Astralis 2-0 Team Liquid

Inferno: 16-5
Map stats: https://www.hltv.org/stats/matches/mapstatsid/70988/astralis-vs-liquid

Nuke: 16-12
Map stats: https://www.hltv.org/stats/matches/mapstatsid/70995/liquid-vs-astralis

Astralis win the Grand Final!

Natus Vincere 0-2 Team Liquid

Dust 2: 13-16
Map stats: https://www.hltv.org/stats/matches/mapstatsid/70934/natus-vincere-vs-liquid

Overpass: 9-16
Map stats: https://www.hltv.org/stats/matches/mapstatsid/70939/liquid-vs-natus-vincere

Team Liquid upset NaVi to move on to the Grand final

(Obligatory disclaimer: Yes, I know the difference between a "theory" and a "hypothesis". I'm using the colloquial usage of the term. I'm not submitting a formal paper here.)

I figured a post like this now and then might be a little fun. I wanted to discuss a little theory of mine about the Mario universe. As the title suggests, the short version is that Mario is a dictator.

This theory hinges on one important point: There are inconsistencies within the stories that are told about Mario's adventures that suggest that his exploits are fabricated.

Let's begin with the most central theme in Mario's adventures: The repeated kidnappings of Peach. Consider for a moment that in every kidnapping event, Peach has had less-than-stellar security detail--typically none at all--despite the number of kidnapping events that have occurred over the years. If arguably the most high-profile member of a kingdom is being kidnapped on a regular basis, you would expect their security detail to be significantly greater than it's consistently shown to be, so why is it always so lax? The three most logical explanations are either a) the security detail is actually much tighter than is shown and Bowser is just that much stronger, b) the security detail is thinned out before every kidnapping event due to a coordination between Bowser and an insider in the mushroom kingdom, or c) there are no kidnappings at all and they're merely being portrayed as such.

We can eliminate option (a) fairly easily: Are we really expected to believe that an ordinary plumber can single-handedly take out an entire kingdom that an entire other kingdom was unable to stand against while their princess was captured? This plumber has no military training whatsoever, and we're expected to believe that he can stand against an entire army by himself? Unlikely.

That leaves us with two logical explanations: Either the kidnappings are coordinated on the inside, or the kidnappings are completely fabricated. Deciding which of the two is the most likely requires further considerations.

With that in mind, you may be wondering if there's any support for either of those accusations, so let's first discuss Bowser himself. Specifically, let's discuss his physical traits. He's a scary-looking dude, no doubt. But Bowser is clearly not a creature that evolved for aggressive behavior. If we examine his build from an evolutionary perspective, we can see that he has a large and bulky shell; his claw strikes are powerful, but slow; his fire generally lacks range or (in the case of earlier Mario games where range was better) sustained use, and its speed is generally terrible; and he can't move quickly at all, except in short bursts. All of these traits suggest a creature that isn't built for aggressive, offensive action, but for self-defense. A creature like Bowser is unlikely to attack another kingdom at all, unless he's acting in self-defense or given some other form of incentive.

Now, between the remaining two options, we again have either an inside job or a fabrication. Without deciding yet which it is, let's at least consider this: If it really is an inside job, there are only two ways in which someone could stand to benefit:

1. Mario would stand to benefit due to receiving and perpetuating his status as a hero, so he would have to have some kind of way to incentivize Bowser to coordinate with him, otherwise Bowser wouldn't have any need to work with him. If Mario really is a plumber, however, then there is absolutely no way he would have the wealth or political leverage for Bowser to benefit in that relationship. It's possible that he was a plumber at first, but ended up becoming a puppet to Bowser, but in no situation does Mario remain a plumber if we're to assume that he's continually coordinating with Bowser, otherwise he would have no way to deal with the increased security detail.
2. Peach isn't actually being kidnapped, but is attempting to escape the kingdom with Bowser's help. If Mario is actually an independent dictator rather than a puppet, then it would stand to reason that prior royalty would want to escape in order to avoid harm. In this case, it's easy for a coordinated escape with another kingdom to be portrayed as a kidnapping.

