Homebrew Sponsored Magic Advice (Consorting with Spirits)

[vultur]

He doesn't really need wards without thresholds either. He really doesn't need much, since he hasn't done much on-screen.

Well, I don't know how else he could have done a ward on a battlefield.

It can't be a Stunt. Stunts modify skills and are generally taken by mortals. That'd be like making the At Range upgrade for Incite Emotion into a Stunt.

I thought you'd posted in the past that it did make sense to have stunts modify powers, and did it on the Generic NPC thread? Maybe I am misremembering, or did you change your mind?

It's not actually very specific narratively. Only half of the canon examples are actually clearly provided by a sponsor. Place Of Power magic comes from a place, Kemmlerian Necromancy never mentions an actual sponsor, and Soulfire is weird.

I'm not sure of that...

Sponsored magic is the name we’re giving to spellcasting that draws on power sources other than the caster himself (he can still draw on his own power; it’s just not an exclusive arrangement).
These power sources, called sponsors, are at least semi-aware, if not fully-aware, entities. Ancient and strange and potent, they have agendas of their own,

So it does seem they all have an actual sponsor. I think umdshaman is right that Kemmlerian Necromancy is sponsored by death:

Kemmlerites draw on the power of death itself to fuel their dark magics

As for places of power:

Such a source might be
called a genius loci (“spirit of the place”), but other times they aren’t as overtly-identified— they might simply manifest as a particularly potent ley line, for example. No two places of power are the same, with each tying into some entity’s agenda. These entities are often abstract, suffusing the place, but they may manifest a transient physical form when the attunement and binding rituals are performed.

"Each tying into some entity's agenda" suggests to me that even the ley line ones have some sort of semi-awareness and agenda, or are at least a link to something that does.

Besides, Claws doesn't have to be claws. That principle holds for Powers in general.

That's a good point, but I think sponsored magic has a lot more thematic stuff attached to it than Claws, or even something more specific like Incite Emotion.

Specificallym though it feels to me like debt/agenda is a core element of sponsored magic, even more than evothaum (which soulfire seems to lack, going by the book; so it seems to me it's not really worth -3 if you already have Evo and Thaum, though it totally is worth -5 if you have no other spellcasting).

[Sanctaphrax]

Well, I don't know how else he could have done a ward on a battlefield.

I've heard speculation about him using the threshold between the Nevernever and the real world or something like that.

Or who knows, maybe there was an old fence lying around.

Off-screen, so who knows.

I thought you'd posted in the past that it did make sense to have stunts modify powers, and did it on the Generic NPC thread? Maybe I am misremembering, or did you change your mind?

There are limits. "+2 to Investigation with Psychometry" is one thing, modifying the basic rules that your Powers work under is another.

I'm not sure of that...

...

So it does seem they all have an actual sponsor. I think umdshaman is right that Kemmlerian Necromancy is sponsored by death:

...

As for places of power:
"Each tying into some entity's agenda" suggests to me that even the ley line ones have some sort of semi-awareness and agenda, or are at least a link to something that does.

There are hints that maybe some kind of entity is meant to be involved, but the writing doesn't really back that up. Nothing in the novels makes it look like there's anything intelligent behind necromancy, and the rules don't mention such an entity either.

There's always an external power battery and there's usually some kind of agenda-esque-thing (agenda sounds too planned for some of these magics if you ask me), but actual characters who provide the magic are not always present.

[umdshaman]

Compels. Compels are Compels, agenda-related or not.

At this point it feels like you're purposefully misunderstanding. There 2 separate points.
* Mechanically, a compel related to a specific agenda is rather like having another aspect. Not completely, but sort of. In fact, I'm not sure why (templates aside) an aspect related to your Sponsored Magic isn't a Must. I'd probably house rule that. Anyway, normally the GM compels you to act in keeping with your character normal behavior in an inconvenient way (using the aspects). Since arguably your High Concept (if nothing else) will reflect your sponsorship, the GM is free to compel you to do whatever your sponsor feels you should be doing.
* Narratively, it doesn't seem to make sense that "self-sponsored" magic has a debt mechanic. With Sponsored Magic, you're getting an extra boost from your sponsor. With "self-sponsored" magic, its just there because its part of Sponsored Magic but there's not really any justification for your boost.

