.

Artemis is a Goddess who empathizes and shows pity and the same goes for Mia. Out of anything in the world, she would never want her brother to suffer. That's why she desperately incorporated Carmilla's teachings to her everyday survival. Artemis and Mia have a sense of stubbornness when it comes to the things they want to protect but they know when to do things fairly when they see things from both perspectives.

Mia’s weapon is a bayonet, Artemis' weapon is the bow and arrow. Both of them have long-ranged weapons that they use in their battles.

Mia was willing to hunt other Revenants down for their blood beads to save Nicola and Artemis has no hesitation to bring down punishments to those who cross her for a good reason. They always do things for the greater good. When Mia partied with MC and crew, her mission of saving the successors became a part of her journey and her character. Not only did she want to save Nicola, she wanted to help the other Successors that were suffering, just like Nicola. That humility also attributes to Artemis as well.

Interestingly enough, the two stories from Artemis' mythology both feature Stags. The first one being the story of the Trojan War. Artemis was enraged at the king of Mycenae when he killed one of her stags. Alternatively, in the beginning, Mia is enraged at Jack for killing Nicola. The difference as we know that Jack didn't 'kill' Nicola out of pure bloodthirst, it's aligned with his duty. However, the King of Mycenae just did it just to pacify his ego.

The second lore is when Heracles ends up saving the stag he tried to capture by letting it escape from the king and allowing it to go back to Artemis. Similarly, the MC saved Nicola from his frenzy and allowed Mia and Nicola to reunite.

The unique part is that just as Artemis closely cares for nature and Stags (and they’re usually symbolic to her), Mia cares a lot for her younger brother Nicola. If we take a closer look at Nicola's Successor design, he has two antlers as if he's a Stag.

Artemis’ Gifts

Focused Gift Speed-Increases the speed of your Gifts while you are focused.

Shock Web-Manipulates ichor to create a low-power trap at your feet that staggers any assailants.

Dexterity/Willpower Up-Increases dexterity and willpower.

These Gifts of Mia's involves the skillsets of Artemis'. Having a great amount of speed, a trick or trade to stall your prey (web) and having the dexterity and the willpower to keep up with an opponent would be similar to the features Artemis exhibits as a goddess.

-

Bloodsucking Blades-Temporarily increases the drain rating of weapon attacks for you and your partner.

In Greek Mythology, the only warrior that Artemis approved of and hunted with was Orion. For those who aren't aware of their story, Artemis and Orion were companions and possibly lovers. Their story ends in various ways with mainly Orion dying because either Artemis defending herself from him or the other gods who tried to protect Artemis' chastity and wanted to rid of Orion. Mia will not kill you of course, but this Gift could probably related to Artemis' relation with Orion and how they would hunt together and gave each other strength.

-

Fusillade Rondo-Fire a barrage of homing bullets. An offensive skill performed with Bayonet.

Bayonet Mastery-Increases attack power when equipped with a bayonet.

Blood Grab- Dodging enemy attacks drains their ichor according to your weapon's drain rating.

These Gifts are aligned with Artemis's proficiency as a Huntress. For Fusillade Rondo, Fusillade means "A series of shots fired in rapid succession" and Rondo is a musical term that's utilized in a concerto/sonata and instrument composition, it's used in a refrain four times. Bayonet Mastery is simple since Artemis is a master at using her weapon so it makes sense that Mia has this Mastery Gift. Blood grab could relate to Artemis' dexterity in general when facing her opponents.

-

Ice Armor-Temporarily creates a barrier around you and your partner that boosts ice resistance.

Freezing Roar-Fires a projectile of freezing ice at the target.

Guard of Honor-Generates a number of ice pillars that unrelentingly bombard the target.

In terms of affiliation with the element of ice, there isn't much correlation to go by asides from Artemis' (possible) personality since she is a goddess that only favors wildlife, nature, and women and can easily be enraged at injustice. The properties of Armor, the Roar and the Guard of Honor, each of them can relate to Artemis and how she protects herself. Ever Hunter/Huntress would require some form of Armor, the Roar could represent her ties with the animals and nature itself, and the Guard of Honor metaphorically displays Artemis' allegiance with the system of justice and how she would target those who would go against it.

Concluding Thoughts

Mia is a really strong character, and I think this Goddess is a perfect choice as her blood code. I'm not too sure about her alternate Astrea's Blood Code at this point, but with how everything fits in with the story Artemis is the way to go. I was excited to type Mia's blood code analysis, the ideas in my head just kept pouring in with how her lore mixes in so well with how they designed Nicola. This is brilliant. It's the little things in character designs that make me so amazed at times. Even when I first played CV I never thought of these details until I started looking back on it. I can understand why Mia is highlighted a lot and I honestly enjoy how her side of the story played out and her contribution to the crew back at home base. She's a very warm character that is always there to support MC and the others, and I hope she and Nicola can continue to be happy.

#code vein #blood code study #Artemis blood code #code vein theory #code vein lore #code vein mia #code vein mia karnstein #mia karnstein

[kingofthewilderwest]

I was surprised that you didn't mention Viggo in your mental illness analysis. I've always thought that he seemed like a high functioning psychopath, perhaps an example of the Dark Triad (psychopathy, Machiavellianism and narcissism). He is ruthlessly cruel to dragons, infects people for profit without remorse, and has a henchman executed in his first appearance. He also seems to have lacked genuine affection for his own brother. Like Dagur, I found his redemption unrealistic.

From this post.

The post prompt did ask specifically for dragon riders, which is one reason I wasn’t putting Viggo on the radar, but I suppose I also interpret Viggo’s personality from a different angle than you do. While it is true that Viggo can be cruel to dragons (though not out of the norm for Barbaric Archipelago society!), can be very self-confident, and is interested in his profits, I also find Viggo to be someone who operates under a sense of gray morality rather than a psychologically diagnosable, consistent disregard to others. He especially isn’t someone I find who acts with something like Narcissistic Personality Disorder (NPD) - it takes more than being greedy and putting oneself first to have NPD. There are so many neurotypical human beings in this world who act with both greed and disregard to certain populations (like non-human animals), and Viggo is someone I think who manifests a drive for profits - but not someone who has an excessively inflated sense of self-importance or an inhibition to comprehending others’ emotions. 

I find Viggo a neurotypical individual, as with most of the villains in the How to Train Your Dragon franchise - Alvin the Treacherous is also someone who does horrible things without care to other individuals, Krogan has far less interest in other human lives, but that sort of treatment of other humans comes from many avenues, not per say personality disorders. What experiences we have in life and how we respond to them shape how callous or kind we are to people, and that’s what happens with Viggo. I mean, even siblings loathing each other is something that happens with far more frequency than the psychological conditions detailed in the DSM.

And in truth, beyond a discussion of mental ailments, I also don’t think that calling Viggo extremely callous and lacking remorse is a full picture of what his personality is. I see Viggo as a character who is willing to go into more “gray” zones than others with conscience do, but he’s also someone who doesn’t give up his conscience entirely. He even admits that as a kid he was someone who thought a lot more along idealistic virtues. So he’ll do brutal acts, yes, but needlessly brutal? Not as much. And the more time Viggo spends with Hiccup… the more we see instances of mercy.His very introduction sets the stage as someone who sees a gray zone of morals (rather than no conscience) and is willing to learn the techniques to win from anywhere he can. It’s through this sense of conscience, and this sense of learning techniques from whomever he can… that he comes to respect Hiccup. I think that his redemption was written in a realistic, gradual-growing manner.

Viggo’s redemption arc grows in two main fronts: his disenfranchisement with Krogan, and his growing respect of Hiccup. 

Setting the Stage: Viggo and Ethics

In Viggo’s character introduction, we see how Viggo talks about the blur between society’s typical assessment of good and evil. He furthermore mentions something interesting - when he was a child, he wanted to be the “honorable Viking” himself.

Viggo: Maces and Talons. I began playing with my grandfather when I was just a boy. I always insisted upon being the honorable Viking chief. I could never understand how he bested me time and time again. For years I assumed his skill transcended mine. 

