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at the moment I'm using google docs.  The material is a mess at the moment, but once it's not, I'll post links for you to look at if you're interested, I'm not using any other software right now, I'm not sure what would be useful.

well, maybe, if your job is biosphere engineering, or political organizing, or adjusting air chemistry.  I'm also planning on including beehive as a playable character type.

All I'm saying is, most people play TTRPGs as a way of indulging in a shared universe in which you can deal with any problems you have with a big burning axe.  This is its entire appeal to the 20-45 year old set; It gives you a relief from a world in which no problems have permanent consequences. 

It turns out that being a murder hobo is good for you.

I do understand that.  I don't know about the entire appeal, but I know it's a big part of the appeal.  I'm aiming to work on a slightly different kind of escapism, building a better world, in slightly more realistic ways that are still easier, and more rewarding, than the frustrating shit pit that is the real world.  Online discourse suggests there are people that like that style of play, it might be wrong, I suppose I'll see, at worst I'll have had some fun building mechanics and a setting.

well, maybe, if your job is biosphere engineering, or political organizing, or adjusting air chemistry.  I'm also planning on including beehive as a playable character type.

TTRPG, and yeah, basically skill check theater, making something other than combat crunchy in the way that combat usually is.

So I am working on a system of mechanics.  I want a game that decenters combat, and that centers biological engineering, social interactions, and plumbing. The setting is solar punk, on a space station. The aesthetic is weeds in the cracks.  The setting diverges from our real world in the 90s, when the biosphere 2 experiments were being conducted, in the game world they were successful and biological science advanced enough to make constructed biosphere's in space practical.  Africa ended up uniting and an international organization, with the US, Russia, China, the EU and the AU (African union) as members ended up constructing an international space station.  Poop is an important resource, controlled by waste management, who are known as the shit lords.  hoarding poop is a serious crime, and jenkem is a drug widely considered a scourge on society.  Combat, if it occurs at all, is handled with a single roll and some free form roleplay.  biosphere modification is a daily task, along with group politics such as propaganda, and crafting, on a more short term time scale there's mostly interpersional interactions, hacking, and plumbing, which includes atmosphere engineering.  The rogue plumber in brazil is definitely an inspiration.  Biospheres have varying degrees of biodiversity, and once they are diverse enough they start to alter their environment towards their ideal conditions.  players can help or hinder that, and they can also work to change the biosphere so that it has different ideal conditions.

Now if I could just figure out the temperature and cooking time on this, we could have a vibrant forum once more.

I'm personally happy to see folks on the right who hate Trump,  they do tend to be batshit, but sometimes they are aware of things that Liberals or the Left are not.

[Only One Student Has Enrolled in New WVU Program Designed to Counter 'Woke Ideology']

It looks like what we have here is a failure to indoctrinate:

Only One Student Has Enrolled in New WVU Program Designed to Counter 'Woke Ideology'

And, it's in West Virginia no less. What's a cult to do?

Is that like the conservative equivalent of gender studies? 

Yeah, that's what I'm expecting too, although I am getting some hope from all the DSA candidates that are winning primaries.

[Karl Rove Predicts Iran Will Try to Hurt Trump in Midterms]

In simple terms, the Iranian theocracy has won this little war. And, they know they are now stronger than they've ever been. And so, it's now just a matter of them extracting the reparations they want from us, and they also know time is on their side.

The POSOTUS believed he had the military capability to force a regime change in Iran simply by ordering a short bombing campaign. But, the result of his failed bombing campaign is that the Iranian theocracy now has the capability to severely weaken the Turd Reich. And, although the Iranian theocracy can not actually destroy the Turd Reich outright, they can easily weaken it by occasionally restricting the flow of oil through the Straits of Hormuz.

Therefore, I see no reason for the Iranian theocracy to come to any kind of a final agreement with the Turd Reich prior to the U.S. Midterm elections.

The original interview this article is based upon is behind a WSJ paywall. But, this is a short summary:   

Karl Rove Predicts Iran Will Try to Hurt Trump in Midterms

As per this article:

"Legendary GOP operative Karl Rove predicted the Iranians would try to hurt President Donald Trump in this fall's midterm elections by creating problems during a Fox News hit over the weekend.

