I see a lot of FUD and bad DD going around wallstreetbets, and its time for more rational discussions about the state of GME and the potential for another bull run. It is possible, but people need to stop being next level retard. It is going to kill any opportunity to recover the stock unless we stop right now and get our heads straight on what's actually going on. So while I don't know shit and this isn't real financial advice, here's a more rational take on what we need to do to get GME moving again.
Full disclosure: I was in GME in early December at around $15, I was a pussy ass paper hands and folded a winning play of $35 call for Jan 15th when it looked more and more unlikely. I got back in immediately for Feb 19th calls and turned 4k into 70k. I took some profits on the way up (I felt bad for doing so but I knew it was the big brain move, and in the end I pocketed 40k on 4k investment so 0 complaints from me). I'm still holding $115 calls made when the stock was $70 for Feb 19th, and made more 250 calls recently for Feb 26th and Feb 12th at $130 and $100 yesterday. I'm holding all of these till bust, so I'm in it to the moon. I have some shares too but those are a long play, I don't look at them.
First, we need to accept or at least be open to the idea that the original short squeeze is done. The factors that led to it have changed, either the hedge funds reshorted at higher prices (around 200 most likely), or they can out last us because they know they have bail outs and the media has put the momentum against us. WE CANNOT COUNT ON THE ORIGINAL SHORT SQUEEZE TO REVIVE THIS STOCK. WHAT WE NEED IS AUTHENTIC BUYING AND NEW MOMENTUM.
On that note, stocks can move ridiculous prices on low volume. What we need is real, authentic retail buying at prices up to at least $200. But right now GME looks like a sinking ship and no one wants to touch it with a 100 foot pole. So how do we fix that? We still have momentum on our side from a large number of believers from around the GLOBE that want a part in this once in a lifetime story. This is powerful but has to be used right, and that's hard when the brokers are shutting us out. But hope is not lost, and restrictions should lift over time. We need patience and resilience.
We also need to stop telling people who aren't in this for the moment to hold till they die. Some people are losing REAL money over this and we're being complete assholes telling them to hold till they lose their life fortunes so we can make some tendies. Weak hands are going to sell and pressuring them to hold will make the FUD worse. If we want a come back we need the selling to stop, and that means we need to let the weak hands fold WHILE keeping the floor price above a certain level. Let's talk about volume. The recent 'low volume' isn't low compared to the past months, its just lower than the day when GME was THE MOST TRADED STOCK IN THE WHOLE FUCKING WORLD. Stop talking about volume. REAL selling has happened, which is probably the institutions and the paper hands folding. We need to let this energy run its course. Don't act like it's going to the moon and to buy at any price, save our bullets for the hard line in the sand.
Once the selling has stopped (and it will), we just need to regain momentum with organic buying. People all over the world are waiting on the sidelines for GME to look like its picking up steam again and they will PILE THE FUCK ON just like last time. If we push the price high enough, we can trigger another short squeeze but it is NOT the same conditions as the first one. Stop with the bullshit about ladder attacks (which I've only heard of on this reddit) and us being cheated by the big man, that only scares people away because they think the game is unwinnable. It is STILL a giant fuck you to wall street just by making this stock rocket again, the game does not have to be rigged to make this a david vs goliath story. Whether it is or isn't, that only creates more FUD.
This sub needs to get its shit together. We need real authentic I LIKE THIS FUCKING STOCK for reasons OTHER than the short squeeze. Like GME just adding a fucking Amazon employee to the board and plans for it expanding online. There is REAL REASON to believe in GME, and that needs to turn into authentic buying, which will then create the momentum we need to get everyone else to pile on the stock again. But this shit about short squeezes and ladder attacks and $10,000 or bust needs to stop. It's just making this look like a sinking ship where everyone on it is stuck in the denial stage of grief. This stock has real potential to hit $300+ again, we just have to change our mind set and the game plan. And I'm too stupid to tell you how, but I know this isn't the way. So buy the fuck out of GME at current levels, but change the narrative to something that has actual basis in reality. And tell people to let the sellers sell so they stop keeping us down and we can get a real rally going. We have enough people on our side to move the needle and get the engine started again, its not over. But its gonna require patience and time and if you aren't in it for the long haul or are gonna pussy out on the way up then just sell now so we can start buying again. At this point, if you're not buying, either get off the ship or hold till death do us part.
Best of luck retards, I know we can do this

🐦 Hey CD Projekt Red, I think you shipped the wrong config on PC. Here's a guide that shows you how to "unlock" Cyberpunk for possibly massive performance improvements.

Update regarding the 1.05 patchnotes saying this file appearantly does nothing:

Hey all, I had no intention to jebait anybody in any way. I even asked two friends to try this fix before posting it, because it seemed unreal to me a file like this could change ANYTHING. After they confirmed this, I went to post it on reddit and people's responses were huge. I expected this to ONLY maybe help in niche-cases. Only after hundreds of people allegedly confirming that it made noticable diffferences, stability being the most common, reflecting purposefully increased memory pools, I started to collect data and tried to draw a better picture since some characteristics seemed very distinct (for example new Ryzens seeming to be totally unaffected). Maybe I got hit with placebo, but how the hell is it possible thousands of people appearantly did too? This bugs me quite a bit. If I really spread misinformation, I am sincerely apologizing. Obviously it's hard to argue with patchnotes most likely backed by developers or a member of QA, but for me my personal changes were far beyond any deviation that would fall in within placebo limits. (Yes, I am very aware that a game restart can fix a common memory leak issue or can get the game the chance to reorder itself, therefore giving you a few perceived temporary extra fps gains) I am still positive my game ran way more stable (even on higher settings and better resolution) and it recovered a lot better from fps drops. A prominent point were definite improvements in load times. I am not trying to pull something out of thin air for the sake of defending myself, I am being honest.
To the people calling me out for allegedly farming awards or having ill intentions: If there is any way I can refund the awards, for example via staff, I will do so asap. If I can refund Platinum / Gold 1:1 I will immediately do that if I am asked for a refund. I have zero interest in keeping any undeserved rewards. The one person who actually has donated me 4.69$ via PayPal has already been promptly refunded after reading the 1.05 patchnotes. https://i.imgur.com/DY6q0LR.png
I only had good intentions, sharing around what I found to get back feedback on, waiting for people to either tell me this is only in my head and that I am a muppet or responses confirming my assumptions. And I got a lot more from the later.
I would appreciate it if a CDPR dev can reach out to me personally so I have first hand confirmation, but It's definitely hard to argue with an official set of patchnotes claiming this file does nothing.
Again, sincere apologies if I indeed sold you the biggest snake oil barrel in 2020 on accident. It's just hard to grasp for me atm that this thread has tons of posts backing up my assumptions while an official statement states the complete opposite.
>> I have created an updated all-in-one video guide, scroll to 'What we've learned' for it.

Pre-Story 🐒

Hi, I played Cyberpunk for 14 hours now and was quite bummed from the start.
I have the following rig:

CPU: i7 4790K @ 4.4GHz
GPU: EVGA 1080Ti
RAM: 32GB DDR3
Game on SSD, Windows on a seperate SSD

My rig is normally a ~~monster~~ trusty chap when it comes to performance, I can play the most recent titles on 1440p high on at LEAST 60 fps.

I was shocked that I was only averaging 30 - 50fps (lowest settings possible,1080p, 70fov, no extra jazz) at best depending on the amount of objects I was looking at. For someone that is used to play at 1440p @ 144hz, this was heart-wrenchingly bad performance and half an agony to play. So I took a look at CyberPunk in Process Lasso and noticed that both my CPU and GPU always lounge around at 40 - 60% and that my GPU consumed a humble 100 Watts. Something felt horribly off. It makes ZERO sense that my cpu & gpu barely do anything but at the same time my performance is horse shit.
I was looking on advice on /pcmasterrace, people with similar or worse rigs than mine were shocked how I was basically at the ~~bottom's barrel~~ bottom of the barrel, while they had no issues to play at 1080p @ high or 1440p @ medium. What the heck is going on?

Guide 💡

Since I am a C# developer and very comfortable around configuration files, I figured it wouldn't hurt to take a look at the configuration files. And found something that I didn't believe.

https://i.imgur.com/aOObDhn.png

Please take a look at the above picture. This picture shows the configuration columns for each platform. PC, Durango, Orbis. (Durango & Orbis is what XBox & PlayStation run on).
Now take a look at PoolCPU and PoolGPU. These values are the same as the other platforms. This looks off. So I decided to give it a try and just screw around with this config. So based off my rig I assigned some values that made a little more sense to me.

https://i.imgur.com/xTnf0VX.png

I assigned 16GB (of RAM I guess) to my CPU and 11GB of my GPU's VRAM.
And howdy cowboy, my i7 finally woke the fuck up and started kicking in second gear, now working at 85 - 95% CPU usage. My 1080Ti also now uses 230 Watts on avg instead of a sad 100W.

https://i.imgur.com/fP32eka.png

Booted the game and et voila, I am now rocking a solid 60+ fps on:

High Settings
No Film Grain, No Ambient Occlusion, Lens Flare etc.
80 Fov
1440p

My loading times have gone down from 20 seconds to 2.

I can't put the emotion in words how I felt when I discovered this. It was something between disbelief, immense joy and confusion.

I can confirm GOG patch 1.04 and Steam patch 1.04 have this borked configuration file.
If you need guidance on what to assign in your config:

PoolCPU: Use half of what your RAM is, make sure to leave 4GB for windows tho.
PoolGPU: Google your graphics card on google and see how much VRAM it has. For example my EVGA 1080Ti has 11 GB GDDR5X, so I am entering 11GB.

A fair bit of warning 💀

These changes can possibly crash your CyberPunk and Windows. I do not take any responsibility for any problems resulting from this.
CyberPunk will complain that it crashed, even when you close it. This shouldn't matter too much though.
Mileage may vary. I can't guarantee this will massively improve your performance, I can only say mine did a huge leap and the response from my friends has been very positive.

If anybody is more familiar with the configuration I am touching, please let me know and I will adjust it. I am merely showing this around because it looks like a promising starting point for many who have weird performance issues.

If this helped you, please let us know with a short comment how much your FPS and joystick ( ͡° ͜ʖ ͡°) went up.

Update: What we've learned.

Since this is starting to make bigger waves I decided to create a video compiling a lot of key points of this thread of all sorts. I made a 16 minute long video that should be a one-for-all guide catering all types of users.
>> All-In-One Video Guide <<

If you prefer to go through this in a written version, the agenda i go off on in the video can be found below in prosa.
Timestamps for the video:
General Info: 0:00
Additional Fixes & Troubleshooting: 3:57
Calculating your Values: 6:58
Finding the file: 9:50
Explanations about the File: 10:30
Actually configuring it: 11:58
Zero Config & Theory Crafting: 14:28
Written Version:
TLDR Possible Benefits * strong fps gains (up to 50%) * better stability, less jitter * better load times Condensation * newer processors seem to be already fed correctly, ryzens mostly * older processors seem to benefit a lot more from this, especially the 4th gen i7 / i5 (4790K) * scroll the thread. try to Ctrl + F your proc / gpu, a lot of kind people post references * deleting the file or entering critically low / impossible values will most likely resolved by the engine initializing with defaults * safe tryout can be the 'zero' config * its not placebo, its just possible the changes are very minimal for your setup Troubleshooting / Additional Fixes * VS Code is light & should replace notepad on windows. Treat yourself to a good editor. https://code.visualstudio.com * running 'Cyberpunk 2077.exe' as admin can help sometimes * make sure to run the latest nvidia drivers. * pay attention to formatting in the csv * yamashi's https://github.com/yamashi/PerformanceOverhaulCyberpunk (mentioned by u/SplunkMonkey) * u/-home 's https://www.reddit.com/Amd/comments/kbuswu/a_quick_hex_edit_makes_cyberpunk_better_utilize/ AMD Hex Edit (mentioned by u/Apneal) * if your pc starts to behave strange, lower the Pools, try zero config How To Calculate Values? * Task Manager / Performance * https://www.heise.de/download/product/gpu-z-53217/download for GPU-Z * Amount of RAM / 2 & leave atleast 4GB for windows Examples: 64GB RAM = 32GB 32GB RAM = 16GB - 24GB 16GB RAM = 8GB - 12GB 8GB RAM = 4GB Folder Locations
Steam
X:\...\Steam\steamapps\common\Cyberpunk 2077\engine\config
GOG
Y:\...\GOG Galaxy\Games\Cyberpunk 2077\engine\config
Epic Games
Z:\...\Epic Games\Cyberpunk 2077\engine\config

My personal memory_pool_budgets.csv
;;; ; ^[1-9][0-9]*(B|KB|MB|GB) - Pool budget ; -1 - Pool does not exist on the current platform ; 0 - Budget will be computed dynamically at runtime ; PC ; Durango ; Orbis PoolRoot ; ; ; PoolCPU ; 16GB ; 1536MB ; 1536MB PoolGPU ; 10GB ; 3GB ; 3GB PoolFlexible ; -1 ; -1 ; 0 PoolDefault ; 1KB ; 1KB ; 1KB PoolLegacyOperator ; 1MB ; 1MB ; 1MB PoolFrame ; 32MB ; 32MB ; 32MB PoolDoubleBufferedFrame ; 32MB ; 32MB ; 32MB PoolEngine ; 432MB ; 432MB ; 432MB PoolRefCount ; 16MB ; 16MB ; 16MB PoolDebug ; 512MB ; 512MB ; 512MB PoolBacked ; 512MB ; 512MB ; 512MB
Donations
~~I have been asked by a very small amount of people if there's another way they can send a little something my way besides reddit, so here's my business paypal:~~ Paypal Link removed since 1.05 says this file does nothing. The one person who has donated 4.69$ will be refunded immediately. :)
~~Please feel zero obligation to do so, I greatly appreciate it though if you decide to.~~
Please consider donating money to the people creating performance mods (yamashi for example), creating a codebase like that takes a LOT of time and sending a digital coffee their way can be a serious motivation booster.

