Ray Irving 🇺🇦
Ray Irving 🇺🇦
@skiingmouse.bsky.social
British ex-pat in Switzerland. TTRPGs (mainly Call of Cthulhu), Cyber Security, Philosophy, Psychology and whatever interests me…
202 followers302 following616 posts
OMG! 😮 I am in love. Want want want! @fuzzybunny.org, @flourish.org
Yes, used hang out with medics a lot and can confirm this is standard practice for consultants - if they like you they put all kinds of flowery praise in the referral letters, just for fun and giggles really.
Got a consultant's letter from the NHS today that described me as "a pleasant, 53 year old individual" and I'm genuinely unsure what to think about it. Never had a personality appraisement from a urologist before
This is the 3 constraints of Project Management working as normal, you can pick *only* 2 from: a) Low cost b) Fast delivery c) High quality AI code gives you a) and b) but the lack of c) leads to technical debt… You can correct the quality issues but that costs, so you end up with b) and c).
Harvard just dropped a study AI productivity in software engineering and it found the average increase in productivity from using Claude code is.....zero and for exactly the reasons you'd think fion.ac/jellyfish.pdf
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Today’s #TTRPG challenge: design a scenario using this hat!
The extraordinary 3,000 year-old ‘Berlin Gold Hat’! One of four known cone-shaped golden ‘hats’ from ancient Europe. Sheet gold decorated with bands of solar and lunar motifs, which may represent calendars according to latest research. Neues Museum, Berlin 📷 by me #Archaeology
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Next Land Talks is tomorrow! Speakers on the tickets page: luma.com/mka0gu7s Get a ticket, bring a friend, if you think the cost of land, or quality of housing, or the consequences of those, needs radical improvement.
@rpgaugust.bsky.social scenario #3 👆🏻 will be Castrum Primum (converted to Cthulhu Invictus in northern Britannia 117AD), a standout scenario in the Cohors Cthulhu Germania book. Did you have a syllabus or escalation ladder for the experiments? Any specific advice from the play tests?
That Bronze Age Cyclops art really is quite the thing (not to mention those hippo riders…), very evocative…
Heavily inspired by Morrowind, Planescape and 70's Star Wars with a dash of bronze age and art nouveau. The mood? Conan after Conan: all the heroes are dead and this is the world they built. That's OMIOS URES, my weird fantasy RPG. And it's FREE on itch.io! matheusgraef.itch.io/omios-ures
Vernor Vinge passed away in 2024, his SciFi book *Rainbows End* which is set in 2025 - uncannily accurate prediction of destructive book scanning: www.theregister.com/ai-and-ml/20...
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Definitely passes the same vibe check…
A bronze helmet of Corinthian type. Herodotus references this helmet as an element of the Greek hoplites' gear. Numerous Corinthian helmets were discovered within the sanctuary at Olympia, offered as dedications to Zeus. The perforations along the rim served as attachment points...🧵1/2 📷️ me
Good thread - we don’t actually know for sure how Homeric armour looked…
Something that's worth noting: Do I want Homeric adaptations to employ preclassical Mycenaean armor instead of the classical stuff that almost always dominates? Of course. BUT it's important to note that, say, throwing in folks gussied up in Dendra panoplies ain't NECESSARILY accurate. 1/
As portrayed in Nolan’s Odyssey, the Atreus brothers come over as exactly the kind of guys who would go to considerable effort to obtain exotic wives. The scene with Menelaus in his gold spangled palace in Sparta makes it clear - Lupita fits in perfectly. It’s entirely believable.
When you watch the movie, you realize casting Lupita as Helen was not „woke“ at all. It makes complete dramatic sense for Helen to be beautiful in a way that looks exotic and otherworldly in the context of the story. Casting a black Polybus also helps the viewer identify him in a crowd of suitors.
Over on LinkedIn I can’t look anymore - every post: “here’s the bind” “why this matters” “and another thing” Totally doing my head in!
I could scarcely believe my intuition was right. I sort of said it as a joke -- "How do we know your talk wasn't written by AI?" But in truth, something in the rhetoric, argumentation, possibly even the tone, felt AI-ish. When he shifted in his seat, I thought he was offended by the implication..
Later in my 2nd Call of Cthulhu campaign I had the epiphany every single player had totally different motivations to play - I now swear by premise buy in, session zero and hooks between party members
One upon a time I tried to run a pirate campaign. The premise was simple: You're the crew of a pirate ship having adventures on the high seas. Not a single one of them created a character that had any points in sailing or a background involving piracy.
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@flourish.org remember playing this and marvelling at the parallax scrolling?
Inspector Morse was a huge thing for me at the time, totally unmissable, seriously tempted to start re-watch…
I just watched the first episode of inspector Morse, and wow does it hold up. I love it. I had a blast. I forgot how much I loved this show and what a big impact it had on me as a young man. Super fun to watch right after the Jeremy Brett Hound of the Baskervilles! Which came out one year later!
All set for tomorrow, running the Regency version of the #callofcthulhu scenario Zennor & the Sins of St. Senara by @stygianfoxpub.bsky.social. Jane Austin’s Persuasion meets Lovecraft, well, sort of… 🤭
Inspired by @fuzzybunny.org and if anyone has a *working* version of the Tintin ttf please help me out
Fixed the fonts issue, but @flourish.org has pointed out Tintin should be in Arabian clothing. Another rabbit hole beckons…
Ray Irving 🇺🇦 reposted
Ray Irving 🇺🇦 reposted
Land Talks #5 is soon! I'm running another evening of lightning talks about land policy. This one's got quirky stuff about the impact of driverless cars on land, and crunchy stuff about how liberalising planning can reduce trust and cause more problems. luma.com/avdjw348 Come along!
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Replying to @drgonzo123.bsky.social
#DnD has a lot to answer for - I think the issue stems from later versions containing a mini game, namely designing and levelling up your PC. Players are so invested in this mini-game that killing a PC without cause breaks the social contract with the DM. Thus the “balance” obsession. It’s absurd.
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Took me 25 minutes to download an app, create an account and set up credit card payment to charge a hire car before returning it in Germany. Ridiculous!
As a non-electric car owner I have been trying to charge my dad’s car at various commercial charging points today, and the whole experience has been utterly shitty. The future is a damn mess!
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If you're in London - my third evening of lightning talks about Radical Land Policy is next Tuesday - have a look at the Luma page to see the speakers! luma.com/v8knl21z