Dr.Device

Thanks for the info!

My next character will be another originally-villainous archetype, the Robotics Mastermind (I think that's right).

I played a lot more Champions Online than I ever did CoH, but I think I like the play style of CoH better. In theory, I really liked the more freeform nature of powers in CO, but I feel like they never got the balance as good as it could have been. It also felt sort of like a half measure. One thing I definitely missed in CO was the CoH teleport. An actual teleport instead of a weird desolid+flight.

I'd love to see a super hero MMORPG that was more Hero-like in its philosophy, with special effects more separated from mechanics. I have ideas, but the probably isn't the place to go into them. 

I installed this yesterday and played a bit.

I wasn't a huge player before (I only got one character to 50), but I enjoyed it.

For my first character I recreated my previous level 50 Will Power/Super Strength Tanker as a Super Strength/Will Power brute.

I really like that the archetypes aren't restricted between the sides, now. Was that change made before the end, or was it introduced with the return?

4 minutes ago, Pattern Ghost said:

 

Resistance to the singular "they" is silly. It's been used singularly for a very, very long time, with sufficient documentation.

 

And I admit that I'm a bit of a language snob, so oversensitive to this kind of thing.

I get it.

I went from very prescriptivist when I was younger to pretty much totally descriptivist these days. If people are using it, it's a word. And if enough  people are using it wrong, well, they're using it right, now.

(But occasionally the prescriptivist in me rears up and screams when someone uses "flaunt" for "flout".)

13 minutes ago, Pattern Ghost said:

The word for talking about a mixed-gender or unknown gender group of people of Latin-American descent already exists, it's "Latino." It comes from Spanish. In Spanish, words that are male or neuter/unknown gender generally take an "o" ending, and words that have a female gender take an "a" ending. These are long-standing grammatical rules. When we borrow the word for use in English, there's no real need to change the word. "Latino" does not refer only to male individuals, though it can do so if describing someone who's known to be male.

 

Granted, non-binary folk are something not covered in the usage of the word as a singular adjective. Then again, the population of non-binary folk is relatively small, and it's an easy enough problem to work around, should it become necessary to avoid giving offense. I've never seen "Latinx" used other than in the context of describing the group, but we already have a word for that.

 

Thanks for the detailed answer.

I can see where you're coming from, but there is even less reason to be bound by the rules of a language that we are borrowing a word from then there is to be bound by outdated rules in our own language. I sizable group of Latin individuals adopted that term because they felt using Latino to describe them all was insufficient. No one is pretending it's a panacea, but it is a small step toward moving away from the masculine as a default. And as for the non-binary folks, why find some other work around when we already have this one?

This reminds me strongly of the resistance to the singular "they".

21 minutes ago, Pattern Ghost said:

 

The Latinx nonsense isn't evolution of language. Evolution's a natural process.

You seem emotionally invested in this. What is it exactly about "Latinx" that bothers you? Do you have a better word for talking about a mixed gender group of Latin-American descent? Or talking about non-binary folk of Latin-American descent?

11 hours ago, Pattern Ghost said:

This is doubleplusungood. "Latinx" is not a word.

Language evolves.

Existing words weren't serving a needed purpose, so a new one was created. 

It happens all the time.

1 hour ago, RDU Neil said:

 

Ok... that does sound... bad.  I never took the presentation literally, but if you do... then yeah... that is a horror show. 

But, on the plus side -

Come to the Phantom Zone!Live forever! See the universe! 

It practically sells itself.

Are Endgame spoilers okay in this thread?

I'll wrap this in spoiler tags, just in case.

Here's what I'd like to see for a Fantastic Four movie

2 minutes ago, Toxxus said:

It's not clear that they are.  There's a whole debate about it and everything.

 

"All persons born or naturalized in the United States, and subject to the jurisdiction thereof, are citizens of the United States and of the state wherein they reside. "

 

Groups that are very clearly covered:  Children born in the country whose parents are citizens.

Groups that are not clearly covered:  People illegally or legally in the country and subject to the jurisdiction of their country of residence.

 

In fact, in that same amendment, a little further down in the equal protection under the law clause they use "in the jurisdiction" which indicates a decision based on physical location and distinct from "subject to the jurisdiction" which is a legal obligation.

 

Historically the children of foreign officials - diplomats in particular - have not been covered as they are not "subject to the jurisdiction" of the United States.

There's debate about everything, including whether or not the Earth is flat, so I don't find the existence of debate meaningful.