When we are young, we’re often more idealistic, be it anything from dreaming how far we’ll succeed in life, to believing how people will (or should) act in difficult situations. Society can have a sense of an ideal “good” morality framework that makes you act like the honorable Viking in every circumstance, doing nothing that would be even the slightest bit morally gray. We learn that Viggo had that sense of conscience and idealistic good in him as a boy, a desire to be that honorable and morally upright being who never stepped into questionable mud.

But what Viggo learns in life - and which many of us do, honestly - is that moral choice isn’t so easily black and white. What actually is the right choice is more convoluted in context, circumstances, means, ends, goals, values, starting states, ending states… so many factors… that it’s sometimes legitimately hard to weigh all the pros and cons and make what you believe to be morally best. Do you do something some people would consider “sketchy” to reach the great, moral end goal? Or do you avoid getting that great moral salvation moment at the end because you cannot tolerate doing something “sketchy” at the start? Or do you just play it by whatever your conscience feels at the time? Deontology, teleology and utilitarian-type ethics, virtue theory… there’s a reason why philosophers have posited so many different frameworks by which to evaluate moral theory and to try to arrive at an understanding of what morality is. It’s because it’s tricky as fuck in the real world.

The way I see Viggo’s comment, he started with a pretty idealistic deontological framework as a boy. He believed that he could always do the right thing and that the means would always be just as pure as his ends. Deontology in moral philosophy is the belief that actions in and of themselves are good and bad, and that you can’t use any action to reach a greater goal at the end (the ends do not justify the means, essentially). But Viggo found out, through Maces and Talons, through the trials in life, that this maybe wasn’t the best way to approach life’s challenges. And indeed he continues on to say:

Viggo: But you see, in Maces and Talons, as in life, the line between good and evil is often unclear. Black and white can become gray so easily. What one soul considers evil another might consider righteous. The honorable chief who fails to see this is found to be the fool.

Viggo isn’t saying that any action is permissible. What he’s saying is that he’s moved from a deontology-based ethical framework to something more utilitarian. That is, he thinks the ends can justify the means. Sometimes you have to do something that might raise a few eyebrows in order to reach that better end result. That’s what he’s saying about “What one soul considers evil another might consider righteous.” Someone who is a deontologist would frown at a utilitarian individual’s course of actions, but both people legitimately believe they are doing the morally upright choice.

Now, I’m not saying that Viggo believes he’s always in the moral good. I don’t think he does. He knows he’s made moral mistakes and has crossed the line. But I also don’t think he’s saying, “Meh. All actions are okay. Nothing is evil!” Viggo is just saying that you’re naive if you’re going to try to act life as a deontologist. And that is indeed how we see him act throughout Race to the Edge. He’s not going to do something “sketchy” without remorse and reason, but he’s also going to take a few steps down the “gray path” that the strict deontologist wouldn’t.

This setting the stage is important to understanding Viggo’s character as he comes in contact with Hiccup. Hiccup is someone who still holds the ideals Viggo has discarded as unsatisfactory and incomplete. It’s one reason why Viggo might think Hiccup isn’t a threat at first. But as you watch Viggo develop, you realize… Hiccup’s ideals being the “honorable Viking chief” are going to hark to Viggo’s internal interests, too. And as Hiccup still manages to get things done without being played for a fool… Viggo’s respect in him will grow.

Viggo’s “Mercy”

Viggo has a sense of mercy for the people around him, too. It’s not readily available in his opening introduction - that’s a rather ominous and worrisome moment. However, it sets the stage for how he continues developing. We know Viggo is someone who once believed in being the “honorable Viking chief” - and now his introductory scene shows how he has removed himself from what he believes is a naive perspective.

When Viggo learns about the hunter who takes inventory without permission, he first holds a sword in front of the man. Many other villains in the HTTYD franchise would have been crueler to this man. But Viggo, instead, after terrifying the man by holding a sword to him, puts the sword away. He doesn’t punish the man, lets the man go away, and says, “We’re not animals.” His first appearance isn’t executing a henchman; it’s granting the henchman a second chance. The man, as he leaves Viggo’s tent, breathes out, “Oh, thank you, Viggo. Thank you.” Viggo is a harsh boss who is willing to do some scare tactics to get people to pay attention to him, but he isn’t going to kill someone for a minor infraction like that.

In fact, Heather, who’s used to seeing lots of barbaric people in the archipelago, is surprised to see Viggo’s mercy. He’s acting a lot kinder than many of the villains she’s come across before - including her brother.

Heather: You forgave that man. I wasn’t expecting that.Viggo: Forgiveness. Not exactly a sound business practice, now, is it?

Now, this isn’t the full story. You’re right. If you’ve been reading this far and are raising your eyebrows, that’s because you know we’re not done. This scene’s not as cute and clean as that. We hear the man screaming after he’s taken away. Clearly the man who thought he was forgiven wasn’t brought out free - he was punished. Clearly Viggo isn’t as forgiving as his first action makes him appear. 

I personally am not convinced the man necessarily died. Maybe he did, maybe he didn’t, but since it’s a long, sustained scream that we hear in the distance… the man is likely to have survived. The man would have been suddenly punished, given how he was deceived, but a quick execution would have created a cut-off scream. Regardless, the end result of Viggo’s conversation with Heather isn’t the nice-sweet-mercy-thing we originally thought. He’s giving her an ominous threat about what could happen to her if she ends up being a traitor. She could get taken out before she even realizes that she’s being punished.

The reason I’m bringing this up is because it still sets the stage for Viggo’s perspective and growth throughout the show. Viggo might have punished this man in a creepy way - be it death or something less - but the concept of “We’re not animals” actually, interestingly enough, remains. Viggo is willing to do some dark, manipulative things - like trick this man into thinking he’s punishment-free, then enacting the punishment - and through it intimidating Heather - but he’s also someone who pays attention to the gray zone of morality… and we see that the more we interact with him.

Growing Tensions between Hunters and Riders

Hiccup starts as a toy to laugh at. But as the two interact increasingly more, Viggo finds that Hiccup should not be underestimated. This is the growth that happens between these two from Seasons 2-4.

So. For starters: Viggo doesn’t kill people when he doesn’t need to. He toys with Hiccup when they first meet, but he doesn’t kill the teen - even when he has the chance. This is true even in “Maces and Talons Part 2″ before Hiccup influences Viggo. We see from the start Viggo has the internal capacity to grant mercy. 

At this point, Viggo finds Hiccup more of an amusing nuisance than anything else - not a threat to be extinguished. Viggo even thinks that Hiccup’s reputation plays the young man up more than he actually is. So, at this point, Viggo believes he doesn’t need to kill Hiccup - Hiccup hasn’t done anything to “merit” that. It’s enough for Viggo to show Hiccup that he’s more manipulative and powerful than the boy, and through that, hopefully dissuade the young dragon rider from interfering with his business dealings. Viggo manipulates, without killing, to toss Hiccup off his back before the boy can do any more mucking around with the dragon hunters.

Of course, Hiccup doesn’t get dissuaded. Hiccup decides to continue tackling on and disrupting dragon hunting trade. The kid Viggo initially considers to be an amusing non-problem turns into a real problem. Viggo becomes frustrated - the kid is interfering with his business! (His legitimate business, might I add. Everyone in the Barbaric Archipelago was hunting, fighting, or using dragons for trade goods. Viggo doesn’t necessarily beat dragons cruelly - he’s using them as wares like everyone else at the time). And so Viggo transitions from disregarding Hiccup to finding him an actual, annoying, frustrating pest.

Now Viggo needs to deal with Hiccup.

At first, Viggo thinks that he can deal with Hiccup and his increasingly meddlesome behavior by manipulating Hiccup - hence his “Defenders of the Wing” manipulation tactic. Hiccup can still be of use as he is. The kid’s fervor for protecting dragons can be used. But by Season 4 times, Hiccup has aggravated and tarnished enough of Viggo’s plans that he really needs to do something about Hiccup, and he’s going to use increased measures, precautions, and dangerous tactics to do so.

Viggo and Hiccup constantly raise the stakes and circumstances for each other. They continue seeing the capabilities each has. By this point, Viggo no longer underestimates Hiccup, but considers him quite the adversary. Just consider the change in perspective Viggo’s had toward Hiccup from S2 “Maces and Talons Part 2″ versus S4 “Gold Rush”:

“Maces and Talons Part 2″ - Viggo is not worried about being exposed to Hiccup alone, thinks that Hiccup and Toothless were no problem or danger at all to him, and leaves them alone without any consequence once he has the Dragon Eye he needs.

