archer

Dad Sucks at Doing the Laundry
 
And now the absolute worst...

...Uncle Donald Came to Visit Today.
 

I got a text today saying that the little girl is coming home. I'm relieved, to be sure, but also sad and a little frustrated, that it had to have happened at all. 
 
I'll confess that I'm also afraid that certain of the more reactionary elements in my wife's family will look at this as proof that COVID-19 is no big deal and that they don't need to get vaccinated. 

It's too early to say that.
 
The movie has been out for one week and has higher reviews than Black Widow. It already has over 50 percent of Black Widow's gross. If it has better performance in weeks 2-4 then we'll get a better comparison. 
 
Plus how does this invalidate ScarJo's lawsuit? The crux of that is that Disney doesn't want to  give her a cut of streaming sales because it would also then be possible to determine steaming's income and that would lead to bigger paydays for the actors.

Also, had this 1982 Supreme Court case pointed out to me.
 
LARKIN ET AL.
v.
GRENDEL'S DEN, INC.
 
https://h2o.law.harvard.edu/cases/5577
 
Apparently, a state can't in all cases delegate regulatory duties to private individuals or private organizations because it violates the Due Process Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment. It has to pick and choose when it can according to whether the private organization is substantially doing the regulatory duty using the same standard as a state agency would.
 
In the Texas abortion case, however, the state is attempting to devolve regulatory power onto private individuals or private organizations which no state agency even has. That's violating the precedent which Larkin v Grendel set up.
 
Which makes any court challenge to the Texas law much easier since the Supreme Court has already set up guidelines for how to a state may do such a thing. And how it may not....
 

Also, had this 1982 Supreme Court case pointed out to me.
 
LARKIN ET AL.
v.
GRENDEL'S DEN, INC.
 
https://h2o.law.harvard.edu/cases/5577
 
Apparently, a state can't in all cases delegate regulatory duties to private individuals or private organizations because it violates the Due Process Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment. It has to pick and choose when it can according to whether the private organization is substantially doing the regulatory duty using the same standard as a state agency would.
 
In the Texas abortion case, however, the state is attempting to devolve regulatory power onto private individuals or private organizations which no state agency even has. That's violating the precedent which Larkin v Grendel set up.
 
Which makes any court challenge to the Texas law much easier since the Supreme Court has already set up guidelines for how to a state may do such a thing. And how it may not....
 

Also, had this 1982 Supreme Court case pointed out to me.
 
LARKIN ET AL.
v.
GRENDEL'S DEN, INC.
 
https://h2o.law.harvard.edu/cases/5577
 
Apparently, a state can't in all cases delegate regulatory duties to private individuals or private organizations because it violates the Due Process Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment. It has to pick and choose when it can according to whether the private organization is substantially doing the regulatory duty using the same standard as a state agency would.
 
In the Texas abortion case, however, the state is attempting to devolve regulatory power onto private individuals or private organizations which no state agency even has. That's violating the precedent which Larkin v Grendel set up.
 
Which makes any court challenge to the Texas law much easier since the Supreme Court has already set up guidelines for how to a state may do such a thing. And how it may not....
 

Also, had this 1982 Supreme Court case pointed out to me.
 
LARKIN ET AL.
v.
GRENDEL'S DEN, INC.
 
https://h2o.law.harvard.edu/cases/5577
 
Apparently, a state can't in all cases delegate regulatory duties to private individuals or private organizations because it violates the Due Process Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment. It has to pick and choose when it can according to whether the private organization is substantially doing the regulatory duty using the same standard as a state agency would.
 
In the Texas abortion case, however, the state is attempting to devolve regulatory power onto private individuals or private organizations which no state agency even has. That's violating the precedent which Larkin v Grendel set up.
 
Which makes any court challenge to the Texas law much easier since the Supreme Court has already set up guidelines for how to a state may do such a thing. And how it may not....
 

One thing I can way about this anti-abortion bill is that it's well-written. I could think of several things off the top of my head which would allow it to be overturned or limited but they'd preemptively stopped all of those possible leaks (like the existing legislation against frivolous lawsuits doesn't apply to this law and you can't change the venue to find a more friendly judge).
 
