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Foglet posted:I've seen enough of Mage: The Awakening and God-Machine Chronicles to know exactly what they are getting themselves into. Combined with that bit about having to act rationally, and not emotionally, to keep those fractious factions working together, I'm definitely going to make popcorn for the eventual F&F.
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# ? Nov 30, 2017 16:36 |
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# ? Jun 5, 2024 03:39 |
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Bedlamdan posted:As JC Denton, I was willing to ally with the right-wing militia the National Secessionist Forces, the Mole People living under NYC, the Luminous Path Triads, and the remnants of the Illuminati in order to stop Bob Page and Majestic 12 from using 3D printing to make himself God. It was a difficult pill for me to swallow, I admit, but I felt that all these groups had credible reasons for opposing the VersaLife Corporation. I can, reluctantly, align my values with those of fictional right-wingers to topple a fictional authority, and only hope that I can be IRL forgiven for doing so. There's a conversation you can have with an NSF leader about how the NSF has a lot of socialist members and something of a mix of right-wing and left-wing ideology. Also politics are weird and makes for strange bedmates. In the Angolan Civil War, the anti-communist apartheid government of South Africa allied black Maoists to defeat Soviet-style communists, and the US used money gained from operating oil fields guarded by the Soviet-style communists to fund the black Maoists while strongly enforcing an arms embargo against South Africa.
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# ? Nov 30, 2017 16:57 |
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I mean for what it’s worth I do think that even the most devout of Hillarymen or MAGAchuds would be equally unhappy with authoritarian regimes such as Ceaușescu‘s Romania, modern day North Korea, or the Khmer Rouge, and largely for the same reasons too! Whether it’s Left or Right, hyper-authoritarian regimes are incredibly bad, and tend to purge problem people indiscriminately and with increasingly looser definitions of who or what constitutes a problem.
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# ? Nov 30, 2017 17:46 |
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Bieeardo posted:Wait, what? I missed that part too. It's not emphasized but the powers are referred to as "cybernetic" and "subroutines", and it's clear that those with those powers are modified in some way from the art. I think you could certainly have a situation where both ends of the spectrum are fighting against a totalitarian regime, but if that sort of regime arises out of politics in America, it's gonna be rooted on one side of the political teeter-totter. It might work better if the fascist threat arose out of superpowers or an alien threat or something similarly "magical". If you want to get the two sides of American politics to unite, it probably needs to be a foreign or unique danger to America itself. It reminds me of the handwavey Confederate apologism in some Deadlands books, and seems amazingly poorly timed given the rise of right-wing fascist politics in America and Europe. Hell, a lot of the "Regime's" imagery and politics explicitly draws upon McCarthyism, which was explicitly right-wing. (Yes, prominent Democrats served as leaders on the HUAC, but overall the movement was far more popular with Republicans than Democrats, and was born out of the conservative movements of the time.)
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# ? Nov 30, 2017 18:45 |
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Mr.Misfit posted:The rise of right-wing elements across the western hemisphere has not been unnoticed, but I did not connect that with the Alt-Right as Nazism. I think most folks jumped on it because "Nazi actually means National Socialist so they were not right-wing" is a defelection defense currently used by people who are busy looking, quacking, and heil-ing like ducks. So the assumption was intentional water-muddying rather than actual ignorance. Particularly since extreme right-wingers, at least in America, tend to claim "personal freedom" when they mean "personal freedom to force others to obey us" so it can be tricky for someone who doesn't already know to tell what's actually going on. Avoiding inflammatory terms, the left tends to have values like equality, community, and reform while the right is stuff like tradition, authority and duty. As downsides the left tends to be anti-capitalist (because capitalism tends to focus money/power on a few at the expense of everyone else and gives short-term rewards for screwing people over) while the right is anti-foreigner (because it's strange people with strange ways of doing things and they don't deserve what we have). It's pretty straightforward to extrapolate from there to examples of the extremes like anarchism (left) or fascism (right). Sorry that you got beat up over what may have been an honest mistake.
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# ? Nov 30, 2017 21:06 |
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If the extreme left is simply anarchism then I still want to know where the heck Stalinism, Maoism, and all the various excesses of certain regimes during the Cold War are supposed to go on the left <-----> right axis. Because the extreme right seems to want to purge me for my skin color but I readily admit that I'd also be one of the first ones with my back against the wall when the revolution comes.