“Gold Rush” - Viggo mentions having extra precautions about being around Hiccup and the riders, and in fact is planning to kill them and their dragons because they’ve been such a threat to his operations. He goes out of his way to make sure the residents of Dragon’s Edge are eradicated.

It’s a growing rivalry with a morphing perspective on Viggo’s end.

And by the end of it, Hiccup outsmarts Viggo… and Viggo falls to his near-death.

Viggo, despite having his added gray morality choices (compared to Hiccup’s limited “honorable Viking” ideology), is overcome.

Viggo’s Mercy

Viggo has learned to see Hiccup as someone to not be underestimated. Viggo has seen Hiccup’s inventiveness and abilities to get the task accomplished. As someone like Viggo who takes tactics where he can, it makes sense that his frustration of Hiccup… turns into begrudging respect of Hiccup. He can respect someone clever wherever he finds them.

We see Viggo starting to take some of Hiccup’s ideas to level the playing field. Viggo starts using the cauldron to withstand the fires of the volcano - the same tactic Hiccup and the Defenders of the Wing used to survive lava. This makes sense. Viggo is a tactical man who knows when an idea is smart.

But because Viggo is learning to begrudgingly respect Hiccup… he’s actually being influenced by Hiccup in more ways than how to survive lava encounters. He’s also got some respect for Hiccup’s ideological framework - that ideological framework that Viggo himself once held true as a child.

And this is where we really start to see that Viggo does have a sense of mercy and compassion for other individuals. 

Krogan is introduced in a way somewhat akin to Viggo. Krogan at first seems to offer mercy to a dragon hunter who doesn’t like how they hunt, asking for feedback and offering to let the employee leave. But then Krogan murders the man and asks the others if they’re willing to question his tactics, too. Just like Viggo, Krogan offers false mercy and trust, then shows who’s really in charge. But unlike Viggo, Krogan never demonstrates a respect for smart, tactical behavior, nor a respect for the value of a human life.

Krogan is someone who’s more willing to be ruthless with his punishments or disregard others. In this season the two butt heads a lot about not only how to run their operation… but also about moral values. Viggo is the one who tells Krogan they need Fishlegs alive because the boy has extensive dragon knowledge; Krogan is the one who says he has enough knowledge himself and they might as well kill Fishlegs. Viggo is the one who says that reverence isn’t a bad thing so long as it doesn’t cloud one’s judgment, and uses Hiccup’s ingenuity and victories against Viggo as inspiration for future projects; Krogan is the one who just looks down on Hiccup and thinks he shouldn’t be given such respect. When Krogan says that Hiccup’s weakness is being afraid to shoot to kill, Viggo actually seems… irritated at the suggestion.

And, most tellingly, when Krogan is willing to let men die going down into the lava… Viggo is trying to minimize casualties:

Krogan: Why are you sending only one man down at a time?Viggo: I sent three down last time. Only one came back, which is two more than the time before that.Krogan: They’re disposable. That’s why we have so many of them.Soldier: That’s right. Krogan doesn’t tolerate failure.Krogan: Right you are. Now, say your farewells and get your pathetic behind back in that tub. Now!

Krogan doesn’t care if these men die. The fact that Viggo actually is trying to keep his subordinates from dying says something, doesn’t it? In a subtle way, Viggo’s enacting mercy.

Throughout Season 5, we see that Viggo is definitely the more thoughtful and considerate individual between the two.

Some of it is harking back to who he always has been - again, he didn’t kill Hiccup needlessly in “Maces and Talons” or anything. Some of it is that Krogan’s rudeness is making Viggo hate their alliance and disrespect his partner in crime. And some of it is also harking back to Viggo learning to respect Hiccup for who he is, tactics and morals and all.

Viggo’s Redemption

Frankly, the more we see Krogan be rude to Viggo, the more we see Viggo preferring Hiccup over him. But because Viggo and Krogan have the same goal, while Hiccup has an opposing goal, it’s pragmatic and obvious for Viggo to continue with his current partnership.

Until, of course, that partnership ends. Krogan forsakes Viggo. Krogan, like always, has no regard for anyone else. Krogan, like always, holds no respect for Viggo’s motivations and ideas. Krogan, through these actions, butts Viggo out of the game and nearly has him killed.

So for someone who’s grown to respect Hiccup Haddock and grown increasingly disillusioned with his partner Krogan… and for someone who still has some goals he needs to accomplish with extra assistance… it makes sense that Viggo is going to go to a new partner.

Viggo does this in a realistic way that isn’t sudden repentance saying he’s wrong. Viggo is still manipulative, trying to trick Hiccup, talking up things like the red oleander flower. Viggo is still wanting to partner with Hiccup for his personal ends, not for bettering Hiccup’s stock or because he sees eye-to-eye with Hiccup’s desires. But Viggo’s working with Hiccup out of a set of conditions that makes complete sense from context.

Viggo is never someone who returns back to idealism and what he considers a naive frame of ethics. When he recruits Hiccup for help in Season 6, he even tells Hiccup that the kid isn’t ruthless enough, and that this is going to come back to bite him. Viggo has learned through life that the person who seems to have greater skill is probably the person who isn’t limiting themselves from achieving their needed (and often good) end. But because of how situations fall down between Viggo and Hiccup, he makes that last-minute redemption built out of the respect that’s been ever-growing out of him for the dragon riding crew.

At the very end, when Viggo is about to die… he’s going to respect the boy who he sees deserving of respect, over dying for the cause of Krogan, who’s betrayed him.

And maybe, in that part of Viggo that’s still a child, he’s happy to be fighting for the “honorable Viking chief” - even if he, the traitor, dies in the end.

So for Viggo’s characterization arc? Personally, for me, it works.

Unlike Dagur, I think that Viggo’s arc was much better paced and gradually built, with a good progression of events that allow us to understand why Viggo would eventually take Hiccup’s side. He’s not someone with a psychological inability to feel compassion for others. He’s not someone so self-important that he can’t respect and learn from people who best him. He’s not someone unusual to society - he’s someone who is focused on profits and puts others’ interests a little bit aside for his own gain. He’s not someone who is morally credible in every choice, but he’s also got some good points to make about how we might or might not achieve our goals. Frankly, I agree with Viggo on more points than I should probably admit. But regardless, this is why I appreciate his character arc, and why I feel he was a well-constructed character start to end in the RTTE narrative.

#long post #rtte #Race to the Edge #Maces and Talons #Maces and Talons Part 1 #Maces and Talons Part 2 #Gold Rush #Triple Cross #The Wings of War #The Wings of War Part 1 #Viggo #Viggo Grimborn #analysis #my analysis #ask #ask me #anonymous #awesome anonymous friend #Krogan

[danlowe-blog]

The Future of Game Animation

Recently Ninja Theory Senior Animator Chris Goodall posed a question on Twitter: What do people think the future of game animation is going to be.

This is one of my favorite topics to think about, and so I was eager to share some thoughts.

Short Term: Motion Matching

GDC 2016 was Motion Matching’s big coming out party. The core ideas had been floating around the world of academic research for years before that, but this was the first time that actual game studios were starting to show this tech in practical scenarios. Two presentations were made: One by Kristjan Zadziuk, about prototypes in development at Ubisoft Toronto, and another by Simon Clavet about his work on For Honor. The buzz at the conference was palpable, and since then, there have been rumors circulating the industry, that a lot of other AAA teams are now starting to build their own Motion Matching technology.

For those who aren’t familiar, Motion Matching is a method of automatically picking which piece of animation should play next on a character, by allowing the system to make its own choices, as opposed to relying on Stateflow logic; which is the current, manually-crafted method, of deciding which animations should play.

The Motion Matching system makes these choices based on high-level goals that you feed into the system. So one of these high-level goals might be “2 seconds from now, I want the character to be in this position, and this facing direction”, which the system gets by predicting the future position of the character based on player inputs. Another common high level goal is, “match the position and velocity of the feet and the hips, as closely as possible to what was already happening in the previous frame”.

