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Lone Goat posted:These probably would've been fine spaced out across multiple chapters but when you put them all in a row like that it makes the source seem like some Whedon-tier obnoxious quipfest. those are cute little Pratchett-esque jokes, I don't know why you nerds are tilting
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Sep 26, 2023 19:29
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SupSup 90: It's very funny that this is what a power up chapter looks like in this story: Alden messing around with magic late at night and figuring out some really useful stuff. It was pretty satisfying.
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Sep 27, 2023 20:18
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Wittgen posted:SupSup 90: It's very funny that this is what a power up chapter looks like in this story: Alden messing around with magic late at night and figuring out some really useful stuff. It was pretty satisfying. SupSup 90: It seems like the "geas" on his Skill works with similar rules to his gremlin thing - though in this case simply making it happen once seems to have just completely undone it. The crushing spell is cool, though how useful it is depends heavily on certain factors. If he can reasonably target moving objects with it it would actually be very good (since he can apparently target "parts of objects" and could easily destroy equipment with it), but if he can't it's probably way too slow/cumbersome to reasonably use in any sort of combat situation.
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Sep 27, 2023 20:34
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Patrick Spens posted:Just to be clear, Orbis Tertius is an incredibly violent horror story, I just really like Carza's narrative voice so I quote parts of it and not e.g. crucified prisoners being used as bait for an ambush I definitely find myself thinking of older adventure/horror stories, especially given how present the jungle and the concept of the world as this inimically hostile to human life thing (given mutation), but also in such a way that it is not evil - Merely alien. The contrast between the Sleepless as being perhaps literally inhuman and the more, well, “mundane” inhumanity of both them and their opponents makes me think of Heart of Darkness and Apocalypse Now and the like. The Sleepless are definitely taking a lot, inspiration-wise, from the Vietcong, after all.
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Sep 28, 2023 04:33
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Yeah there's a really interesting through line of corruption and purity throughout the whole thing. The contamination is most literal example of it. You've got to wear masks and avoid dirty water and literally cut it out of yourself if you get infected. But then Kralat is both purification and corruption. He's trying to purify Krodaw, not just of the current batch of colonials, but of the technologies and ideas that make colonialism possible. But then he's also trying to corrupt Carza, and use her as a vector to spread his ideology and tactics back to ALD IOM. I kinda doubt the author's actually got something serious to say on the topic, but it's fun to pick at all the threads.
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Sep 28, 2023 05:10
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Man, I really love the whole "we're in a story and we totally realize it" aspect of "A Practical Guide to Evil". Stuff like explictily calling out the rule-of-three and planning around how to thwart the author's intent or stuff like this in vol 3:quote:“Thanks for the tip,” I grunted. “While we’re at it, I don’t suppose you’d care to tell me your nefarious plans?”
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Sep 29, 2023 23:50
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Nitrousoxide posted:Man, I really love the whole "we're in a story and we totally realize it" aspect of "A Practical Guide to Evil". Stuff like explictily calling out the rule-of-three and planning around how to thwart the author's intent or stuff like this in vol 3: That could get annoying, but luckily (minor spoilers for motivations revealed a few chapters from then) that guy can be manipulated so easily in particular because he's a fey, who are more-than-usually bound to the rules of story
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Sep 30, 2023 00:00
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Skill Thief 25 - Super cool chapter with something that seems like it might be inspired by the red text from Umineko. The scene with Adam and Tenver was great. I feel bad for not picking up on the thing with Ferrero being a Puppet, but it was the good sort of reveal where the logic for it makes perfect sense. And it's wild that all of this seems to have been Tenver attempted to get Adam to decide whether he truly trusts him or not. Tenver owns and I really look forward to finding out exactly what his deal is.Nitrousoxide posted:Man, I really love the whole "we're in a story and we totally realize it" aspect of "A Practical Guide to Evil". Stuff like explictily calling out the rule-of-three and planning around how to thwart the author's intent or stuff like this in vol 3: John Lee posted:That could get annoying, but luckily (minor spoilers for motivations revealed a few chapters from then) that guy can be manipulated so easily in particular because he's a fey, who are more-than-usually bound to the rules of story Yep, basically what John Lee said. (also minor spoilers about the same thing) Arcadia in general (where the Fey live) is basically like a far more rigid version of Creation, and the Fey cannot (directly, at least) act against their Roles. In Creation, peoples' actions create "grooves" in reality that are enforced to varying degrees, but there's still wiggle room and you can choose to not act as strongly according to your Role. This is what Black does - if he fully adhered to the historical role of the Black Knight (that has been "carved into the fabric of creation" throughout the centuries), he would gain more direct power in exchange, but also be more vulnerable to stuff like "falling at the hands of Heroes." Ytlaya fucked around with this message at 04:47 on Sep 30, 2023 |
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Sep 30, 2023 03:09
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Arkendrithyst Patreon: How do you solve a city full of soul twisted convicts that are trying to murder each other? By reincarnating them into better existences, of course! Great mini-arc!
