setsneedtofeed

Fallout 4

I've got a lot of mods installed (200-ish). The commonwealth in my version of the game is absolute hellscape with radioactive storms that kill visibility, pitch black nights, hoards of feral ghouls, and upgunned raiders. What it means is that I actually invest in building proper settlements now. I console command for all the resources because I can't be bothered picking through trashpiles. With all the mods, I have huge concrete walls surrounding my settlements which have comfortable bars and hangout areas. It can be very comfortable just chilling in a settlement while a storm rages outside.

When I do go outside I'm playing additional mod loaded content most of the time and doing my best to ignore that default story.

SSTF @lemmy.world 4mo ago

I'm currently experience grinding random low level encounters the wilderness in Arcanum. As a speech/lockpicking character, I need high success rates with those skills in the actual quest areas since I'm no good in combat (and the combat feels pretty terrible anyway).

SSTF @lemmy.world 4mo ago

Every person should be given a free psychological evaluation once a year

Oh great.

Every person should be given a free mandatory psychological evaluation once a year

Oh no.

1

SSTF @lemmy.world 4mo ago

I don't consider anything I watch a guilty pleasure, since I'm pretty open about watching B and bad movies.

I enjoy movies where a director has made a surprisingly successful cult movie and on the back of that got creative freedom and a big budget from a studio, which they then used to create something beautiful and terrifying. My exemplar movie for this is Southland Tales, which I absolutely love on all possible levels.

I really like movies that commit to a sharp genre turn. The Guest (2014) is a great example.

Lastly, spaghetti westerns. This seems like a maybe more mainstream choice, but had a conversation in real life not too long ago with somebody who had no interest in any kind of western and didn't know about the distinction between classic and spaghetti. When I was articulating the difference I was able to boil it down to classic westerns being nostalgia and romanticization of the American west, while spaghetti westerns were made by people with no nostalgia for it. It creates a subgenre which is grittier and more morally grey than the John Wayne era movies. My favorite is Once Upon A Time In The West, though I'd recommend people work up to that by watching other genre movies first.

5

SSTF @lemmy.world 4mo ago

Can you dry fire it and rotate through every position? From what I've seen on revolvers sometimes a cylinder can be binding somewhere specific to the cylinder rotation.

You might also want to take every screw out of the frame to check and make sure none of them are broken which could be causing inconsistency.

1

SSTF @lemmy.world 5mo ago

That's a discussion far beyond the scope of "Is the Patriot in its existing configuration working as needed?"

1

SSTF @lemmy.world 5mo ago

That's more or less partially repeating the article on why missiles are more difficult to intercept, but it isn't providing the actual numbers to examine. Given that Russia has modified missiles and is firing larger barrages to overwhelm defense systems, the nuance with numbers is important.

If 10 interceptor missiles are fired with an expected hit rate of 9/10, how much do the modified Russian missiles affect that? Does it drop to say, 8/10 or 3/10. The actual numbers are very important to figure out what to prioritize in defense between upgrading systems or deploying more of existing systems.

Previously Ukraine was intercepting 30%ish of missiles with Patriots which historically have a 90%+ interception rate. I don't think the drop in interception can be entirely laid on modification to Russian missiles but also to the increase in firing and use of barrages. The interaction between all the variables is important.

7

SSTF @lemmy.world 5mo ago

I'd like a better breakdown on numbers to know if the Patriot's inception missiles themselves are missing when they are fired, or if the problem is more on Russia firing many more missiles.

Other articles only address the total interception stats dropping rather than stats of the Patriot batteries themselves. I know the total interception rate has gone from mid 30% numbers to around 6%.

I think looking at a breakdown is an important nuance because it shows if the Patriot systems themselves need to be upgraded, or if there just need to be more of the existing systems deployed. I know the spokesperson said the modified Russian missiles are more difficult to intercept, but what does "more difficult" translate to in the percent of fired interception missiles that successfully connect? Is that a 5% drop or a 35% drop for the interception missiles actually fired?

Given that Ukraine is looking to the US for more Patriots, I suspect the systems themselves are acceptable but there just aren't enough deployed to provide enough coverage.

This is all curiosity from a public sideline, as I'm sure that privately the ordnance experts have these numbers and details on interceptions to do better breakdowns.

SSTF @lemmy.world 5mo ago

I think the original trilogy (plus Reach and ODST) work because while there's a ton of lore, the really convoluted stuff is kind of at the background to the moment to moment feel of the game. The most forward facing content is a pastiche of other easily digestible scifi that's all mixed together in a fun, interesting way. You've got conventional humans who feel like a straight expansion of the colonial marines from Aliens up against a diverse and interesting array of aliens. The Covenant are a refinement from Pathways Into Darkness and then the Marathon games. You've got the flood as a space zombie change of pace.

