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#91
Off the Record / Re: Brexit and the waning days...
Last post by Tamas - Today at 02:41:30 AMStreeting? Wes Streeting? Seriously?
#92
Gaming HQ / Re: Europa Universalis V confi...
Last post by Syt - Today at 01:35:46 AMBiggest conundrum for me to wrap my head around at the moment is diplomacy. Glancing at the map it appears to be covered with teeny tiny entities, begging to be conquered.
But then you look at it and they're vassals or fiefdoms of someone who has a personal union with someone and is also allied with someone else who has vassals etc. and it quickly becomes a crazy game of Jenga where you have to figure out which block you (i.e. your country and army) you can safely remove. That list is longer if you're, say, France, less so if you're Holstein-Rendsburg or Meissen or other midsized country.
It's also confusing how some interactions work in personal unions or regencies. The countries are separate entities, so when I was playing Brandenburg and the ruler of Lower Bavaria died, it created a personal union, but while I initially had leadership, Lower Bavaria took it over within months (since they are much stronger in 1337 start).
Which feels weird; it's a bit hard for my brain to internalize that I'm running the country, and its ruler is one factor of many in that - and just because they are also ruling another country, it doesn't mean I can do whatever towards them. I am not playing as the ruling dynasty.
Similar with Holstein-Rendsburg. Your count starts is also the regent of Denmark at game start. But at least at first glance I couldn't see many direct benefits (it was my first game, so didn't look into diplo bonuses etc. that it might give).
But then you look at it and they're vassals or fiefdoms of someone who has a personal union with someone and is also allied with someone else who has vassals etc. and it quickly becomes a crazy game of Jenga where you have to figure out which block you (i.e. your country and army) you can safely remove. That list is longer if you're, say, France, less so if you're Holstein-Rendsburg or Meissen or other midsized country.
It's also confusing how some interactions work in personal unions or regencies. The countries are separate entities, so when I was playing Brandenburg and the ruler of Lower Bavaria died, it created a personal union, but while I initially had leadership, Lower Bavaria took it over within months (since they are much stronger in 1337 start).
Which feels weird; it's a bit hard for my brain to internalize that I'm running the country, and its ruler is one factor of many in that - and just because they are also ruling another country, it doesn't mean I can do whatever towards them. I am not playing as the ruling dynasty.
Similar with Holstein-Rendsburg. Your count starts is also the regent of Denmark at game start. But at least at first glance I couldn't see many direct benefits (it was my first game, so didn't look into diplo bonuses etc. that it might give).
#93
Gaming HQ / Re: Europa Universalis V confi...
Last post by crazy canuck - November 11, 2025, 09:41:31 PMYes, there is a region map mode you can toggle. It's worth taking a look at that, and the tactical map mode before starting a war.
#94
Off the Record / Re: Israel-Hamas War 2023
Last post by Razgovory - November 11, 2025, 09:28:42 PMReally weird to go to Sudan to explain to kids in a refugee camp about how hard people in Gaza have it. https://www.tiktok.com/@soha_x/video/7566743964896873750
#95
Off the Record / Re: What does a TRUMP presiden...
Last post by Tonitrus - November 11, 2025, 09:26:53 PMQuote from: Razgovory on November 11, 2025, 09:17:03 PMWho was asking for that?
QuoteHe (Sen. Rand Paul) and hemp industry insiders have blamed Sen. Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.) for the inclusion of the hemp ban after he advocated for closing a "loophole" in the 2018 Farm Bill that allowed for the unregulated sale of the products.
#96
Off the Record / Re: What does a TRUMP presiden...
Last post by Razgovory - November 11, 2025, 09:17:03 PMWho was asking for that?
#97
Off the Record / Re: TV/Movies Megathread
Last post by mongers - November 11, 2025, 07:23:56 PM'Self Reliance' - nice entertaining little film, a good premise with Anna Kendrick (spelling?).
#98
Off the Record / Re: The Off Topic Topic
Last post by The Minsky Moment - November 11, 2025, 06:30:29 PMQuote from: Admiral Yi on November 11, 2025, 10:21:06 AMI recently learned that Justice Roger Taney of Dred Scott fame voted in favor of the slaves in the Amistad case.