The end result is that Motion Matching has the potential to dramatically reduce the amount of work required when creating animation systems. It also tends to produce very high quality results: Since transitions from one move to the next, are taking into account hip and foot position and velocity, you tend to get really smooth blending, which is sometimes not the case with a traditional State Machine approach.

I expect that in the next few years, we’ll start to see Motion Matching used more and more in games. Of course, it doesn’t have to be an all or nothing switch from traditional systems; you can embed a Motion Matching system into a traditional State Machine, so for a while, you’ll see a kind of hybrid approach, where some moves will be using Motion Matching (e.g. locomotion), and others might use a more traditional implementation (e.g. scripted events). But I think gradually Motion Matching will replace the majority of moves that we see in games.

The initial response from some animators towards Motion Matching, was concern; that the ease with which you can create systems, might potentially reduce the need for animators. From what I’ve experienced so far, this is absolutely not the case: Motion Matching systems typically still benefit from the usual clipping down of data (or otherwise tagging data), and of course, that data is still better if it is cleaned up animation, rather than raw mocap.

The initial vision for Motion Matching was that you would be able to just throw a bunch of unstructured mocap into a Motion Matching database and the system would do everything for you, but it turns out this kind of approach doesn’t produce good results. Technically it does still work, but the system often makes unwanted choices (e.g. sometimes deciding that rather than playing a run cycle, it’s going to play the last two footsteps of an Idle to Start over and over and considers that a run), and so a lot of teams are finding that curating your animation data can give better results.

So in short, there will still be plenty for animators to do, in a Motion Matching world.

Short Term: Script Based Automation

At GDC 2016, I presented a new animation tool that Zach Hall and I had developed when I was working at Ubisoft Montreal. The tool automatically processed raw motion capture data into shippable quality animation. Before building this tool, we did an analysis of how our mocap animators were working, which showed that an estimated 50-80% of the tasks that they were doing, were things that could be automated. So, we set about automating those things.

In a way, what we did wasn’t particularly revolutionary: Every studio writes scripts to automate repetitive tasks, the only difference in our case was the degree to which were willing to do it. I’d also say that a key point was that we were really looking closely at what the animators were actually doing, whereas sometimes technical animators can think they know the problems animators are facing, but they’re actually building solutions for things that aren’t necessarily the most important things.

I got a very positive response to the GDC talk, though I’m yet to hear of other studios trying a similar approach.

I would hope that in future, more teams start to look seriously at automation and pipeline efficiency, because it really is a huge opportunity. A single technical animator can potentially save the work of many, many animators, if they’re aimed towards the right things. It’s just unfortunate, that it seems like more often than not, people tend to rely on what they’re familiar with, and so a manager might prefer to hire 10 more animators to brute force the work, rather than assign a technical animator to focus purely on improving efficiency.

I’m hopeful though that things will happen in this area.

Short to Mid-Term: Neural Networks -  Motion Generation at Runtime

If you haven’t seen Daniel Holden et al’s paper on Phase-Function Neural Networks, drop what you’re doing and watch this now. This is the future of game animation, right here.

In my view, Neural Networks and Deep Learning are going to change everything (not just about game animation, not just about game development: everything). While we may not see Neural Network based animation systems shipping in games for a while, some developers are already doing experiments using something similar to Daniel’s approach.

Studios will begin to use animation data to train neural networks, and those networks will then be able to generate animation at runtime. Just like Motion Matching the data that it generates is based on high-level goals, so it makes this a natural successor to the some of the work that’s being done with Motion Matching.

There are a number of benefits to Neural Network (NN) based animation systems over a Motion Matching approach…

They’re cheaper memory-wise: You only store the trained network weights, and not actual animation data.

Motion Matching is picking from a pre-existing set of animation data. NNs on the other hand can generate poses that weren’t in the original data, just that makes sense in context with the original data. This allows for far more adaptive characters. So for example, if you want your character to run past a table and pick up an object from that table, the position of the object doesn’t have to perfectly match what was in the training data; there just needs to be enough examples of picking up objects from tables while moving, correlated with appropriate high-level goals, for the system to understand how that type of action works. Then when you’re generating animation at runtime, you can set goals that never existed exactly that way in the training data (like different object positions on the table, different speeds, etc), and it should be able to deal with that.

NNs need to be fed lots of training data, but one approach to creating this data is to do offline procedural adjustments to your mocap (the kind of adjustments that might normally be inappropriate to use at runtime), and then use the result as training data for the NN. This essentially gives you something similar to a runtime version of that offline process. So for example, Adjustment Blending is a method of adjusting animation, that produces high quality results, but is most suitable for offline processing. This is because it relies on knowledge of what the character is going to do in the future. However, you could use Adjustment Blending to create lots of examples of adjusted data, and then use that adjusted data to train the NN. This would essentially give you similar results to Adjustment Blending, but at runtime. Another example of this type of approach is the uneven terrain example used in Daniel’s PFNN paper.

There are some challenges with NNs too, that the industry will need to work through…

NNs are currently slow to train. You can’t see the results of your changes until hours later. This will hopefully get faster as time goes on, but it’s currently an issue.

NNs are even more of a black box than Motion Matching. If the NN does something you don’t want it to do, it can be incredibly difficult to figure out why.

NNs rely on being fed a lot of example data. The more data, and the higher quality the data, the better. With this in mind, it’s likely only going to be appropriate for mocap, at least at first. You’ll also have “style transfer” which will help us to produce more stylized animation, but it’ll be a long time before we’re able to generate high-quality, Pixar style animation because there isn’t enough of that animation in the world, to train the system.

Short to Mid-Term: Animation Capture - Quality and Volume

As mentioned, NNs need to be fed vast amounts of data, and you generally need this data to be consistent and high-quality. Part of the reason that Deep Learning has made such rapid advancements in the last few years, is because of the vast amounts of data available on the Internet.

With this in mind, I see there being huge benefits to focussing on animation capture quality, and methods for capturing large amounts of animation data, very quickly. The amounts of data that we’re talking about here are so large, that it would be too much for an animator to clean up manually, so ideally we’ll need to use the raw data that comes out of the capture system, or treat the data in some sort of automated way.

Improvements in synchronized, body, finger, and facial motion capture will certainly help. Longer term I would expect to see far more full body 4D capture, and a focus on surfaces and muscles rather than bones and traditional skinning methods.

One area that I expect to get very good in the next few years is the ability for NNs to generate motion data from a single video source, rather than dedicated capture systems. Researcher Michael Black and his team are already working on this kind of thing, and I’m guessing that very soon, the results will start to be as good or better than optical systems.

If this happens, it’ll be an absolute game changer: Teams will be able to source their data from any video footage, so imagine the entire wealth of movies, TV, CCTV footage, people’s home videos, etc. all being sources for mocap data. Moreover, depending on the fidelity of video footage, and the quality of the NN system, you’ll likely be able to derive more than just skeletal data from this footage. You’ll eventually be able to estimate fingers, facial, muscle, subcutaneous layers, skin, etc: All things that are useful, and usable.

Long Term - The Incredible and Scary Future - Semantics

Some NNs are already able to derive semantic information from photos and video footage, and this is where things really start to get crazy. These systems are able to make accurate guesses about who and what are in images, what the relationships are, and so on. These types of systems are continuing to improve at a super-fast rate.

So say for example, you build an NN that can look at video footage and not only generate the motion of the person in the footage, but also accurately guess whether the person in the footage is male or female, guess how old they are, guess their ethnicity, maybe even guess their personality traits, their level of education, how wealthy they are, what type of job they do, what their political stance is, etc. Imagine that you then associate all that information with the generated motion, and then use that as part of the motion generation training data for the NN that generates animation on-the-fly.

So now you can set character traits as high-level goals for the system. So maybe your game director can simply say: Create me a character that moves like a 50 year old, overweight man, who is shy, and is recovering from an injured ankle: The system sets those parameters as part of it’s goals, and so when it generates the motion it generates with those parameters in mind.

I’ve just been talking about animation so far, but the same advancement is happening in other game development disciplines, and so by this point, there will also be systems to generate faces, bodies, clothing, etc. and so these same parameters can be applied in those systems to generate character meshes that are also context appropriate.

So you’re now able to build any type of character just by asking.

Let’s get more crazy...