So, to quickly recap, we have inconsistencies in the security detail, in the antagonist, and in the protagonist. These already suggest that the stories of Mario's exploits may not be at all what they're portrayed as.

With the above in mind, let's take a look at one more damning detail about Mario himself: The mushroom peoples are said to have transformed into bricks, yet Mario has no qualms with destroying them throughout his adventures.

With everything above in mind, we can see the following narrative fall into place:

1. The mushroom people were never turned into bricks. It's a false story used as a dehumanization tactic in order to justify Mario's murder of innocent people. It's pretty easy to justify killing your own people, after all, if you convince people that a brick wall was erected and had to be destroyed so you could save the princess, so the loss of those transformed people was necessary.
2. Mario isn't really a plumber. It's possible that he was at one point, but he definitely can't be anymore.
3. Mario's exploits are either staged, or he's continually re-kidnapping a fleeing princess seeking refuge in another kingdom and the kidnapping is being portrayed as a rescue.

Now, a final important point: Over time, we've seen the narrative shift in Bowser's reasons for kidnapping Peach. The most recent case was an attempted marriage in Odyssey. It stands to reason that, as a dictator, Mario has to continue controlling the narrative as news leaks out regarding foreign events, e.g. a marriage between a "kidnapped" princess and a foreign ruler. The continuous stream of foreign news and gossip could install doubt about your prior narratives--"Why is our princess marrying someone from another kingdom? Was she even really kidnapped or did she run away?"--and force you to adopt a new one--"The princess is being forced into an unwanted marriage by her kidnapper!". This is a far different narrative than those cases where Bowser was said to want to destroy the mushroom kingdom.

We can therefore establish that Mario's image is absolutely essential. Any crack in his portrayal as a hero could cause the mushroom people to revolt, so he needs to assert control in any way possible. Thus, he will create any narrative necessary to paint himself as a hero and to make himself more relatable, and to make his adversaries as monstrous as possible. It's also particularly unlikely that he's Bowser's puppet, otherwise we wouldn't expect Bowser to allow himself to be thwarted so frequently, something that would make him appear weak to his own people and threaten his place. It's far more likely that Mario is acting independently and losing his grip on his narrative.

So the story that seems to have the least inconsistent narrative is as follows:
Mario is a dictator who wants to appeal to the working class by being viewed as a plumber, so the citizens of the Mushroom kingdom will think "he's a true blue collar worker, he's one of us!". Peach isn't actually being kidnapped, but is attempting to flee from Mario's dictatorship and seek refuge in the Koopa Kingdom. Mario continually assaults the Koopa Kingdom in order to re-kidnap Peach. In the process, he ends up murdering countless sympathizers who try to aid in her escape, or even uses the opportunity to destroy his opposition in a way that's easy to brush off. During all of this, he continually pumps out propaganda about Peach being kidnapped when she's really seeking asylum and about his heroic rescues when he's really taking his own army with him, paints Bowser as a villain, and dehumanizes his victims and normalizes their murder. In addition, because of his clear readiness to dehumanize his own people, it's likely that Bowser and the rest of the Koopa Kingdom are also being dehumanized and portrayed as monsters in order to justify the slaughtering of countless foreign people and to help instill fear and anger among the mushroom people. Peach and Bowser have also likely fallen in love and attempted to marry, but Mario continues to lay siege on Koopa Kingdom in order to kidnap Peach, and Mario's propaganda network paints this marriage as a forced one between an unwilling Mushroom Kingdom princess and a terrifying and ruthless Bowser.

In short: Mario is dictator using a propaganda network in order to paint himself favorably while painting his adversaries as monsters or objects in order to justify mass murder and prevent a fleeing princess from seeking asylum in a foreign kingdom.