Ritual + Channelling is kind of a bad deal compared to Sponsored Magic. Focused Practitioners in general are kind of weak compared to Wizards and Emissaries.

A Focused Practitioner doesn't generally have both (not that they can't). They also take significantly less refresh cost than Wizards. And Sponsored Magic has narrative drawbacks. Plus not being strictly balanced doesn't mean there's a hole. And "self-sponsored" magic doesn't really fix that problem anyway, since it all requires that you already have it... or at least that was my understanding. If I'm wrong then I have one more thing to add to my list of complaints about it.

Worldwalker is a bad Power for a Wizard to take, but Wizards who walk worlds want something like it.

It's not as versatile as using magic but its actually a really good power, especially for a Wizard who takes regular day trips to the Nevernever. It costs more refresh to get all of the bonuses as stunts, plus it doesn't cost you anything (other than time between entry/exit) to use.

First up, they can't use Discipline.

Sure they can. "Hey, GM. I'd like to take Breath Weapon [Fire] to represent my character's specialization in Pyromancy. Can I have it use Discipline instead?" There isn't anything special about the skills the Powers in the book use. They're just the most appropriate to the way the powers are described.
[/quote]

Second up, optimization 101 tells you not to pay full price for redundant abilities. You'll pretty much always be better off with Refinement, or with something unrelated like Toughness.

Aside from the fact that "optimization" is just a polite term for "minmaxing" (which is not a good reason to design things a particular way and as a GM would make me that much more likely to nix a custom Power/Stunt) Breath Weapon isn't redundant. Magic costs mental stress; Breath Weapon doesn't. That advantage is not trivial at all.
[/quote]

Third up, Breath Weapon is just kind of weak in general. Low damage and short range.

The RAW doesn't really specify, but I'm probably not going to let you throw fire two zones away with evocation, either. As far as damage, in a lot of ways many low-damage attacks are better than a single high damage attack. If my stress boxes are filled (which I can do in 4 hits of any strenght, technically) then I have no choice but to be taken out or fill a consequence regardless of the amount of stress I just took. But, yes, that was just an example. An appropriate specialization substitute would probably need to be a bit more powerful than that.

[vultur]

I think the Gatekeeper just has a stunt that gives him a +2 to Lore with Nevernever geography stuff (finding weak spots, predicting what's on the other side of a Nevernever-mortal world border). Harry doesn't have Transportation/Worldwalking Evothaum, and he still opens NN portals quite quickly and easily in the books... because it's a low complexity ritual, not because it's evothaum or evocation. His tracking spells are pretty simple too

EDIT: If he has anything special for worldwalking beyond a Thaumaturgy specialization bonus; he probably already has a very high Lore (I'd presume Epic) and his actual Lore knowledge stunts may not be worldwalking-based but time-based and

(click to show/hide)

Outsider stuff/Nemesis detection

[vultur]

I've heard speculation about him using the threshold between the Nevernever and the real world or something like that.

Or who knows, maybe there was an old fence lying around.

Off-screen, so who knows

Good points. I like the NN-mortal world threshold bit, but I don't think that would accomplish anything if everyone is already on one side of the border (you could probably do it to prevent creatures from crossing the border though).

Actually, now that I think of it, maybe it wasn't a Thaumaturgy-style Ward in mechanical terms at all, but just a really big Evocation Block, which he "extended duration" with a second evocation, described as a ward fluff-wise. If they were on a battlefield, all the Rampires might well have been in line-of-sight and accessible for evocation...

There are limits. "+2 to Investigation with Psychometry" is one thing, modifying the basic rules that your Powers work under is another.

Ah, OK.