And that's including being overturned by the US Supreme Court. 
 
The legislation is written to that the various provisions are expressly severable from each other. 
 
So if the Supreme Court objects to the law based on one, two, three, or eight provisions, those individual provisions would be repealed but the rest of the law would remain in place.
 
 
The only hole I've thought of that the legislation didn't plug is the one where the Trump election lawyers are getting into trouble for filing lawsuits which have evidence or no basis and the lawyers knew that going in. So the lawyers could lose their license to practice law by filing ridiculous lawsuits using this law.
 
For example, there's no dedicated abortion clinics in Texas. All that exist are multipurpose women's health clinics. 
 
So if the only evidence a bounty hunter has is that a woman walked into a health clinic and the lawyer filed a lawsuit with that as his only "evidence", a hostile judge could rake him over the coals for that. And honestly, should rake him over the coals for that.
 
 
Also federal HIPPA rules still apply so the patient's medical records are confidential. So a lawyer would have to request to subpoena the medical records, the patient would be notified and have a chance to refuse, then a judge would have to decide whether there's enough justification to let a third party look at someone's private medical records (beyond a sheer fishing trip through someone else's private medical information.) And the Texas law has no method of altering that. 

I've not tasted enough minions to even be able to determine their flavor palate.

It's legalized warfare against other classes, starting with women. 😕

One thing I can way about this anti-abortion bill is that it's well-written. I could think of several things off the top of my head which would allow it to be overturned or limited but they'd preemptively stopped all of those possible leaks (like the existing legislation against frivolous lawsuits doesn't apply to this law and you can't change the venue to find a more friendly judge).
 
And that's including being overturned by the US Supreme Court. 
 
The legislation is written to that the various provisions are expressly severable from each other. 
 
So if the Supreme Court objects to the law based on one, two, three, or eight provisions, those individual provisions would be repealed but the rest of the law would remain in place.
 
 
The only hole I've thought of that the legislation didn't plug is the one where the Trump election lawyers are getting into trouble for filing lawsuits which have evidence or no basis and the lawyers knew that going in. So the lawyers could lose their license to practice law by filing ridiculous lawsuits using this law.
 
For example, there's no dedicated abortion clinics in Texas. All that exist are multipurpose women's health clinics. 
 
So if the only evidence a bounty hunter has is that a woman walked into a health clinic and the lawyer filed a lawsuit with that as his only "evidence", a hostile judge could rake him over the coals for that. And honestly, should rake him over the coals for that.
 
 
Also federal HIPPA rules still apply so the patient's medical records are confidential. So a lawyer would have to request to subpoena the medical records, the patient would be notified and have a chance to refuse, then a judge would have to decide whether there's enough justification to let a third party look at someone's private medical records (beyond a sheer fishing trip through someone else's private medical information.) And the Texas law has no method of altering that. 

I'm waiting on the legislation which will allow people to sue if they think you aren't contributing to climate change.
 
 

I'm waiting on the legislation which will allow people to sue if they think you aren't contributing to climate change.
 
 

WHAT WE NEED TO LEARN: LESSONS FROM TWENTY YEARS OF AFGHANISTAN RECONSTRUCTION
by the Special Inspector General for Afghanistan Reconstruction
 
https://www.sigar.mil/pdf/lessonslearned/SIGAR-21-46-LL.pdf#page=1
 
If you've ever wanted to read a 140 page official report detailing everything we got wrong in trying to nation-build in Afghanistan, you've come to the right place.

So sorry to hear about your cat, Ternaugh.

I hope this doesn't become an issue. I don't have a problem with it being a factor. Frankly, I have little sympathy for players that aren't vaccinated at this point. Even if they're on my team. 

