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Dintiradan

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Posts posted by Dintiradan

  1. I've been playing the beta for Arena (the new free to play implementation of Magic the Gathering) for over half a year now. While it's still very much a beta, it's improved a lot over the past few months, and they've been expanding the player base. I got a bunch of invite codes last weekend, and I still have three left, so if anyone's interested in the game, send me a PM. Window-only at the moment, unfortunately.

     

    EDIT: All keys have been claimed. If you're still looking for keys, https://www.reddit.com/r/MagicArena/comments/8zzqpl/beta_codes/ is a good start.

  2. While I am loathe to bump this topic, I find myself in the midst of a schism; only Slarty, the ultimate authority on all things everything, can mend it.

     

    Muffins with bits of fruit in them.

    Muffins with bits of nuts in them.

  3. I've never gotten the appeal of avocados. It's just tasteless filler to me, certainly not bad, but nothing good about it either. Maybe it's a cilantro-esque thing where people get different flavours out of it?

     

    Today was "guess I have to do something about this half-finished can of diced tomatoes". Thaw a chicken breast, pat dry, rub with Italian seasoning, sear four minutes a side. Add chopped onion and crushed garlic, saute for a couple minutes. Then add the diced tomatoes plus some basil (fresh if at all possible, because fresh basil is Best Herb) and simmer for ten minutes. All told, takes twenty minutes, which means rice is a great side. Butterfly the chicken if you're in a hurry, I guess? It's a good base recipe that can be modified easily. Alas, family does not like the spicy variants.

  4. 6 hours ago, [ Multiverse Munchers ] said:

    I don't think you can blame history; it wasn't an accident that things ended up this way.  Marvel was designed from the 60's up to be a shared universe, but it wasn't because there weren't any golden age characters other than Namor and Cap (and the original Human Torch and Vision, etc.) -- those were just the only two they pulled forward.  Whereas DC pulled a lot more forward, and their trappings too, like the fake cities that made it clear they were not part of our world.  Two very different strategic approaches.

    Point. Though the whole setting approach is very much a matter of taste. I've got zero attachment to New York -- in fact it's usually a point against Yet Another New York Cape in my books. Whereas Metropolis, Gotham, Opal, whatever can be anywhere.

     

    (On a side note, could we put "relevance of urban superheroes when violent crimes in urban areas have been dropping for several decades" on The List?)

     

    5 hours ago, [ Multiverse Munchers ] said:

    However, nobody cares about Shazam one way or the other, so it's hard to see how that ruined DC.

    :(

  5. I'm trying (and failing) to find the Bendis(?) quote where he says that a crossover with 616 would be the surest sign that the Ultimate universe writers had run out of ideas.

     

    Marvel's relative cohesiveness has always been its biggest strength, and it has its history to thank for that. I think that other than Namor and Cap (I dunno if the first Human Torch is still a thing) it was designed from the ground up to be a shared universe. Whereas DC's a bunch of different properties that merged together. I suppose DC started the shared universe thing with World's Finest and the JSA, but not to the same extent that Marvel did.

  6. Oh, yeah, make more work for yourself if you want. I'm less familiar with the Marvel storylines, especially earlier ones, but I know you lean more towards Marvel, so I put more Marvel stuff on it.

     

    I was re-reading/finishing Gotham Central a while back. Got the elements of a great procedural, very character-driven, all while being set in Gotham -- would recommend very highly (and it's what I was hoping the Gotham TV show would be based on, alas). Aaaand suddenly here's a Red Skies Crossover, because hey Day of Vengeance and Infinite Crisis is on and we gotta do something about that. So now Captain Marvel is fighting the Spectre, and the Rock of Eternity is blowing up over Gotham, and Gothamites are being possessed by the Seven Deadly Sins, and isn't this what you wanted from a series where the previous issue focused on when it's justified to compel a journalist to reveal their sources? No? Well, good news for you, the events of the crossover are never relevant again for the series. Next issue's all about fruit of the poisoned tree, you'll love it.

     

    I remember Starman being especially bad when it came to stuff like this. At the climax of an issue when -- whoops! -- Godwave just hit and everyone's depowered. Don't worry, we'll just deus ex machina things on the next page and forget this ever happened. At the end of an arc when... hey, didn't we deal with you already? Oh, Neron gave you a power-up. Don't know who Neron is? Too bad! Oh, and Blackest Night is happening, so we gotta have someone fight a Black Lantern.

     

    It's possible to do crossovers/references well, provided authors have time to integrate it with their own storylines. Sandman had an arc where a bunch of people throughout time and space had to wait out a "reality storm", and they passed time by telling stories Canterbury Tales-style. It's something that fits with the rest of Sandman, even if you know nothing of Zero Hour. But usually it's... well, read the TV Tropes link.

     

    As for the events themselves... it varies, but usually it's thumbs-down. Events usually come from corporate down, rather than authors up, and that's not a good recipe. And with one author writing scores of characters means you're going to be disappointed with at least one character's portrayal. I find that the "enormous ensemble cast dealing with Big Thing" itch is better scratched by turning to Elseworlds/What If stories (where the goal is telling an actual story) than main universe events (where the goal is usually changing up the lineup).

     

    Could do a event-by-event dissection, but I'll save that for Dintiradan Ranks Slarty Ranks Everything.

  7. hey let's rank marvel events with "secret", "war", "infinity", or "vs" in the title

     

    Secret Wars / Secret Wars II

    Infinity Gauntlet / Infinity War / Infinity Crusade

    Civil War

    Secret Invasion

    Avengers vs. X-Men

    Secret Wars

    Civil War II

    Inhumans vs. X-Men

    Secret Empire

     

    dc's simpler, let's just do the ones with "crisis" in the title

     

    Crisis on Infinite Earths

    Zero Hour: Crisis in Time

    Identity Crisis

    Infinite Crisis

    Final Crisis

     

    (you could do the "countdown" ones as well, but then the lines get blurry)

     

    EDIT: i don't want to bias your scoring, so i'll save a rant for later

     

    EDIT 2: oh hey world war hulk qualifies let's throw that one on too

     

    don't feel obliged to rank all of these

  8. 6 hours ago, googoogjoob said:

    Approximately 20 million dead, the population of China wouldn't regain its pre-war population level until well into the 20th century, and you still rate it above Wings, pirates, and Clippy.

    Hey, I have to deal with the fact that the thing growing on my face is Canonically The Worst Thing Ever.

  9. Gilgamesh

    Enkidu

    Utnapishtim

    Inanna/Ishtar

    Humbaba/Huwawa

    Gugalanna

     

    EDIT: Let's have more fun with razor thin differences of theology!

     

    Transubstantiation

    Transignification

    Consubstantiation

    Impanation

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