I'm sorry for BEING MEAN TO YOU.
It was wrong because IT DID NOT ADVANCE MY GOALS.
In the future I will PUT FORWARD A DISHONEST FAÇADE OF “POLITENESS”.
there. as YOU CAN SEE, i read THE “sburb etiquette faq”, AND HAVE FOLLOWED IT. you MAY INTERPRET THIS AS A “GESTURE OF GOOD WILL”.
you SEE, WE KEEP GETTING BANNED FROM PLACES, SO IT’S HARD TO FIND SOMEWHERE ELSE TO ASK QUESTIONS. and MY OTHER HALF WONT ASK YOU ANYTHING BECAUSE HE STILL “doesn’t want to bother [you]”. so IT FALLS TO ME. even THOUGH YOU POSTED THAT MESSAGE i accidentally SENT WHERE MY HANDLE LEAKED, WHICH IS BASICALLY ATTEMPTED MURDER.
anyway. the PROBLEM AT HAND:
our SESSIONS KEEP GETTING SHORTER AND SHORTER. as YOU ONCE SAID, A NORMAL SESSION TAKES ABOUT A YEAR. but IT HASN’T BEEN ALL THAT LONG SINCE WE LAST SPOKE, AND i was ON SESSION 5 THEN.
we ARE NOW ON SESSION 12. absurd.
assuming THAT YOU DON’T JUST DISMISS THIS OUT OF HAND (AS YOU OFTEN SEEM TO DO, WHEN i tell YOU ANYTHING UNUSUAL), i desire YOUR “TAKE” ON THIS MATTER.
not BECAUSE i would EXPECT TO AGREE WITH IT ON ANY LEVEL- i’m quite SURE THAT ALL THIS IS SIMPLY A PRODUCT OF MY EVER-INCREASING SKILL AT THE GAME ALLOWING FOR FASTER COMPLETION- BUT MY OTHER HALF HAS GROWN CONCERNED, AND COWERS IN THE FACE OF THE EVER-LOWER NUMBERS WE FIND ON THE RECKONING COUTDOWNS, (NOT THAT WE NEED MORE TIME, AGAIN, i’m skilled. the MANDATORY SPEEDRUNNING ISN’T GETTING TO ME AT ALL.) AND i’m sure HE’LL LISTEN TO WHATEVER REASSURANCE YOU MAKE UP.
with THAT OUT OF THE WAY, JUST WANT TO CLEAR SOMETHING UP WHILE i’m messaging YOU ANYWAY: THE MESSAGE THAT THE knight OF blood SENT YOU BACK THEN WAS utter hogwash! i absolutely DO NOT HAVE ANY SORT OF ROMANTIC FEELINGS FOR YOU.
and BESIDES, IF i did, KILLING YOU- AT LEAST INTENTIONALLY- WOULDN’T BE HOW IT WORKS. couldn’t REPRODUCE WITH A CORPSE- OR WITH A HUMAN FOR THAT MATTER.
i mean, EVEN IF YOU WERE A CHERUB, IT WOULDN’T MATTER. if THERE’S ANYTHING ATTRACTIVE ABOUT YOU, IT WOULD BE THE HUMANITY. the SOFT FLESH, THE DULL EYES. not THAT i would DARE DEFILE A HUMAN IN SUCH A WAY! or AM EVEN THINKING ABOUT THAT AT ALL EVER! i’m just SAYING THAT HYPOTHETICALLY THERE COULD BE A KIND OF “EXOTIC” OBJECTIVE APPEAL.
and ANYWAY, IF i said SOME VIOLENT THINGS TO MY COPLAYERS ABOUT YOU AT THE TIME IN MY SLEEP-DEPRIVED, SOCIALLY DESPERATE, REASONABLY PISSED STATE, THAT WOULD HAVE BEEN PRIVATE INFORMATION ANYWAY, SO IT SHOULDN’T HAVE BEEN DIVULGED TO YOU, AND ANY TRULY MORAL ACTOR WOULD HAVE ALSO NOT PUBLISHED THAT WITHOUT MY CONSENT.
HI… DID my sister contact you again? SHE’S been acting kind of strange and dropped a few hints about it, and uh… WELL, I’M SORRY if she sent you anything weird.
I’M ALSO sorry I kind of ghosted you… IT shouldn’t have fallen to my co-player to explain how things worked out back then, but I WAS worried that if I KEPT messaging you, so would she...
SHE’S been really anxious lately. WE’RE having this problem where we have less and less time to complete each session. I THINK it’s just coincidence, but she thinks it’s some kind of consequence of us getting better at the game? LIKE, we need less time, so we get less time?