I made a game in a month and earned 30k in revenue

[Video Games/Rollercoaster Tycoon] Theme Park Studio: How a developer set exceedingly high expectations and failed to meet them

Tl;dr: fans of a video game are excited about the release of what could be the spiritual successor of their video game. Said developer makes very bold promises and obviously fails to deliver, finally releasing a very disappointing game and alienating most of the community.
I recently stumbled upon this subreddit; I've enjoyed reading most of the posts here and figured I had a few stories to share as well. From 2012 to about 2018, I was active (though with intermittent breaks) in a community of Rollercoaster Tycoon 3 players. This was a small community, with no more than a few hundred active members at its heyday and only a few people active now. Despite its small size, there were definitely a few memorable instances of drama. This is one of those stories; it actually involved another game called Theme Park Studio, which – as you may expect from the title – was not what it promised to be.
Background
Rollercoaster Tycoon 3 was released in October 2004, developed by Frontier and published by Atari. It was primarily a theme park management game, where players have to earn money and keep guests happy in a theme park by constructing and maintaining rides, shops, paths, scenery and more. There was also a sandbox mode that allowed players to build without any monetary restrictions. A small but active community set out to build roller coasters and theme parks (and occasionally completely different projects) in this sandbox mode and share their results online.
While the game was good for its time and viewed positively by many, it did have some downsides. Firstly, the game used a grid: when placing rides and scenery, you were confined to this grid and had little freedom to place things where you want. Secondly, the roller coaster construction system was limited compared to similar games, and as a result most roller coasters were hardly very smooth. Thirdly, the game was poorly optimized. As an example: the game had a day-night cycle, but the game was basically unplayable at night, so people set the game to only daytime.
Over time, people became more and more ambitious in their projects, and these problems became more apparent. As a solution, lots of custom content (akin to mods in other games) was made by members of the community: custom scenery objects, custom rides and even custom roller coaster tracks. These objects were much more versatile and looked much better than most in-game content. As a result, people almost exclusively used custom content to build their projects. Combined with some smart picture and video editing, almost nothing was still recognizable from the original game.
While custom content brought a whole new level of versatility and arguably kept the community running for a long time, the aforementioned problems still persisted. Because the game was being pushed to its limits, people were wondering when a sequel was coming. By 2012, there was no word yet by Atari on a potential sequel, and many similar games from other video game publishers had failed to offer any meaningful improvement to Rollercoaster Tycoon 3. However, this was soon to change.
The spiritual successor
Enter Pantera Entertainment, a small, unknown video game publisher and developer. In November 2012, they posted a trailer to Theme Park Studio, which presented itself as a theme park building tool. Unlike Rollercoaster Tycoon 3, which had a focus on park management, the focus was on building attractive theme parks and rides. Many of the aforementioned issues were solved in this game: there was no grid-based system that dictated where you had to build, roller coasters could be constructed with much more freedom, and the graphics looked more modern. One major feature was the ability to import custom content. Obviously this was also possible in Rollercoaster Tycoon 3, but only using third-party software. That the developers were now anticipating for this was a good sign.
The community was generally excited about Theme Park Studio: it looked to be the spiritual successor to Rollercoaster Tycoon 3. The staff from Pantera would even visit the forums (at the time, most of the community was active through online messaging boards) and would happily provide updates, answer questions and take suggestions. This left a good impression with most of the community.
Over the coming months, more and more promises were being made on new features and huge amounts of content. The game was looking to become a very ambitious project. Now, it would later be discovered that little development had actually been done on the game: the trailer had really only showed footage from Pantera’s earlier title, Hyper Rails. Nevertheless, the release date was set for summer 2013, and the community was still optimistic for a long time.
In April 2013, a Kickstarter campaign was set up. For the uninitiated, Kickstarter allows for developers to source crowdfunding for a project. Developers set a goal and have a set time to achieve that goal. People can ‘back’ a project by donate towards that goal, and in return receive rewards based on the amount they donated. Money only goes towards the project if that goal is actually reached; otherwise the ‘backers’ receive their money back. Well, Pantera set a goal of $80.000 for Theme Park Studio, to be fulfilled within a month. Backer rewards were ambitious: lower amounts would get you the game for free, both a physical and digital copy, and perhaps some merchandise, while those who backed larger amounts were allowed to suggest or design certain rides for the game, and the highest-tier backers (think $500 or more, which only a few people donated) would get you an invitation to a big release party. Now, keep these rewards in mind, as they’ll become important later on.
It took a while and people feared the goal wouldn’t be met, but thanks to enough promotion and a few generous donations, about $100.000 was raised, and the goal was met. Despite Pantera’s ambitious promises, the community was optimistic. Some high-standing members of the community were even assisting in the development of the game and were offering their custom content – made for Rollercoaster Tycoon 3 – to be used in Theme Park Studio. Unfortunately, as we would later discover, this hard work would never really pay off.
Early access
The Kickstarter campaign offered a release date of September 2013. As time went on, it became very apparent that this was unachievable. The game was delayed several times; first to later in 2013, then to April 2014. Finally, they announced that instead of waiting for the complete game, Theme Park Studio would enter Early Access on Steam in February 2014.
Early Access allows people to play a game before its full release. People can play the game and offer feedback to the developers, who can use this feedback to improve the game and add new content in free updates to the players. In this case, that would mean that Theme Park Studio would first release as a basic theme park builder, and that other features, such as new rides and the custom content importer would be added later.
Early Access is an example of something that works well on paper, but is often butchered in practice. When done well, Early Access is a win-win situation: players don’t have to wait to play the game but can get involved in its development, and developers will receive money which they can use to fund the rest of the development. Unfortunately, it is rarely done well, and there are many games released through Early Access that are flat-out unplayable or clearly unfinished. Similarly, many games never leave Early Access or only leave many years later, because developers have little incentive to improve and complete a game they’ve already received money for.
Well, Theme Park Studio would turn out to fit the latter category. Upon release, the game was... disappointing. Most notable was the lack of ability to build roller coasters: players could only build flat rides (simple rides such as a merry-go-round or a Ferris wheel). The game was also poorly optimized and didn’t look particularly great. Still, many people called for the community to be patient and wait for new updates to come: Pantera had provided a route map for the implementation of further updates to provide some perspective.
This implementation was generally very slow. For example, the ability to build roller coasters – a rather essential part of a theme park construction tool - didn’t come until August that year; even then, people weren’t happy about it, as it was unintuitive and difficult to use, and many considered it hardly an improvement from Rollercoaster Tycoon 3. The community slowly grew divided. A sizeable group defended Theme Park Studio and called for people to be patient, but a growing group had become very critical of the game and its developers. However, besides lacking updates and producing a game of low quality, there were other glaring issues as well.
Pantera loses approval
Now, remember the aforementioned Kickstarter rewards? As time went on, it became increasingly clear that many of these rewards would never be released. Many people complained about not receiving digital access to the game once it was released through Early Access, despite promises from Pantera – and that was the easiest reward for them to fulfil. Even to this day, some people are yet to receive digital access. People were also losing hope about higher-tier rewards, such as physical copies of the game, merchandise and the release party.
Probably the most controversial reward tiers were those that allowed backers to design rides, however. More than 100 people had pledged enough money to have a ride suggestion implemented into the game. It turned out, however, that many of these suggestions would never see the light of day. On the forums, people complained about their suggestions being rejected, while some received no response from Pantera. When eventually an update was released that was supposed to contain rides suggested by backers, people noted that way fewer rides were added than that there were backers. I don’t remember the exact numbers, but I think no more than 10% saw their rides actually published in-game.
Now, resentment grew towards Pantera for failing to uphold their end of the bargain and releasing an unfinished, low-quality game. By this time, there was also not much left of the actively involved, feedback-taking staff that represented the game when it was first announced: the developer became notorious for failing to take and accept constructive criticism. Many people had their posts removed and accounts banned from the official Theme Park Studio forum for speaking out against the developer.
Another absurd rule on their forums was their stance on ‘dark rides’, mainly indoor rides based around creating an atmosphere above being thrilling, such as a haunted house. As the name suggests, many dark rides are dark: the atmosphere is creepy or scary, and many horror themes are used. Well, the forum banned the posting of rides containing demonic themes or otherwise being ‘sacrilegious’, effectively meaning most dark rides. This pissed off the community, as quite a few people made dark rides and this was seen as infringement on their creativity. It also spawned a series of memes on rides that were “too dark and sinister for Theme Park Studio”. Another questionable decision by the development team was to add VR support; while becoming the only theme park building or management game to have it, it was generally criticised because it would add very little to the game and so many other aspects of the game needed much more working on. I’m sure there were other decisions made by Pantera that received significant backlash from the community, but these I remember best.
The aftermath
Over time, interest in Theme Park Studio faded away and people generally gave up hope that they would ever receive their Kickstarter rewards. There were still a few avid supporters of the game, but the broken promises, slow progress, disappointing results and bad PR meant most people in the community had changed their stance over the years. The game was forgotten and slowly faded into irrelevance. There was no real way for backers to get their money back or otherwise hold Pantera accountable for the unfulfilled promises, an issue that other failed Kickstarter campaigns unfortunately also have. Amazingly, some of the backers reported actually receiving a physical copy of the game, albeit five or six years after the initial Kickstarter campaign, but similarly there are still people waiting for their rewards to this date.
Theme Park Studio was finally released in December 2016, after many years in development. It released without much fanfare and definitely without a release party that backers had paid hundreds, sometimes even thousands of dollars for; many people didn’t even notice it had left Early Access. The game never took off and its reviews on Steam are mostly negative. The entire fiasco made people much more sceptical of other new games: from 2014 onwards, many other theme park simulation games were announced and released, but people were much more cautiously optimistic about these games (and rightfully so; many of them failed, but those are stories for another time).
Eventually, the true spiritual successor to Rollercoaster Tycoon 3 was released: Planet Coaster, developed by Frontier (the original developers of Rollercoaster Tycoon 3). It was released in November 2016, prompting some to think that the definitive release of Theme Park Studio only weeks later was a hasty attempt to piggyback off of that success. It did almost everything Theme Park Studio promised and offered the possibility to build much more detailed and complex rides. Over time, many people who played Rollercoaster Tycoon 3 switched over to Planet Coaster because of the vast improvements.
People generally forgot about Theme Park Studio, and many people wanted to leave it in the past. It’s hard to find many of the original forum posts on the topic. RCTLounge, one of the major forums on the topic, was closed in 2016 due to inactivity. In 2018, Shyguy’s World, another forum on the topic, actually removed the Theme Park Studios board and deleted all posts to forget about the ‘dark and sinister’ affair. As the forum’s owner said: “The first rule of Theme Park Studio... you do not talk about Theme Park Studio”. The official Theme Park Studios forums are also down and the website is vastly outdated. Most of this post was sourced by memories, the Wayback machine and the few threads I could still find.
Many people agreed that Pantera was probably a well-intentioned company that had simply bitten off more than they could chew. Clearly they had vastly underestimated the difficulty of this project and lost any drive to complete the project as it went on and support disappeared. Nevertheless, all the drama resulted in a bitter aftertaste for many people and changed people’s outlooks on the future releases of similar games.