There are hints that maybe some kind of entity is meant to be involved, but the writing doesn't really back that up. Nothing in the novels makes it look like there's anything intelligent behind necromancy, and the rules don't mention such an entity either.

There's always an external power battery and there's usually some kind of agenda-esque-thing (agenda sounds too planned for some of these magics if you ask me), but actual characters who provide the magic are not always present.

Well, I took the statement about all Sponsored Magics as pretty strongly implying that there is.

And I don't think the agenda necessarily implies intelligence in this setting; YS talks about "semi-aware", whatever that means, and includes ley lines and things. I don't think Harry's Winter Knight Mantle is intelligent, but it definitely acts like a sponsored magic agenda (pushing him toward predatory behavior).

[narphoenix]

At this point it feels like you're purposefully misunderstanding. There 2 separate points.
* Mechanically, a compel related to a specific agenda is rather like having another aspect. Not completely, but sort of. In fact, I'm not sure why (templates aside) an aspect related to your Sponsored Magic isn't a Must. I'd probably house rule that. Anyway, normally the GM compels you to act in keeping with your character normal behavior in an inconvenient way (using the aspects). Since arguably your High Concept (if nothing else) will reflect your sponsorship, the GM is free to compel you to do whatever your sponsor feels you should be doing.

Yes, but by the numbers, it doesn't change anything. It doesn't matter why you're doing stupid things, numbers wise, just /that/ you're doing them.

Now, mind you, narratively it matters. But we're talking mechanics here.

* Narratively, it doesn't seem to make sense that "self-sponsored" magic has a debt mechanic. With Sponsored Magic, you're getting an extra boost from your sponsor. With "self-sponsored" magic, its just there because its part of Sponsored Magic but there's not really any justification for your boost.

It's not that big a deal. You're essentially just spending Fate Points in advance. And Fate Points are explicitly designed to change how the narrative (dice) goes

A Focused Practitioner doesn't generally have both (not that they can't). They also take significantly less refresh cost than Wizards. And Sponsored Magic has narrative drawbacks. Plus not being strictly balanced doesn't mean there's a hole. And "self-sponsored" magic doesn't really fix that problem anyway, since it all requires that you already have it... or at least that was my understanding. If I'm wrong then I have one more thing to add to my list of complaints about it.

Yes, but narrative drawbacks =/= mechanical ones. And have what, exactly?

It's not as versatile as using magic but its actually a really good power, especially for a Wizard who takes regular day trips to the Nevernever. It costs more refresh to get all of the bonuses as stunts, plus it doesn't cost you anything (other than time between entry/exit) to use.

Opening a door to the Nevernever is already simple for a wizard to do with impunity. And it makes sense to allow someone to use Lore anyway to navigate the Nevernever. So, to get the +2, it would only cost 1 refresh, so...

Sure they can. "Hey, GM. I'd like to take Breath Weapon [Fire] to represent my character's specialization in Pyromancy. Can I have it use Discipline instead?" There isn't anything special about the skills the Powers in the book use. They're just the most appropriate to the way the powers are described.

Aside from the fact that "optimization" is just a polite term for "minmaxing" (which is not a good reason to design things a particular way and as a GM would make me that much more likely to nix a custom Power/Stunt) Breath Weapon isn't redundant. Magic costs mental stress; Breath Weapon doesn't. That advantage is not trivial at all.

The RAW doesn't really specify, but I'm probably not going to let you throw fire two zones away with evocation, either. As far as damage, in a lot of ways many low-damage attacks are better than a single high damage attack. If my stress boxes are filled (which I can do in 4 hits of any strenght, technically) then I have no choice but to be taken out or fill a consequence regardless of the amount of stress I just took. But, yes, that was just an example. An appropriate specialization substitute would probably need to be a bit more powerful than that.

Actually, the advantage kind of /is/ trivial. Evocation lets you blast at higher than your normal skills with Weapon:6 with ridiculous impunity. AND the RAW says that the only limit on Evocation is line of sight. If you can see someone 6 zones away, you can nuke them with fire.