Bedlamdan fucked around with this message at 21:34 on Nov 30, 2017 |
# ? Nov 30, 2017 21:31 |
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Bedlamdan posted:If the extreme left is simply anarchism then I still want to know where the heck Stalinism, Maoism, and all the various excesses of certain regimes during the Cold War are supposed to go on the left <-----> right axis. Because the extreme right seems to want to purge me for my skin color but I readily admit that I'd also be one of the first ones with my back against the wall when the revolution comes. Because it's not just a straight line.
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# ? Nov 30, 2017 21:37 |
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loving alignment charts...
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# ? Nov 30, 2017 21:45 |
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Alas Vegas is shipping.
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# ? Nov 30, 2017 22:22 |
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Had a good chat with some friends and came around to their way of thinking in regards to Sigmata. I think I was just grabbed a bit by the hype parts of my brain and if I was to do something along the lines of the game they're proposing, I think I would rather prefer to just reskin Blades in the Dark a bit.
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# ? Nov 30, 2017 22:30 |
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This whole thing makes me want a game that's just unapologetically about doing a communist revolution.
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# ? Nov 30, 2017 22:35 |
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Guy Goodbody posted:This whole thing makes me want a game that's just unapologetically about doing a communist revolution. By the setting Red Sun for fate core. It will do exactly what you're looking for. Well, maybe.
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# ? Nov 30, 2017 23:03 |
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Also, now that everyone has had time to digest the comments in isolation, I will admit that after hearing his response that I dropped my pledge. I think he's a nice guy, but, when I realized what the game was, I wasn't as interested. I feel something that inherently political should not pussyfoot around because it weakens the whole thing. If you're going to make a product like that, commit or go home. I'm sure he's a nice guy and I wish him the best, but I don't believe his product is for me.
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# ? Nov 30, 2017 23:11 |
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Guy Goodbody posted:This whole thing makes me want a game that's just unapologetically about doing a communist revolution. Does Grey Ranks count? Gets bonus points for being about an actual, real-life uprising against Nazis, but it tends to end about as well as you'd expect child soldiers against the Nazi war machine to go.
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# ? Nov 30, 2017 23:59 |
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Humbug Scoolbus posted:Alas Vegas is shipping. I'm so excited. For my 40th birthday, my friends and I are getting a suite in Las Vegas for a week and playing through Alas Vegas during the day (while we plan to go out and do stupid poo poo at night).
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# ? Dec 1, 2017 00:33 |
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Covok posted:Also, now that everyone has had time to digest the comments in isolation, I will admit that after hearing his response that I dropped my pledge. I think he's a nice guy, but, when I realized what the game was, I wasn't as interested. I feel something that inherently political should not pussyfoot around because it weakens the whole thing. If you're going to make a product like that, commit or go home. I'm sure he's a nice guy and I wish him the best, but I don't believe his product is for me. Yeah, that's pretty much where I'm at. There tends to be an attitude of wanting to be all things for all people in RPG design, but it can be a real bad idea - see the support for explicitly fascist PCs in Rifts as an example of how wrong that can go. (At least Pinnacle had the sense to edit that aspect out of their version.) I think this is a rich time for inspiration for antifa / punk / anti-authoritarian RPGs in general... which, of course, is unfortunate as far as real life goes, but I can't see doing that sort of thing at this point in time without telling my players "This is going to be explicitly ideological." I don't think overtly ideological games are something to drop at an open gaming night in front of strangers, but I think a lot of groups can deal with that sort of thing.
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# ? Dec 1, 2017 00:56 |
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The question I have for this guy is that if an authoritarian regime doesn't include anyone at any point of the political spectrum then how the hell did it get power? That's ahistorical. Seems silly. Also LOL at "this forced me to re-evaluate my political opponents' actions as heroic in some ways", oh yeah buddy it's really heroic to shoot native americans and beat the poo poo out of minorities for wanting to be treated like human beings. Megaman's Jockstrap fucked around with this message at 01:19 on Dec 1, 2017 |
# ? Dec 1, 2017 01:17 |
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I'm sticking with it. I'll give a rundown once I get it.
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# ? Dec 1, 2017 01:32 |
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In the comments he says that players don't play as any of the listed factions (unless they insist), and that refusing to work with factions you disagree with is supported (and not automatically the 'wrong choice'). I'm back to being cautiously optimistic.
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# ? Dec 1, 2017 02:38 |
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National Socialists called themselves that because socialism and communism had supporters as potential answers to Weimar Germany's ills. They even attracted a few left wingers- up until the Night of Long Knives. After that not so much.
