the promise of a golden age is over

[sovietgoner]

‘Chess’

Guess who’s back?

[dude-dude-dude-dude-dude-2]

World record holder….McMillan Tac 50

[rhubarbes]

by Robert Sundelin

[frederick-the-ii]

Remember lads: it's okay to make an entire triple-A video game bashing Christianity, and only expect small backlash, but as soon as you draw a picture of Mohammed all of a sudden it's your fault for getting blown up.

[hiigara-ahead]

SHUT UP I JUST WANNA STAB DUDES WITH PITCHFORKS

[sugapiie]

Most badass pastor i’ve seen

[postingmachine9000]

ordinarily I’d mock Ubisoft for their games being so far down the shitter that they need to resort to controversy as a cash grab, but the premise behind Far Cry 5 is legitimately awful

we are at a point in our history where America is incredibly divided between left and right with increasingly common street fights breaking out and political violence being increasingly normalized on both sides of the aisle, all fueled by each side of America demonizing each other and refusing to recognize each other as their equals

Far Cry 5′s premise is only contributing to that divide and encouraging demonization and divisiveness in a nation that’s already divided, making a bad social problem even worse

I don’t expect games journalists to do this because they’re not very socially conscious and its not their tribe being demonized, but there needs to be an effort to hold Ubisoft accountable for producing such a socially irresponsible game that will only foster division and inter-american resentment

[hiigara-ahead]

shuddup i wanna stab dudes with pitchforks.

[association-of-free-people]

How many layers of unhinged Russophobia are you on?

[basedheisenberg]

Are they aware… thats a cathedral/museum and not a government building?

[schuetzengrabenmints-deactivate]

You expect them to be intellectually honest at this point?

[alaija]

So Time is concerned about the spread of Orthodox Christianity?

I’m confused.

[eliminativism]

Why are the people here being so fucking abtuse?

You are more intelligent than jumping on that without pointing out the stupidity, alaija.

The cathedral is a well-known building from Moscow and it symbolises the influence of Russia on the current American government - you know, the thing that is being investigated by American security agencies? Which is not at all a conspiracy, but something which is really happening, and is being obstructed by the white house in actions bordering or even crossing the line to illegality?

Which only completely unhinged wingnuts could deny at this point?

Pull yourself together, ladies.

[duran-duran-less-official]

Out of sheer morbid curiosity, and partly because I know jack about world politics, what negative impact is Russia’s influence going to have on the United States?

[eliminativism]

Russia is back to oldschool imperialism, while promoting ethno-nationalism. One of Putin’s close mentors is basically a modern pan-slavist - and we thought we had seen the last of that with the removal of the tzar. Putin’s goal seems to be a restoration of the imperial borders.

Russia is conducting cyber attacks against western nations, has invaded Georgia and the Ukraine and created two puppet states on the Ukraine’s territory. Putin has set his eye on Estland and Lithuania next. The Polish government is worried as well, since they are next to another Russian puppet - Bellarussia - whose dictator is propped by Putin.

The US has the military power and technological know-how to keep Russian military aggression and cyber attacks in check, as well as keeping Russia from human rights abuses against its own population - Russian journalists and politicians who are remotely critical of Putin are jailed, beaten, threatened and in some cases killed. Putin’s government promotes a very conservative form of orthodox christianity, we would say “christian fundamentalism” in the West, and bases new laws on the principles of a strict orthodox faith. Homosexuals are hounded and beaten openly in the streets by nationalists in Russia, and when they call the police, the Russian police either does nothing or arrests the homosexuals and abuses them further in the jail cells. Russian orthodox politicians are in favour of legalising domestic violence and the rape of women is being more and more ignored by the Russian police as a criminal offense.

Putin’s party tightly controls all Russian national media, in which the Russian population is told that a massive invasion by all western countries constantly looms over Russia, and that the economic and diplomatic sanctions which other nations enacted for the severe military transgressions of Russia are basically attempts to starve the Russians to death, creating fear, a siege mentality and loyalty to the government.

Additonally Putin’s government is highly corrupt - if you have enough money, you can break any law in Russia. The oligarchs can force other companies to sell their assets or send thugs to destroy factories and beat up workers in order to get good business deals and create monopolies. Putin and his close friends are filling their pockets with illegal businesses, bribes, money laundering, blackmail and embezzlement of tax money.