Rove made the point shortly after anchor Paul Gigot observed that Trump "has some persuading to do to convince the public" that the United States' war with Iran has been successful."

And, as per further along in this article:

""Well, even if it happens, I'm not convinced that it's going to be that dispositive, that that's going to determine the outcome, the election, [it] will help, obviously. But look, we're not the only ones who know this. We're not the only ones paying attention to oil prices," replied Rove. "Remember, all of these negotiations with Iran need to be completed by the middle of August. The Iranians are not dumb. They know that the fall campaign starts in earnest on Labor Day. I would not be surprised to see them attempt to have an influence on the outcome by creating problems in mid-August, and causing oil prices to rise and uncertainty to grow.""

And so, I'm obviously not the only one who suspects the Iranians are going to continue to toy with the POSOTUS and his Turd Reich.

That probably means extremely high gas prices, and nasty price shocks on everything that needs to be transported.  I hope, along with the Iranians, that the Democrats sweep the midterms, but I don't want everything to cost obscene amounts to get there, and I also really hope the Democrats take things far more seriously than they have been.  Momdani style action is pretty desparately needed.

I wouldn't even know how to find Cain on FB.

I would like to know...

Cain Aerte, located in Luxembourg

The US signing an MOU that requires the cooperation of a third party was a hilarious blunder.  Iran has set itself up with a Xanatos gambit.  I believe they knew what they were doing; Lebanon is mentioned three times in the first term of the MOU.  That's not concise diplomatic language, that's hammering the point across.

Iran likely went into this expecting Israel wouldn't cooperate.  But, what are the options?

If the US somehow, magically, gets Israel to stand down voluntarily, that's still a win for Iran--and it drives a wedge between the US and Israel.  This war appears to have popular support in Israel, even if Netanyahu doesn't.  The MOU being adhered to would leave Iran in a pretty strong position.

If Israel doesn't stand down voluntarily, then either:

The US attempts to force Israel to comply, by cutting off their weapons supplies, applying sanctions, or whatever other pressure they can bring to bear.  A weakened Israel would be a big win for Iran.  It's possible they want this even more than the terms of the MOU--after all, that $300 billion reconstruction fund sounds nice, but nobody expects Trump to hold up his side of any deal in the long-term.

The US doesn't force Israel to comply, and the MOU falls through.  Now, Iran has justification (on paper) for keeping the strait closed.  Not a best case for them, but they're still holding the cards.  I've heard it claimed that oil reserves will hit a wall in about four weeks, at which point things will get very bad, very quickly.  I guess if Cain was around, he might know if that is accurate.


I think Iran can't back down, and Israel won't, which means whatever happens, will be a result of US action. The US has already lost, but the ultimate form of that loss is unclear.  Will they back out entirely, without an agreement, and leave the rest of the world to clean up their mess?  Will they cut off Israel?  Will they attempt a ground invasion of Iran?  Will they come up with something even stupider than the above?

I don't think blunder is quite the right word.  I think a cessation of hostilities by Israel has always been a very important thing to Iran, I don't think there would have been any progress if that had been left out.  Now we get to see if the US actually does anything to reign Israel in.

Its times like these I really miss Cain's opinion

Does he not come around any more?

So the conflict with Iran keeps being announced as over, and then not really being over.  This most recent surrender at Versailles looks the most like a real end of any of them for a while, but I am seeing a lot of folks saying it isn't going to actually end anything.

Anyone want to weigh in?  Cain maybe?

I'm personally very frustrated by Schumer saying he will keep reparations from being authorized by congress if he can.  I do think that money should be coming directly from Donald Trump's funds, rather than the government, but we have absolutely, as a country, acted in awful ways that need to be compensated for.  Iran deserves reparations for the damage we have done.  Having a reconstruction fund will encourage more interaction between our countries, in ways that will create more opportunities to directly support Iranian people and their own, on the ground, struggles for freedom.  It's also a big fat pork barrel, which isn't a great thing, but should be motivating Schumer and others to get their fingers in the pork.

yeah, my roommate hasn't abandoned the Republicans, he's just finally critical of Trump.