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# ? Dec 1, 2017 03:10 |
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Maxwell Lord posted:National Socialists called themselves that because socialism and communism had supporters as potential answers to Weimar Germany's ills. They even attracted a few left wingers- up until the Night of Long Knives. It's a fairly typical element of the fascist playbook. You're everyone's 'true friend', except for communists. March arm in arm together to create a stronger state for the good of everyone! Then suddenly, all moderate socialists count as communists, and out come the purgin' boots. Same thing happened in Italy. One of the best answers why I've seen is that it's an issue of perspective. Socialism's emphasis on class politics may not rise to the level of full-on communisms, but it's too much a part of the identity and loyalty of socialist groups to be compatible with fascism's 'love the the state and nothing else!' end-game.
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# ? Dec 1, 2017 03:48 |
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Loomer posted:It's a fairly typical element of the fascist playbook. You're everyone's 'true friend', except for communists. March arm in arm together to create a stronger state for the good of everyone! Then suddenly, all moderate socialists count as communists, and out come the purgin' boots. Or, from the other side, the Reign of Terror in the French Revolution.
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# ? Dec 1, 2017 05:50 |
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Guy Goodbody posted:This whole thing makes me want a game that's just unapologetically about doing a communist revolution. Well, Venezuela is pretty close. You can always kickstart a fund to get enough money to participate!
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# ? Dec 1, 2017 11:58 |
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darnon posted:Or, from the other side, the Reign of Terror in the French Revolution. Robespierre purged everyone to the left of him as well as those on the right. Admittedly, there were far fewer people to the left of Robespierre, but they did exist before meeting madame guillotine.
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# ? Dec 1, 2017 17:39 |
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Peas and Rice posted:I'm so excited. It was originally planned for your 35th birthday.
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# ? Dec 1, 2017 17:43 |
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I just now got that Alas Vegas is a play on Las Vegas. Huh.
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# ? Dec 1, 2017 17:51 |
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I wonder how I, as a backer of Far West, will get my copy of Alas Vegas, since backers of one were supposed to get the other.
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# ? Dec 1, 2017 17:52 |
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Jedit posted:It was originally planned for your 35th birthday. The good news is I can actually afford a nice suite now. The bad news is I'm older and can't drink like I used to. In positive KS news, did anyone else here back Tiny Dungeon 2e? I'm extremely impressed with how they do their updates: they give a quick overview status report with a % completion, and then go in depth about what the progress is on everything. It's like I'm reading an update from a competent project manager.
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# ? Dec 1, 2017 20:18 |
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Peas and Rice posted:The good news is I can actually afford a nice suite now. The bad news is I'm older and can't drink like I used to. No, but it's the same way with the Brass reprint. This is from 11/19 - I've enjoyed getting them (though they're already announcing an expected delay ).
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# ? Dec 1, 2017 20:30 |
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I missed a bunch of Sigmata chat but the fact that like all the stretch goals are hyper left alternate settings made me smile. Also I had to explain the cable street one to my manager which ended with me explaining the basic concepts of anarchism
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# ? Dec 4, 2017 19:24 |
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Covok posted:Also, now that everyone has had time to digest the comments in isolation, I will admit that after hearing his response that I dropped my pledge. I think he's a nice guy, but, when I realized what the game was, I wasn't as interested. I feel something that inherently political should not pussyfoot around because it weakens the whole thing. If you're going to make a product like that, commit or go home. I'm sure he's a nice guy and I wish him the best, but I don't believe his product is for me. I think that in a vacuum the idea of "all of these groups are being cracked down on for different reasons and are willing to form an uneasy truce to fight back" is fine, but he's being a fuckin bitchmade about it
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# ? Dec 4, 2017 19:25 |
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This is a super early post in regards to crowdfunding, but this seemed like the best thread to put this in. I am currently developing a game and plan to crowdfund it in fall of 2018. Part of this process is me running a blog about what its like to take a game through design, marketing and promotion, art, etc. and get it to kickstarter and (hopefully) funded. If there is anything in this vein you all would like to see or think I should focus on I would love to hear it. This is the pitch for the game: Bee Lives: We Will Only Know Summer is a game designed to run 1 to 4 players through a year of managing a wild bee hive. Players of this medium weight euro game will utilize resource management and worker placement mechanics to be the hive that sets up the best possible path for its survival. In Bee Lives you will manage your own hive by interacting with both your internal hive player board and the shared external board that is made up of tiles and