IF you have an opinion on this, I’D LOVE to hear it. IT’S hard to ask around- as much as she’s been improving as a person, she’s still abrasive enough to keep getting us banned off of most of the network…
Oh SHIT it's the Cherub siblings again! It's been a while. And to address some miscellaneous points before we dive into the actual meat of the issue.
Cherub Sister, I do forgive you. Not out of kindness, or any personal qualities you possess that make you especially forgivable, because your contempt is still leaking through your words and it's still kind of fucked up that you did that stuff to your brother. However, you are pretty top-tier at banter, and as long as you can keep the causticity to snipes in between actual communication (instead of messaging JUST to be rude), you're cool in my book.
I don't dismiss stuff out of hand unless you say ridiculous stuff at me like "I won the game the door opened and your mom gave me Victory Sloppy". I didn't even believe Cherubs were real at first and I still asked for verification instead of "nuh uh not real". And look at us now, we're basically best friends at this point.
I'm going to take the last four paragraphs as a compliment. I don't know much about how Cherub reproduction works, nor do I think I got a physical description or image of what they even look like, so I can't really speak on much of this, other than that you probably shouldn't be complimenting people on their "exotic" looks because it's somewhat un-PC. Also I agree, we should execute the Knight of Blood.
Cherub Brother, you could never "bother" me. You were always chill with me, and you will continue to be chill with me, regardless of how much of a pain your sister may or not be at any given point.
But now to actually address the issue you're asking me about. And not to immediately sour my newfound friendship with Cherub Sister, but she's absolutely wrong on this matter. With very few exceptions (and none I can think of currently), none of the game's features take into account Player skill or prior experience whatsoever. If it wants to generate a nearly-impossible Session, it will do so regardless of whether said Session is populated by veterans with a double-digit victory count, complete sboobs, or a mix thereof. So your skill is irrelevant, insofar as it isn't causing your current issue. It sure as hell is good at solving it though, so take pride in that.
So now the question is "why is this the case"? I doubt your Cherubhood has anything to do with it. It *did* affect the game at the start, with your not-quite-a-solo Session, but you've been playing with others now. So unless this game is uniquely biased against Cherubs (for some reason???), we can rule that out. And... I've basically hit the limit on how hard I can guess at what's going on. If there *is* some factor that you can account for that would fix the issue, I'm not seeing it, meaning that your Sessions becoming increasingly shorter is either due to A) coincidence, like Cherub Brother thinks, or B) something functionally indistinguishable from coincidence.
The bad news is, I have no way of helping you. The good news is, you may not need my help. Let's say this is a coincidence. It doesn't seem likely to be a coincidence, due to your perspective being "they're getting sequentially shorter", but I see confirmation bias all the time. Look for examples of Seers building "dens", and all of a sudden, every Seer has a den. Humans usually die when shot in the head, but repeat that action an infinite number of times, and there be an infinite number of survivals. That doesn't mean human skulls are particularly resistant to gunshots though. No matter what narrative you try to weave from the objective data, the number of deaths will be a proportionally larger infinite number. Math guys don't @ me and simply understand what it is I'm saying.
Granted, what's currently happening to you is "human gets shot in the head five times, is still alive, now they're reaching for the shotgun", and no amount of "erm actually" and vague gestures at nonexistent statistics stops that from being a bitter pill to swallow. My only point is, until further information can be gathered or provided, the only thing that can be done is surviving the current Session. In fact, whether your time limits go back to normal or shorten again, you still have to survive *this* Session. I think the likelihood that you're being deliberately "challenged" unlikely, but abnormally short or no, having a double-digit Session count is something to be extremely proud of, and it sure as hell indicates you'll be able to answer said challenge. So for now, keep doing what you're doing, while being on the lookout for anything happening in this Session (or previous ones) which might indicate a cause or pattern.
Also, if you want to make sure it's not your level of skill impacting things. Maybe suck a little more? Don't self-sabotage, because dying is bad. But maybe you could afford to cut it a little close, or look demure and beaten-up when your injuries are minor at best. Or at the very least say "AW MAN I DON'T THINK I COULD DO THAT AGAIN, MUCH LESS A SHORTER ONE, I'M NOT *THAT* GOOD" when you're at the Door. The game reads your mind, so this might not work, but it can't hurt to *not* do it, right? Stupider solutions have worked before, I personally have had to manually deactivate and reactivate the ectobiology apparatus to finish Frog Breeding once. Shut just wouldn't intake ecto-slime, and then it did.
