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Joined 2 years ago
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Cake day: June 6th, 2023

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  • Its wrong in the current market, yep. But if we didnt have inflated housing from various factors including parasites and empty housing from those billionaire corps and small time landlords, things would be generally more affordable across the board like they were in the past.

    With the bar for ownership lower, that rental line shifts too. And suddenly the concept of “starter homes” is back on the menu like it was only a few years ago. And maybe we could get some smaller homes being built again to meet that demand.

    Last thing i wanna say is that specific rental options don’t have to be shitty. I was lucky to have snuck my early adulthood right into this mess as it formed. I saved up for my starter house (which i am now stuck in seemingly forever due to this market, but i know i am also lucky) by renting, but i rented an 1000 sqft private entry apartment with good quality. I felt plenty dignified in there. And there are options even better of course. Some people only want to rent forever afterall. Townhomes in particular are more suited for that style of renting. Nothing against that. But also, sardine packed buildings have their place. If someone is that rough off, i’d assume they prefer that to being on the streets. The issue is even those buildings have been royally fucked by today’s market. Those 500sqft apartments shouldn’t cost more than my current mortgage, but they do, and that’s insanity.


  • Rent for single family properties is higher than the mortgage of that same property. In theory. So ideally no single family property should be rented as its purely a parasite relationship. Again, in theory.

    The problem is that isn’t always true in practice with today’s market and rules. because if the previous owner has had their mortgage long enough, then it could be quite a lot less than a new mortgage. That makes a situation where rent is higher than their old mortgage (providing landlord profit), but cheaper than a new mortgage (providing a valid choice to a renter).

    But many of us argue that the current situation is unnecessary and drives up overall market costs. Even when done by just small landlords, it all adds up because the system allows it to.

    So its not so much telling you what to rent and what not to rent. its more that in a better system, you wouldnt ever choose to rent that way. Mortgages on small or attached single family homes would just be cheaper and affordable like they were in the past. And if you needed even less costs, renting would be the option in actual properties designed for it. Whether that is sardine packed 600 sqft, or not.






  • Ray tracing is not a fad though, and reducing it to just reflections is ignorant. Reflections, shadows, bounce lighting/global illumination, etc. all get noticeable bumps in quality. They are definitely more subtle than previous bumps from new techniques because those old techniques have gotten so damn good. But at the same time, those previous techniques have reached their limits and have unfixable problems. Whether that is occlusion artifacts in reflections, light leaking from global illumination, non-interactive baked lighting, shadows with uncanny resolution and no penumbra, hacky ambient occlusion, etc. etc… the problems are all minor, sure, but they are there, noticable, and devs want to keep pushing.

    And this is ignoring the benefits on the dev side as well. No more annoying rasterized light placement. And pulling your hair out trying to hack the engine to get the look youre after. “It just works” is an unfortunate comment but holds a lot of truth. Even non realistic looking games will use more and more ray tracing as time goes on because of that. And eventually every device and card will have performance for a full suite of effects. Its an inevitability, not a fad.



  • Art style, fidelity, and realism are all somewhat separate. Yeah a good art style can make a game timeless. There are countless examples of that. But it doesnt mean that realistic looking games cant have a great art style. I think cohesion is a huge part of what people mean by “art style”. Realistic looking games that focus on having a cohesive look can also be fairly timeless. They may not compete with today’s fidelity (resolution, technology, etc), but Assassin’s Creed, various Battlefield games, Crysis 1, and plenty more all look great if you look at them today.

    Theres also the concept of somwthing not realistic, but high fidelity. Minecraft RTX is simply amazing. Taking that already timeless art style and increasing the fidelity doesn’t suddenly remove the timeless factor, and i love that. I want more of that. Even if it means i need a fairly beefy gpu for such simple graphics otherwise.



  • Fwiw im level 89 crackling energy sorc. Easily one of the worst subclasses available but i stuck with it because its fun, i enjoy the challenge, and im a stubborn bastard. I had no vulnerable on my build at all. The crit nerfs alone reduced my damage more than the other buffs. I even use 2 of the lightning specific buffed aspects. Combined with survivability nerfs, i can no longer complete the dungeons i could before.

    I appreciate their attempts to increase viable variety. But the nerfs to the OP meta builds leaked onto the already struggling variety builds.