What are your thoughts? Have I made any critical errors? Is there more evidence that I missed that supports this theory? Do you have an alternative theory you'd like to share?

(If you notice any typos or repeated sections, please let me know. This took a while to write up, so it's possible that I missed something.)

No, not the PC classes in your game - the classes that describe the people you play the game with.

Mister Fantastic: Every single number on this player's character sheet has been optimized beyond comprehension to be at least 20% higher than you thought was possible, and it's all legal. Reading one of his sheets will teach you about traits, feats, and rules you never knew existed. Often mumbles cryptic, one-word answers while barely paying attention that end ongoing rules discussions leaving the other players with blank faces. His characters are nearly invincible except for one small key weakness (AC 26 at level 1, but with a CMD of 5). This player can typically one-shot the BBEG and reverse the party's fortunes in a single round. If he's charmed or dominated it will result in a TPK unless dealt with instantly.

The Veteran: A quiet fellow wearing a T-Shirt that says, "Don't tell me about your character: just play." He's never flashy, and seems to do very little, content to let everyone else play and have fun. Always prepared for any situation when no one else is. More likely to aid other players than act directly. He'll only involve himself when everyone else is making a mess out of things, and when he does wake up, his ability to deal with any given situation leaves Mister Fantastic green with envy. Has been known to kill BBEGs via roleplaying. Has the ability to summon natural 20s on demand but rarely uses it. The GM often consults with him on rules issues.

Negative Diplomacy: No matter the class or the character's abilities, whenever this player opens their mouth to talk to someone who isn't in the party, you know the group is going to be in combat to the death in less than three rounds. The GM is uniquely powerless to prevent this from happening. His superpower is always knowing the worst possible in-character thing to say.

Milla Vanilla: Every character this person plays is the exact same thing - even when playing different classes. For whatever reason, this player cannot mentally step into the shoes of their character, and ends up on endless repeat. Often not noticeable until one has played multiple games with this person and notices that their ninja assassin is remarkably similar in temperament to their paladin.

The Conspiracy Theorist: This player is convinced that every single thing that happens is part of some grand tapestry and he is on a mission to figure it out. Often obsesses over small details, makes bizarre (sometimes nonsensical) connections between events, places, and facts. Your worst fear is that he's giving the GM ideas. It's confirmed when some of his wilder predictions come to pass later in the game.

Aaron Justicebringer: The kind of perma-lawful good holy crusader who walks into a tavern and announces, "Greetings! I am Aaron Justicebringer. You may flee if you wish." He's on a mission to smite evil. Since he's always got detect evil running, he finds quite a lot of it and smites often, without concern for trivialities like local customs, ettiquette, roleplaying, and plot. This player always plays crusader types.

Kaboom: Kaboom likes loves lives to set things on fire. Often a wizard or sorcerer, and the kind of fellow who can reduce six enemies to ash in a single round (even if those were six fire elementals). Flaming spells, flaming daggers, flaming hair, and one can track him across Golarion just by following the smoke. Unfortunately, that's all he's good for. Kaboom is a blunt instrument, best kept wrapped in asbestos until the party finds a target he can be aimed at in a location that hasn't got too much potential for collateral damage. This player comes in non-fire flavors too.

Sleepy Pete: Sleepy Pete has a wife, six kids, and a stressful day job. By the time he makes it to the session, he's been clinically dead for two hours already. He'll be asleep within an hour of starting, even faster if food or alcohol is involved. Sleepy Pete is also prone to missing sessions with little forewarning. You're not even sure what his character or personality is because you've been given almost no opportunity to observe him in a conscious state.

Brandon The Builder: A player who in all other ways is relatively normal, Brandon must never be given downtime in any way, shape, or form. With a full set of item crafting feats and flawless mastery of the downtime rules, Brandon will not only rule the entire kingdom in less than six months, he'll find a way to provide every single party member with a Headband of Mental Superiority, Belt of Physical Perfection, two +5 Tomes or Manuals of their choice, and a well staffed keep while doing it.