How to Survive Camping - what does this campground have against my four-wheelers

I run a private campground. I wish I could say that the worst thing I have to deal with in this job is spreading manure around as fertilizer but no, I’ve got bodies to dispose of, spiders inside of brussels sprouts to contend with, and bargains with sentient mounds of jellied flesh to fulfill.
If you’re new here, you should really start at the beginning and if you’re totally lost, this might help.
I haven’t seen much of Beau lately. He’s not been showing up in the mornings anymore. Not since the whole thing with the thorns. I guess he was off being sulky that I didn’t heed his warning. I was looking forward to seeing the look on his face when I figured out all on my own how to get rid of the thorns in my lungs AND the thorns all over the campground.
...who am I kidding, he only has two expressions - disinterest and annoyance - and I don’t think he’ll be adding surprise to the list anytime soon.
Well, I was still holding out hope for a single eyebrow raised in mild disbelief. I think that’d be as close as I’ll get to a compliment.
If you’re questioning my confidence right now, well, I feel it’s merited. I was right about the gummy bears being spawned from the beliefs of a long-dead civilization. Considering my theories are wrong more often than not, that’s quite an accomplishment in my book.
I do try to do my research and while a lot of this is guesswork based on unreliable sources, sometimes I get lucky, I suppose. With Mattias’s journal though, I’m hoping we’ll stop being lucky and start being right.
My brother has the journal indexed. He’s gone through and marked which parts seem to relate to which creature. He spends a lot of time reading while holding his daughter. He tells me that she’ll quiet down as soon as he sits down to read with her and it’s funny, it’s almost like her eyes are tracking on the pages. I’ve been telling myself that this is fine, the fairies are technically on my side right now, but also this is a changeling and changelings are evil little shits so I can’t help but be a little alarmed.
He gave me all the page numbers that referenced the hall. I did my research and I made a plan. While Mattias didn’t have reason to request anything from the gummy bear king, he did have reason to make a hasty exit at one point. Attempted murder is liable to piss off anyone, inhuman or not. So Mattias tried to kill the gummy bears in their own lair, it failed spectacularly, and then he had to flee. And you think I’m reckless. Despite the failed assassination attempt, he at least successfully escaped, and bless him, he wrote down how he did it.
I’ve learned the importance of having a reliable escape route, after the thing in the dark swatted my four-wheeler like it was a cat toy.
All that was left was to secure an offering to the gummy bears. They wouldn’t give me what I wanted if they didn’t believe I was going to leave them a live human being in exchange. Now, a lot of you had suggestions for the sorts of individuals that this world would perhaps be better off without or perhaps wouldn’t mind a swift departure from existence. I’m sure I could make any of those options work. However, much like myself, this town has selective morality. Losing some people due to predation by the creatures that inhabit my campground? Yes, fine, this is merely the natural consequences of existing alongside the inhuman realm. Offering someone as a sacrifice for a bargain with these evil things? Oh hell no.
I could argue that this was necessary to keep the town safe and I might sway them to my side but it’d take a town hall meeting and likely most of what little political capital I retain around here. I’d have to deal with malicious rumors for years to come. Kate made a bargain with one of those things. Kate can’t be trusted. Who knows what else she’s made agreements with?
For the record, they don’t know about Beau and they aren’t going to find out.
And finally... last time I dealt with a human sized gummy bear I wound up with some of its splattered remains in my mouth. I’d prefer to keep them largely confined to creatures that are easily punted into the nearest tree.
So in order to trick the gummy bears I needed a willing accomplice. Yes, yes, I know cheating has its own risks, but it sometimes works out in the stories. It’s a valid strategy. Humans can get away with it.
I thought about asking my brother, but that hardly seemed fair. He’s got a new daughter and technically she’s a changeling, but at some point she’s going to be the real deal and I shouldn’t endanger him unnecessarily. Not when I had other options. I needed someone with enough sense to know when to run but perhaps not enough self-preservation to know when to say ‘no’. Most of my full time staff don’t fulfill the latter requirement and my part-time staff don’t fulfill the former. There was one person I could think of, though they weren’t local and might require some additional enticement. It was worth a try.
I dialed up a number that had been included with a Christmas card that I was frankly a little surprised to get. The woman on the other end didn’t seem too surprised when she picked up and I said who it was.
“Want to pull a Prometheus with me?” I asked.
“That turned out pretty badly in the myth,” Turtle replied.
“I’ve managed to pull it off.”
“Yeah, I know, I keep up with the posts. So what are you planning, boss?”
Aw. She still calls me boss.
“Yeah, I’ll do it,” she said when I explained the plan. “But I want full access to your library, family notes, and the photocopier.”
The photocopier is very old and I’m amazed it still works. I don’t like other people using it because I’m afraid they’ll press the keys the wrong way (I’m not being paranoid, there really is a right way with this thing) and then I’ll have to spend money on a new photocopier. But I agreed, after making Turtle promise she’d be very careful when making copies.
A few days later Turtle arrived. I let her have access to my study and the photocopier while I checked the traps for a gummy bear. It took a few days but I’ve got a guest bedroom and Turtle went through an entire package of paper making copies. When I found one, I radioed her and told her where to meet me. She brought my four-wheeler. We were going to do this the easy way. I strapped the cage down on the back and hopped on and instead of spending hours following a crippled jellified raccoon, we spent like fifteen minutes driving in a circle through the deep woods. Then I set the cage down, released the gummy bear, and took a crowbar to its squishy little body as soon as it crawled out.
Everything proceeded just as before. The smoke escaped from its remains and rolled uphill and the trees bent sideways, twining their branches together to form a doorway.
“You sure you’re ready for this?” I asked Turtle just before we stepped through.
“Got my running shoes on, boss.”
We’d agreed the night before that if something went wrong we would escape using zombie apocalypse rules. You didn’t have to outrun the gummy bears, you just had to outrun the other person. Considering I work outdoors and Turtle works in a bakery/bookshop, I was pretty certain I was the one with better cardio.
We entered the hall together. In my right hand I carried the item that would be the key to our escape. Turtle carried a flashlight and she shone it into the shadows near the wall. Black smoke quickly dispersed out of sight wherever the beam of light fell. After a bit of this Turtle turned it off. No sense antagonizing them. We were presumably here to parley, after all.
We found the dais with the gummy bear king already enthroned, its stone teeth and eyes jiggling unnervingly in its gelatinous mass.
“I brought you a body,” I said. “See? I’ve kept my end of our bargain.”
“Uh,” Turtle stammered. “Um.”
She’d tried to think of a script to really sell the idea that she’d been brought here deceitfully but she’s not that great of an actress so I suggested she not say anything at all. However, the nervous stammering she improv’d was actually working quite well. She legitimately sounded suddenly alarmed and I glanced around quickly to make sure nothing was crawling out of the shadows at us. There was nothing. Turtle was just nervous.
“It will suffice,” the gummy bear king bubbled. “I shall give it to one of my people. Perhaps the feel of living flesh will remind them.”
“Remind them of what?”
Beside me, Turtle shifted nervously. She took a step away, towards the exit, and I absently reached out and grabbed her arm to stop her from fleeing. It was meant to be reassuring, acknowledging that we were in this together, but Turtle jumped a little and looked even more nervous. Her face was pale and her eyes were wide. I’d tried to prepare her for what we’d see, but I guess I hadn’t done a good enough job of it. Had she ever dealt with the gummy bears during the summer she worked here? I couldn’t recall.
“None remember what we were,” it sighed. “Those that created us are nothing but a vague memory and so we have been forgotten. And because no one knows us anymore, my people no longer know themselves.”
“You remember,” I said.
“I was their king. I had a name. I don’t recall what it was, but the weight of it echoes. Someday that, too, will die away and then this hall and everything within it will be gone.”
There was such sorrow in its voice. Like the master of the vanishing house, desperately clinging to life, begging to be worshipped or feared or loved so that it might live another day, another year, or more. These creatures, too, were fading away. It was only a matter of time and here was their king, asking only for some small comfort for its people before they faced oblivion.
The guilt stabbed through me for what I intended to do.
“So how do I get rid of the thorns?” I asked.
“The Partholan came from the land of the dead, they say,” it sighed. “We, too, are affiliated with death. And when the disease started to take them and when they realized that their end was upon them, they dug their own graves. We carry that death inside us. Come closer, campground manager.”
I walked close and put one foot up on the dais. Behind me, I heard Turtle squeak my name nervously. I glanced back to see what the matter was and found the smoke starting to billow inwards from the shadows, creeping closer to her feet in anticipation of taking her flesh for its own.
“Hey, don’t block off my exit,” I snapped, “lest I think you’re making this bargain in bad faith.”
In the stories, humans can lie as much as they wish. Inhuman things typically aren’t so unrestrained.
The smoke recoiled and Turtle let out an audible sigh of relief.
“Hold out your hand,” the gummy bear king commanded.
I did. And it spat a tooth out. The small stone landed on my palm, sticky with slime. I remembered, vividly, the remains of the human gummy bear splattering across my face and it took an act of will to not drop the stone and rub my hand raw against my jeans in a compulsive attempt to get the feel of it off my skin.
“Thanks,” I said, my composure strained. “What do I do with this?”
“I cannot say in what manner you will have to apply it. All I can promise is that it carries a death inside of it; a death intended for the thorns.”
I carefully slipped the pebble into my jeans pocket and as I did, I palmed the other object in there and covertly drew it out. I kept it concealed in my closed fist as I backed away from the dais to stand near Turtle.
“You told me that you knew something about my death,” I said.
“A body for the stone,” the creature replied. “That was our bargain.”
“I want to know what you’ve seen!”
Its eyes shifted inside its pallid mass and the remaining stone teeth stretched into a leering grin.
“I wish for a body,” it said. “This one you’ve brought me is a fine vessel for any of my people, but it is not fit for a king. Bring me another, a body worthy of my stature, and I will tell you more.”
I understand this game. It would ask for more and more, dangling its promise of answers in front of me like a lure each time. It was a noose it wanted me to willingly place my neck through. The bargain would ruin me.
Good thing I never intended to honor it in the first place.
“Fine,” I snapped. “Turtle, let’s go.”
She certainly didn’t have to be told twice. Her face softened with intense relief and she quickly turned and took a few steps towards the exit. The black smoke was quick to roll out of the shadows, cutting off the path. I wasn’t concerned. Not yet. I continued to face the gummy bear king on the dais.
“We had a bargain,” it hissed, the flesh rippling rapidly, stretching thin as it drew itself up in height.
“And I am a descendent of Mattias,” I replied, “and as treacherous as he was.”
“You have no fire,” it burbled. “I would not have let you enter if you had brought some.”
That is how Mattias escaped, after he failed to kill the gummy bear king. He threw his lantern to the floor and the hall - entirely made of wood - burned, and the black smoke fled from the flames.
“Yeah, well, technology has progressed a bit since Mattias’s time.”
I opened my palm to reveal what I’d retrieved from my pocket.
“This,” I said, flicking the cap off, “is a lighter. And this-”
I raised the bottle I carried in my right.
“-is a molotov cocktail.”
I lit it and threw as the smoke billowed towards us. The smoke stopped short, cascading into a wall of vapor at the edge of the light cast by the exploding flames behind us. I pulled the bandana around my neck up and over my nose and mouth and Turtle did the same. The fire was spreading quickly, climbing up the columns and across the walls. We kept in the boundary between it and the darkness, staying just ahead of the advancing flames, but not so far that the gummy bears could reach us. The hot air scorched my cheeks and it was hard to breathe, but I could see daylight up ahead. The archway was almost within reach.
Their hall would survive. It would restore itself, just as it had when Mattias set it alight in his time. Perhaps it would be weakened in doing so. If we were lucky, this would be its final collapse and I would succeed where Mattias had failed.
Better that these remnants perish. A slow death is a cruel death and their death throes bring such suffering to those unfortunate enough to be caught up in them.
This was the comfort I offered to myself as the hall burned.
“Damn your family!” the gummy bear king howled from behind us. “A curse upon you! May your death catch you, may you greet it with regret!”
I do not fear its curse. My family already carries one. And what death hasn’t been met with regret? We always yearn for a minute more, even as we resign ourselves to our passing.
We passed through the archway and were in the forest once more. I pulled the bandana down and gratefully gulped at clean air, blinking tears out of my stinging eyes. For a moment, I couldn’t see, blinded by the soot from the fire and the brilliant sunlight reflecting off the snow. Then, my eyesight cleared, and I saw something rather unexpected.
Beau stood nearby, leaning on a tree with his arms crossed over his chest.
“Uh,” I said. “Hi?”
He didn’t reply. He just glowered at me. And then I felt Turtle tugging the sleeve of my jacket, nervously calling my name, and I turned to see what she wanted.
She was pointing at the archway. It hadn’t unraveled yet. I could see the flames of the burning hall still.
And they were dwindling. Rapidly.
“That’s odd,” I said absently.
The fire was splitting in two. A tunnel appeared in the flames. Something was smothering them, something immense enough to cut them in two, pushing them away and towards the walls of the hall. Something immense, something that bubbled, something that had two stones for eyes that were fixed on the entrance where I stood watching in dawning realization that our escape had not gone precisely as planned.
The gummy bear king was coming. A wall of roiling flesh, growing ever larger to encompass the entire hall was bearing down on us, intent on forcing its way through the gateway that I had opened and entering the campground.
I grabbed at the tree and pulled, trying to see if I could separate the branches that comprised the archway. Nothing. The flames were flickering away, plunging the hall into darkness once more. In desperation, I whirled on Beau.
“Do something!” I yelled at him.
“This was your idea,” he replied calmly.
Running wasn’t enough. The gummy bears aren’t that dangerous when they’re merely stealing whatever bodies they could find. But if that thing escaped, exactly as it was? I couldn’t have that. I couldn’t let it into my campground. Frantically, I looked around for something that could be used to break apart the trees and destroy the gateway.
Turtle was quicker on the uptake than I was. I heard an engine rev and then Turtle yelled at me to get out of the way. I stumbled to the side just as Turtle hurtled past on my four-wheeler and rammed one of the trees.
The tree jolted and the branches creaked, tearing away from each other under the strain as the four-wheeler fishtailed in the doorway. Past Turtle’s head I could see the incoming wall of flesh, rolling and bubbling as it cascaded down the long hall. We didn’t have enough time. The four-wheeler wasn’t powerful enough to bring down the tree.
I grabbed Turtle’s arm and pulled her off the seat. She stumbled and I continued to drag her through the snow, away from the archway and towards where Beau stood watching. If we were going to get consumed, then by god, he was coming with me.
The gummy bear king surged out through the gateway like toothpaste from a tube. It enveloped the four wheeler, which tumbled sideways into the creature’s mass, wheels still spinning. It sprayed jellied flesh, shredding the face of the gummy bear king. The creature retreated from the onslaught and the trees, strained by the passage of the avalanche of flesh, finally loosened their grip on each other. They sprang upright, their branches releasing.
The gateway snapped shut. And the gummy bear king went with it, its bulk dragged backwards with a sickening slorp.
It dragged the four-wheeler along with it.
I admit that is what finally broke me, watching my vehicle carried away on a tide of translucent flesh. I kicked at the snow. I yelled. I didn’t have the presence of mind to even form coherent sentences so I just wound up screaming “fuck” a lot at the top of my lungs. And when I had exhausted my rage, I stood there with my chest heaving, exhausted.
So that’s another four-wheeler gone. It won’t be replaced. That was my personal one and it was a donation, since I’ve already emptied my vehicle budget. I guess I’ll just be walking everywhere because I’m not about to risk the staff four-wheelers or golf carts.
Though I swear, if I have to deal with a gummified four-wheeler this summer I’m gonna be really angry.
“Sorry about that,” Turtle said nervously. “I, uh, can’t afford to replace that for you.”
“It’s fine,” I sighed. “You did the right thing. And that was some good acting in there. Convinced me that you were terrified for your life.”
“I’ll be honest: that wasn’t acting,” she admitted. “It occurred to me that this was precisely how you would lure someone in as an actual sacrifice. I mean, I wouldn’t be the first employee you killed.”
Ooof.
I didn’t really know how to reply to that so I turned my attention to Beau instead. He didn’t say anything. Just held out his cup and after a moment, I realized what he was expecting. Not blood freely given, the cup was nearly full.
He wanted the pebble.
I took it from my pocket and held it up. Just an ordinary gray rock. I dropped it into the skull. The liquid inside began to boil and thick steam rose from the surface.
“Breathe it in,” he instructed.
I’ll be honest - I didn’t expect it to be pleasant. His whole deal is either involuntary fasting or prolonged vomiting, after all. But it was worse than I expected. My whole body cramped up and I collapsed into the snow, curled into a fetal ball and every time I exhaled I brought up thick clumps that looked like bloody seaweed. Turtle had to use my radio to call for Bryan to bring one of the staff vehicles around and help transport me back to my house. And Beau just wandered off, taking the cup and the pebble with him.
I spent the next couple hours on the floor of my bathroom coughing up sludge. Turtle came in to check on me a couple times I think and eventually I wore myself out and fell asleep. I woke up still on the bathroom floor, but she’d cleaned up the blood and put a pillow under my head and covered me with a blanket.
I couldn’t convince her to come back to the campground this summer. The bakery/bookstore gig is conveniently close to home. She left this morning. Tomorrow I’ll go searching for Beau and find out what he’s done with that pebble. I can only hope that he’s already taken it upon himself to deal with the thorns… and that I’ll get the pebble back before the campground opens again.
I’m not sure I want to find out what’ll happen if he starts offering people drinks with it still in his cup.
I’m a campground manager. I do what I must to keep myself alive. Humans are weak, slow, and woefully unequipped to survive the things that lurk in the dark parts of the forest. All we have are our wits and our lies. As a society, we abhor deceit, because we know it to be a weapon. Yet against these inhuman things we must seize every weapon we can, if we are to survive them.
I tell my campers to follow the rules because that will keep them safe. Yet this thing I am caught up in is more than a fight for survival. It is a fight for my land, a fight to determine who will control the future of this campground and have sway over all the land that surrounds it and perhaps even further. There is no rule I will not break. There is no weapon I will not use.
I broke a promise and burned the hall of the gummy bears. I would do it again and again, every time, if that is what it took to save my land. [x]
Whatever it takes.
Read the full list of rules.
Visit the campground's website.