Taney was an accomplished lawyer before becoming a judge. In 1819, he represented a Pennsylvania minister, who was arrested in Maryland on a charge of disturbing the peace by delivering an anti-slavery sermon. He said the following on closing argument:
QuoteA hard necessity, indeed, compels us to endure the evil of slavery for a time. It was imposed upon us by another nation, while we were yet in a state of colonial vassalage. It cannot be easily, or suddenly removed. Yet while it continues, it is a blot on our national character, and every real lover of freedom, confidently hopes that it will be effectually, though it must be gradually, wiped away; and earnestly looks for the means, by which this necessary object may be best attained. And until it shall be accomplished: until the time shall come when we can point without a blush, to the language held in the declaration of independence, every friend of humanity will seek to lighten the galling chain of slavery, and better, to the utmost of his power, the wretched condition of the slave. Such was Mr. Gruber's object in that part of his sermon, of which I am now speaking. Those who have complained of him, D 2 44 and reproached him, will not find it easy to answer him: unless complaints, reproaches and persecution shall be considered an answer."
https://tile.loc.gov/storage-services/service/rbc/rbcmisc/lst/lst0094/lst0094.pdf
I don't know what happened with Taney. His biographers might. It may be, like many, that in the 1810s he assumed that slavery was on its way out, whereas matters seemed quite different by the 1850s. Taney was a practical man, a political man, and very ambitious. He was well connected to the landed Maryland elite, who in 1819 might have viewed anti-slavery opinion with indulgence but in the 1850s as truly seditious.
Taney signed on to Amistad, without a word. That case is legally distinguishable from those that followed because it implicated the slave trade, which was clearly illegal, both in the USA generally, the State of Connecticut, where the ship was held, and in Spain. But in Amistad the Court acknowledged the African plaintiffs as proper parties to the case, a recognition which Taney would not extend by 1857 in Dred Scott.
However, Prigg v. Pennsylvania was decided the following year; in that case the Court (Justice Story again) ruled that states could not pass laws impeding the recovery of fugitive slaves fleeing from the South. That case is fairly regarded as a blot on Story and the Court, but there is a key aspect that cut the other way. Story's ruling was based on the premise that the Constitution conferred exclusive power to the federal government, and thus the states couldn't pass ANY laws regarding fugitive slaves, even ones to assist recovery. He held that it would be OK for states to refuse to cooperate with federal authorities passively, applying what we would now call the anti-commandeering doctrine.
Taney pushed back on that aspect of the decision hard - he said on the contrary that the Constitution contemplated that states would and should pass their own affirmative legislation to assist recovery of fugitive slaves. And his opinion clearly anticipates arguments he would make in Dred Scott:
QuoteBesides, the laws of the different States in all other cases constantly protect the citizens of other States in their rights of property when it is found within their respective territories, and no one doubts their power to do so. And, in the absence of any express prohibition, I perceive no reason for establishing by implication a different rule in this instance where, by the national compact, this right of property is recognized as an existing right in every State of the Union.
Then, immediately after that statement, he directly invoked the question that would be addressed in Dred Scott, passing on it for the time being: "I do not speak of slaves whom their masters voluntarily take into a non-slaveholding State. That case is not before us."
15 years later, the case would be before him.
#99
Gaming HQ / Re: Civ IV: Colonization
Last post by mongers - November 11, 2025, 06:18:09 PMQuote from: Admiral Yi on October 15, 2012, 08:01:45 AMWith the new computer and all I finally had enough juice to run this game.
Someone mentioned earlier that it's a stinker, but I'm having good fun with it. Like obsessive, get no sleep kind of fun. Does have a tendency to freeze. Constantly.
Unlike CIV II, which I played the fuck out of, the majority of the work in this game is wagoning your goods from city to city so you can build stuff and manufacture stuff.
Not really sure about the economics of the game. I've settled a continent, producing like a madman, and by 1700 I've only saved enough cash to buy one ship of the line.
I have enough rebellion points to declare independence, but I figure why not keep growing, since I don't have to win until 1792.
Any ossum tips anyone feels like giving, feel free.
Well I found this in my gog.com account so gave it a whirl, excellent relaxing game.
Can't say how it compares to the original colonization, might give that a go after this.
Also found this excellent AAR of the original by Sbr, he really went to town, pity all the photos have gone:
Jamestown, Let's Not Starve to Death: An English Colonization AAR
#100
Off the Record / Re: The Off Topic Topic
Last post by mongers - November 11, 2025, 05:53:13 PMQuote from: celedhring on November 11, 2025, 04:49:24 PMNot long ago I learned that beloved "that guy!" Stephen Tobolowsky of Groundhog Day fame, also co-wrote "True Stories" with David Byrne. Who would've thought.