Well that didn't take very long:
 
Al Qaeda Kingpin Resurfaces In Afghanistan Surrounded By Taliban Security
 
https://www.thedrive.com/the-war-zone/42189/al-qaeda-kingpin-resurfaces-in-afghanistan-surrounded-by-taliban-security
 
https://www.msn.com/en-in/news/other/amin-al-haq-who-helped-osama-bin-laden-escape-us-capture-once-returns-to-taliban/ar-AANVMr7
 
 
Edited to add a backgrounder on the Al-Qaeda and Taliban ties. This article was written shortly after Trump in 2018 announced he was willing to meet and negotiate directly with the Taliban:
 
https://warontherocks.com/2018/09/deadly-cooperation-the-shifting-ties-between-al-qaeda-and-the-taliban/
 
 

Hospitals in North Texas have "quietly developed" a plan to allow doctors to take vaccination status into account when deciding how to triage intensive-care beds if the coronavirus pandemic overwhelms ICUs.
 
https://www.rawstory.com/texas-hospitals/
 
So basically the plan is that in North Texas if two patients need an ICU bed and only one bed is available (like is happening in Alabama, Mississippi, Louisiana, and perhaps elsewhere), the person who got vaccinated will get the bed.
 
I have to say that sounds 100% fair to me: the more responsible person gets the bed and the irresponsible person doesn't.

I had an NPC hero who had his own theme song he played whenever he showed up. I don't remember the song anymore. He was an annoying wannabe with some minor powers who thought he was much more cool and powerful than he actually was. Superhuman strength compared to a normal but not much strength for a superhumanly strong person, if you know what I mean. Flight but fairly slow. Fairly low-powered energy blast. A striking appearance. Utility belt with an array of low-powered gadgets inspired by James Bond and superhero movies. Depended on Flash a lot and wasn't very careful to make sure that it only hit the enemy rather than the enemy plus heroes and bystanders who are trying to get away...
 
The main use for his Flight power was to try to get to the cameras first and give interviews which would show up on the nightly news. You know, like leaving the actual fight in progress to go warn the reporter and camera man that this was a dangerous situation and that they should move back for their own safety. And then answer the reporter's questions about who it was the PC's were fighting and get his account of whatever assistance they were giving him as he handled the situation.
 
He's the kind of guy who'd show up at Comic-Con as a guest who charges for autographs, signed pictures, and selfies with fans. And if Comic-Con didn't think to invite him, he'd track down and pester everyone associated with Comic-Con until he was invited to be a guest.
 
He wasn't really a bad guy but he kind of wanted his superheroing hobby to turn into his day job and he too often let that be the first impression of who he was when dealing with other heroes.
 
I wasn't really trying to point balance him because he was a NPC so I didn't treat his quirkiness of playing a theme song announcing his arrival as some sort of character sheet disadvantage. I mean, it was often a disadvantage in real life but not on his character sheet.
 
He was actually using a device to play the music so I guess his compulsion to play it could have been treated as a psychological complication.

I'm sorry I missed this conversation (having written the Narosia book). 
 
My original pitch to DOJ for Narosia was to be an all-in-one intro to fantasy hero with all of the systematic decisions already made (magic works like THIS, equipment works like THIS, etc.). We succeeded on that point. However, I think it ended up being too much. The tenets of my design philosophy were:
The world needed to make sense. It is a deconstruction of dungeon crawling. Why dungeons? Why tougher monsters the deeper you go? Why don't the monsters overwhelm the surface world? Hand players a ready to play game powered by the Hero System. The GM needed to be able to easily keep the history of the world in their head. Not the details, but the framework.  What could have been better was the accessibility of it all. It's absolutely a fair criticism that maybe it's too much. That is the consequence of trying to make it complete (which it isn't, actually). I developed the Quickstart character building system (and have a generic Fantasy Hero version of it) to facilitate rapid character development. At cons I would run a Narosia Quickstart: build a character in 45 min and then play for 1:15 (2 hour slot) or 3:15 (4 hour slot). I was always successful. Absent such a system, which is fairly comprehensive in its character options, you end up with classic decision paralysis unless you know how to play Hero. 
 