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Sep 30, 2023 21:59
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Peachfart posted:Arkendrithyst Patreon: How do you solve a city full of soul twisted convicts that are trying to murder each other? By reincarnating them into better existences, of course! Great mini-arc! (A'K Patreon) After the series in general, I appreciate the understated humor of the multiple chapters of setting up Margleknot and all of its intractable and unsolvable conflicts, only for him to immediately ignore all of that and bull charge straight into every problem. He acted with restraint and respect for big messy problems for like a decade and now he is completely done with that, so he will brute force absolutely everything with wizard magic until it stops being bad.
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Sep 30, 2023 23:25
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SS78 public Alden realizing he can preserve the clothes around a human is a huge breakthrough but that exact application sounds risky to me. Breathing may be impossible if the clothes are tight on the chest and Alden moving the preserved suit around quickly with a squishy human inside has got to cause some damage. The interview was frustrating but makes sense in the context of the previous chapter. We didn't even get the surprise question everyone gets at the end. Edit: I still think clothes/suit are a bad choice but a thin blanket or compact sleeping bag could be perfect. Attach a grip and some string for an adjustable handle and you have an instant antigravity gurney. Kyoujin fucked around with this message at 00:52 on Oct 2, 2023 |
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Oct 2, 2023 00:39
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The question isn't at the end of the interview. It's at the end of the day.
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Oct 2, 2023 02:41
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Latest Outcast patreon: I'm liking the Dragon Queen's characterization. Specifically how she'll give the illusion of someone who can be communicated with, but it's only because she (occasionally) views other people as mere curiosities, rather than there being any true desire to understand them. Meyneth killing her dad one or two chapters back owned.
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Oct 3, 2023 02:17
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Orbis Tertius 27. Carza continues to be the best "...Carza, did you shriek... uh..." Her eyes couldn't leave the corpse. Even now she thought it was going to keep moving. To pull the knife out and move to find her and catch her and break her snap snap snap. "I don't... don't know. Don't k-know what I said." "...you said... said you were going to..." Egg took over as a renewed wave of pain made Hull curl into a ball again, suppressing his vomit. "...said you were going to feed his cock to the 'burny man in my dreams'." Carza blinked. "...I would never be so... She paused. Insane? Bloodthirsty? Downright homicidal and sadistic and murderous and monstrous and terrible? Her voice had a slightly broken tinge to it. "...vulgar..." Also, the way contamination will just bail on a body if it decides the body is done for is creepy as hell. Patrick Spens fucked around with this message at 05:45 on Oct 3, 2023 |
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Oct 3, 2023 05:37
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Ytlaya posted:Latest Outcast patreon: I'm liking the Dragon Queen's characterization. Specifically how she'll give the illusion of someone who can be communicated with, but it's only because she (occasionally) views other people as mere curiosities, rather than there being any true desire to understand them. (Outcast Patreon) The Alessia scene at the end of the last chapter was sort of comedically ruined for me because of pattern-matching. Like, when someone in a story thinks back to their dead loved one and then to a living person, then shakes their head and goes "no, that's wrong," then it's usually part of a romance plot, right? I know that's definitely not what the author was going for here, but it didn't stop me making bad jokes to myself about "well that's a real romantic curveball" and that totally destroyed any gravity there. Ragnavi is a good example of how antagonists don't have to be very complex to be engaging. It's nice to have a villain who is unapologetically a bad person without that making them boring or predictable.
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Oct 3, 2023 08:30
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Einander posted:(Outcast Patreon) The Alessia scene at the end of the last chapter was sort of comedically ruined for me because of pattern-matching. Like, when someone in a story thinks back to their dead loved one and then to a living person, then shakes their head and goes "no, that's wrong," then it's usually part of a romance plot, right? I know that's definitely not what the author was going for here, but it didn't stop me making bad jokes to myself about "well that's a real romantic curveball" and that totally destroyed any gravity there. lol I didn't think of that, but now that you mention it I can see it.
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Oct 3, 2023 22:11
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Ytlaya posted:IMO people should not discuss anything at all here, in the Web Serials thread. Discussing things is weird. Instead, we should all go play Baseball, or perhaps attend Thanksgiving dinner with our families. I cannot take the prose of this post seriously.