Via astroturfing, the clever spread of flase information on the internet and money campaigns, Russia has supported and ensured the loyalty of various right-wing parties in western countries - one of which is the Trump movement in the US. Another one which was recently defeated in the elections is the Front National in France - LePen and her party received huge sums of money from Putin, so that in the event she would take office, her government would approve of any Russian transgressions, oppose any actions planned against Russia and sabotage Western alliances, like NATO, so that no proper defense against Russia could be erected.

Russia is one of the biggest threat for world peace at the moment, and international stability is actually not great - the Russians are getting very aggressive, because the West, being democratic, is slower on the draw when it comes to political coubter-measures, and also, in Europe, very demilitarised - which is why the support of the US against Russia is so important, so that the Russian system of treating its subjects does not spread and fewer people have to suffer corrupt government violence.

[hiigara-ahead]

in which the Russian population is told that a massive invasion by all western countries constantly looms over Russia, and that the economic and diplomatic sanctions which other nations enacted for the severe military transgressions of Russia are basically attempts to starve the Russians to death, creating fear, a siege mentality and loyalty to the government.

Have you read any of the Russian media?

Putin has set his eye on Estland and Lithuania next.

Have you even BEEN to Lithuania? Who the hell would want to do anything with that shithole?

Are you Polish?

(Jesus fuck, serves me right for logging in to tumblr in the middle of the day)

[tverdlofi]

[concentrated-sunshine-deactivat]

Me and my big mouth!

So on the last episode I said I would only be posting missions that were interesting, plot important or saw new enemies appear…

Everything was going quiet until @knightoflodis clambered up onto a rooftop to get better fields of vision..

@knightoflodis : uh…central, eyes on..something new, it’s like half a man with jet engines in place of his legs, and a big gun…we have flying hostiles incoming and they are ducking and weaving like a mofo

In the face of this new threat and no close support for @knightoflodis the squad hunkered down behind cover and dropped smoke, waiting for the new hostiles to come to them and come they did..

Charging very aggressively into the fire of the entire squad and dodging most of the incoming fire from everyone except 

@quinzelade : nailed him, fucking hell these things are fast and agile, barely managed to clip him with half a magazine.

@eliminativism : yeah well lets see them dodge this!

unfortunately the fact they stayed up on the roof meant we couldn’t take advantage of their being shredded (takes extra damage from any attack for a few turns) as moving up onto the roof and into cover was basically a full turn for us

Oh and now @clamanath and @knightoflodis are taking suppressing fire from the flying aliens, a nasty talent they get which means the suppressed unit has it’s aim reduced, it’s movement reduced and if it moves it gets shot at, very nasty for pinning a squad down.

@odynpony : I’ll push up and take out the suppressors! *misses*

@odynpony : bad news guys, these wankers are very hard to hit!

@knightoflodis : don’t worry I can holo-target them and make it easier, note to squad, maybe let me lead with that…you know as the squad scout!

or I could just kill it I suppose..

@da-moose-mcgillycuddy : I don’t see what the problem is guys, just shoot em and they die, lemme just poke my head over the side to check the alleyway…

…aw fuck more of those slender fucks..holy shit one of them just jumped 3 stories straight up and …oh look the others are taking cover in a building, it’s cute that they think that’ll help them..

..shit not quiet dead, @listener-blue I’ve set them up for you.

@listener-blue : that’s great but THERE IS A FUCKING WALL BETWEEN ME AND THEM WHAT AM I MEANT TO DO, CURVE MY BULLETS OVER THE FUCKING BUILDING?

@eliminativism : Don’t worry I have a magic portable hole…

…hey presto no more wall

@listener-blue : boom headshot!

@clamanath: hello little grey person, you look injured, let me help you with my healing bullets….

…dammit @quinzelade these are not healing bullets, why would you lie to me about that?

@knightoflodis : ok just the one guy left, I’ll light him up and someone can finish him off with my holo targeting…

…or I can just kill him again, god damn why do I have to be so good?

A very smooth encounter given the suprise close range Floaters, they will likely be one of the biggest problems I have in the game since they are hard coded to be aggressive, are very mobile and can suppress isolated troops & later on they have nastier abilities too.

Oh Officer training unlocked, now we can start getting people trained up as officers that can buff their squad mates and give people extra actions, this sits on top of their class abilities but if I recall correctly it prevents people from becoming PSI troopers, MECs (big mech suits) or genetically enhanced, any volunteers?

promotions for everyone except @eliminativism apparently, who has no kills apparently and grinding enemies down doesn’t count in x-com, bit like old d&d.