collaboratively built by all of the players. During the game you will swarm to propagate your bees and score victory points, but these newly formed wild hives are going to compete with you and the other players for resources on the board. Can you ensure your hive will make it through winter? This particular game is something that I have been thinking about for a while. As a beekeeper, game maker and educator I wanted to create something that a wide variety of people could enjoy yet also serve, as needed, in an educational setting. After running through many iterations in my head and on virtual paper, I finally settled on what is becoming Bee Lives. The goal is to create a medium weight euro style game focused around resource management and worker placement mechanics. Ideally, focusing things in this way will give players an accurate representation, in game form, of what it is like to be a beehive in the wild. The game has been well received in the playtests it has gone through so far at the local game makers guild meetings, the unpub-mini and the unpub at PAX Unplugged it was at. I have a graphic designer who is working on things at the moment and an illustrator that is going to begin work early on in 2018. I am more than happy to talk about the game and process here and have mentioned it in the game design thread a few times. Here are all the places you can follow me along for the time being outside of SA: Newsletter signups for those of you that like to stay passively involved: http://eepurl.com/db5CYL You can also find more information on this game and other services provided by the company creating it, Hit 'Em With a Shoe, at our website: http://hitemwithashoe.com/ Twitter, facebook and instagram: https://twitter.com/beelivesgame https://www.facebook.com/beelivesgame/ https://www.instagram.com/beelivesgame/ We also plan to attend several conventions this year for both promotion and playtesting. If you are also in attendance please stop by, say hi, and try the game! We will be at: Dreamation (Morristown, NJ) Gary Con (Madison, WI) Unpub 8 (Baltimore, MD) Origins (Columbus, OH) Dice Tower Con (Orlando, FL) Gen Con (Indianapolis, IN) Pax Unplugged (Philadelphia, PA)
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# ? Dec 4, 2017 22:06 |
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This is the weirdest kickstarter. The whole thing is written it this odd, off-kilter style with RANDOM CAPS, like a bot wrote it or something. You don't even get the game until the $500 mark, lower tiers get you...bracelet charms? Three copies of the game are $2500 and 5 copies are $5000, making it more expensive if you buy in bulk. I'm also pretty sure the creator really wanted the word dragon in the title for no reason.
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# ? Dec 5, 2017 00:05 |
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Of course he wants a quarter of a million.
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# ? Dec 5, 2017 00:23 |
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Henker posted:I'm also pretty sure the creator really wanted the word dragon in the title for no reason. God that's entertaining. While he isn't explicit, I assume the Dragon is a Book of Revelations reference, and he has some theory about fiat money collapsing and how we'll all have to get RFID chips with the Mark of the Beast to buy Illuminati chemtrail gas with Devilcoin MK Ultra Doritos. Also, it pisses me off a bit that he's calling himself SSI Publishing - it's probably just accidental name collision, but I have a lot of good will for Strategic Simulations Inc. jmzero fucked around with this message at 01:13 on Dec 5, 2017 |
# ? Dec 5, 2017 01:08 |
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If I'm reading this correctly, you don't get the 90 dollar MSRP game unless you back at 500 dollars. Everything before that is just keychain and poo poo.
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# ? Dec 5, 2017 01:44 |
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The description of the game sounds cool, like a mix of Imperial and Indonesia, but lol at the thought of it being even half as good as either of those games.
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# ? Dec 5, 2017 02:09 |
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Henker posted:This is the weirdest kickstarter. The whole thing is written it this odd, off-kilter style with RANDOM CAPS, like a bot wrote it or something. You don't even get the game until the $500 mark, lower tiers get you...bracelet charms? Three copies of the game are $2500 and 5 copies are $5000, making it more expensive if you buy in bulk. If you follow through to his Twitter, it's mostly inoffensive, infrequent random stuff…plus a comparatively large amount stuff about how great Gal Gadot is in Wonder Woman? Of course, the Kickstarter alone indicates this guy would have fixations. I just wasn't expecting that fairly laid back but somehow still creepy one.
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# ? Dec 5, 2017 05:19 |
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BENGHAZI 2 posted:I think that in a vacuum the idea of "all of these groups are being cracked down on for different reasons and are willing to form an uneasy truce to fight back" is fine, but he's being a fuckin bitchmade about it That's almost the exact plot of District 13: Ultimatum, except the groups are working together to avert a specific threat. That movie ends with a neo-Nazi skinhead high fiving a black dude after they successfully stick it to the Man. It didn't work then. It's not going to work now.
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# ? Dec 5, 2017 15:46 |
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# ? Jun 5, 2024 03:39 |
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Nemo's War is getting a reprint with a mini expansion in a Kickstarter that will be starting today. The preview page is here, will go live at some point today. Anyone got experience with this? I've heard good things and the art is gorgeous, but I'm not much of a solo gamer. December is a rough month to back a Kickstarter so I'm not sure.
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# ? Dec 5, 2017 16:12 |