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Cake day: July 9th, 2023

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  • Would the sensation be similar to being at high altitude without oxygen? There is a Smarter Every Day video from several years ago where the host conducts simple cognitive and motor function tests in a pressure chamber which simulates high altitude atmospheric conditions. Within a couple of minutes of being off oxygen, he’s suffering from hypoxia and is unable to either continue the tests, or to mask up, despite being told the he will die if he doesn’t secure oxygen. Admittedly, it’s incredibly chilling to see the guy rendered so helpless, but, from his perspective, it did not seem particularly traumatic. As I understand it, if he had not had his mask applied for him at that point, he would have lost consciousness and then died in his sleep shortly thereafter. All things considered, not the WORST way to go. Beats getting stuck in that compartment with a leak and eventually drowning.











  • Further context, assuming the ruleset governing the OG Baldurs Gate games was true to the tabletop (I know they sort of kludged AD&D and aspects of 3e together). As the above said, a dual classed human “retires” their original class, and then begins to advance in their new class, essentially starting over from level 1, with only the hit dice and HP of their original class rolled over (you cannot access any of the class abilities you learned while advancing your original class). However, once your new class level is superior to your original class level, you can now access both skill sets.

    It’s a very strange system, and I am curious what the fluff reasons surrounding it are, if anyone has any insight into that edition.





  • 100%. I know that the jury is out, academically speaking, on the actual effectiveness of the bombs, but it makes intuitive sense to me that they at least contributed to the Japanese decision to surrender unconditionally.

    In fact, up until the bombs were dropped, Japan was working with the Soviet Union to act as mediators in peace talks, so Japan could get a better deal. Of course, while the USSR entertained the diplomatic overtures from Japan, they were actually planning on declaring war, as they had promised at Yalta. But, I think it still contributes to my point that a civilian population that has been targeted by a besieging force must believe their only options are unconditional surrender or utter destruction (which, incidentally, is exactly the verbiage the US presented Japan in the Potsdam Declaration 10 days before the first bomb was dropped). If there is a plausible third option available (or believed to be available), then that’s what will be pursued.


  • No, it was not my intention to suggest that. I’m sure the Germans threw everything they could afford into the Battle of Britain.

    Though, I am most definitely not an expert in the field and should be treated as I am, a dude on the internet lol.

    However, even Germany in early WW2 (arguably at the height of their power) was unable to throw enough explosives into London to make that switch flip in the civilian population from “we shall fight them on the beaches” to “okay, in light of recent events, we are reevaluating our ‘Never Surrender’ policy…”.

    In fact, I might even suggest that the scale of bombing necessary to make it a viable tactic was impossible at that time, as the nuclear bomb hadn’t yet been invented. Perhaps someone more knowledgeable than me can fact check this assertion, but I think the only time intentionally targeting civilians has successfully cowed a belligerent was when the US nuked Japan. And even then, it took two.


  • Also, to add to the other poster’s point, in a medieval siege, the defenders have every reason to believe the attackers will happily let every man, woman, and child behind the walls die gruesome deaths to starvatiom or disease. That’s why, when it came down to the wire, cities would submit.

    In modern times, cultivating a believable military posture of, “Surrender, or we will personally execute every last motherfucking one of you” is politically dicey. Look at the news stories coming out of Gaza about supplies running low thanks to Israeli interference. Right, wrong , or indifferent, the international community (as well as your domestic community, if those that disagree with these sorts of tactics are allowed to make their voices heard) tends to look down their noses at targeting noncombatants populations. So, due to these complications (which were largely absent or less impactful from warfare in the time of Genghis Khan) wholesale slaughter of civilian life isn’t really openly used. In fact, guidelines like “proportionality” are invented which dictate the level of response you can give certain provocations and what not.

    So, if you’re a modern day commander being tasked with taking an urban center, the closest way to approximate a medieval siege would be to absolutely carpet bomb everything. Make it known that you will happily let every single person in Moscow die, if not send them to the afterlife yourself. While you’re bombing the suburbs, you’ll also need to encirce the whole city to prevent supplies from being delivered, since you can’t guarantee every bomb will hit it’s target and need starvation to provide additional assurance to the population that, if they maintain their current course, they are doomed.

    Unfortunately, the world isn’t going to allow that, and you know it, so you commit to the level of bombing deemed acceptable by the world at large. At best, you wind up in a situation like London during the Blitz. Your bombing runs are effective, in that they disrupt the daily life of citizenry, and cause some infrastructure damage and loss of life. However, you’re never going to be allowed to scale up to the point where your victims feel they have no way out but to submit. There’s enough plausible deniability that, even when a bomb hits close to home (literally or figuratively), the victim is more pissed at the bomber than their government.


  • Right? Like I see folks in this thread and elsewhere echoing some of the typical things you hear when Hollywood botches an adaptation. Things like “it would be better if it was faithful to the source material” and other sentiments like that.

    However, in this case, the one aspect of the games that is easily translateable to film (the writing) seems to have aged the absolute worst. Self-referential Internet humor was a bold, unique aesthetic in 2009, but it’s been largely played out the 15 years since the og game released, or at least Borderlands’ take on that style of humor has gotten stale. Maybe the writing was better outside of 2 and Tiny Tina’s (the entries I played the most), but I sort of doubt it.

    I would not want to be tasked with adapting Borderlands. Stick close to the source material, get flamed for writing something juvenile. Diverge from the source material, get accused of not capturing the spirit of the franchise. It’s an impossible situation.