Look at all the Meld, that’s worrying because it means that the aliens are advancing ahead of me quickly. A bit meta gamey

Someone make a not of Dr Shen complaining about the horror of the Floaters being cybernetically enhanced, oh the inhumanity of removing limbs from creatures and putting them into cybernetic suits…

@listener-blue picks up snapshot which means she can move to a new position and still shoot on her turn. Normally snipers need both actions to shoot.

@knightoflodis continues down his path of death by picking up ranger which increases his damage by 1 (per tech tier I think, so lasers get +2 and so on), all he wants to do is scout and instead he is a murder machine

@redroadtoadventure moves down the DPS tree, picking up aggression that gives +10% crit chance per visible enemy (max 3 times) obviously this is very powerful as it can help whittle groups down fast, not so good against solo things..

@da-moose-mcgillycuddy is going a more generalist build and picks up a perk that lets her carry double the number of support grenades, so she has 2 HE ‘nades to destroy cover and 2 smoke to cover allies or 2 flashbangs for downed UFOs. later on people can carry 3 small items so 2 HE, 2 smokes and 2 flashbangs.

@quinzelade picks up opportunist meaning she is very dangerous in overwatch mode, no aim penalty meaning they are accurate AND she can crit enemies with it which means she might kill an enemy shooting at a team mate before it can make the shot.

@clamanath gets suppression which is a form of proactive healing, can’t hurt team mates if you’re being pinned down already.

@odynpony gets my default assault perk, close combat spec, any enemy that gets within 4 squares gets a shotgun to the face.

And no rest for the wicked, another UFO makes a run on the UK only to be slapped down by X-com interceptors, only taking a tiny amount of damage in return.

Time to load up for squad Rapier to hit the ground :D

[da-moose-mcgillycuddy]

@da-moose-mcgillycuddy : I don’t see what the problem is guys, just shoot em and they die

I mean, things do typically kick the bucket when they’re shot at a whole bunch of times. I don’t see why this logic is so controversial.

And me carrying more things that go boom and make big craters in the ground can only be a plus.

[concentrated-sunshine-deactivat]

The big danger with Floaters is that they absorb lots of overwatch fire letting other more dangerous but less agile enemies close in on the squad…this can be very..very bad depending on what is coming at you. I swear to god if there are Floaters on Site Recon I am quitting :P

[hiigara-ahead]

put this under the cut ffs

[concentrated-sunshine-deactivat]

I keep forgetting that :P

[hiigara-ahead]

That’s all right, I keep forgetting to buy the new xcom ((

[steampunktendencies]

Ioan Human

[rivesveronique]

Šmirous Karel (1890 - 1981) Portrait of a girl , autochrome

[concentrated-sunshine-deactivat]

Me and my big mouth!

So on the last episode I said I would only be posting missions that were interesting, plot important or saw new enemies appear…

Everything was going quiet until @knightoflodis clambered up onto a rooftop to get better fields of vision..

@knightoflodis : uh…central, eyes on..something new, it’s like half a man with jet engines in place of his legs, and a big gun…we have flying hostiles incoming and they are ducking and weaving like a mofo

In the face of this new threat and no close support for @knightoflodis the squad hunkered down behind cover and dropped smoke, waiting for the new hostiles to come to them and come they did..

Charging very aggressively into the fire of the entire squad and dodging most of the incoming fire from everyone except 

@quinzelade : nailed him, fucking hell these things are fast and agile, barely managed to clip him with half a magazine.

@eliminativism : yeah well lets see them dodge this!

unfortunately the fact they stayed up on the roof meant we couldn’t take advantage of their being shredded (takes extra damage from any attack for a few turns) as moving up onto the roof and into cover was basically a full turn for us

Oh and now @clamanath and @knightoflodis are taking suppressing fire from the flying aliens, a nasty talent they get which means the suppressed unit has it’s aim reduced, it’s movement reduced and if it moves it gets shot at, very nasty for pinning a squad down.

@odynpony : I’ll push up and take out the suppressors! *misses*

@odynpony : bad news guys, these wankers are very hard to hit!

@knightoflodis : don’t worry I can holo-target them and make it easier, note to squad, maybe let me lead with that…you know as the squad scout!

or I could just kill it I suppose..

@da-moose-mcgillycuddy : I don’t see what the problem is guys, just shoot em and they die, lemme just poke my head over the side to check the alleyway…

…aw fuck more of those slender fucks..holy shit one of them just jumped 3 stories straight up and …oh look the others are taking cover in a building, it’s cute that they think that’ll help them..

..shit not quiet dead, @listener-blue I’ve set them up for you.

