SL128

Authoritarians have a tendency to gain support as their reigns continue. We shouldn't count on it dropping.

Here's a great video on split brain research, as was clumsily referenced in the episode: You did, but it's really fascinating stuff and I felt like sharing it now that science news and discussion is starting to be a thing! Edit: Woah, you really did rerecord a bunch for this episode. Maybe I responded to something that's erased from history.

Problem solved

Thanks Tycho! I just watched the third since I missed most of it, and will be watching the first two later.

Thanks everyone! This is massively helpful; everyone else with clips, please post them! I'll soon start compiling and organizaing them all into a spreadsheet here so that they're all in order and in one place (mostly for myself). Once that's done, I'll start editing. P.S. If you don't know how to find your clips, go to clips.twitch.tv P.P.S. Let me know who you'd like to be credited as (e.g., eRonin or superhiero); I will default to Twitch names

He beat all bosses except the tigers, which he nearly beat using summons.

Congrats on beating Dark Souls 2! But you cannot escape fate forever...

Since the live casts are now two days off of release, could we start getting the discussion threads up ahead of time? There have been times I've wanted to make a post, but forgot or lost interest by the time threads are live, and I assume that's true of others as well. Also, I still haven't been sent the links for DS1 clips so I can make a compilation. I won't have nearly as much free time soon, and so it would be preferable that I get them soon unless someone else would rather compile them. He has used it, but I don't remember there being anything interesting about it on stream.

With the reduced list for the next stream (or two), I've edited the Order Tiers to be time estimates. The stream will probably be 4-7 hours long For the snow area everyone hates, I think you should play it normally until you know why it sucks (probably 1-2 deaths), and then summon all the NPCs for an actually fun time. For the Gank Squad and Ancient Dragon, I think it's fair to summon after a few honest tries.

I check the VOD, and Papa Francisco's invasion took just over 10 minutes. Time well spent on everybody's end.

I got rid of the hackers and two guards, and then emetic poisoned him so he would go to the bathroom. Instead he went to the trashcan, so I tried improvising by throwing something towards the toilet as he ended vomiting, hoping he might move close enough to drown. Instead, 47 threw the screwdriver at his head and I failed. Oh, and apparently without communicating it, they decided to allow lethal poison even though it's not an accident.

Yep, I completely forgot about that covenant even though it's the last thing I did before beating the game! I didn't realize Vendrick needed to be defeated for his blessing, so I've also added that. I also agree that the gank squad isn't as bad as people say, but it's still mostly based on tedium and isn't interesting enough to justify it.

@Nick Breckon I made a checklist for the rest of DS2's optional content so that nothing gets forgotten, and the instructions for finding it are all in one place. I'll be ticking these boxes as they're completed. If anyone has suggestions for things I forgot, should improve, or otherwise change, let me know via a thread response or a PM. P.S: I still haven't been sent the clips for the compilation video.

Having been passed during the last stream, I resumed playing Dark Souls 2 after four months. When I got to the Iron Passage, I was too intimidated to try due to the madness of last week, and based on my experience with the first Smelter Demon. I decided to beat the other two bosses first and complete all other optional Iron King content. After that, it was time to fight the Smelter Demon. Knowing that I was likely to be at it for at least an hour, I decided to start listening to Idle Thumbs as I despawned the enemies of both gauntlets over the course of about half an hour. After clearing them all out, I decided to do a run for the items in the normal path before attempting the boss. In this item run, I managed to make it to the boss door having only gotten hit once. It turns out spending all that time to clear the gauntlets wasn't necessary at all. After crossing the fog barrier, I beat the Smelter Demon in one attempt and it wasn't even close. As for the video, it probably won't be done by Jan 1st as I'd planned since I still haven't been sent the clips.

I forgot about this thread! For this ET, I just dropped the chandelier on him like every other dull person. Apparently, she murdered the headmaster and 'discovered' his body. The soldiers were there to investigate, and to protect her from the killer.

Cool! Would any of you with access to the Twitch account mind sending me the clip urls? You should be able to find essentially all of them here: https://clips.twitch.tv/my-clips/channel Instead of getting each link manually, you can use this extension to save time: https://chrome.google.com/webstore/detail/copy-links/kcpoommnneaebpfgaoejklgemonkmjpc

I've been planning to make a compilation of the DS1 clips by the end of the year, but heard on one of the Nick's streams that one of you has considered doing it, @Chris or @Jake. If that's the case, let me know so I can send some of my clips with less than 10 views (I made a few that I didn't share). If not, let me know and I'll go ahead and start making it.

I don't comment much in the podcast threads, but I fully agree with this. I oftentimes like listening to them on Mondays anyway. As always, great episode.

Thanks for the streams today. Tomorrow will be so good. https://clips.twitch.tv/idlethumbs/ExcitedCarabeefBleedPurple Edit: Chris said about halfway through that he wanted to see a speedrunner do that mission using only the battleaxe. Here's that, but also Silent Assassin in the Santa Suit: Thanks again for the stream.

Kyir is streaming, and it appears that Nick joined him with a new character, "Benhart of Jugo" https://clips.twitch.tv/kyir/FilthyPigTinyFace

Yes, it was definitely in the audio upload.

They were both runs to Gwyn in the second to last stream (parts 11 and 12, but I think only 12). I think the second happened over an hour before he stopped. It is an exaggeration as far as pure difficulty goes, but the game has a ridiculous and unenjoyable curve if you don't swap paths for a while.

Now that you're somewhat interested in it, Nick, here's a video from Dan Floyd of Extra Credits on the lore of DS1. I think it's really worth watching for greater contextualization of everything you've experienced over the past two weeks (information starts at 2:39 for those interested enough). There is also one terrible habit you have that will destroy you in Dark Souls 2. You have the tendency to never want to leave an area/boss once you've started it, even if you're not ready or could spend 5 minutes getting better equipment. Dark Souls 2's structure, essentially, is a hub with four main paths sprouting out, each of which has a few branches to other paths. It is expected that once you beat a zone, you relocate and make progress in another path before returning. In Dark Souls 1, it's fine if you move from the Duke's Archives to the Crystal Caves immediately, but those decisions can run you into a wall in Dark Souls 2. Feeona also ran into more crazy nonsense.

At this point, there are 1 or 2 Firekeeper souls you can get to improve your flask (which I strongly recommend you do). I also still recommend going to the Undead Asylum to trade for another FaP.

And also for everyone who wants to listen with the Idle Thumbs theme on loop: Listen on Twitch I don't recommend that, but I'm sure some would say the original direct-to-video release is better than the Driggs' Cut.