What if you derive semantic understanding from scenes and places. For example: What if you use CCTV footage, along with the NN that analyzes people, to get a semantic understanding of city demographics. What type of people travel through what type of areas. What type of people live in what types of appartment buildings. What type of people drive vs use public transport. Which people go to Starbucks vs the artisinal local coffee chain. What type of people give money to the homeless, etc.

Now you feed this information into an NN that generates city neighborhoods, or whole cities, or whole continents full of cities. First, it generates a set of demographics, then it uses the character and animation NNs, to populate each city in appropriate ways.

So maybe now all the game director has to say is “Make me a city like London circa 1975”, and as long as there are enough data sources for what a city like that should be like, the system will generate an appropriate city, with appropriate people, who have appropriate behaviour.

Want to get even crazier...

Maybe at this point the game director who’s asking for all of this, isn’t even a game director anymore; maybe it’s just the player, asking directly for what they want.

“I want to play a game in the style of James Bond, but set it in the 1800s.”

“I want to play a brand new Star Wars story, from the perspective of Chewbacca.”

Eventually, we tie this in to devices that track emotional responses as the player is playing e.g. cameras that look at facial responses, or wearables like smart watches that track heart rate. Maybe you don’t even ask for a subject matter, maybe you say how you want to feel.

“I want to play an experience that makes me feel happy.”

“I want to have an experience that gives me a sense of family and belonging.”

“I want to experience a story that gives me the same sense of childish wonder as when I first read the Harry Potter books.”

Maybe in the next step you don’t even ask the system for anything. Maybe the system scans you as soon as you enter your door, understands what mood you’re in, and generates a complimentary experience.

At this point you start to delve into philosophical questions about what it even is to be human and whether the human experience means anything, if you’re just having your every whim automatically appeased, so maybe I should leave things there.

So yeah, that’s my road-map for the crazy future of game animation and game development as a whole.

Oh also I guess at some point we’ll get good full body IK.

#animation #technical animation #techology #deep learning #game development #machine learning #neural networks #motion capture

[goodkippers-blog]

Kommo-o: The Honorable Dragon of Alola!

What’s going on world?!? Today I have an analysis and sets for the pseudo-legendary of Alola, Kommo-o!  So keep on reading and we’ll take a quick look! 

Kommo-o is a brand new Dragon/Fighting type, something that we’ve never gotten before and it’s really interesting (I presonally love the design, there’s just something of nobility to it that I really dig).  Offensively, you’re really only hard walled by Fairy types, and fortunately Kommo-o has options to deal with those.  Defensively, it’s quite interesting too: you have the nice resistances to Water, Fire, Electric, and Grass that Dragon sports while also resisting Bug, Dark, and Rock. However, Kommo-o is weak to Dragon, Ice, Psychic, Flying, and has a nasty 4x weakness to Fairy, which are all too common in this day and age.  So with that out of the way, let’s see how this dragon’s stats stack up:

 75hp/110att/125def/100spatt/105spdef/85spe

 Being the Pseudo of its gen, Kommo-o is blessed with mostly high stats.  Having only base 75hp is a bit of a letdown, and while 85 speed is good this gen, with the update to Pokemon Bank, Kommo-o may have trouble out speeding a lot of things that are going to be reintroduced in sun and moon. However, everything else is quite good: with 125def and 105spdef, Kommo-o can take hits pretty reliably from either side of the spectrum, and with 110att and 100spatt it can do a fair amount of damage right off the bat and has access to some neat boosting moves to compliment it.  So with the stats laid out, let’s look at what abilities it has to offer:

 Bulletproof: Grants immunity to some ball and bomb moves (ex. Shadow Ball, Sludge Bomb, Aura Sphere).

 Soundproof: Grants immunity to sound based moves (ex. Boomburst, Parting Shot, Roar).

 Overcoat (Hidden): Grants immunity to damage from hail and sandstorm, as well as powder and spore moves and Effect Spore.

 I can honestly say all of these abilities are quite good: you really can’t go wrong and which one you pick is really up to personal preference.  I personally would go with Bulletproof as it does make you immune to a lot of common attacks (for a full list go to http://bulbapedia.bulbagarden.net/wiki/Bulletproof_(Ability)), but really which one you pick depends on what you need.  For the two sets I’m gonna show you, we’ll be using Bulletproof just for the sake of simplicity, but know that any of the three abilities will do just fine, so without further ado, let’s look at what Kommo-o can do!

 Autotomize!

 Modest or Timid: 252spatt/253pe/4hp

 Bulletproof; Life Orb, Expert Belt

 -Autotomize

 -Clanging Scales, Draco Meteor

 -Focus Blast

 -Flash Cannon, Flamethrower

 Kommo-o gets an interesting move in Autotomize, which doubles your speed in one go, which is great for Kommo-o as it really has pretty good speed just on its own.  The EVs are obvious: max spatt and spe to hit hard and fast, and the nature depends on power vs speed.  Life Orb is the item of choice to help boost power, and Kommo-o is usually pretty bulky so it can work with it fine, but an Expert Belt can be used to boost super effective moves.  Autotomize is obviously needed, but as for attack moves you have a few options: Clanging Scales is a unique move to Kommo-o, having high base power while reducing your defense by one stage after using it (in a dumb twist of fate Bulletproof makes you immune to Clanging Scales lol), but Draco Meteor can be used if you want more power at the cost of halving your special attack every time you use it.  Focus Blast is the next stab of choice, and is really the only option for this set as it doesn’t really get anything else (Aura Sphere would’ve been neat).  The last move is of preference: Flash Cannon hits Fairy types that would otherwise wall you, or Flamethrower can be used for good coverage.

 Dragon Dance!

 Jolly or Adamant: 252att/252spe/4hp

 Bulletproof; Life orb, Lum Berry, Expert Belt

 -Dragon Dance

 -Outrage, Dragon Claw

 -Sky Uppercut

 -Poison Jab, Shadow Claw, Earthquake

 Kommo-o can also do a physical movest if you so choose.  Again, EVs are more or less the same as the last set except you’re focusing more on physical rather than special, and the same goes for the nature.  Items are also the same, except Lum Berry is thrown in just in case you’d rather not be burned.  Dragon Dance is the boosting move of choice, as it boosts your attack and speed by one stage in one go.  As for the first attack, Outrage hits very hard but can lock you in and cause confusion, whereas Dragon Claw is more reliable at the cost of a lot more power. Sky Uppercut is the next STAB...and is really the only option sadly: you can use Brick Break in case of dual screens but you do lose a bit of power (I wish it got Close Combat lol).  The last move is, again, to preference: it really boils down to do you want to hit Fairies well or just have good coverage, purely up to you and your team needs.

 Kommo-o is what I think of when I hear “Jack-of-all-Trades” in that it can do a little bit of everything but doesn’t do anything as well as some other pokemon.  Its offensive stats, while good, do need a boost of some kind in order to really shine, although its move-pool by itself is pretty threatening. Fairy types, however, are its worst nightmare, as even weak Fairy type moves do heavy damage to Kommo-o, so if you’re planning on using it make sure you have an answer to Fairies.  In all honesty, i’d say Kommo-o is a good and fun pokemon to use: as I said, there are things that can do what it does but better (many DD users out-speed it AND hit harder, although the special side does have more of a niche) but with it’s well-rounded stats and unique STAB combo, Kommo-o is an interesting pokemon to use that certainly has potential.  This has been the Alolan Mudkip, and as always let me know if you have pokemon you wished praised/shamed.  Take care my friends, I’ll catch y’all next time!

#pokemon #pokemon sun and moon #kommo-o #alola

[aaronsniderus]

What You Should Really Be Looking for in a Lender (And It’s Not Just Rates)

When you shop for a mortgage, you’ve got a lot to think about. How much can you afford? If you’re buying a house, where do you want to live? If you’re looking to refinance, what are your goals?

Another key consideration should be who handles your mortgage. It can be tempting to look at the lender with the lowest overall rate. Advertised rates themselves can sometimes be unintentionally misleading because your rate is determined mostly by your personal financial profile. In most situations, you’re probably not getting the advertised rate.

Although your rate should be a consideration, it shouldn’t be the only one. You should also be looking at the options the lender provides, the level of service, ease of use and any fees they may be charging.