And yes, an appropriate substitute /would/ have to be more powerful… like Self-Sponsored Magic.

[Taran]

And yes, an appropriate substitute /would/ have to be more powerful… like Self-Sponsored Magic.

MORE POWER!!!

It doesn't need to be more powerful.  It just has to be something that a specialist can do that a normal wizard can't.

[umdshaman]

Now, mind you, narratively it matters. But we're talking mechanics here.

It's FATE. The narrative trumps the mechanics.

It's not that big a deal. You're essentially just spending Fate Points in advance. And Fate Points are explicitly designed to change how the narrative (dice) goes

That's actually a really big deal. In fact, the RAW basically suggests that the only time you should be allowed to do it is that one per adventure (or perhaps even character) heroic moment. Aside from Sponsored Magic anyway.

Yes, but narrative drawbacks =/= mechanical ones. And have what, exactly?

You're the one who decided I was only arguing about mechanics here. I am arguing about a mechanical construct that is ill-suited to represent its narrative premise, as stated elsewhere. And "have what" is that if self-sponsored magic doesn't require you to already have another form of magic than its basically just a more powerful version of Ritual and Channeling. In my opinion, its a bad idea to just plain upgrade the RAW.

Opening a door to the Nevernever is already simple for a wizard to do with impunity. And it makes sense to allow someone to use Lore anyway to navigate the Nevernever. So, to get the +2, it would only cost 1 refresh, so...

http://www.jimbutcheronline.com/bb/index.php/topic,40855.msg2006067.html#msg2006067
And simple or easy are not the same thing as "with impunity" but its an example. Honestly, if that's what you're saying then there's no point to Improved Worldwalking at all.

Actually, the advantage kind of /is/ trivial.

Well, you're allowed to disagree.

And yes, an appropriate substitute /would/ have to be more powerful… like Self-Sponsored Magic.

GOTO 1. I'm not having the exact same argument again.

[Sanctaphrax]

Thanks, narphoenix, for saying a lot of things that I was going to say.

At this point it feels like you're purposefully misunderstanding.

I assure you, I'm not. I've been saying the same thing over and over again around here for years, this isn't just something I cooked up to annoy you.

Sure they can. "Hey, GM. I'd like to take Breath Weapon [Fire] to represent my character's specialization in Pyromancy. Can I have it use Discipline instead?" There isn't anything special about the skills the Powers in the book use. They're just the most appropriate to the way the powers are described.

Far be it from me to tell you not to houserule, but that is what you're doing here. The book never gives any indication that you can use any other skill.

Aside from the fact that "optimization" is just a polite term for "minmaxing" (which is not a good reason to design things a particular way and as a GM would make me that much more likely to nix a custom Power/Stunt) Breath Weapon isn't redundant. Magic costs mental stress; Breath Weapon doesn't. That advantage is not trivial at all.

Did minmaxing become a dirty word while I wasn't paying attention?

Optimization or minmaxing or whatever you want to call it is a fundamental part of almost every game. You've gotta pay some attention to character power to make the game work. For example, playing a wizard with no Conviction or Discipline is just annoying for everyone.

And it's a fairly trivial advantage. If you threw out 4 evocations and the target's still standing, Breath Weapon won't get you anywhere.

The RAW doesn't really specify, but I'm probably not going to let you throw fire two zones away with evocation, either.

Seriously?

I don't think I've ever heard that interpretation before.

It doesn't need to be more powerful.  It just has to be something that a specialist can do that a normal wizard can't.

Taking Breath Weapon actually makes a fire-thrower worse as throwing fire. 2 FP/session would give them more fire-power than a weak secondary attack using a secondary skill.

Personally, I think people who specialize in throwing fire should be better at throwing fire than people who don't.

Thinking out loud, being able to throw out 1-power attack evocations of a specific element without paying stress might be a fair -1 Power.