Broken Billy: This player has no comprehension of the mathematical progression of the games he plays. Instead, he jumps at the first thing he finds that sounds cool. This leaves him with a hodgepodge of abilities that quickly become useless as the game progresses, leaving poor Billy more and more frustrated as the game goes on. Broken Billy steadfastly ignores all advice and all warnings given to him by the GM and more experienced players. Prone to having five first level classes on his fifth level character.

The Novice Namer: Never good at coming up with names, this player has given birth to many legendary heroes: Bob the Barbarian, Robert the Ranger, and who could forget Sheldon the Sorcerer.

The Knife Hoarder: For whatever reason, this player insists on having at least 2 knives on his belt and 4 hidden on his person. He'll never actually use these knives, but as they'd say "just in case."

The 1-Leaf-Clover: This person's dice are trying to kill him. Oh he might roll a natural 20 to get a cheap room at the inn or tell if an item is masterwork (its not), but the second he's in combat, the most you can expect is a 12 or 13.

The iGenie: Only looks away from his laptop when his name is said three times.

The Bookworm: If not taking an action, is found face first in a book looking for a rare never before seen rule that will get him out of the in-game situation. There has got to be rule specifically for negotiating with a different race to reduce the price of a toll. There just has to be!

Secretly Evil: This player almost always plays a Wizard/Sorcerer and takes a Necromantic path. They'll write a sizable and traumatic back-story. Then in game they'll never do or say anything evil in front of the group(in or out of character). In fact, they'll do very little in general. Instead they wait until everyone is gone and tell the DM what evil things they actually did while "no one was looking".

You should try FATAL: Makes all their characters and every encounter somehow revolve around sex.

Spellsaver: Spellcaster that never casts their spells because they think the next fight is going to be harder.

The Lore Keeper: This player may not be the most talkative person at the table, but that's possibly because they're too busy writing down every even happening in the game. Conversations, shared loot, timelines, and character sketches -- this player is devoted to the story, and keeps track of all of it.

What are we missing?

(Some inspiration from this old reddit thread.)

I've recently played really good game of Secret Hitler, so I wanted to let you know about it. If you don't know Secret Hitler, it's great game and I'll briefly describe it below. You can play it online, for free, without ads at secrethitler.io (opensource). You can as well buy it, or even just download pdf, print it and play with paper cards!

Secret Hitler summary

Game for 5-10 players, tabletop. Players are divided to Fascists and Liberals. One of fascists is Hitler. Fascists knows who is who, but Liberals don't know anything. There is chancellor and president, players vote them and they elect laws (president receives 3 laws, 1 discards, 2 passes to chancellor, which discards 1 law and the other one passed). Fascists win, as 6 F laws passed or Hitler was elected as chancellor with 3 or more F laws. Liberals win, if 5 L laws passed or Hitler was killed. If you want to know more, watch some gameplay at YouTube, it's really interesting game about lying to people and manipulating them. And if you will be interested in the game, we might play it together online :-)

I was a Fascist. Right on the first turn as president, I got 3 Fascists laws and I selected Hitler as chancellor - I had to because of order and it would be suspicious not to do so. So I passed him the laws and he of course had to pass Fascist law. But then, he peaked (because 3rd F law passed) at top three cards and lied about it (said FFL, was FLL). Because of this, everyone, after few turns which revealed he lied, started suspecting him. When the liberals had 4 laws passed, I tried as hard as I could to defend Hitler - he just missclicked (no, he would told us!), you know it. After about 10 minute discussion, my propose was rejected, someone else elected as Chancellor and Liberals won the game.

Leave your own stories in comments and be sure to tell, if you would like to play this with other people here, it's wonderful game. And if you would like to, I have other stories - for example when we (IRL) played Secret Hitler to 3 AM, and at the last but one turn, everyone went extremely suspicious and we played one turn almost hour and half (I don't lie about this, I started to measure it after 20 minutes of discussion).

