The Steam controller is amazing for Elden Ring and similar games. It makes the camera so much easier to deal with.

Didn’t catch any grenades, but I imagine so?

I played last night and showed those young’uns how to use the gravity gun.

Hadn’t played regularly in about 15 years, but the reflexes are still there.

Oh yeah, Amarillo is a big city for the NI-coC. Abilene, too.

The us-or-them situation is exactly what they’re aiming for: isolated people are easier to control. But yeah, I’m not sure if it’s an intentional strategy or just what happened to work out for their purposes.

Well, I grew up in what is known as the non-institutional church of Christ. There are different branches of the coC, ranging from the relatively liberal to the downright draconian.

What made this particular branch of the coC “non-institutional” is that they are independent of each other congregation, so the leadership of each group is separate from every other.

The way it actually shakes out is that every congregation gets super deep into the weeds about arcane interpretations of an ancient text about which they are unqualified to explain while making overconfident proclamations of certainty. Other congregations disagree with a fairly minor point in this reading, and they will become effectively dead to each other. Ultimately, the different churches (they would hate me calling them that) would form a loose confederation across the region with various groups they could live in uneasy peace with.

Within the congregation itself was a religion that taught that the world is a wicked place from which we should set ourselves apart. Evolution was a lie spread by the devil to make us doubt God’s power. Women were not allowed to speak or wear pants during the church service. We did not use instruments to make music during the service, as that was not mentioned in the Bible. Any disagreement with doctrine could get one removed from good standing, and we left two churches (forced out, really) based on the Elders’ strict views on baptism and musical instruments: my father would not agree that immersion was strictly necessary to save one’s soul, or that it was sinful to exceed the Bible’s authority and use instruments.

It is a bit of a weird duck as a cult, but they’re extremely controlling, patriarchal, and reactionary. They’re in most towns, but people usually think they’re an offshoot of the Baptists (of which certain types also dip into cult status in my opinion). I’d place them between the Baptists and the Jehovah’s Witnesses on a fundamentalist belief scale. I think the BITE model is a useful one (but not perfect) for defining cults:

• Behavioral control
• Information control
• Thought control
• Emotional control

The coC did all of these things: they wanted members to live apart from society where only those in the church were acceptable social peers, to limit exposure with “subversive” ideas and science, to make people so afraid of going to hell that you’ll blindly accept the teachings. You were expected to attend every service: Sunday morning & night and Wednesday night.

In short, they wanted to control people’s lives by love-bombing newcomers and then suffocating them until they fit into their assigned tiny little box.

And yes, we were in the end times. Even though nobody knows when Jesus will return. Wink.

I feel equal parts pity and exasperation that they’re ignoring critical crises like global climate change to focus on superstitious nonsense.

I grew up in a cult, so my whole life.

I also don’t see a transmission. I wonder if this thing is direct drive or has some kind of fluid coupling?

That motor looks loud AF.

I love you.

I’m a man and I’d never date a Republican either.

A person’s politics are a reflection of their values: if they’re willing to identify themselves as someone who validates all that fascist shit, then I want nothing to do with them.

It’s crazy to me that this take is even remotely controversial.

Because they’re certain that the people getting punished are heretics to their reactionary ideology.

They see it as inferior people getting what they deserve, and since it’s privatized they imagine they’ll pay less for the privilege.

But why?

Make the fascist fire you.

Yamaha makes the best guitar for the money.

The instrument I probably play the most is a nylon string Yamaha with a great dual pickup/mic that I got for $100 at a pawn shop. It has some cosmetic wear, but that’s a bonus in my opinion.

“You’re not watching your kid enough, so we’re putting you in jail away from the kids you’re supposed to be watching.”

Why are cops such fucking idiots? Even if I agreed with their judgement (which I definitely do not) it would be the wrong solution.

My very favorite system is Apocalypse World; it always plays out as high-drama operatic pulp. It does tend to go PvP in later sessions, so it’s definitely not for every group.

I also enjoy Blades in the Dark, a heist game set in a haunted Victorian London-inspired city. There are a lot of great innovations that mean the players don’t have to meticulously plan out their session (often wasting time on contingencies that are irrelevant), and instead can jump right in and get to the juicy bits.

Mothership is a great sci-fi horror OSR (old school revival) game that is very modular and has a ton of pre-written modules. Normally I prefer a more improvised style, but this is a solid ruleset that works well towards building the tension required for the genre.

If you’re just looking for a one-shot, Fiasco is always a great time: very rules light and more like a writers room exercise than most RPGs, but there’s no better game for hilarious hijinks inspired by films like Fargo or Burn After Reading.

Dogs in the Vineyard is another great one by the same designers as Apocalypse World in which the players are teenage paladin gunslingers in a weird old west populated by demons and heretics. The players come to town with absolute moral authority and may judge whomever they wish, but there’s no guarantee they’re really the good guys even though their characters absolutely see themselves that way.

DnD is a fine game.

But in my opinion, there are so many better roleplay systems.

I’m a man, and I voted against the fascists.

Because I’m not a fragile moron who thinks Daddy Trump will make women be nice to me.

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The best Nicolas Cage movie, and it isn’t even close.