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Oct 4, 2023 11:31
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Adding a recommendation for Orbis Tertius. It reminds me a bit of Mike Shel’s The Aching God mixed with Disco Elysium vibes. But horror. Seems distinctly unsuited to being a royal road web serial (it’s not progression fantasy), but glad it’s there nonetheless. Give it a try if you’re looking for a more grounded adventure centered around exploratory anthropology in a hostile world.
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Oct 4, 2023 14:21
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Chasing Sunlight This is the new story from the guy who wrote Blue Core and Paranoid Mage (I've read neither, so I've had no expectations); I've read through the nine chapters available at the moment. They're all pretty long and he releases them once a week, so it's a substantial chunk of the story - apparently it's going to be about ~30 chapters long. It's pretty much Sunless Sea pastiche. There is no natural light in the world and humanity huddles in little oasises of safetly, lit by gas and magic neon; outside of these, in the abhorrent dark, bizarre incomprehensible horrors roil squamously, rugosely and every other Lovecraftian adjective-ly. There is no sun, obviously... but the MC has glimpsed the fabled sunlight in his previous, disasterous airship expedition of which he was the only survivor. The story starts with him preparing for a new expedition, the one where he will finally reach sunlight, and even though no one believes his ridiculous stories he brought enough valuables from his last trip to build a new state-of-the-art airship, hire a competent captain and crew, and have several important factions of his home city take him seriously enough to foist some companions-slash-spies onto him or try to sabotage him. The story is pretty good, so far. It feels less like a webnovel and more like a regular novel that the author decided to serialize online before putting up on Amazon. I was a little worried at first about the chapter length and release frequency, but every chapter is fairly self-contained and the premise and character roster are simple enough that I don't think it's going to be difficult to follow after the initial binge.
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Oct 4, 2023 21:47
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Death of the author and all that, but isn't the Paranoid Mage guy supposed to be an extreme chud?
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Oct 4, 2023 21:56
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YesCicero posted:I enjoyed Paranoid Mage despite it being really cheesy, but apparently the author is, uh, not great:
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Oct 4, 2023 22:27
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That's pretty dumb, but I must admit I don't really care at this point; I consume content made by Americans with the expectation they have brainworms of some kind. If it helps, I haven't seen any of that stuff in the new story. The politics aren't prominent and are mostly Sunless Sea-ish faction stuff, detached from our reality. (Although I sure will have an egg on my face when it turns out the Sunlight is a metaphor for Draining the Swamp or something.)
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Oct 4, 2023 22:35
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Blue Core was... Fine, but I stopped reading it because it had a weird obsession with marriage.
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Oct 4, 2023 22:37
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Megazver posted:That's pretty dumb, but I must admit I don't really care at this point; I consume content made by Americans with the expectation they have brainworms of some kind. yeah, sort of the same way - there's obviously a threshold of poor behavior beyond which I'm not going to be down to read someone's work, and another one for direct financial support, but I basically try not to investigate or judge authors too much if bad opinions don't really seem to be the animating force behind or heavily shading their work (this is probably pre-internet thinking, but it's not like we used to have more to go on than a short bio blurb for most authors [wherein we could make inferences from how they presented themselves and details like having 6 kids, but it didn't really matter], and I still prefer to take things on their own merits or lack thereof) some opinions/allegiances are so bad that they preclude you from being a decent person, but there really doesn't seem to be much inherent correspondence between quality of political opinions, level of personal shitbaggery, and artistic output (also now fully expecting to get similarly owned when the brainworms make things take a turn for the didactic and this post looks like a defense of a fantasy Trumpenfuhrer in 6 months or w/e) LGD fucked around with this message at 00:33 on Oct 5, 2023 |
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Oct 4, 2023 23:36
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SupSup 92: I like how these kids are portrayed realistically as "what if college freshman, but even younger" Also Skill Thief 26 - So good. Great climax to the mystery. I like the angle the story has taken with both Aspreay and this guy, where they're both sympathetic (though the captain significantly more than Aspreay) but also have done things that are unquestionably evil. Curious how the gently caress Adam and company are going to handle the monster. I wonder if Tenver is going to play a big role, since we don't really know any of his capabilities (and it's also kinda sus to me that Tenver's Talent is Archery - that we've never seen him use - and there's a historical event called the Arrow Eclipse). I have trouble believing Adam will be able to win solo, and painting the monster seems like it's not an option.