A SIR_JACK_A_LOT Christmas Carol - My magnum dong opus on turning $35K to $1.75M (50X) in less than a year

Lessons I learnt the long/hard way, so you don't have to.

Update Thank you for all the comments below. I've tried to include as many tips and fail safes you have mentioned, in this post. I do recommend people read the comments as I may have missed some.
Firstly, thank you to this excellent community my PC is now built and working (pics to come in another post). I thought here are some lessons I learnt in building the PC, researching and other bits I thought would be worth sharing, as a lot of this I never had even heard about. Some will be obvious and others less so. I should note, that I'm not a pro or someone who does this regularly, just someone who spent a while reading around, so feel free to correct/highlight any mistakes, and I'll try to update the post. The descriptions, aren't really meant to be a full lesson about each part and will be lacking a lot of detail, but are more a jumping board for further reading if anyone is interested. For full information on building a PC I highly recommend looking around on YouTube and other sources.
If I get anything wrong, please correct me and I'll update.
On Monitors:

If you are after 144Hz 1440p gaming, use a Display Port (DP) cable, not a HDMI, if you can. As you could be hampering your refresh rate, (https://www.tomshardware.com/uk/features/displayport-vs-hdmi-better-for-gaming) Update Although you could be fine if you are using HDMI 2.1, see link for more details
Freesync vs Gsync. For simplicity, both these technologies aim to match performance on screen with your GPU. Freesync works with Radeon, GSync with NVidia (although some Freesync monitors will be GSync compatible, likewise for the otherway around). It's complicated and due to changes in the standards over the years it can vary from monitor to monitor. Make sure to do research on the specific monitor you're wanting to get/have. If you are buying a new monitor keep this in mind. https://www.viewsonic.com/library/entertainment/g-sync-vs-free-sync-explained UpdateAccording to comments freesync monitors will almost always work with Nvidia. As always, do read around about it.
Windows by default is set to have a refresh rate of 60Hz, if you have a higher spec monitor you can change this to match your monitor in "Advanced Display settings".

RAM (All except point 1 was completely new to me)

2 Sticks of 8GB Ram will perform better than 1 stick of 16GB Ram (https://techguided.com/single-channel-vs-dual-channel-vs-quad-channel/). Also when installing them, put them in the correct channels, check your Motherboard for details.
Your motherboard will prefer your dual channel RAM to be in specific slots. I had an issue where I couldn't get the maximum performance of my RAM which I had placed in slots 1 and 3, but the moment I put them in 2 and 4 it worked perfectly. Check your motherboard manual.
Enable XMP in Bios (This might also be called DOCP or A-XMP). This will vary between motherboards, but if you don't your 3200MHz ram is likely running a lot slower. In my build, XMP wouldn't work till I put the RAM in the correct channels, hope this saves someone the hours I spent finding this out ;) Update You can use Task manager to verify you have done this correctly. 3b. Someone pointed this out XMP may void your CPU's processor (https://community.amd.com/t5/processors/xmp-profile-ram-3200-mhz-and-amd-warranty-policy-for-ryzen/td-p/145798) (https://community.intel.com/t5/Processors/XMP-Warranty-void/td-p/1196241). If anyone knows any more, please message me directly so I can add the details. This was mentioned by someone in the comments and I would rather pass the information and ask you to do your own checking as well.
When picking RAM, frequency matters, but so does CAS Latency. You want high frequency but low CAS (CL) latency. I'd recommend doing more reading about it, if you want to know more I'd recommend doing some more reading, but the "true latency" can be calculated as TL = CL * 2000/Freq. E.g. CL 18 3600Mhz Ram has a TL of 10ns. Update Someone who actually knows what they are talking about found point (4) confusing if not perhaps misguided and I recommend you read their post here (https://www.reddit.com/buildapc/comments/kis9r5/lessons_i_learnt_the_longhard_way_so_you_dont/ggtdudd?utm_source=share&utm_medium=web2x&context=3)
Ensure the speed of the RAM is compatible with the board you are looking to purchase (or visa versa).
Motherboards will have Qualified Vendor Lists, listing RAM they have tested and certified to work. This may be worth looking at. Just because your RAM isn't on the list doesn't mean it won't work, or won't overclock, it just means it hasn't been certified to, so do take this into consideration. (I found this in my build, while it was from Crucial and some Crucial RAM was on the QVL, mine wasn't. Thankfully it was fine.)

Motherboards

Newer processors (e.g. at time of writing many AMD motherboards require a bios update for the 5000 series AMD CPU) may require you to install a new BIOS before they can be detected. Not all motherboards can have their bios updated without a CPU installed. When shopping for your motherboard looking to see if it does USB Bios flashback should be considered. This was completely new to me and glad I learnt it in time.*Addition* Newer motherboards don't require bios updates and so won't need this feature, though you will have to check.
Different mother boards are compatible with different CPUs, pick your CPU first
CPU coolers may need different mountings depending on the CPU. When picking your cooler keep this in mind, you may need to ensure there is an adaptor. Additions from the comments
Not all mother boards have connectors for front IO USB-C. If this is important to you and part of your case, it's worth looking into.
Using an M.2 usually disables some of your SATA ports. If you are planning on using all your SATA ports, make sure to check to see if this happens and how it happens on your chosen mother board.
Some motherboards are built with Debug LEDs now that will help you diagnose problems.
If you are after RGB effects, ensure your motherboard is compatible with the effects you want to add. There are 5V and 12V headers, so make sure they match. I'd recommend looking into this more yourself, as I've likely vastly oversimplified. (https://rog.asus.com/forum/showthread.php?110272-What-do-5v-and-12v-RGB-cables-look-like-you-ask#:%7E:text=You%20can%20also%20see%20the,as%20shown%20on%20these%20photos)

CPU

Some CPU's have integrated graphics. If you don't want to buy a dedicated graphics card, you need to purchase one of these CPU's. You then plug your monitor into the motherboard.
CPU's have a Thermal Design Power, if you are not using the stock cooler read up on it (https://www.tomshardware.com/uk/reviews/tdp-thermal-design-power-definition,5764.html)

Component compatibility

Make sure all your components are compatible. PC Part Picker (https://pcpartpicker.com/) is generally pretty good at this. If uncertain, this is a wonderful community to ask.