An individual can be subject to multiple jurisdictions. Almost all of us are. I'm subject to the jurisdiction of the United States, the state of Texas, and the city of Austin. If I were in the military I'd also be subject to that jurisdiction. If I travel to England, I'm subject to the jurisdiction of that country, but still subject to the jurisdiction of the US (unless I go through the complex process of renouncing my citizenship). The amendment does not say subject exclusively to the jurisdiction of the US. The argument that being subject to another jurisdiction somehow means they aren't subject to US jurisdiction is entirely specious.

Besides which, to argue that these children are not subject to the jurisdiction of the US is to argue that their parents also are not. If they are not subject to the jurisdiction of the US, then they are not bound by its laws. If that were the case, US law enforcement would have no authority over them. 

Children of anyone with diplomatic immunity have always been excluded for exactly that reason. They, in fact, are not subject to the jurisdiction of the US. That's what diplomatic immunity is.

1 hour ago, Toxxus said:

The original interpretations of the law (there's a decent Wiki article on the topic) wouldn't have covered the 300k-400k children being born to parents here illegally each year.

Even in the mid-1800s it was determined that only legal residents of foreign nationals were granted birthright citizenship.

 

But the law changed with the passage of the 14th amendment, which is quite explicit that those children are citizens.

4 minutes ago, massey said:

 

No, they weren't important to me.  And they weren't important to anybody else either.  You see, it's not their movie.

 

As hard as it may be to believe, you are not the universal arbiter of importance. I'm not saying they needed more screen time. I thought Shuri being in the battle made perfect sense, and I don't have a strong opinion on Mantis. If all you're saying is that it wouldn't have made sense to spend more time on them away from the battle, given their place in the story, I have no problem with that. But to just flat say that the characters are unimportant is dismissive of the people out there who do care about those characters. Those characters are important to them, and their view of the movie matters just as much as yours.

3 hours ago, massey said:

Shuri is not important.  Mantis is not important. They barely deserve the screen time they got.

They are not important to you. You aren't the only person the movie was made for.

And as far as Shuri being combat capable goes, she's a princess in a country where rule can be determined by martial prowess. It's pretty likely that she has extensive combat training.

12 hours ago, Toxxus said:

You could put a mirror to this and with very few alterations say the same of the Democrats.

 

People keep saying stuff like this, trying to equate the two parties, but I never see any actual coherent point by point comparisons.

If it can be done so easily, please show us how. 

Tony built that gauntlet. I'm sure once he was in physical contact with it, his armor's shifting/reforming capability was up to the task.

Also, the movie was great.

I'll be seeing it before I go to work on Friday morning.

39 minutes ago, Pattern Ghost said:

 

I hadn't heard that one yet.

 

Here's what I found, for others who may not have heard it. From Snopes:

 

https://www.snopes.com/fact-check/hhs-allow-doctors-to-refuse-lgbtq/

 

Pretty messed up. If you have religious objections to providing medical service to anyone, then you need to find a new line of work.

 

And Severino seems to have a fundamental misunderstanding of the issue of gender confirmation surgery (hopefully I used the current terminology this time). There are very well-established protocols leading up to GRS to ensure that it's being used on the right patients* and as far as I know there are less issues with the process than in the past. EDIT: The footnote got sucked into the quote block for some reason, but the part after the * below is not part of the quote, it's my footnote on care standards. I can't edit the quote sections of the new board as the code doesn't show.

 

GCS is my preferred terminology. Other trans folk prefer others. As long as you don't call it sex change surgery, you're probably fine.

As far as the fear of doctors being forced to perform GCS, yeah, right. It's a highly specialized surgery that requires very specific training. No trans person is going to want someone who is anything less than skilled and enthusiastic performing it.  Using that fear as an excuse to allow doctors not to treat us at all is just an excuse for transphobia and general bigotry. 

2 minutes ago, Toxxus said:

1-  I have a hard time believing you have actual concentration camps that escaped media attention.

2-  There wasn't remotely enough evidence to convict anyone with what was brought forth.  Claiming that he's factually a serial sexual abuser is pretty extreme.

3-  I actually agree with you partially on this front.  However, congress sets the spending bills and the tax bills and with a brief exception for Bill Clinton we've run a massive deficit each year for decades because our government spends far more than it takes in and obliges itself to future debts to the tune of 100+ trillion dollars - already.

4-  No idea what you even mean here.  They're not trying to make anyone not exist.

5-  I don't believe this is happening at all.  In fact we've had some countries recently applaud the fact we're no longer ashamed to be Americans.

6-  I won't argue that his ego is a titanic monstrosity.  It is, but some of these trade deals are garbage and hurt us.  Pushing back to get fair deals is not a sign of evil.  We got a new deal with Mexico recently.

7-  Both parties do this and it's garbage.  Doesn't seem like rational discussions on issues and, gods forbid, some compromise are in fashion any more.