Still, there is a lot there. I built 2 (arguably 4) magic systems for the game. The feel of each system was exactly what I wanted, and conceptually a Skill based magic system where you pay only 1 point for a spell proficiency seems simple enough. Looking at it now, there is a lot of detail (which provided 100s of hours of fun for us), but that detail can still be overwhelming. In many ways I traded one set of complexity (building Hero powers) with a different one. The magic systems are still complex, but in a different way from core Hero. Is that a positive or negative? Entirely subjective. 
 
I still run Narosia, and learned a lot from writing it. I have worked on Narosia 2.0 because I see how it can be better, simpler, and more unique and inclusive.

There are constructs in the book (like race) that don't need to be. The cosmology can be simpler and cleaner. 

 
Now, even with greater simplicity, does that serve the Fantasy Hero Quickstart objective? No, not really. I wanted it to be that, but no 500 page rulebook can be that. 
 
Ideally, something with an edited Hero System Basic ruleset + fantasy character building + basic magic + adventure is what I'd like to see. 
My Fantasy Hero Quick Start is 38 pages with very little padding (that covers characters, magic, and equipment). Add that to 138 pages of basic + 32 page adventure and that's a 200 page book. 
 
Here's the question I would pose: why make such a product?
 
I dreamed once of winning the hearts and minds of gamers over to Hero to have the type of gaming experiences I've been lucky to have. I don't think that's realistic. Hero does what it does in its way and those that engage with it will like it or not. At the end of the day if the 4-6 players at the table don't engage with it, the point is kind of moot. I think we can always win over 1-2 players at any table, but winning them all is really difficult, and everyone has to WANT to play the game that operates the way Hero does or the campaign fails. Especially when player expectations of online tools, online content, and accessibility is such that the legacy of Hero I don't believe can match. Nor should it. 

I've got 3 active projects right now:
1. Narosia 2.0
2. NOVA6
3. Atomic Sky
 
Narosia 2.0 and Atomic Sky drove the development of NOVA6. I'm super happy with that game and I run it weekly. It's just about ready to launch (and you can find it on the website in its most recent version). It isn't Hero, but it is a descendant of Hero. It addresses the accessibility aspect, with rapid time to play that I feel doesn't lose much from a fantasy hero experience (at least). We finished the Narosia grand campaign in NOVA6 (meaning the original playtesters going through Village of Gillkas, to the Library of Baradahm, and finally Act 3, all in NOVA6) and it works. I will say,  however, that it is a different experience than the Hero version of Narosia, all good, but not necessarily "better" (depending on what you want out of the game). 

NOVA6, especially in its more detailed version (which we call NOVA6 Expanded and aren't moving forward with), was tailored for Narosia and Atomic Sky. However, I didn't like how it played for Atomic Sky (dieselpunk atomic apocalypse). So... Atomic Sky drifted into other directions, other systems. At one point it was going to be its own system (*shudder*, like I need to make ANOTHER system). It was in D&D 5E (and working, and would, I think, be attractive to a wide audience there). But I didn't like it. I only ever really liked it in Hero. Years ago I did a full conversion (well, full-ish) of Fallout and S.T.A.L.K.E.R., both of which I ran on the con circuit for years and had a ton of fun (and are still on my website). So, I've come back around to Atomic Sky being in Hero and, thinking through it, having it be essentially PA Hero 6E. However, I'm not going to replicate all that material since I think it is largely unnecessary. What I will do is use that material to make a complete setting book (no integrated rules), make the campaign decisions about how powers and such work, and then build out scavenging and campaign guidelines for what Atomic Sky is about. I want power-armor character, scrappy snipers, monstrous mutants, synths, high tech, and low life, scrabbling for survival with hope for a higher purpose. Hero GMs can build on that material (or not). 

I've learned a lot on this journey, and I'm happy to be focusing on Hero again. This time my objective is different: I want to make something I, as a Hero fan, enjoy playing and hope to bring some of you along with me. I'm not trying to win over non-hero players (like I was with Narosia). And this experience will likely result in a Narosia 2.0 that is also more of a service to this community rather than tilting at the windmills of winning over D&D players to Hero.
 
They'll join us if they want, because they see us smiling, shouting, and having fun at that "table over there" rather than challenging them that they are engaging in wrongfun and that we know better.