Power supply

PC Part Picker gives you a good idea as to how much power your system will need, if not check the graphics card you intend to buy. Not all machines need a 1000W behemoth. Picking the right one will save you money
Power supplies come with a rating standard e.g. Bronze+ etc..., this is basically their efficiency. (https://www.tomshardware.com/uk/news/what-80-plus-levels-mean,36721.html). I think it's safe to suggest people should at least go for Bronze.
Make sure your PSU fits in your case. I bought an ATX PSU, then decided on the 011 Dynamic Mini case, only realise it needed a SFX (smaller) PSU. I ended up going for a different case. Likewise an SFX PSU may not have the cable length you need or fit as snuggly in an ATX case (source: comments section)
Look into the build quality of the PSU. A faulty PSU can cause serious issues down the line, so it is worth taking time look at PSU Tier lists and review. (Link provided by several commenters https://linustechtips.com/topic/1116640-psucultists-psu-tier-list/)

Tools (OP Note: I've only tried Ninite)

Ninite (https://ninite.com/) Is an easy way to download all the basic programs one tends to install onto a fresh Windows install, without having to go to 10-15 websites. E.g. you can select to install Chrome, Zoom, Steam, OpenOffice all from one installer. If you keep the install, it can also be re-run to update all the software in one swoop.
Patch My PC (https://www.majorgeeks.com/files/details/patch_my_pc.html) Patches software on your PC (Thank you to the sys admin in the comments for this.)
Chocolatey (https://chocolatey.org/) A powerful command line way to install and upgrade software.

Storage

M2 drives can be SATA or NVMe, NVMe is faster. (M2 drives are generally plugged directly into the mother board, for anyone who until recently was using a hard disk drive and considered SSDs "fancy")
I highly recommend reading this comment (https://www.reddit.com/buildapc/comments/kis9r5/lessons_i_learnt_the_longhard_way_so_you_dont/ggtn00w/?context=3) as it contains stuff I was unaware of.

Case

If your case has bottom intake or exhaust vents, don't put it directly on carpet, as it can block the air flow. (Yup....I did need to be told this ^_^, my previous computer just didn't have any bottom intake, hell it hardly had any intake).
Make sure your mother board, PSU, GPU and all your components fit in the case. This is particularly worth noting if you are going for a micro ATX or a ITX case. Worth noting is to remember to include fans + GPU length, any additional length caused by radiators (if you water cool), the size of your CPU cooler (if you air cool) Additions from the comments
When considering your case, if you are water cooling, "Room for 2x 140mm fans does not always mean room for a radiator as well". Make sure to double check the clearance. Measure twice buy once.

Advice on building (Notes and horror stories from the comments) 1. Many new coolers come with pre-applied thermal paste. If yours doesn't don't forget to apply it, to the CPU (See videos by people with more experience/knowledge than me on what to do). 2. Remember your mother board I/O shield (advice from the comments about making sure to put it in before you install the motherboard, mine came with it attached). 3. Make sure the CPU is correctly installed before you clasp it down. 4. If your motherboard has two slots to install a GPU. One of them (normally the top) will provide better performance. Make sure to use the correct one. 5. Make sure your CPU cooler doesn't block a RAM slot. In making my PC the AMD wraith has a notch on one side with the AMD logo, thankfully I put the RAM in first, so I swiftly learnt that I had to rotate the cooler 180 degrees to get it to fit. 6. If you can avoid it, do not build your computer on carpet (and do not stand on carpet when building) and be aware of static when building. If this is your first build, do some reading around this. Wear a static bracelet and attach it to something grounded. 7. Remember if you have a dedicated graphics card. Plug your monitor into the graphics card, not the motherboard. 8. If you are installing fans, make sure they are in the correct direction. 9. When playing the radiator of your AIO (if you are using one) make sure part of it is higher than the pump (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BbGomv195sk) 10. It's often worth the time to read the motherboard manual. 11. This may sound silly, but cables and the sockets on the PSU are often labelled. Be aware of this, it will help you in the build.
More subjective advice

I've been recommend by numerous people to go for Gold+ PSUs, with often being stated that while its more efficient, it will also be better made. Your budget may dictate otherwise. If you look through the comments you will frequently find the advice "don't cheap out on the PSU and go for at least Gold"
For most users if your CPU comes with a stock cooler. It will be good enough. You can always change it later. If your planning to overclock, you likely know more than me, so feel free to ignore. Update According to the comments, AMD stock coolers tend to be considered good enough, Intel, not so much.
A LOT of people below have said "Do not mix cables from different PSU manufacturers." as they are not universal. I don't know anything about this, so do some additional reading if you are considering doing so. Update From further comments this is something to take serious. Update from further comments, the word of advice is "Do your research before using cables not supplied with the PSU you are using."

Further notes from the comments: Below are points I've read in the comments that might be worth drawing to people attention. Please read around the topic if it applies to you. 1. One person has said XMP causes their Oculus Rift to do weird things.
Hope this helps some people. Addition I recommend reading the comments, as many people have put in their own tips/horror stories ;)
Take care all and Merry Christmas.

The 4 Trading Fears (and how to conquer them)

Most traders think they know what is going to happen next. This causes them to put too much weight on the outcome of the current trade and forget to assess their performance as a probability game that they are playing over time (imagine focusing on your results after 100 trades instead of after just 1). Too much focus on the current trade puts extra weight on it like an exponential moving average instead of a simple moving average. Trading results are not an exponential moving average, all of your past trades matter — remember the 100 trades mentality.

“Be fearful when others are greedy and be greedy when others are fearful.”

There are two major emotions in trading: fear and greed. Warren Buffett is often quoted for “Be fearful when others are greedy and be greedy when others are fearful.” These forces constantly battle each other in the individual trader and the market as a whole as bulls fight against bears. Too much greed leads to euphoria and a lack of sensible judgment of what is going on in the market. Too much fear leads to dysphoria and a lack of control over trades and capital as depression often leads to harm-seeking behavior rather than mitigating the pain.
Fear of Losing
Effects:

Makes trader hesitant when entering or exiting. Causes an inability to pull the trigger when needed.
Can lead to bigger losses or missed profits.

Solutions:

Create a trade plan before entering a trade, ensure it has edge, a high probability of winning, and a good reward:risk ratio — then pull the trigger based on these numbers rather than emotions.
Let success mean sticking to your plan rather than making profits (you can always tweak your strategy later to lead to more profits, but you won’t get profits even on the best plan if you can’t stick to it).
Know that losses are part of the game. The best traders have tons of losses. What separates them from the rest is their ability to manage a loss and continue without being affected.

Fear of Missing Out
Effects:

Putting rules and trade plan aside just to get in a trade.
Taking any price to get in a trend just to get in, even if the price is not a good value.
Skeptics covert to fans of a trend to avoid missing out on profits or taking too big of losses betting against that trend.
All of these cause blindness to the RISK of a trade (taking trades without knowing the risk is a guaranteed loss in the long run).

Solutions:

Only trade when you have clear edge and clear reward:risk
Stick to your tested strategies — just because a wave is perfect doesn’t mean you can surf it if you don’t know how to surf!

Fear of Letting a Profit Turn Into a Loss
Effects:

Taking profits too soon and cutting your trade too short just to secure a win and not end up with a loss — great traders know the difference of opportunity cost between a losing trade and cutting a win off too soon
Wanting to feel like a winner rather than be a winner. These traders feel like getting any green number out of a trade is a good outcome, when in reality they will never break even this way. You must make big wins and small losses to come out on top as a trader. Small wins won’t get you anywhere.

Solutions:

If you are for or against a trend, stick with the trade until the trend confirms it changes (this ensure you squeeze the most out of the move and have quantifiable evidence to get out of the trade).
Understand that the market will give many “false starts” and sideways moved, but once a real trend begins, it often goes much further than anyone expects. You only become a winner by riding this real trend all the way, not by getting chopped up by the false moves.
Remember the 100 trade concept — the goal is to be profitable in 100 trades, not in 1 trade. A small win can be wiped out by a small loss (and you will always take small losses when trading). After 100 trades of this small movement up and down, you will end up breakeven or slightly down from bad fills and fees. The only way to be green after 100 trades is to make big wins because those won’t be canceled out by the small losses.

Fear of Not Being Right
Effects:

Caring too much about being right about an analysis leads to a trader forgetting that trading is a probability game. Which again puts too much focus on the present trade instead of the 100 trades.
Ego becomes inflated when you are “right” to a point of overconfidence which leads to taking on too much risk and feeling invulnerable — this can lead to huge losses as you are caught in a losing trade thinking that you are the trader who is always “right.” So you hold onto the trade to wait until it goes back to you being “right” again — but it ends up becoming a big loss or blowing your account.
Form a bad habit of thinking right vs. wrong instead of good vs. bad. There is no being “right” in trading because there is never one right answer. There are infinite opportunities at any given moment in the market, so taking one opportunity isn’t wrong just because it doesn’t make a profit — it could have still been a good trade that just didn’t work out. On the other hand, if you take a bad trade and lose money, then you can learn from this and move forward without caring about being “right or wrong.”
Prevents the trader from growth and learning because they only gather information for when they think they are “right” and ignore the information they get when they think they are “wrong” because they believe they already know why they were wrong.

Solution:

Instead of “right or wrong,” try focusing on whether you trading “good or bad.” Good trading means sticking to your tested strategies, sticking to your plan, trading without emotion, and maintaining a balanced trade mentality.
Let your ego go before trading. When you sit at your desk to trade, be aware of how your ego is trying to maintain your image of yourself. Let this go to give yourself room when trading to make mistakes and still maintain a balanced trading mentality to help limit losses and maximize profits.
Stop being a perfectionist. The best traders in the world take losses consistently, but what sets them apart from the rest is their ability to manage these losses and continue trading without any effect.
Set a goal to constantly improve instead of to always be “right.” Even if you make some bad trades, as long as you are learning from them and improving, you are going in the right direction.

The goal of managing fear is to balance it with an appropriate amount of greed in the form of confidence. Believe that if you trade well with a great strategy and always stick to your rules, you should come out profitable in the long-run. But also balance that confidence with knowing that the market doesn’t “owe” you anything and is simply an endless steam of information. It doesn’t care about you or what you think you “deserve.” Your job is to observe this stream of information and pluck trades out of it with a high probability of giving you enough profit to cover your inevitable losses.

Thank you for reading and supporting Inlight Trading and the growth of many consistently profitable traders!

I promise, I’m not here to steal your prices!