Any perspectives on that, fellow Tildoes? Tildarians, Tilderinos, Tildonkeys, etc.?

From what I can tell, the main argument against it is that it's not historically accurate. I guess that makes sense, but A) that doesn't seem to warrant the utter seething rage that I see from opponents, and B) I rather doubt the Battlefield franchise has made it a habit to be 1-to-1 regarding history anyway. I've played none of them, but I saw someone mention that in-game events are definitely not historically accurate anyway. So I guess the "keep women out" side is conflating the game's setting with a declaration of dedication to historical accuracy? Seems silly to me to take umbrage at a game failing to meet an expectation that you invented.

Then again, maybe I'm wrong. My initial gut reaction was to write it off as casual sexism and an unwillingness to break tradition, and while I'm sure that explains a minority of the outrage, I highly doubt the controversy can be explained so simply.

Anyone here want to way in?

With the focus on the big budget games at E3, smaller releases and indie games tend to get lost in the noise, or just ignored. Are there any upcoming games you're excited about, but don't see anyone talking about?

Personally, I've been keeping an eye on Noita, which was just added to Steam listings. The particle effects look amazing, let's hope the gameplay lives up to it!

So I picked up Jurassic World: Evolution recently because I loved Jurassic Park: Operation Genesis as a kid and have a "dinosaur park sim"-shaped hole in my heart. I'm enjoying it for what it's worth. I think 60 bucks is a little steep for what it's offering, so I can't recommend you pick it up right now unless you REALLY want a Jurassic Park sim game with potential for future growth.

Anyways, that being said, I am 99% convinced this game is just a reskin of the old one. Everything from the dinosaur animations, to the mission types, to the vehicle controls, to how the general flow of gameplay goes feels almost identical to Operation Genesis. I get that there's only so much you can do when you're making what is essentially the same game with from the same property, but take this from a man who put an ungodly amount of time into OG as a child: it feels 100% the same. Like I think all they did was take OG and give the dinosaurs a very nice new paint job and then give everything else a half-hearted coat of paint.

I don't mind all that much since I can't play OG anymore, but I still found it odd how shockingly similar this games feels to OG. Anyone else notice this? Or am I just crazy/supplanting my memories of the old game onto the new one?

I got my hands on a copy of Rise of the Tomb Raider recently, and while playing I noticed that Lara would "helpfully" try to push me toward the correct solution to a puzzle, often while I was simply looking around to make sure I wasn't leaving any loot behind. Worse still, it could be literally every 10-20 seconds or so that she would repeat the same hint. It got infuriating after a while, and I was horrified (okay, I'm exaggerating, but whatever) to find that there wasn't a setting available to get her to shut the hell up.

I loved Tomb Raider games because you had to solve the puzzles yourself. Having the game hold your hand the entire way kind of defeats the point of that. It was really disappointing knowing that I couldn't play the game without either having a puzzle spoiled for me or having the obvious repeatedly pointed out to me. It was like having Navi from Ocarina of Time nagging me all over again, but worse, because at least I could ignore Navi and just deal with the occasional "Hey, listen!".

This sort of hand-holding seems to be getting increasingly more common, at least in my experience. The form often differs--e.g. in Skyrim you have quest markers that not only guide you all the way to a dungeon, but all the way through it--but it's there. I feel like the worst of it is that gamers don't get to actually play the game autonomously or at their own pace, and that this sort of thing violates a basic principle of "show, don't tell".

Am I just really unfortunate with the games I've been playing lately, or is this really as common as it seems? What examples of hand-holding have you run into that you found disappointing?