@listener-blue : that’s great but THERE IS A FUCKING WALL BETWEEN ME AND THEM WHAT AM I MEANT TO DO, CURVE MY BULLETS OVER THE FUCKING BUILDING?

@eliminativism : Don’t worry I have a magic portable hole…

…hey presto no more wall

@listener-blue : boom headshot!

@clamanath: hello little grey person, you look injured, let me help you with my healing bullets….

…dammit @quinzelade these are not healing bullets, why would you lie to me about that?

@knightoflodis : ok just the one guy left, I’ll light him up and someone can finish him off with my holo targeting…

…or I can just kill him again, god damn why do I have to be so good?

A very smooth encounter given the suprise close range Floaters, they will likely be one of the biggest problems I have in the game since they are hard coded to be aggressive, are very mobile and can suppress isolated troops & later on they have nastier abilities too.

Oh Officer training unlocked, now we can start getting people trained up as officers that can buff their squad mates and give people extra actions, this sits on top of their class abilities but if I recall correctly it prevents people from becoming PSI troopers, MECs (big mech suits) or genetically enhanced, any volunteers?

promotions for everyone except @eliminativism apparently, who has no kills apparently and grinding enemies down doesn’t count in x-com, bit like old d&d.

Look at all the Meld, that’s worrying because it means that the aliens are advancing ahead of me quickly. A bit meta gamey

Someone make a not of Dr Shen complaining about the horror of the Floaters being cybernetically enhanced, oh the inhumanity of removing limbs from creatures and putting them into cybernetic suits…

@listener-blue picks up snapshot which means she can move to a new position and still shoot on her turn. Normally snipers need both actions to shoot.

@knightoflodis continues down his path of death by picking up ranger which increases his damage by 1 (per tech tier I think, so lasers get +2 and so on), all he wants to do is scout and instead he is a murder machine

@redroadtoadventure moves down the DPS tree, picking up aggression that gives +10% crit chance per visible enemy (max 3 times) obviously this is very powerful as it can help whittle groups down fast, not so good against solo things..

@da-moose-mcgillycuddy is going a more generalist build and picks up a perk that lets her carry double the number of support grenades, so she has 2 HE ‘nades to destroy cover and 2 smoke to cover allies or 2 flashbangs for downed UFOs. later on people can carry 3 small items so 2 HE, 2 smokes and 2 flashbangs.

@quinzelade picks up opportunist meaning she is very dangerous in overwatch mode, no aim penalty meaning they are accurate AND she can crit enemies with it which means she might kill an enemy shooting at a team mate before it can make the shot.

@clamanath gets suppression which is a form of proactive healing, can’t hurt team mates if you’re being pinned down already.

@odynpony gets my default assault perk, close combat spec, any enemy that gets within 4 squares gets a shotgun to the face.

And no rest for the wicked, another UFO makes a run on the UK only to be slapped down by X-com interceptors, only taking a tiny amount of damage in return.

Time to load up for squad Rapier to hit the ground :D

[da-moose-mcgillycuddy]

@da-moose-mcgillycuddy : I don’t see what the problem is guys, just shoot em and they die

I mean, things do typically kick the bucket when they’re shot at a whole bunch of times. I don’t see why this logic is so controversial.

And me carrying more things that go boom and make big craters in the ground can only be a plus.

[concentrated-sunshine-deactivat]

The big danger with Floaters is that they absorb lots of overwatch fire letting other more dangerous but less agile enemies close in on the squad…this can be very..very bad depending on what is coming at you. I swear to god if there are Floaters on Site Recon I am quitting :P

[hiigara-ahead]

put this under the cut ffs

[steampunktendencies]

Oil paintings by Belichenko and Boukhtiyarova

[dangeroustoast-blog]

Magnetic ball in magnetic putty

[southdakilla]

[lashedbystorms]

Lion Monument, a sculpture in Lucerne, Switzerland, designed by Bertel Thorvaldsen and hewn in 1820–21 by Lukas Ahorn. It commemorates the Swiss Guards who were massacred in 1792 during the French Revolution, when revolutionaries stormed the Tuileries Palace in Paris, France. Mark Twain praised the sculpture of a mortally-wounded lion as “the most mournful and moving piece of stone in the world.” source: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lion_Monument

photo credit: nathanwebster https://www.flickr.com/photos/all_the_intrigue_is_gone/

[funkysafari-deactivated20260131]

A wonderful night in Zimanga Private Game Reserves Umgodi hide. Taking advantage of when the buffalo drink for a long exposure to capture the stars. by Alison Langevad