Not exactly an IDWH, so much as a I Don’t Work There...
First time posting anything like this, but I’ll try to be as precise as possible. For this story, we’ll need to take a trip in the Wayback Machine, back to the far-flung realm of 1994. The internet was still a strange and unusual thing, the Super Nintendo and Genesis were on the waning edge of the console cycles, and I (as a 15yo) was into it. The high school version of water cooler talk was what games were we playing, did we know this, have we tried that, etc.
Coming into the holiday season, I was feeling my inner math geek come to the forefront, as the parents had long since told me about Santa, and instead I was given the directive: “You have this much money for this year’s presents. Make it last.” Yes, ma’am! As I had not been introduced to any sort of spreadsheet aside from margarine, I had to cobble together two sheets of notebook paper, draw out columns and rows, and list out all the games I was interested in for the rows, and the stores I was going to check out for the columns. A handcrafted work, but for my eyes at the time I was pretty proud of it.
Cue me tagging along with mom whenever she went shopping, where I’d split off to do my thing, and she’d take care of hers. All very neat and tidy for some of the more niche and/or departed stores of yesteryear - looking at you, Larger-than-village of the Circuits. All was going well, until one fateful day, when my parents and I were visiting the Mart of Sprawls, and the following situation occurred. Conversations are paraphrased, given the timeframe involved. I will be Me, Salesdroid will be SD, and Dad will be Dad.
After entering the store, the parents went off to the fabric area to indulge Mom’s sewing hobby, while I wandered over to shelf after shelf of electronics goodness. Pulling out my handy chart, I sent to work poring over my options, weighing one game here versus two there. A grand metagame, if you will, to wring every last penny out of my purchases. Only to be stopped dead in my tracks by the bane of shoppers: an empty rack. Hrmm. I wander over to SD, who was manning the register but not busy at the time.
Me: “Excuse me, do you have suchandsuch?”
SD: “Let’s check.”
We both go back, verify the shelf is empty, nothing in the overflow area beneath the shelves, etc. Drat. I pen down a quick N/A in the appropriate box, and go back to my task. After a few moments, I become aware that SD has not gone back to the register, but is standing there, staring at me.
SD: “What are you doing?”
Me: “I’m checking prices for my presents.”
SD: “Don’t do that.”
Me: “Uhh... what?”
SD: “Don’t do that. Competitors aren’t allowed to price-shop us. It’s not allowed.”
Me: “Whatever, dude.”
At that point, I excused myself from that aisle, and walk several over to the entire row devoted to PC games (Steam was not yet in existence). After a few minutes, I notice movement out of the side of my vision, and see SD standing at the end of the aisle. Check my other side, and SD’s clone was standing at the far end. They walk forward together in tandem and box me in.
SD: “You need to leave the store now.”
I was given no room to argue; they just forced me up to the front doors, and then stood there to make sure I didn’t come back in. Now, at the time, I was old enough to have a learner’s permit for driving, so I had my own keys to the car. I go out, sit there for a moment and fume that my plans for the day were shot, and then a stray thought hits me. My parents knew I was in electronics. If they showed up looking for me in a holiday crush, and I was missing, they would absolutely freak out. So I dig in the cup holder for a quarter, march all the way across the parking lot to the gas station on the corner, and reference my handy spreadsheet for the store’s phone number. Call in to the store and have them paged over the intercom. After two pages, they pick up the phone, expecting the worst. One of the grandparents is sick, police trying to find them to deliver bad news, something! What they were not expecting was my chipper voice on the other end of the line.
Dad: “Vemika, what are you doing on the phone? Where are you?”
Me: “I’m at the gas station; they kicked me out.”
Dad: “What?!”
Me: “Yeah! They said I was price-shopping for a competitor and kicked me out.”
And then I hear the words and tone of voice that any kid knows means bad weather on the horizon. Batten down the hatches, Harriet!
Dad: “Get. Back. Here. Now.”
I just about sprinted across the parking lot, as that command brooked no room for misinterpretation. SD and his cohort had already left by the time I got back, so the parents met me at the front door, I explained more fully what happened, and then they walked me back to electronics. SD must have felt the chill of the grave approaching, as he turned around to see me. Pointing at him. With Momma Bear and Poppa Bear over each shoulder. To say he turned white as a sheet would be an understatement, but without a word, he started walking away from us.
The sight of fleeing prey awakened the thrill of the hunt in Momma Bear, so she started chasing him, demanding answers. What happened? Why? Middle of the holiday crush and you kick a kid out of the store where anyone could have been waiting? Up one aisle this scene unfolds, down a second, and up a third before SD has hit his limit. In an instant, he whips around on his heel and smarts off to Momma Bear.
Insert coin Player 2 joins the battle! Turns out Poppa Bears are really protective of their Momma Bears.
What followed was a verbal volley so ferocious and three-sided, I had no hope of following all of it. I just knew that what was unfolding before me could charitably be described as a ‘tag-team mauling’. The conversation got so loud and animated that it attracted the store manager, who had to haul everyone into the employees-only area to sort through it all.
He talks to me first, I explain what I was doing, and hand over my spreadsheet so he can see it. He undoubtedly recognized that I was handing over all his competitors’ numbers, as after a moment he handed it back and said there was nothing wrong with it. He even opined that other store managers will come in to do just that, he’ll walk around with them, chat, etc. Very straightforward interaction, as he described it.
Mom and Dad went next, venting their spleens about the situation, and while it was a bit overdramatic, they still had a pretty good point about kicking a teen out without at least inquiring if a parent is nearby. They weren’t demanding compensation, nor did we get any. They just expressed their outrage and disappointment, and they left their cart full of items where it sat to be returned to the shelves.
As for SD, I didn’t hear about any fallout from his side. But I can say for a fact that the incident was reported, as about a week later I got a call out of the blue from the district manager for the store, to apologize again on the store’s behalf and offer me a challenge of finding a better price than theirs, and they would match it. Which is something I took them up on, several times.
Edit: Corrected a few typos which spellcheck let pass. Also: holy schnikes, I was not expecting this to get as warm a reception as it did; thanks to everyone who gave it a read!

A break down of the bull case for Ethereum and how it relates to Bitcoin

There is a general understanding among ETH investors that the enhancements from ETH 2.0, EIP-1559 and L2 solutions will result in a sustainable monetary policy with near 0% issuance and the potential for Ether to become a deflationary asset. What is even more interesting is that the net return of ETH as a SoV becomes superior to BTC the moment that issuance is lower than the staking yield. In other words, even if BTC had already ceased issuance, it offers no mechanism to provide yield to long term holders with a negligible risk exposure as ETH does. There is an execution risk that Ethereum will not deliver on what is currently planned, but if it does then what I have explained will become a reality.
You cannot separate BTC/ETH's payment rails from their respective monetary policies. As you are probably aware, issuance is just a subsidy, and without it the network will need to operate as a profitable business with a cash-flow that is entirely dependent on network fees. We are observing a situation that is causing a degradation of the utility of the Bitcoin network. What I mean by that is that the incentive for users to transact directly on the network is being diminished because of the tokenization into ETH and by the introduction of custodians (like Paypal) and traditional banking services who will soon be entering this space. If these trends continue, I suspect that the only activity that will end-up happening on-chain will be done by whales sporadically transacting to hodle and the occasional settlement from institutions. Bitcoin seems fast and frictionless, but that is because you are comparing it to something in the physical world. In digital terms Bitcoin emulates the friction of operation that is found with gold: it is difficult and expensive to move it, securing it yourself is not trivial, and it does not make for a great medium of exchange. I don't think this will be a good dynamic to generate enough transaction fees. That is of course my subjective interpretation of it, but regarding this particular situation it is nearly impossible to make objective assertions at this point. It is possible to assert that, in the digital world, the expectation of frictionless money would entail near instant transactions with negligible cost and without the relative risk/paranoia of dealing with nuclear waste and having a hacker watching your every move waiting for you to make a mistake to snatch it away. Digital money would also need to interact with other digital assets, preferably defined and operated within the same ecosystem. Ethereum is steaming ahead on all ends.
Ethereum is fostering a digital economy (this is a very important part of understanding the value of Ethereum, but I will not be exploring it in this post) with DeFi at its center. It is currently generating about three times as much trx fee revenue as Bitcoin. L2 solutions are going live as we speak, and it appears that they will be much more practical and provide better UX when compared to the Lightning Network. This will help to amplify L1 block space value and push revenue even higher. That will be followed by EIP-1559, which will burn transaction fees. Mining is currently excessively profitable and the hash rate cannot keep up. This means the financial incentive can be reduced and by burning trx fees we achieve the equivalent of an issuance reduction, while stabilizing mining revenue. Eventually the transition to PoS will dramatically cut the operational cost of the network. That means that Ethereum as a business will become more profitable and less reliant on the issuance subsidy. Finally, we will see the introduction of sharding which will scale L1 by up to 1,000 times, compounding the effect of L2 solutions and making it feasible for the network to operate as a platform for new use cases. A solution to the hackenuclear waste security situation is being explored via social recovery wallets. It is still in the early stages of research and design, but it is important to realize that the Ethereum community recognizes it as a problem and is working on a solution.
There is a lot more that can be said about the BTC vs ETH debate and I am working on a full write up that explores each individual element in more detail. Regardless, it is important to pay attention to this trend: the smartest people in this space are shifting their point of view and realizing Ethereum's potential. Raoul Pal is a seasoned investor, extremely bright and open minded. He started with Bitcoin, but it did not take him long to understand the value proposition of Ethereum. Lyn Alden is a brilliant investor and mental powerhouse who initially did not think investing in Ethereum could be justified, but she is also starting to shift her view and now understands that it has a justifiable risk/reward ratio to be included in a portfolio (although she is not personally invested in Ethereum). She has plenty of negative things to say about it, however it appears that she recognizes this is not a black and white situation. I have a feeling she will be revising her analysis on Ethereum again in the future with a more optimist view, but maybe that is just wishful thinking.
The crypto space has a few analogies that have been used to describe technical/economic mechanisms that are somewhat tricky to understand: mining, Ethereum's gas, and the analogy between ether and oil. Crypto "mining" is not like real world mining. It's purpose is not to extract resources, but it is rather a decentralized mechanism to process transactions. Newly minted BTC tokens are not "mined", they are minted by the protocol and awarded to operators. Furthermore, it is impossible to change the total mining output of the network... adding/removing miners does not affect the mining output. If you are new to crypto, you can read a more detailed explanation of mining here. ETH's "gas" is not like fuel (it cannot even be stored). It is just a computational metric that is more akin to the distance a car must travel, but not what actually makes it move. The fuel is electricity and it must be paid for with ether. When you transact you are also paying for the "car" which is the use of all active mining hardware/validators for a fraction of a second. And ether is just money.
If you put too much weight on these simplified analogies, you will not understand the economic actuality behind them. This is a source confusion in the crypto space, and it is used to support false narratives. From an economic perspective, ether is money. Once you understand this, you will know that the narrative that BTC and ETH are not competing because they are different things is analogous to saying fax machines do not compete with the internet.
The beautiful thing about ether is that it is actually not "just money". It is a mixture of a scarce monetized commodity, money, bond and tech stock.

Monetized Commodity: Ether is becoming more scarce and will continue to do so with the transition to proof-of-stake and EIP-1559. Ethereum does not have a supply cap, but it does have a roadmap for a sustainable security model and if it achieves a positive cashflow then it will not only eliminate issuance, it can become deflationary. An argument can be made about potential issues with Bitcoin's sustainability in the long run.
Currency: Ether is used as a unit of account and medium of exchange to pay for every activity in Ethereum. It is also used in the same way for venture capital related to ICOs, and Ether is also used as collateral in the DEFI space and new monetary uses will continue to emerge. It is an immature form of money, just like Bitcoin is an immature form of gold. Some people prefer to say that Ether is just a utility token. However, a utility token is just a narrowly scoped form of money. Not only is Ether's scope within its digital economy growing, by next year users will be able to pay millions of merchants with Ether through Paypal. We have never seen the adoption of a new form of money grow organically. New forms of money have always been imposed by authorities. What would the organic growth of money look like? It would look like Ether.
Ethereum's digital economy: Ethereum has limitless use cases and it is already generating economic activity with real world usefulness. Ether's value will benefit from acting as the native monetary asset for Ethereum. As Ethereum's economic activity grows, the velocity and/or value of ether must also increase.
Bond: With proof-of-stake you need to lock up Ether to receive a yield in return. It is similar to how bonds work.
Tech Stock: Ethereum provides a service. That service is paid with ether. The network is controlled by holding ether that is staked. The more valuable the service provided by Ethereum becomes, the more users will be willing to pay for transactions and the more valuable the protocol and the Ether token become. Cloud based services is the entire business model of many companies. The network will be entirely operated by stakers who happen to be the recipients of transaction fees. It is not exactly the same as holding a stock, but there are a lot of parallels.
Full reserve banking model: This is a bit of a stretch, but it is a potential end-game for Ethereum. It can serve as the base infrastructure and reserve asset for a full reserve banking system. In a nutshell: a consortium of banking companies can be formed to standardize a framework to hold and stake Ether under custody in exchange for wrapped Ether. Customers deposit Ether, banks exchange it for wETH and stake the original ETH. Resting balances of wEther on customer accounts can receive a cut of the staking rewards. Banks get their profit model, customers get to spend wrapped Ether with traditional banking services and potentially receive a share of the staking yield. Customers could also have access to a yield curve based on variable reserve requirements. This would allow banks to create money (which is actually good for the economy when it is done with moderation), but for the first time ever customers would have the choice of how much risk exposure they are comfortable with. This dynamic could help to establish a form of democratic check and balances system that discourages moral hazard. Ether could become a godsend to banks in the land of negative yields. It's a pipe dream, but not entirely impossible. Don't forget that the US OCC has essentially given banks the green light to take the first steps in this direction (US banks have been approved to use the Ethereum blockchain for their operations AND they can become validators... yup this happened).