Trailers

• Battlefield 5 Official Multiplayer Trailer

• FIFA 19 Official Reveal Trailer with UEFA Champions League

• Origin Access Premier: Official Reveal Trailer

• Unravel Two Official Reveal trailer

• Sea of Solitude: Official Teaser Trailer

• NBA LIVE 19 Official Reveal Trailer

• Madden NFL 19 - Official Reveal Trailer

• Command and Conquer: Rivals - Official Reveal Trailer

• Anthem Official Cinematic Trailer

• 4 Minutes of Anthem Open World Co-Op Exploration Gameplay - E3 2018

Thoughts?

So, it seems bingo cards of hype or disappointment have become all the rage nowadays, and with E3 coming up in a few days I was wondering is Tildes wanted to make their own hype/disappointment bingo card. Feel free to chime in with suggestions.

Here's a few:

"Microsoft does something actually cool." - wishful thinking, but I love my xbox and just want to see it flourish.

"Video Game movie announcement that doesn't look like shit" - how hard can this be?

"Sony gets exclusive content" - this is just me being bitter about the exclusive dlc in PS4 Destiny.

"God of War sequel" - I know it's guaranteed to happen at some point, but it would be hype if they dropped some sort of teaser or something even though it's incredibly early.

"0 charisma presenters" - why can't these studios just hire someone to hype them up?

"Awful fucking 'gamer' dialogue" - you know what I'm talking about. Just look up E3 last year with Anthem.

"Over-focusing on a lack of microtransactions" - this point is gonna be over sold so hard because of Battlefront.

https://careers.blizzard.com/en-us/openings/oNiH7fwD archive.is mirror

We're working on a new, unannounced Diablo project. Are you a skilled Dungeon Artist? Come work with us, and together we will build something exceptional.

• Work directly with level design to build atmospheric dungeons with a focus on composition, detail and mood, while ensuring that the gameplay space is readable.
• Work with Lead Environment Artist and the Art Director to ensure all environments are meeting the high-quality bar Blizzard is known for.
• Experience working with a lead artist or art director in developing a unique and cohesive modeling and texturing style for environment assets

Definitely looks like a whole new game in the pipeline. Any other dungeon crawler fans on ~tildes so far? I think I've got 300+ hours in Diablo 3 alone, let alone 1 and 2.

What do you want in a new Diablo, what do you definitely not want?

Most of my friends and my husband love board games- the more complicated, the better! My whole life, many board games have given me pretty bad anxiety to the point where I pretended I hated them rather than admit I was just scared.

Over the past few years, I have found a few games I don't mind playing- mostly cooperative (Sentinels of the Multiverse, Betrayal at House on the Hill) or anonymous ones (Cards Against Humanity, Jackbox Games). I still have a hard time playing strategy games like Catan or Ticket to Ride; games which involve guessing what others will do like Rook or The Resistance make me want to die.

A lot of times, my friends just want to sit around and play board games, and I'm trying to build up a list of games I like to play so I can join in. Any advice for getting used to them/learning to play in advance, or games that are fun for serious board gamers, but still sort of low pressure?

Thanks!

I'd like to see everyone favorite games to start a discussion and maybe get some recommendations. My favorite game is either the pokemon series or skyrim. I've played pokemon all my life but skyrim was my first big RPG, which I loved, I have owned it on 4 different platforms!

Let's do it guys! Every good forum/community from Ars Technica to the XKCD forums has had a go taking turns playing the most detailed simulation game I have ever seen. I can generate the world for ideal 44.10 (and hopefully 44.11) settings with my extra adventurer reactions.

Now that dwarves can get angry and stressed again, now is an opportune time. Who's with me?

Of course no one likes microtransactions (I feel dirty for typing that), low-effort cash grabs, and all the funny stuff 'early access' games have done. Tell me about things that you're certain everyone but you likes, or maybe not even something you don't like but don't agree with.

Can one or two of these combined make up deficiency of another? If a game plays really well and has an immersive story, but looks like shit, can you still play it? How about if it plays well and looks good, but the story is a jumbled mess? What if it looks nice and has a nice story, but plays like shit?

What makes a game a deal breaker to you, and which of these aspects can be a savior to an otherwise deal breaker?