If you’re looking for the best possible mortgage financing, we’ll take you through what you need to look for when shopping around. Let’s start at the place most people would look when starting their mortgage shopping journey – the rates page. After that, we’ll take a look at some of the less obvious factors that can set lenders apart.

Mortgage Rates – Buyer Beware

When you’re shopping for a mortgage, it’s only natural to look at interest rates. However, publicly available rates on mortgages can be misleading. It’s not intentional, but let’s walk through why you shouldn’t take these quotes at face value.

There are actually a number of items that help decide your interest rate. The base rate that people get is influenced by market factors, including movements in the bond market. Although there’s not a perfect correlation, generally if people are worried about the economy, they pull their money out of stock and buy bonds for the guaranteed return, pushing mortgage rates down as mortgage bonds become more popular. If it’s the other way around, rates tend to go up.

However, your personal financial situation has a lot to do with your rate as well. When mortgage lenders set your rate, they look at a number of factors in determining your personal interest rate. Two of the biggest ones are your median FICO® Score and your down payment amount or equity stake following the closure of the mortgage. For both categories, the higher the better. Others include the loan type as well as the number of prepaid interest points you choose to pay for.

Shorter terms often mean lower rates because the investor doesn’t have to wait as long for the payback.

Because one of the first things people look at is the rate, mortgage lenders know that they have to post samples on their site. However, because everyone’s loan is different, each quote on the website comes with its own set of assumptions. These include:

Loan amount

Term

Loan-to-value (LTV) ratio: a comparison of the loan amount with the actual value of the home. You get this by taking the value of the home and subtracting any existing down payment or equity stake from 100 (E.g., 3% down payment equals 97% LTV)

Number of discount or prepaid interest points paid

When comparing rates, keep three things in mind.

Try to compare apples to apples. If you’re looking at a 30-year fixed, compare with other 30-year fixed rates.

Make sure you’re looking at the annual percentage rate (APR) because this accounts for both the interest charged for the loan as well as any cost in setting it up. The bigger the difference between the base rate and the APR, the more fees the lender is charging.

Keep in mind lenders may be using different hypothetical scenarios in their assumptions to come up with the rates.

Although many of us start with the interest rate when shopping for a mortgage, it definitely shouldn’t end there.

It can be easy to get caught up in the rate game and picking a lender because they offer a rate that’s 0.125% or 0.25% lower than the next mortgage originator down the street. While it may seem like a good idea at the time, it shouldn’t be the only basis for your choice of mortgage lender. Here are a few other things to consider.

Does the Lender Offer Anything to Give You a Leg Up?

Beyond the rate itself, you should ask yourself what a lender offers you when it comes to your mortgage transaction. Whether you’re looking to buy or refinance, Quicken Loans offers some cool advantages to its clients.

Power Buying Process™

If you’re looking to buy a home, you’ve probably noticed it’s a very competitive market out there right now. Inventory is low, and that means that much of the time, sellers have a choice when it comes to whose offer they’ll accept. Sometimes it comes purely down to how high the bid is, but sellers also appreciate certainty and that’s where our Power Buying Process comes in.

This three-tiered process helps give both buyers and sellers certainty as to what an offer means when it’s on the table.

A Prequalified Approval has us pull your credit to see your median FICO® Score and get verbal or written (but unverified) estimates of your income and assets. Although this is a great way to estimate what you can afford, it carries all the weight an estimate normally would – not much.

We encourage all of our buyers to take the next step and go forward with a Verified Approval™.

Verified Approval is like a Prequalified Approval, but we verify your income and assets by collecting documentation like W-2s, bank statements and pay stubs. This gives your offer equivalent strength to that of a cash buyer because the seller knows that your information has been verified by us and you have access to the financing to back up your offer, which could give you an advantage over other prospective buyers in a multiple offer scenario.

To give you that extra confidence boost you deserve, if through no fault of your own your loan doesn’t close after our review, we’ll give you $1,000.1

However, making a solid offer isn’t the only thing home buyers are worried about. In a rising rate environment, you want to be able to lock your rate as soon as possible in order to take advantage before they go up. However, most lenders require that you find a property before locking your rate.

With RateShield™ Approval2, home buyers can lock their interest rate for up to 90 days while they shop for a new home. If a home is found within the 90-day period, we compare the interest rate you have with the one currently available on the market. If it’s higher, you keep the rate you have, if it’s lower, you get the lower rate. It’s a win-win and helps protect your monthly payment.

Ease-of-Use

Buying a home or refinancing your current one can already be stressful enough. With a lot to think about, you’ll want a lender who takes the complexity out of the process so you can focus on what’s really important.

With Rocket Mortgage, we’ve taken some of the biggest things that made getting a mortgage a painful experience in the past and launched them into the stratosphere. No more hunting for W-2s, pay stubs and bank statements. You’re able to sign on to one of our many trusted partners and share your information directly through an asset import tool and, in many cases, even have your employment verified electronically.

While the aim of Rocket Mortgage is to make things radically simple for all of our clients, getting a mortgage is still a huge financial transaction. We understand if you want to talk to one of our Home Loan Experts at any point. They’re here to answer your questions while still leveraging the power of technology to allow you to securely share the information we need to get you the best loan option for you.

Client Service

When you’re looking for a lender, you want to find one who will work for you and provide the highest level of client service.

When you get your home loan with us, moving through the steps on Rocket Mortgage and working in tandem with our Home Loan Experts, we aim to make your mortgage process as smooth as possible. We’re honored to have received J.D. Power’s highest-ranking for customer satisfaction for Primary Mortgage Origination each of the last eight years. But it doesn’t stop at the closing table. We hold the highest-ranking in the nation for Mortgage Servicing from J.D. Power for the last five years as well.3

Quicken Loans services 99% of the loans it originates. That means we’re your mortgage partner for life, from application until you make your last payment, even if that’s 30 years down the line.

Because we maintain that relationship with you throughout the life of the loan, we’ll also be able to let you know when it might be a good time to refinance if you have the opportunity to lower your interest rate, remove mortgage insurance premiums or use your existing equity to accomplish any other financial or life goal you may have.

Finally, while other servicers often try to pinch their pennies everytime they can, at Quicken Loans, we know that a penny saved is just a penny. Quicken Loans doesn’t charge fees for paying off your loan early. We also won’t charge you to get your mortgage documents or to pay online or over the phone. Other lenders can’t always make the same claims. If they sell the servicing rights to collect your payments after your loan closes – and many do, they likely won’t be able to tell you what fees you’ll be charged after the loan closes.

If you can, have the lender be clear with you on whether they sell servicing. Ask what fees you can expect and how to avoid them.

If you’re looking to buy a new home or refinance your current one, you can get started online or give one of our Home Loan Experts a call at [phone]. If you still have questions, we would be happy to answer them for you in the comments below.

1 Participation in the Verified Approval program is based on an underwriter’s comprehensive analysis of your credit, income, employment status, debt, property, insurance, appraisal and a satisfactory title report/search. If new information materially changes the underwriting decision resulting in a denial of your credit request, if the loan fails to close for a reason outside of Quicken Loans’ control, or if you no longer want to proceed with the loan, your participation in the program will be discontinued. If your eligibility in the program does not change and your mortgage loan does not close, you will receive $1,000. This offer does not apply to new purchase loans submitted to Quicken Loans through a mortgage broker. Additional conditions or exclusions may apply. Verified Approval within 24 hours of receipt of all requested documentation.  

2 RateShield Approval locks your initial interest rate for up to 90 days on 30-year conventional, FHA and VA fixed-rate purchase loan products. Your exact interest rate will depend on the date you lock your rate. Once you submit your signed purchase agreement, we’ll compare your rate to our published rates for that date and re-lock your interest rate at the lower of the two rates for an additional 40 to 60 days. Additional conditions or exclusions may apply.

3 Quicken Loans received the highest score in the J.D. Power 2010-2017 Primary Mortgage Origination and 2014-2018 Primary Mortgage Servicer Studies of customers’ satisfaction with their mortgage sales experience and mortgage servicer company, respectively. Visit jdpower.com/awards

The post What You Should Really Be Looking for in a Lender (And It’s Not Just Rates) appeared first on ZING Blog by Quicken Loans.

from Updates About Loans https://www.quickenloans.com/blog/really-looking-lender-not-just-rates

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New Post has been published on Atticusblog

New Post has been published on https://atticusblog.com/chanels-latest-accessory-is-a-2080-boomerang-and-the-internet-is-not-impressed/

Chanel's latest accessory is a $2080 boomerang and the internet is not impressed

Who knew luxurious boomerangs were a factor?