8-  Calling the administration Nazi's is way over the line.  Also, probably inaccurate as it stands for National Socialist and Trump has been pretty outspoken against socialism.

 

1. Well, we're keeping kids in cages. Putting people who cam here seeking amnesty (which is completely legal, by the way) in tent cities in inhumane conditions. We aren't gassing them yet, but people are dying, including children.

2. It wasn't a criminal trial. Innocent until proven guilty is irrelevant. And the admin and the republicans on the committee did everything in there power to make sure that any evidence didn't come out.

3. Well, a little agreement is something, I guess.

4. I'm a trans woman. They want doctor's to be able to refuse to treat me, even in an ER. Even if my life is in danger. They want me to have to use the men's bathroom in public, which would clearly out me as such, which would endanger my life in may places. So my only choice, if they get there way, would be to strictly limit my time in public, or break the law and use the correct bathroom, for which I would be arrested if caught, and then put in jail with men. They don't want me to exist.

5. Which countries would those be? Saudi Arabia? Brazil (with it's newly elected fascist leader)? North Korea? I was never ashamed to be an American, and few Democrats were. I'm leaning that direction now, though.

6. Which deals were hurt us more than the ridiculous tariffs he's imposing?

7. The democratic party is not in the habit of ginning up fear of other. They get hyperbolic about some things, but they aren't demonizing whole races of people.

8. I didn't call the whole admin Nazi's. I said there are Nazis in the administration. Stephen Miller is a genuine Nazi in all but name. He associates with actual Nazis. He espouses Nazi ideals. He is high up in the admin and has the ear of the president. And Simon's post about the origin of the name Nazi is a good point.

21 hours ago, Toxxus said:

 

And as awful as that sounds I can't be convinced it wouldn't have been even worse under Hillary.

 

I think team blue is going to struggle to put forth a candidate that can win the general public as they currently seem to be racing each other to the edges of the far left.

 

I'm still pretty disgusted by what they did to Bernie last time around.  There doesn't even seem to be a point in voting during the primary if you're Democrat.  The party will choose for you with their mountain of super-delegates.

Maybe not for you personally, but if Hillary had been elected we wouldn't have concentration camps in my home state.

We wouldn't have a serial sexual abuser as our latest Supreme Court justice.

Our deficit wouldn't be skyrocketing at record pace from tax cuts that serve to concentrate wealth even more into the hands of the wealthiest.

We wouldn't have a federal government that wants to strip me of the right to exist in public.

We wouldn't be in the process of completely destroying the United States' status as a world leader.

We wouldn't be in a trade war that serves only to stoke the ego of a petulant man-child.

We wouldn't have the most corrupt administration since the Taft administration (and possibly ever).

We wouldn't have a president who takes every opportunity to stoke the fear of other.

We wouldn't have Nazis in the administration with the ear of the president.

Exactly how would it have been worse under Hillary?

22 hours ago, Scott Ruggels said:

Yes, and...?

And now I know exactly how seriously to take any resulting criticisms.

1 hour ago, Scott Ruggels said:

  Some traits we admire in men are unattractive in women.

So, sexism, then.

Wow, Kevin Smith has lost some weight.

16 minutes ago, archer said:

Italy - Two men cleared of rape charges, despite date rape drug found in the victim's system and physical evidence of a sexual assault, because a panel of three female judges think the woman looked to masculine to be sexually assaulted.

 

I kid you not.

 

https://thehill.com/blogs/blog-briefing-room/news/433864-two-men-cleared-of-rape-charges-after-court-rules-woman-too

I need to throw up now.

17 hours ago, archer said:

Federal judge lifts last of injunctions against Trump's transgender military ban.

 

https://thehill.com/policy/defense/433106-federal-judge-lifts-last-of-injunctions-against-transgender-military-ban

 

In case anyone gets into a discussion in the next couple of days with someone who insists that being transgendered means that the person is mentally ill, this article gives a fairly good layman's description of how and why that isn't medically true.

 

https://www.washingtonpost.com/sf/national/2015/10/19/becoming-nicole/?utm_term=.d392e70d37f2

Thanks for this.

One quick note, transgender is already an adjective, so transgendered isn't a thing, it's just transgender.(That's more the grammar pedant in me talking than the trans person, by the way. )

Republican Congressman Matt Gaetz commits felony obstruction of justice

live on twitter

Good times.

Lawrence Watt-Evans had a much better take on this sort of story, titled "One of the Boys."

The Superman analog in that story wasn't evil, but he was alien. He was even a superhero. But he was one because it was the only way he could find to fit in. He just couldn't understand humans well enough to function in normal society.