Actually, now that I think of it, maybe it wasn't a Thaumaturgy-style Ward in mechanical terms at all, but just a really big Evocation Block, which he "extended duration" with a second evocation, described as a ward fluff-wise. If they were on a battlefield, all the Rampires might well have been in line-of-sight and accessible for evocation...

Also a possibility.

And I don't think the agenda necessarily implies intelligence in this setting; YS talks about "semi-aware", whatever that means, and includes ley lines and things. I don't think Harry's Winter Knight Mantle is intelligent, but it definitely acts like a sponsored magic agenda (pushing him toward predatory behavior).

Yeah, I know. The DFRPG definition of agenda isn't the same as the dictionary definition.

It's FATE. The narrative trumps the mechanics.

What does this even mean?

[Taran]

And it's a fairly trivial advantage. If you threw out 4 evocations and the target's still standing, Breath Weapon won't get you anywhere.

Taking Breath Weapon actually makes a fire-thrower worse as throwing fire. 2 FP/session would give them more fire-power than a weak secondary attack using a secondary skill.

Personally, I think people who specialize in throwing fire should be better at throwing fire than people who don't.

Thinking out loud, being able to throw out 1-power attack evocations of a specific element without paying stress might be a fair -1 Power.

If you're inventing new powers, I think it's an easy house-rule to allow breath weapon targeted with Discipline.  I don't think it's fair to throw out house-rules and custom powers but, when it's convenient for your argument, say that you "can't do that because the power doesn't let you."

I also don't think we should bring up the semantics of min/maxing and Power-gaming, optimization.   I think the whole conversation will just devolve - it always does.

The power in question (whether it be a custom power or re-skinned power) has to be balanced and give the best flavour for the specialist in question and make them competitive with the 'general practitioners' in their own field of expertise.  It doesn't have to be 'more powerful'.

My problem was that I didn't think self-sponsored magic had the right flavour and that there might be another way of going about it.  I'm not sure what that would be, though.  I think if you're going to use sponsored debt, it has to be very clearly defined how it would be used.

[umdshaman]

I assure you, I'm not. I've been saying the same thing over and over again around here for years, this isn't just something I cooked up to annoy you.

That's kind of the issue. The thing you've said over and over for years doesn't actually have anything to do with the arguments I made. It's like:
"An apple is an apple."
"Sure. Did you know that potatoes are called 'apples of the earth' in French?"
"An apple is an apple."
"Okay... So is that a yes or a no?"
"An apple is an apple."
Just saying.

Far be it from me to tell you not to houserule, but that is what you're doing here. The book never gives any indication that you can use any other skill.

I'm gonna skip over the rest of the similar comments because the fact is it was an example of a power that could be used. It probably makes more sense to make custom powers. I just don't think "self-sponsored" magic is a good template for it for all of the reasons I've stated.

I also don't think we should bring up the semantics of min/maxing and Power-gaming, optimization.   I think the whole conversation will just devolve - it always does.

Agreed. It's not actually germane.

And it's a fairly trivial advantage.

Again skipping over the similar comments, most of your argument seems to be based on the idea that you'd only face one opponent once per session. And honestly, if you can one-hit (or even 4-hit) that big bad, you're just wasting your time when it comes to rolling the dice. (And actually, yeah, a Weapon:2 can have a pretty big impact at the end of a fight when stress has been taking and consequences used.)

Seriously? I don't think I've ever heard that interpretation before.

It's not really an interpretation. More of a house rule. Guns only have a range of 3 zones, but we never see Harry throwing Evocation at the ranges guns can shoot (or anywhere near); line of sight or not. Honestly, it would probably depend a lot on what the zones represent.

What does this even mean?

It means I get real tired of people treating mechanics and narrative as two different things in FATE. They're not. The mechanics are there to support the narrative but if the mechanics become to problematic, they should go out the window rather than changing the narrative. You can't have a mechanical balance discussion for FATE without also looking at the narrative impact and seeing if the mechanics even fit the narrative. In short, it was the summation of all of the other times I've said something about not separating the two.