EDIT 1: Adding an analogy to explain why ether is money:
Let’s say I have a car with a 14-gallon fuel tank and I want to take it on a road trip. The car is not aware of the price of gasoline, and it would not travel any farther if the price of gas would double the next day. That’s because the intrinsic utility of oil has nothing to do with its monetary value. The car needs gas because of its particular physical properties and how the ICE is designed to utilize it. If I want to drive from point A to point B and it takes a full tank to get there, it will take that full tank no matter what happens to the monetary properties of gas/oil. This is fundamentally different from how Ethereum uses ether.
Ethereum (the network) is not trying to be money, but it utilizes ether exclusively for its monetary properties and not because it can be magically burned by an imaginary engine of sorts. It costs money to participate in the network as a miner, and their engagement is financially incentivized with ether. Block space is a scarce resource, therefore participants who wish to transact use ether to bid for it. These interactions are utilizing ether as a monetary medium of exchange. In the long run, as the price of ether goes up, the ether denomination of gas prices goes down. That happens because no one is using ether as gas/oil, and it is actually being used as money. In the short run you may see the opposite occurring because of the dynamic between the portion of block space demand that is inelastic and the demand for ether.
EDIT 2: Revisiting key concepts to explain how they will become price catalysts.

Wide adoption of L2 solutions: these will amplify the base layer block space value while encouraging further network adoption by a significant reduction of fees. A successful integration with DeFi protocols will dismiss the "Ethereum killers" theory and consolidate market confidence.
EIP-1559: reduce excessive financial incentives to miners by burning transaction fees. This will also discourage miners from attempting to artificially raise fees via spam.
Sharding: scale L1 bandwidth, compounding the effect of L2 solutions, further consolidating Ethereum's dominance in the DeFi space, making it feasible to introduce new use cases and eventually increase trx fee revenue.
The switch from PoW to PoS: discontinuing PoW will eliminate the operating costs related to mining and will allow for a reduction of issuance. Money that was previously allocated to buying mining equipment will be redirected to the acquisition of Ether. Staking Ether will remove it from circulation for extended periods of time. Operating cost will be negligible, allowing validators to withhold most of the Ether revenue. This will be the greatest bull market catalyst in the history of cryptocurrencies and it will eclipse the effect of BTC halvenings.

Bitcoin maximalists will be nay-saying all the way through and past a market cap flip. Do not get caught up in their narrative. If you are not sure, then it is better to rebalance your portfolio proportionally to market caps. If none of these things happen and Ethereum turns out to be a failure, then you would only have reduced your gains by 20%. Otherwise, ETH will be making you mountains of money.
EDIT 3: Ethereum killers
Ethereum killers remind me a lot of Tesla killers, but a lot worse. People need to understand that cryptocurrency platforms targeting financial Dapps are fighting the equivalent force of a black-hole when it comes to Ethereum’s network effect and user retention in this space.
Bigger players, with bigger money, are entering this market and they will not settle for anything other than the top dog. This pattern reinforces Ethereum's position as the premium financial system, which ends up attracting even bigger players and resulting in the black-hole effect. To make matters even more complicated, financial apps are more valuable when they are surrounded by a rich and diverse variety of digital assets and other natively defined Dapps. There is not much you can do with your money in a ghost town.
It is VERY difficult to build this type of environment up because the platform and dapps must also have established full trust from their user base. This is not to say there is no space for other networks to grow, but just don’t get your hopes high that they will be taking Ethereum’s stronghold as a financial system. There are other use cases that do not require the amount of decentralization and security offered by Ethereum, and the networks that can focus on these are the ones who will be able to coexist with in the long-run. Gaming, ERP interoperability and supply chain are good examples of such use cases. Remember that alternatives with cheap transactions have existed for a while and they have barely touched ETH's dominance (EOS, NEO, VET, QTUM, IOTA, LSK, STRAT, ARK and dare I say... TRON).
EDIT 4: Refuting critiques about dynamic monetary policy
If an argument can be made that the financial incentives to operators (miners/stakers) are excessive or insufficient then an argument can be for the implementation and execution of a dynamic monetary policy.
I don't think an arbitrarily picked issuance schedule determined during the genesis of a new highly complex system is likely to be efficient through its lifecycle. Bitcoin's monetary policy provides the certainty of stability and protection from abuse, but it sacrifices the possibility of efficiency and jeopardizes longevity. It would be like if a captain of a ship would point it in the direction of its final destination, set the throttle, then fall back to his cabin for a nice bottle of chianti and hope that the ship would arrive safely. There would be no one at the helm to navigate the seas, no one to make sure it stayed on route, no one to avoid the storms or to take advantage of currents. In my opinion it is a pretty bad approach to something as critical as monetary policy.
With respect to Ethereum's dynamic monetary policy: I don't see any evidence to suggest developers have been enriching their pockets by keeping issuance at the levels they are. Developers are stakeholders and the Ethereum fund holds a lot of ether - debasing ether is against their self interest. There is a great misunderstanding that the one's who are adjusting issuance are the recipients of the new tokens. Is there any documented case of this happening?
EDIT 5: Addressing Bitcoin's immutable monetary policy
The idea that Bitcoin's monetary policy cannot be changed is a myth. It is a false narrative that takes for granted that the issuance subsidy will no longer be necessary at some point, but there is no way to objectively assert this. There is no divine power preventing the monetary policy from being changed. If the security model for Bitcoin was jeopardized because of insufficient cash flow to miners, then Bitcoin's monetary policy would be the first thing on the chop board to go in order to remedy the situation.
EDIT 6: Five years ago naysayers were screaming about how everything that is being done TODAY in the Ethereum network would never work. Now they are calling Ethereum a scam, or that is is a platform for degenerate gamblers, or that the fees are too high and therefore it is useless, or that it can't scale, or that something else better is just around the corner to take its place.... you know... basically all the things that traditional bankers have to say about Bitcoin, maxis are saying about Ethereum.
EDIT 7: The greater the impact a new technology can have on society, the more difficult it is to comprehend its potential. Ethereum has the potential to have a dramatic impact on human civilization. It could take decades for it to be fully realized, but it would change the world in ways that we cannot possibly imagine today. If it happens, the moon will be just a pit-stop.
EDIT 8: Thank you so much for all the awards! Ethereans understand this stuff, and I could feel the frustration in the air every time someone said that Ethereum is not money, or that ETH and BTC are completely different things, or all the other bs attacks that are in great part founded on a lack of understanding of how BTC and ETH actually work. I would love to hear what guys like Raoul Pal, Pomp, Michael Saylor and Fernando Ulrich (for my Brazilian friends) would have to say about some of the things that have been written here. If you know a way to get their attention, then please do it.
EDIT 9: Clarification about Lyn Alden's opinion of Ethereum
EDIT 10: I am still working on a much more ambitious write up. It is focused on economic aspects of money, monetary systems and global asset markets. I still have not incorporated any of the information written here, but I eventually will merge it together. One of the main new ideas that I am exploring is challenging the notion that money has no intrinsic value and that scarcity is the most important attribute of money. I think I make a compelling argument to demonstrate that facilitating economic activity is more important, and how Ethereum has a big edge over Bitcoin in this regard. Here is the link to the WIP doc.
TLDR: Ethereum is not stopping at the moon... it is not stopping on Mars... it is going straight out of the Milky Way galaxy in search for alien life... but you should own some BTC just in case the spaceship malfunctions during launch.

Slay the Spire and its "family"

https://steam.cryotank.net/wp-content/gallery/slaythespire/Slay-the-Spire-01-HD.png
Slay the Spire (StS) has finally arrived to Android! For two years many of us dreamed for this legendary game to be accessible on their mobile devices, and finally the day has come. No need to talk about how awesome this game is, how it basically started a new genre of card-based dungeon crawlers (UPD: or roguelike deck-builders, if you prefer the term), and even about how well or poor it works on Android hardware in its current state (there will be lots of these posts during the days to come). What I wanted to talk about is the impact this game had on (specifically) mobile industry and how other developers were able to utilize this innovative formula in their own products.
Personally, I am somewhat glad that StS release was delayed that much. This allowed a lot of "clones" to be spawned, many of which I enjoyed playing. Some of them appear to be straight rip-offs, but others introduced many fresh ideas of their own, some even surpassing the predecessor's greatness. What the heck am I talking about and how is this even possible will be revealed to you, should you decide to stay on a bit and read through the article below.

General info

First and foremost, let's clarify the important thing: card based dungeon crawlers are not Collectible Card Games (CCGs). Even though they share the same ideas, and some of them (StS included) even have a feature to permanently improve starting cards, or a mode to play with pre-constructed decks, this is not the case for the genre in general. There is no place for multiplayer and PvP battles here: a turn-down for the most, but an undeniable advantage for the rest - only though-out puzzle-like single-player experience which we can pause at any moment and continue when the time is appropriate. Thus, there will never be troubles with downtime, matchmaking, ratings, overpowered builds and other PvP stuff, as there will never be a satisfaction of crushing your opponents with the power of your mighty intellect... The fun of discovering interesting synergies between various card combinations is still present, though.
With this being said, let's quickly look through the core features of the genre, which will be relevant for almost every game we review below: - we must explore a dungeon, which (usually, but not necessarily) consists of three floors with increasing difficulty; - we have limited control over the order in which to face the challenges; - there is a powerful boss in the end of each floor; - we battle using deck of cards, usually drawing new cards from deck to hand each turn; - there is a limitation on how many cards we can play during our turn; - we start with a weak basic deck, but get new cards as rewards for fighting enemies; - there is a possibility to permanently remove (weak) cards from the deck; - successful gameplay strategies revolve around utilizing the synergies between different cards; - there are several character classes, each with their own cards and tactics; - there are often additional items to acquire in the dungeon, providing bonuses and emphasizing specific types of play;
Before Slay the Spire (StS) came out, there was another card-based dungeon crawler called Dream Quest (DQ), which considered by many to be the first game of the genre (at least the first one to make a significant impact). Not sure if the former drew inspiration from the latter, but certain parallels can easily be drawn: in fact, all of the features mentioned in the list above are valid for DQ the same way as it is for StS. The rich plethora of card based dungeon crawlers (both PC/Console and mobile) originated from some combination of the two.
StS, however, can not be considered a clone of DQ, as it introduced a lot of original ideas and spawned its own line of descendants. It is always interesting to analyze each new title to see which of two games was the biggest inspiration, and to group them accordingly. For me the main criteria lies in the core difference in battle system: - in StS, enemies (usually multiple) show their intentions at the beginning of each turn, so we know what to expect and what to play against; - in DQ, the enemy (usually single) draws and plays cards the same way as we do, often using the same abilities and synergies we ourselves can use.
Introductions aside, let's finally get to the interesting part - the games! (Note: Games are listed in alphabetical order to not give any privileges to one over another. For my personal preferences see the comment section).

Dream Quest clones

Call of Lophis takes us on a grim journey through infested lands full of deadly monsters, dangerous traps, and one of the most ridiculous card art I have ever seen. It's surprising to see how dark fantasy elements combine with the humor and gags this game presents. From the gameplay point of view, there is enough card variety and interesting synergies, but it will take a long time to reach the interesting parts. Really: this game just does not know when to end, forcing new and new dungeon locations onto us with basically the same monsters and same approaches to dealing with them over and over. Its the boss battles which crank the difficulty up to over 9000, and if we don't have the right deck by the time we reach them, there is nothing we can do to pull it off. Plus there is some shady business going on with monetization schemes, where even paid version of the game makes us spend money to unlock additional classes and grind a lot to buy permanent improvements. Only truly dedicated players will be interested in dealing with all this nonsense. [...] UPD: Haven't checked on it for a long time - maybe the situation improved somehow.
Crimson Deep is still in early alpha and was not updated for a long time. But the development hasn't stopped, and there is a new major release approaching in the nearest future. It makes no sense to talk about the game till then: the version in the store is too raw to provide any significant gameplay experience, but it would be interesting to see where it goes in the end.
Dimension of Dream is probably the only game that has the same grid-based dungeon layout as DQ itself. This time with full 3D and a possibility to fight only limited set of enemies before facing the final boss (which allows to moderate difficulty as we go, either defeating tougher enemies with better rewards, or to save HP and fight only the easy ones). This game has one of the most interesting battle systems and 6 truly unique classes with deep complex strategies unlike anything we have ever seen (not only the cards themselves, but the order in which we play them greatly affects the outcome). Unfortunately, the English version was pulled from Google Play, leaving only Chinese version for Asian people to enjoy. UPD: Apparently, the game was re-released under different publisher with the title Dreaming Dimension, so there you have it. [...]
Meteorfall: Journeys offers the streamlined approach to dungeon crawling, where all our decisions boil down to Reigns-like "swipe left / swipe right" operation: picking the path, encounter resolutions, and even battles are simplified to utilize this binary choice mechanic. But don't worry: these specifics do not affect the gameplay, still providing enough strategic depth to appeal even to hardcore players. Add here a neat visual style, lots of character classes and their variations, cool card combos, and you get a true masterpiece, which is Meteorfall. [...]
Night of the Full Moon offers a fresh take on a fairy tale of Red Riding Hood, but adding darker elements to it (including werewolves, zombies, mad scientists and cursed cultists). It demonstrates an amazing production quality with top-tier art, beautiful audio support, and intriguing storytelling. Gameplay wise, we have the closest thing to DQ, safe for the grid-based dungeon maps, which were changed to just picking the encounter out of available three. Some people may argue that the game does not offer enough strategic variety, only suggesting a single best build for each class, but you will still get different runs due to the randomness of card and power-up drops. Another argument of it being too easy is completely nullified on higher difficulty levels. Wish the story would develop in a different direction, though. [...]
Spellsword Cards: Origins provides the gameplay similar to the Night of the Full moon, but focuses more on role-playing character development part. Aside from choosing a class, we also get to pick race with unique traits, and a school of magic, greatly affecting which cards will be available to us during the run. The problem here, though, is that monster encounters do not demonstrate a lot of variety, forcing us to fight the same enemies over and over, and the difficulty is rather high, with starting cards doing almost nothing and enemies quickly run out of hand with their devastating attacks, whereas good cards are hard to come by, and even then you will still be devastated on later stages. [...] UPD: Or maybe I am just bad at this game (welcome to comment section for valid strategy suggestions).