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Oct 5, 2023 00:28
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the entire world of paranoid mage is structured around letting the MC fulfill the ultimate qanon suburbanite dream of murdering politicians to overthrow the government without ever having to leave your couch. even outside the politics its just really boring as a story, hes the mage equivalent of a drone strike operator
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Oct 5, 2023 02:35
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Also literally everyone else in Paranoid Mage is just the dumbest, most incurious idiot on existence. Despite teleportation magic being both widespread and integrated into magical society heavily literally no one else has ever thought to do such wildly creative things as opening a portal and shooting a gun through it. Which solves like 99% of his problems. The other ones are solved by him being Just Better than everyone else and able to break a bunch of the magical rules because he's just that special.
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Oct 5, 2023 03:31
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Zore posted:The other ones are solved by him being Just Better than everyone else and able to break a bunch of the magical rules because he's just that special. True, but that also describes almost every story on royal road and a majority of all published fantasy books.
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Oct 5, 2023 04:02
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And his relationship with the love interest is weird. She is sassy and challenging until they meet in person and then she is very passive. Then they immediately get married, and have a kid. It was throwing off weird vibes even before this thread pointed out the author had lovely politics.
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Oct 5, 2023 04:03
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Peachfart posted:And his relationship with the love interest is weird. She is sassy and challenging until they meet in person and then she is very passive. Then they immediately get married, and have a kid. To be fair she went through a very rough situation and he saved her. IIRC that was their first in person meeting. I may be misremembering as the series itself wasn't too good, but better then Blue Core.
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Oct 5, 2023 04:10
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Stexils posted:the entire world of paranoid mage is structured around letting the MC fulfill the ultimate qanon suburbanite dream of murdering politicians to overthrow the government without ever having to leave your couch. even outside the politics its just really boring as a story, hes the mage equivalent of a drone strike operator It's pretty funny looking back cause I saw the same thing except I was like. Wow this guy is fighting against an oligarchic magic society ruled who treat folks without power/minorities (werewolves) as second-class citizens. He's going to be fighting entrenched power structures as a champion of the downtrodden. Then I saw he was a Q-anon dude and I was like ah gently caress the evil society is supposed to be the jews or some poo poo. His love interest referring to him as "Big Guy" should've tipped me off.
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Oct 5, 2023 06:23
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Kalas posted:To be fair she went through a very rough situation and he saved her. IIRC that was their first in person meeting. I may be misremembering as the series itself wasn't too good, but better then Blue Core. It's not very subtle.
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Oct 5, 2023 07:07
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Cicero posted:She also dresses like it's the 50's and constantly calls him "big man". I actually managed to avoid the entire qanon debacle, only hearing about it in passing. I remain blissfully unaware of the lingo involved with that stuff. Please do NOT educate me.
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Oct 5, 2023 07:13
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LGD posted:some opinions/allegiances are so bad that they preclude you from being a decent person, but there really doesn't seem to be much inherent correspondence between quality of political opinions, level of personal shitbaggery, and artistic output Then there's the entirely other coin and one of its sides. Re:trailer trashs author actually living in a lovely trailer and struggling with depression and cats.
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Oct 5, 2023 09:15
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I always get Paranoid Mage mixed up with an even worse story, the one where a bunch of people get dropped in an empty city surrounded by monsters and the lead (fat computer toucher) finally activates his secret immense willpower to work out and become a remorseless, brutal, psychopathic grind machine. I read that (as a trainwreck) for far too long because I really couldn't tell if it was This Is What The Author Actually Believes or they were just doing a bit.
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Oct 5, 2023 11:04
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Does anyone remember the name of the fiction by some former athlete on royal road about a village with special trees set in a post-apocalyptic earth? I tried to find it recently and couldn’t.
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Oct 5, 2023 11:45
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Cacto posted:Does anyone remember the name of the fiction by some former athlete on royal road about a village with special trees set in a post-apocalyptic earth? I tried to find it recently and couldn’t. I don't know if it's the one you mean, though, those trees are perfectly ordinary.
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Oct 5, 2023 11:56
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That’s it! Thanks! And you’re right - ordinary trees.
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Oct 5, 2023 12:02
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90s Cringe Rock posted:I always get Paranoid Mage mixed up with an even worse story, the one where a bunch of people get dropped in an empty city surrounded by monsters and the lead (fat computer toucher) finally activates his secret immense willpower to work out and become a remorseless, brutal, psychopathic grind machine. Another survivor of Systemic Lands I see. I really, really hope this is someone seeing how cold and delusional they can write a main character. It was an interesting series just from the premise that the 'system' is actually run on diminishing returns instead of the exponential power creep we are used to. Kalas fucked around with this message at 21:12 on Oct 5, 2023 |
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Oct 5, 2023 14:26
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Kalas posted:Another survivor of Systemic Lands I see.
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Oct 5, 2023 20:26
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