They aren’t, however, thanks to Chanel certainly one of indigenous Australia’s maximum specific and unique trademarks has been decreased to a style accessory.

The luxurious French style residence is now promoting a timber and resin model for a touch over $2000.

Orem Utah Accessory Apartment 2012 Update

It is commonplace to discover accessory residences in Orem houses

Many times, the improved region is called a “mother-in-law” condo and then illegally rented out. In 2004, Orem determined to restrict the approval of recent accessory apartments due to a few parking lawsuits. However, this didn’t prevent the development, or renting out, of basement apartments. All it did was create a whole new elegance of taxpaying lawbreakers.

After several public hearings, on June 10, 2012, the Orem City Council voted to once again permit accessory residences to be built and authorized. Several regulatory steps are needed to attain prison acclaim for current apartments or to construct a brand new one. Here is a summary of the new rules for acquiring City of Orem approval:accessory to murder definition.

Orem Accessory Apartment Restrictions

Maximum Bedrooms: Two Maximum Square Feet: 1200 Minimum Square Feet: 300 Minimum Ceiling Height: Seven Feet Parking Requirement: Three Paved Pads Outside Entrance: Cannot Face Street Approval Fees

Sewer and water Impact Fee: $1895.Eighty five Building Permit: $60 – $500 Occupancy Requirements

Owner ought to are living in the region The owner needs to sign a sworn statement that each unit will not simultaneously be rented – in different phrases, a proprietor ought to keep to stay in the domestic and no longer convert it into an unlawful duplex. Rental of the condominium restrained to 1 family or 3 singles Fire-Safety Requirements

One-hour fireplace-resistive construction among gadgets, beneath stairs, and in furnace room 20-minute hearth-rated, self-final door(s) among devices and furnace room Handrails need to be mounted in which important Windows and window-well length minimums Smoke detectors in every bedroom and hallway Carbon Monoxide detector mounted on each degree of the house Mechanical System Requirements

Own source of heat and aircon – the conditioned air and return air from one unit’s machine can not be blended with the alternative Proper amount of flammable air for gasoline appliances Proper exterior venting for garments dryer Bathroom and kitchen countertop retailers ought to have a floor-fault-interrupter receptacle or breaker Electrical circuits serving bedrooms have to be arc-fault protected A prison accent condo can be a Godsend to both the homeowner and the tenants. Many citizens find themselves unable to make their full house payments for a ramification of reasons. Renting out an accent condominium affords plenty wished income from an area of the house that won’t have even been used.accessory stores for women.

The Boomerang of Life – How It Determines Who Wins the Game

If there definitely is a boomerang in the sport of existence, how do we encourage it to supply the things we crave the maximum in our lives? How will we win in this elusive recreation with the boomerang? This plays a powerful position in the sport of life, yet most of us were nowhere near the road whilst the guideline e-book became being passed out. We listen to all the clever words approximately what’s actual in life, yet no person informed us how to play to win. Many by no means even found out it become a game and simply in no way entertained the thought that one ought to win at it. It must be difficult; maximum try to clearly live to tell the tale it.

Have you ever contemplated on how tough we people want to make matters to simply accept that they’ve value and will paintings? In fact, if someone does not have a degree, or is not licensed, certified and skilled, we discount their advice and doubt they have got anything worthwhile to proportion with us. This is people at our exceptional. We distrust easy answers that aren’t subsidized by years of trying out and analysis. Why; are we afraid to agree with our judgment?boomerang for outlook.

We are warned about the boomerang as kids

It is the same concept as “Do unto others… ” determined in the Ten Commandments. We can recognize this and most locate it suited recommendation and might typically follow it to a few degree. Things get difficult approximately now. How does this translate beyond just seeking to deal with others as we need to be handled and into receiving what we want in lifestyles, no longer simply what we dished out?

If you want a heart packed with pleasure, happiness and love, how you may make that part of your lifestyles? If you need a soul this is at peace and a thought that are free to dream and create, how are we able to show up that into our lives? All of those goals are practicable, and sure, they’re without problems workable. How you can say? It’s that antique boomerang coming again at us; that which you release into the universe must go back. The seeds you plant are the crop you will obtain. Nothing new on this besides the understanding that it is this simple to bring the very things you a most choice right to you, result’s easy. You send them out, in spades.

If you want to love and pleasure in your existence, a technique the whole lot to your life with the natural cause. This is natural love without attachment to the outcome. Apply no attempt to govern whatever past the act of loving the people and locations which can be in your lifestyles.does com cast have boomerang channel.

How does the soul locate peace?

Pure lovelies as the base of our soul. We arrived in our existence as nonsecular beings and are then told we should learn how to honor our Creator. We honor our Creator by using dwelling an existence of pure cause; that is precisely what we acquire from our Creator; pure love.

If you need a mind that is loose to dream and create the fact you maximum desire, encourage all and sundry around you to dream and agree with. That which you send out returns complete pressure. You win in the sport of lifestyles whilst you learn how to throw the boomerang, not a way to capture it.

How Online Reputation Management Is A Solid Internet Marketing Strategy

We recognize how much groups want net marketing to attain to a much wider marketplace and a bigger target market

We additionally understand that this kind of marketing may be executed the usage of some of gear or strategies suiting to a commercial enterprise desires. One of the gear is recognition control wherein an emblem’s online photograph is boosted by means of countering negativity with positivity. Reputation control is now crucial because the surge of negativity at the net has grown in intensity and no businesses are immune to it. Negative consumer reviews can affect an enterprise and dilute its brand price inside the eyes of clients.

More so, it is not uncommon to peer competition take pleasure in the game of picture tarnishing and that they hotel to posting bad and negative element throughout channels on the internet. If such posts and comments aren’t managed properly, it is able to then create a bad effect on a commercial enterprise in the query. Reputation management is also a way to engage with customers who’ve some type of troubles with the commercial enterprise. This way, you may recognize their issues, come up with solutions and impact their shopping for selection to a terrific quantity. You need to hence hire specialists immediately in order that the reputation of your business is stored intact.

More so, you should remember the fact that in recent times some eighty-five% clients examine evaluations on-line before buying a product or availing a carrier. Thus, no commercial enterprise can find the money for exposing those possibilities to bad evaluations and terrible remarks as this may have a negative effect on the sales and revenues. With recognition control, your business can count on to construct agree with inside the market and benefit self-assurance of on the returned of credibility. Further, by means of giving customers find evaluations and scores about your products, offerings or any other component of the enterprise, you inspire them and allow them to pose agree with you.

In addition, popularity management is a high-quality tool to apprehend consumer feedbacks and court cases and paintings upon them in a fast way. You rent professionals who not best construct popularity but also interact with customers and remedy their issues. You open a channel of verbal exchange with your target market so that their remarks could be heard and relevant answers are supplied. It’s constantly a terrific strategy to attain out to the target audience, pay attention to them and their troubles and then address any troubles they have with the emblem you’re related to. This is how you give the affect that customers care lots.

Clearly, benefits are manifold when you hire one of top on-line popularity control corporations and permit experts to manage your emblem images on the net. This step guarantees that all things bad stated or written approximately your enterprise take a back seat while high-quality things take the center level. This is the real essence of emblem building and that is where recognition control makes the difference. It facilitates you have a solid footprint in the digital area so that you keep to surge beforehand without dealing with any negativity to any factor of the business.

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Phantom 8 Analysis: The Tecno Dual Camera Phone with 6GB RAM

New Post has been published on https://dailytechhub.com/tecno-phantom-8-analysis-camera-6gb-ram/

Phantom 8 Analysis: The Tecno Dual Camera Phone with 6GB RAM

The Tecno Phantom 8 has a brilliant impact design, an optimal processor of 2.6 GHz Octa-core and diamond fire design with an average price, plus its dual camera, Type-C charger, 4G LTE and microSD slot.