It all mixes together well and the more detailed lore can be built on top of it. There are many intentional gaps and hooks which can suggest things without having to be addressed explicitly, leaving room for some mystery.

After those games, the series kind of imploded under the weight of its own lore since the developers/writers chose to bring all of those mysterious elements to the forefront. It gave less interesting enemies to fight, and less motivation to care. I doubt many people have moments from those games burned into their memories the same way moments from the original trilogy are.

2

SSTF @lemmy.world 5mo ago

The MCC Halo had a graphical remaster on the original engine, that's why you could swap between original and remaster visuals on the fly. The upcoming project is a remake on a new engine with changes to gameplay and design.

1

SSTF @lemmy.world 5mo ago

So much, let me recount some of it.

There's a lot of invisible tweaks like the assault rifle has a smaller initial spread which makes it usable at medium range with short bursts. The needler fires faster. The warthog accelerates to top speed faster. Hunters no longer die to one magnum shot. Flood popcorn forms don't chain explode nearly as much and they do a little more damage to the player so you can't just totally ignore them anymore. The player can jump ever so slightly higher allowing them to reach certain areas during combat more easily. Vehicle damage has been tied to speed so tapping (or being tapped) by a slow vehicle isn't an insta-kill. Ghost and plasma turrets have tighter spreads, both when firing at the player and when the player is using them. Marines will now drive unoccupied vehicles and follow the player.

The energy sword, flame thrower, fuel rod gun, and sentinel beam gun are all usable in the campaign now.

More enemy types are added. This is especially noticeable with the flood which has elite-flood forms using shields now. There are zealot flood with swords. There are cloaked spec op flood. This makes the flood more interesting to fight and keeps plasma weapons important to the mix against them.

There are now ODSTs in addition to the normal marines. They have slightly more aggressive AI than the standard marines, so they are more active in combat but can also get killed faster if you ignore them. They replace marines where it makes sense in the campaign.

Enemy mixes have been tweaked throughout. The Library had work done to make the spawns less of a slog to get through by placing the additional spawn waves more heavily behind rather than in front of the player.

There are non-combat animals on the ring now. From butterflies to big grazing creatures.

3

SSTF @lemmy.world 5mo ago

I replayed Halo CE by way of the MCC, with Ruby's Rebalanced mod. The mod adds a lot of value by for the most part seamlessly improving aspects of the campaign that felt a little under polished in the original release.

SSTF @lemmy.world 5mo ago

Certainly. While I don't think I ever saw the original movie all the way through, that mechanical owl is a core memory of mine.

SSTF @lemmy.world 5mo ago

I think every study like this should be looked at and considered as a work in progress and as information that doesn't exist in a vacuum. Also, quotes like "This matches some anthropological estimates for early modern humans." might be ones to consider, as other sources do agree that a lifespan in the 30s was at one point to be expected, but it began extending past that 30, 000 years ago. So when the original study talks about 30 as the upper end, is it looking at an age where an early hunter-gatherer type human would be unable to keep sustaining themselves with that lifestyle? Is it because they are no longer fit enough to keep hunting or is it because even if somebody else fed them that all the other circumstances would just pile on? Is the idea of DNA estimating lifespan also looking at the idea that once an organism ages to a certain point and slows down it statistically dies from predation as well? Since that is something humans as a whole have been able to get past with intelligence. I don't know exactly how that all interacts, which is why looking at a lot of data is important before declaring something.

Which also brings up the idea of an average in relation to an expected lifespan. It is a commonly known tidbit that while the average lifespan in ancient and medieval times would usually be estimated somewhere in the 30s (depending on the exact era, location, and methodology), that's an average dragged way down by infant mortality, and that people who made it out of childhood would have higher expected lifespans. I bring this up because looking at the OP linked study and then skimming a look at average lifespans might make the idea of DNA-destined-dead-by-30 a lock, when it really isn't.

Obvious advancing medicine increases the population average lifespan. A human 30,000 years ago born with diabetes probably wouldn't make it very long while one born these days with proper medication lives much longer. Does seeing the population average lifespan number go up have any relation to another individual, specific human who doesn't have any sort of chronic illness? No, so again just looking at raw population averages as just one way of looking at expected lifespan is something to keep in mind.

The conclusion is that it's an interesting study to keep as a link, and use as one piece of data if you're really interested in gathering more information.

1

SSTF @lemmy.world 5mo ago

It is tedious, with repeated samey layout and a limited selection of flood enemy types. The mod mixes up the environment and adds more flood enemy types for variety.

SSTF @lemmy.world 5mo ago

In videos he has mentioned both reducing the damage from the sniper rifles so they aren't one-hit kills, and allowing jackels to use carbines which will replace some sniper jackels.