Slay the Spire clones

Blood Card offers a unique possibility to construct the dungeon ourselves, providing a pool of encounters of different types: regular monsters, elite monsters, events and shops. We pick a desired encounter from the pool, deal with it and then move on to the next one. Another interesting feature is that our health is defined by the number of cards in draw pile, which limits our tactical possibilities, but is compensated by the fact that we get multiple copies of cards as rewards for fighting enemies. There are a lot of interesting mechanics related to moving cards between various piles, as well as other neat features (like: the Death inevitably arrives in three turns and starts whacking everyone on the field with increasing persistence), but I'll leave them for you to discover on your own.
Card Crusade seemed like a cool idea of mixing classic "roguelike" dungeon crawling with its "deck-based" counterpart, where we explore the dungeon the same way as we do it in Hack, Angband, Pixel Dungeon and other similar games, but use cards to fight actual enemies. In reality though, this implementation just adds a useless abstraction, as the adventuring does not provide any tactical benefits and is only there to inter-connect battle sequences (heck, even breaking pots and chests does not give us any coin, of which developers themselves warn us at the very beginning!). The cards are not very interesting, with next to none cool synergies, and new classes (which should be unlocked by performing specific actions on previous runs) do not provide any major difference. [...]
Card Quest takes us on an epic journey through fantasy lands, where we will perform great deeds as one of the classic RPG hero classes (fighter, wizard, rogue, ranger), each with their own equipment and fighting disciplines. The interesting part is that the cards we use during runs are defined by said equipment, and if we find some new pieces during our adventure, we get to keep them for further runs. Also worth noting that defense cards are played not during our turn, but during enemy turn, which requires us to plan ahead a bit. This being said, the game is extremely hard - it will take a lot of unsuccessful tries to finally reach the end. But the variety of dungeons and possible builds will keep us occupied for long.
Dungeon Tales for a long time was the closest, yet simplified copy of StS mechanics (up to similar cards and gaming strategies), but without certain elaborate features, like upgrading cards or using potions. The basics are left intact though: we still build our deck along the way and face the powerful boss in the end. There are only two characters available yet, but each has a couple of viable builds, so it can keep us invested for quite some time. [...]
Endless Abyss is a close StS clone with very similar character classes (only two so far) and a lot of cards with exactly the same effects. Graphically the game looks very good, but angry monetization, lots of grinding, and forced ads make it almost impossible to fully enjoy. [...]
Heroes of Abyss is a predecessor to Endless Abyss with basically the same core gameplay, but very simplified dungeon crawling part. There is no floor map with choosing our path, nor there are elaborate adventure events: just a series of battles with the boss in the end. The spoils we get after each battle go into improving our starting deck and unlocking new difficulty modes with higher rewards. What makes the game unusual, is that we chose the preferred build right from the beginning with appropriate set of starting cards, without the need to rely on the randomness of card drops. It may be interesting to unlock and compare all the 6 available builds, but once the task is done, there is almost no reason to play the game further.
Heroes Journey provides a different setting for a change: this time we will play as space explorers, who crash landed on an alien planet. Thus, instead of familiar swords and bows, we will be wielding blasters and energy shields: the rest remains the same, up to the majority of cards straight up copied from StS. Unfortunately, this innovative idea was completely ruined by repetitive grinding and angry monetization, forcing player to make dozens of identical runs with the same small card pool, until something adequate is unlocked. Oh, and the game is long abandoned by the developers.
Pirates Outlaws is an amazing rework of original StS ideas in a pirate setting with some changes to gameplay mechanics, such as introducing persistent charges needed to play certain cards, and different buff/debuff statuses that replace each other. There are also some questionable features, such as ship stamina that deteriorates over the course of the journey and leads to game over if not repaired in time, or a quest system, where quests can not be completed in parallel, but instead picking the new quest resets your progress in the current one. Some may also argue that new classes take long to grind for, or expensive to pay for, but with permanent booster pack this should not be a problem. Anyway, the game is highly recommended for any StS fan. [...]
Rogue Adventure offers a twist to usual mechanic: our hand is limited by 4 cards, but each time we use one of them, a new card is immediately drawn to its place, thus we never run out of cards to play. Non-starting cards are common for all classes, but are grouped by type (or race), giving huge synergies depending on how many similar cards we have. Aside from this, the game offers diverse gameplay by providing a lot of different classes, each with its own unique strategies and dynamics, and some interesting items to work around. The developers constantly provide updates with bug fixes and new content, but be warned that new mechanics may break what you are already accustomed for.
Royal Booty Quest started as a straight rip-off from StS with the same classes and abilities, and even cards having the same names. And absolutely atrocious pixelated visuals, which were not possible to look at without eyes bleeding out. Over time, though, it developed its own unique mechanics and interesting card combinations, but the art style did not get any better. However, if this is not a problem, the game is enjoyable to an extent, but since it was not updated for a long time, I doubt it will keeps anyone's interest for long. [...]
Tavern Rumble adds an unusual strategic element - a 3x3 grid, on each units and enemies are placed. The core gameplay remains the same (we still see what opponents are planning to do each turn and adjust our own strategy accordingly), but the addition of the grid introduces another tactical layer: not only we should maximize the damage output, but also plan the layout for our troops to provide the effective delivery of said output, while at the same time establish enough defense to minimize the damage to ourselves. There are a lot of cards and classes to play around, different play modes and a lot of features that are still being constantly added to the game. Some may argue about simplistic pixel graphics or long repetitive grinding, but it is easy to unlock everything within reasonable amount of time, even without paying. [...]

Other Games

Of course, my criteria does not work 100% of the time, as some games are way too different from anything else to confidently enroll them into one of the categories. They either demonstrate traits of both, or implement entirely unique mechanics of their own (which I like the most), while still maintaining the basic dungeon crawling ideas (so a lot of the games you might think of will not end up in the list). What I have in mind is the following:
Dungeon Reels removes the cards from card-based dungeon crawler - why bother, right? Instead, it provides some kind of a slot machine, where each turn three rows spin independently to pick available actions based on what slots we have in our reel. Winning battles awards us with new, better slots to add, each with their own specifics and synergies. Enemies also randomize their moves with slots of their own, but the most satisfying mechanic is the possibility to spin a jackpot with three identical slots for some powerful effect. It is interesting to see this concept developed further, but the game has not been updated for a long time.
Iris and the Giant takes us on journey through imaginary world, inspired by Ancient Greek mythology. Each battle takes place on a grid, where various enemies advance in huge numbers. We play a card from our hand, usually dealing damage to nearest enemy, and then everyone who is still standing and can reach us deals damage in return. There are cards that target multiple enemies at once, as well as ways to play more than one card during our turn, so most of the time we will be deciding which card to play at which moment. The deck has limited size, and if it becomes empty we lose, so new cards should be constantly acquired. There are a lot of interesting mechanics to discover, but the game is very hard and luck based, requiring a lot of trial-and-error to finally reach the end. [...]
Phantom Rose Scarlet has the same basic core, but with completely innovative battle system, not seen in any other game. On each turn there are four positions for cards to be played in strict order, where two of them are randomly filled with opponent's cards, and the remaining two are left for us to fill. Instead of drawing the hand, we have our entire deck available right away, but playing cards puts them on a cooldown, which does not reset between battles, so we constantly face the strategic choice of playing our best cards right away or keep them for later. The game is in active development, providing new mechanics and further developing the story, which is quite captivating here. [...]
Void Tyrant is a bit of a stretch, but still a "card based dungeon crawler", in which we basically play BlackJack against our enemies by dealing card with numbers from 1 to 6 one-by-one from our deck until we stand or bust. Whoever has the highest value wins and deals damage to the loser. There are various supporting cards on top of this mechanic, allowing us to either jinx the outcome in our favor, or to perform various other metagame manipulations. The only downside of the game is the lack of content, as it quickly runs out of interesting things, and since it was not updated for a long time, it is unlikely that anything new will be added in the future. [...]

Conclusion

As you see, there is a lot to play besides StS, so even if you are not hyped by its long-awaited Android release, but appreciate a good intellectual dungeon crawler, you will find something to suit your needs. I hope, even with StS release, new games of the genre will continue appearing on mobile phones, and I will gladly review them and add to the list. If you know any hidden gems (or even trash) that was not highlighted in this article, please share the names and/or links in the comments. I am also open to any discussions on the topic, as I am obviously able to talk a lot about my favorite genre.
Good luck to everyone in all your endeavors.
P.S. I am well aware of games like Dungeon Cards, Card Adventure, Dungeon Faster, Meteorfall: Krumitz Tale, Card Thief, Maze Machina, Cube Card, Card Hog, Fisherman, Relics of the Fallen and other "grid-based puzzles", but do not consider them to be a part of the "family".

games you can make money on steam video

You can also earn money playing games through InboxDollars. After signing up, you’ll be able to select games like Solitaire and Sudoku, and there are cash tournament games you can play to earn cashback on every dollar you spend in the game. Plus, youget a free $5 with InboxDollars just for creating an account. Video games are one of the greatest ways to escape the real world and to have some fun during your free time. It’s also possible to make money by playing video games if you stream, compete in tournaments, or start your own YouTube channel.. Now, most games that pay money are for consoles or PC gaming since this is where the largest player bases compete and where the money is. You just need to get Amazon gift cards. My top pick to start is InboxDollars as you’ll get a free $5 bonus and a number of ways to make extra money to use for Steam. InboxDollars Offer: Free $5 Bonus. InboxDollars is one of the most popular ways to make and save money online. You can only use that money to buy games or other items present in the Steam market. In this scenario the only way that you can utilize to make REAL money is to first develop a game and then sell it in the Steam community which is highly unlikely unless you are a developer yourself or you have enough money to hire one. Make Money Playing Video Games. If you don’t like playing trivial games online then you can play video games on your PC or a console like PS4 or Xbox. Here you sign up with a website, download the software on your PC, select a game you want to play from the list and after achieving certain target you earn rewards or points. Trading - every game that has market on steam will be able to bring you money, games like Counter-Strike: Global Offensive, Dota 2 and Team Fortress 2 are the best, you have an option to open boxes in order to get skins that worth a lot, you can noob trade - buying for cheap and selling for more and there are a lot of other ways. Games that you make money on I am very low on steam money and just want to know same game titles that are very cheap and you can make money on from getting items from like dota < > Showing 1-7 of 7 comments . Pepo. Jul 6, 2015 @ 1:20am Here’s how you can make money on Steam. 1. Trade Your Cards. Most games on Steam have trading cards you can receive for playing them. You get one to three cards the first time you play a game after playing for two hours. Most cards you get end up only being worth a few cents. Wealth Words is an online trivia game where you solve crossword clues and win real money. Money gets credited into your bank account via Paypal. The game has word puzzles in the form of crosswords, poems, and stories. You can play any game of your choice and grab the opportunity to win real money. If you wonder how to make money on Steam, you are reading the correct article.We have composed this article after doing a substantial amount of research on Steam. So, if you are a gaming designer, developer, coder, or even a video game player, this information would be precious.

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games you can make money on steam

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Slay the Spire and its "family"

General info

Dream Quest clones

Slay the Spire clones

Other Games

Conclusion

games you can make money on steam video

games you can make money on steam top