Although the fingerprint sensor was well placed at the back which makes it look more innovative, it is not water resistant. The Phantom 8 is a phone with a good high-end operation according to its price, its dual camera rear with 20MP of the front camera couple with many other options discussed below that will appeal to the most fans of selfies in photography, although every now and then exaggerates filters with so much software processing.

Table of Contents

1 Analysis Section

2 Phantom 8: A Diamond Fire Design

3 Phantom 8 Full Specifications

4 Phantom 8 with HiOS Interface

5 Performance of Phantom 8

6 Phantom 8 Battery Capacities

7 Chamber: the Double Action of Phantom 8

8 Price and Availability of Tecno Phantom 8

9 CONCLUSIONS

10 Phantom 8 Review

10.0.0.1 Performance

10.0.0.2 Battery

10.0.0.3 Camera

10.0.0.4 Function

10.0.0.5 Design

10.0.1 Summary

Analysis Section

Tecno had started the paradigm of dual camera smartphone production with the introduction of Phantom 8 which seems to go along with Samsung Note 8 in this regard. Gone are the productions of fairly-priced phones with basic features couple with an ugly plastic design. The Smartphones of this century are in a serious battle for being high-end devices with cheaper prices than the big brands in which users’ choice prevail. The Phantom 8 complied with this features being a device with specifications that bring it closer to leading devices like Nokia 8, Huawei P10 and Honor 9 in which they share many similarities.

Phantom 8 rivals with OnePlus5, LG Q6 or Galaxy A5, Phantom 8 has a strong battle ahead of you before you decide to put it in your pocket… will you win it?

Phantom 8 has a very bright design on its outer body, but don’t worry, you don’t need to wear sunglasses before you can use it.

Phantom 8: A Diamond Fire Design

Phantom 8 was built with an Advance beauty design in mind. Looking at Phantom 8 compact body design, you will be surprised at its eye-catching back cover finish. The back grasps and reflects light in a clever way – it bounces long rays of light off it and waves them back and forth as you move it. The Eye-catching diamond fire design found in Phantom 8, makes it a trendy accessory for your daily look. It truly doesn’t look like any other phone you might have used before because of its shiny body similar to what we found in Honor 9.

tecno-mobile.com

We note that this phone does not meet the fashionable aesthetics in its technical design since it does not include a bevelled or borderless design. In contrast, on the sides, we barely see a few millimetres of the thickness of its structural material; the company still maintained the top and bottom found in their previous model.

In the bottom, without surprise, we have a single loudspeaker and a USB Type-C connector for data loading and transfer.

Phantom 8 Full Specifications

Phantom 8 is a phone with a 5.7-inch Full HD display with 1080 pixels per inch. Its processor is the latest developed to date, the 2.6 GHz Octa-core which allow the phone to blaze in performance.

In spite of being a mid-priced phone, this Phantom 8 comes well-resolved when it comes to memory: it has a robust 6GB of RAM with 64GB ROM of storage which can be extended with microSD card up to 2TB.

This phone incorporates Android 7.1 Nougat with HiOS interface, as for connectivity, the device has Bluetooth, A-GPS, 4G / LTE and NFC. Its battery is 3,500mAh. Although it has a fast charge technology with Type-C, It also has a fingerprint sensor and weighs about 157.9grams.

If something has remained faithful, Tecno with this Phantom 8 is on the dual camera with bright selfies on both sides and its 6GB RAM with the guarantee of fluidity in performance.

It has a sensor of 12 megapixels RGB and a monochrome of 13-megapixels and the frontalis of 20 megapixels.

[table id=3 /]

Phantom 8 with HiOS Interface

The HiOS 3.0 Interface of this Phantom has already been seen in Tecno previous devices. On the other hand, it reminds us a little about iOS and we discover very nice and ultramodern designs that continue to be simple as a pure Android computer.

tecno-mobile.com

HiOS include an app drawer or an option to enable it as Infinix does with its devices. The Settings menu and apps, in general, look a lot like iOS with a very modern and nice design. Taking into consideration that it is Android 7.0 Nougat, the company has made a good management of the operating system to give it its extra touch and at the same time make it simple.

Performance of Phantom 8

The Tecno Phantom 8 is filled with a strong MediaTek P25 processor; it’s more efficient in responding quickly than any Phantom that came before it when it comes to surfing online, streaming videos, playing games, or dealing with business in a tinkle of an eye. All these are achieved with the innovation of 16nm processor which runs less power, the processor will not strain your battery to any further extent.

tecno-mobile.com

Phantom 8 is embedded with 6GB of RAM which loads very fast against the other flagships. Tecno Phantom 8 can perform optimally because of it capacitates to multi-tasking of almost 80 apps without any hindrance. Phantom 8 is powered by a new LPDDR4X standard; the phone enables faster data transmission of up to 70% speed snappier compared to the last generation smartphone and this allows less consumption of power with easy easily.

Phantom 8 is designed to allow you stay connected wherever you go at a point in time. This phone is supported by “multiple bands” which allows you to roam in any country in the world. In addition, Phantom 8 featured LTE Cat 6 and also provides high speed of data downloading of up to 300Mbps which make it faster than any last generation phones.

Phantom 8 Battery Capacities

Phantom 8 also stands out in the aspect of battery capacity. It is 3500 mAh which includes fast charging technology with Type-C Light Speed Charge. This has allowed us to charge the device almost in full in less than 45 minutes, a positive detail to take into account when deciding which phone this year we want to use daily.

Phantom 8 also stands out in the aspect of battery capacity with the supports the latest light speed fast charge technology of TECNO. This has allowed us to fully charge the device within 70 minutes which can last for 3days. This allows you to recycle your power bank.

Chamber: the Double Action of Phantom 8

If something is so significant today in a smartphone apart from a good performance is your camera. Phantom 8 has a dual 12-megapixel Sony wide-angle sensor with a 13-megapixel telephoto sensor. The wide-angle sensor allows us to record anything we desire while telephoto assists in providing us with stunning images. Both features work together with 10x super digital zoom to give us better selfies experience.

tecno-mobile.com

Phantom 8 nails low-light selfie easily. The ultra pixel enables the phone to take a selfie with 2.0μm pixel effect. Pairing with a large F/2.0 aperture, this ensures that more light is sent to the lens. Using “4 in 1” technology, which means four times of light allowance for an individual pixel sensor and an individual image. As a result, the final image is much brighter.

One feature of the HiOS 3.0 Phantom 8 software is that the camera offers a deep of options. Phantom 8 incorporate low-light selfies because of the ultra pixel which facilitates the phone to take selfies with 2.0μm pixel effect by pairing with F/2.0 aperture that ensures brighter images.

Phantom 8 guarantee that every regular night can be an extraordinary one for you with the double mode selfie flash that light up your face appropriately even in low light conditions. This latest imaging algorithm takes it extra by detecting your skin tone and emits appropriate light that will give you natural look.

Price and Availability of Tecno Phantom 8

Phantom 8 comes in three colours which are Galaxy Blue, Champagne Gold and Black. In Nigeria, it is available on most our online marketplaces. Below are links to various online shopping websites based on your choice:

Jumia Nigeria: The price started from N127,000.00 – Get it Now

Jumia Kenya: The price started from KSh 33,995 – Get it Now

Jumia Ghana: As at the time of writing this review, the phone is not available yet, but you can search here.

Jumia Egypt As at the time of writing this review, the phone is not available yet, but you can search here.

Yudala Store: This is a retail store in Nigeria that is being operated solely in which their prices are actual sales price from the manufacturer. You can buy your Phantom 8 from their as well for N128,000 – Get it now

CONCLUSIONS

Phantom 8 is a very pretty phone… and an attraction of footprints for Tecno. In the hand, it is comfortable to use even with one hand, even though you must be very careful because it can slide without you realizing it. Its Full HD screen, fast processor and super selfie camera with many additional effects make it a good choice in the mid-range, which guarantee you fluidity experienced with Galaxy S8 and Note 8 in terms of performance.

Phantom 8 Review

Performance

Battery

Camera

Function

Design

Summary

Phantom 8 is a very pretty phone... and an attraction of footprints for Tecno. In the hand, it is comfortable to use even with one hand, even though you must be very careful because it can slide without you realizing it.

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User Rating: 3.32 ( 3 votes)

#phantom 8 #Review #tecno phones