It’s annoying that people are downvoting you just for asking an honest question. I think the anti-ai sentiment is strong enough that in many communities, people just oppose it in any context. The arguments I usually see against using ai are:

1. It takes business away from actual human artists
2. It takes a lot of energy, thereby contributing to climate change
3. It is a privacy concern

All are real concerns, but I agree that making memes should be an effectively harmless use of it even if you otherwise oppose it. 1 and 3 aren’t really applicable to your average meme. 2 could apply depending on how you measure it, but most of the cost of ai is from training, not generation. For someone using the tool and not developing it, that training is a sunk cost they are not responsible for. I’ve seen estimates that you can generate about 9 images with the energy it takes to fully charge a phone. I think that’s more than worth it if you share it with a few other people to enjoy.

There is an unstuck button. It’s in the bottom left if you hit esc iirc. I’ve used it a few times.

I second this. I am in a similar position as OP and now I donate to a fund through GiveWell (which is used by many people engaged in EA) directly since the start of this year. If you want your money to do the most good, look into them. They research and audit all kinds of charities and publish their findings on their site.

Its name is wordplay in Korean, where P means blood. But it is weird when translated.

It’s not racist. People accuse others of that term too flippantly. It is ignorant though.

Language changes a great deal over time, and slurs are no exception. What is a completely inoffensive label at some point can be a slur later on. What is a mild insult in one area can be much more severe somewhere else. Sometimes what was a slur can be reclaimed and become acceptable, even positive. But that can also depend on who is saying it and other contextual details. I don’t know anything about “k!wifarms” but I wouldn’t assume malicious intent without more information.

That example looks much like the No True Scotsman fallacy, since a word is redefined later to exclude what would be exceptions to their claim based on an added qualification. Person A also made Person B get the evidence to refute their claim rather than fulfilling the burden of proof themselves. I know it’s not a formal debate or anything, but even so, bad faith arguments are just rude. Just own the mistake and say “you’re right, I was only thinking of first world countries/liberal democracies/developed nations/whatever”.

Temtem uses cards that circle around the creature when capturing iirc. I thought it worked well.

Yeah it’s good in a lot of ways but especially early on you can just get stuck with no way to progress in a day due to bad luck. Also, many synergies require a sequence of specific randomly-generated rooms and the resources to use them when they show up (and in viable locations). But there are a number of permanent upgrades that make it much more consistent, and a few of the minor upgrades are fairly common.

TLoZ: Spirit Tracks had you control Link primarily but you used Zelda’s ghost to possess things, help you fight, and solve puzzles. It would be hard for a solo dev, but you could have a knight with an AI that proceeded based on what paths you unlock for it. So the princess would be some sort of astral projection I guess. But then, you wouldn’t really feel trapped. Maybe you need to hide your activity from the dragon or distract it for a stealth aspect or resource management. You would need to balance swapping back and forth between your body and helping the knight. Might be easier to settle on an in-universe justification after figuring out the core gameplay.

Honestly their alts might be getting banned for ban evasion. Having alts isn’t against the rules but using them to circumvent bans is. I could see having an alt for nsfw stuff and maybe another if you represent a company officially, but otherwise I don’t see why you would need more other than something malicious.

IIRC that community has strict ideas about what sources are allowed, and the moderation is consistent about enforcing that even if the written rules are vague. Not sure why people are saying dailymail isn’t a news source just because it’s low quality. A bad news outlet is still a news outlet. So the mod should have given a better reason for removing it, but I agree with it being removed.

I haven’t played it and hate nearly everything I have seen about the age system, but they did make the map generation more varied in the latest patch. They’ve called the map inadequacies a priority to work on, so it will probably get better if you return to it down the line.

I also picked this up recently and am enjoying it a lot. Can’t speak for the multiplayer, but the singleplayer is very good. There are a lot of meaningful choices and variety that keep things fresh throughout and between runs.

My friends and I really like Civ 5, but we didn’t get into 6 much and had some reservations about the changes in 7. I think we’ll get it at some point, but it will probably be during a sale after some more polish (and maybe some mods to adjust some of the controversial changes).

But I’ve had the itch from the hype and I’ve been wanting to try some other turn-based 4X games. Old World is 75% off on Steam at the moment so I pulled the trigger yesterday. I’ve seen gameplay but I’m eager to try it myself. The narrative choices seem like they add a lot of meaningful decision-making that I want to explore. I also played some Age of Wonders 4 and have enjoyed that too, but there’s a lot to learn with all the combat mechanics. It means there’s a lot of replayability though.

When you give blood, often the “wrong” answer will just have them ask a followup after you submit the questionnaire. Like there is one asking if you had recently visited any of a list of countries of concern. I selected that I had because of a trip to Mexico, but I was still able to give blood that day because when they later asked which region, the one I had visited was considered safe.

I expect if you had been bitten by a mosquito in a place where that isn’t a significant concern and developed no symptoms other than the itch, you would probably be approved to donate. Receiving plasma is less dangerous than receiving blood so I would be surprised if the safety evaluation is more strict.

When people criticise me or my actions, I have at least as much right to defend myself as you do to cast judgement and voice it in the first place. But the magnitude of the condemnation you expressed by your word choice is greatly at odds with what I have done.

I bought a game because I thought its value would be worth the price for me. Having used it, I’ve found my early assessment was right. You clearly have different expectations for a game to be worth buying, and my purchase makes it less likely that companies will have to cater to you in the future. I understand your frustration, but I have not wronged you or anyone else.

I bought it the night before it released so I could download it and have it ready to play. At that point, I had played hours of the betas, had seen interviews with the developers, and had read various reviews that were overall very favorable. And just from playing it one day I’m very happy with my purchase.

I understand people disagreeing with it being a worthwhile purchase but calling it “shameful”, “disgusting”, or “disturbing” is actually really disappointing for me to see. It’s just buying a video game when it releases. You can have a complaint about a product without being so judgemental about people who find it valuable enough to buy even with its faults. Let people enjoy things.

They did the same thing with MH World too, and that’s one of my favorite games of all time. Capcom shouldn’t charge for things like appearance changes, but even so, they create games with huge amounts of value for the price tag. And most of that came from years of free post release added content. A feature-complete game with cosmetic bonuses available as paid dlc is not a problem. Failing to achieve that would be the reason to be concerned over microtransactions. I understand why microtransactions are unpopular, but they can be done well and without them existing, many great games would either not exist or have to be much smaller.

Also, for this specifically, there is a nexus mod that lets you change your appearance for free. There will very likely be a similar workaround with the new game if you have the pc version.

During the betas at least, it was mentioned in at least one of the interview/preview videos that you could adjust your character whenever before release but after release it would cost money. Not sure how accessible the information was but it wasn’t a total secret.

Riot actually has short stories, comics, and a few books on the lore of the world. It doesn’t show up in the game beyond voice lines, but some of the broad strokes of the Arcane story had been all but confirmed for years. Legends of Runeterra is also a card game set in the same world that expanded on things by letting champions talk to more minor characters (other cards in that case). And they are working on an mmo that will probably dive into the lore much more.

Conjuration gave you access to a daedric bow with effectively unlimited daedric arrows whenever you wanted. Pretty significant when stealth archery is the natural meta in the game. Plus you can summon things to give you free damage and take aggro. That’s useful for any build.