[Sanctaphrax]

If you're inventing new powers, I think it's an easy house-rule to allow breath weapon targeted with Discipline.  I don't think it's fair to throw out house-rules and custom powers but, when it's convenient for your argument, say that you "can't do that because the power doesn't let you."

I'm not saying you can't do it. Heck, I did it when I rewrote Breath Weapon.

I'm just saying that it's a houserule.

I also don't think we should bring up the semantics of min/maxing and Power-gaming, optimization.   I think the whole conversation will just devolve - it always does.

Good point. I'll stop there.

The power in question (whether it be a custom power or re-skinned power) has to be balanced and give the best flavour for the specialist in question and make them competitive with the 'general practitioners' in their own field of expertise.  It doesn't have to be 'more powerful'.

It does have to be more powerful than Breath Weapon if you want to be balanced and you want the specialist to be competitive. Breath Weapon is really weak for a spellcaster.

That's kind of the issue. The thing you've said over and over for years doesn't actually have anything to do with the arguments I made. It's like:
"An apple is an apple."
"Sure. Did you know that potatoes are called 'apples of the earth' in French?"
"An apple is an apple."
"Okay... So is that a yes or a no?"
"An apple is an apple."
Just saying.

I think I've been addressing what you said. You've been arguing that an agenda is a weakness, I've been arguing that agendas are the same as ordinary compellable aspects. Which aren't weaknesses.

Again skipping over the similar comments, most of your argument seems to be based on the idea that you'd only face one opponent once per session. And honestly, if you can one-hit (or even 4-hit) that big bad, you're just wasting your time when it comes to rolling the dice. (And actually, yeah, a Weapon:2 can have a pretty big impact at the end of a fight when stress has been taking and consequences used.)

What I said about one opponent apples even more strongly to a group of opponents. Zone-wide evocations are great.

Also, stress recovers every scene. Not every session.

In my experience most fights, even epic ones, tend to end fairly quickly when evokers are involved because they hit hard and are fragile. Four exchanges is actually a fair while.

And if weapon 2 attacks are doing anything, an extra Refinement or some FP could probably have ended the fight earlier.

It means I get real tired of people treating mechanics and narrative as two different things in FATE. They're not.

Yes they are. They're related, obviously, but the narrative doesn't have Fate Points in it.

And in my experience, the best way to make sure that a Power is balanced is by looking at it without considering the narrative. I'm pretty confident in this because I've designed a lot of Powers and watched other people design a lot of Powers. People who use narrative concepts to balance things tend to write bad Powers.

[umdshaman]

I think I've been addressing what you said. You've been arguing that an agenda is a weakness, I've been arguing that agendas are the same as ordinary compellable aspects. Which aren't weaknesses.

Then we have a discord. (See what I did there?)

What I said about one opponent apples even more strongly to a group of opponents. Zone-wide evocations are great.

Haha. I think my example appled some effect after all. :-P

Also, stress recovers every scene. Not every session.
In my experience most fights, even epic ones, tend to end fairly quickly when evokers are involved because they hit hard and are fragile. Four exchanges is actually a fair while.

And that's kind of my point. If your epic fights are lasting four exchanges, you're probably throwing the wrong kind of encounters at people.

Yes they are. They're related, obviously, but the narrative doesn't have Fate Points in it.

The mechanics are subject to the narrative, not independent and not equal. That's what I'm saying.

And in my experience, the best way to make sure that a Power is balanced is by looking at it without considering the narrative. I'm pretty confident in this because I've designed a lot of Powers and watched other people design a lot of Powers. People who use narrative concepts to balance things tend to write bad Powers.

But most of them are. +2 to Lore when navigating the Nevernever IS a narrative balance. If it were just +2 for one refresh it would be too powerful, so its balanced by a narrative restriction. Being able to borrow debt without the narrative restriction of an agenda is too powerful. But really, the point here was the point above... if you make a Power that's based on another Power but it doesn't have the same narrative basis for one of its abilities it a bad power. In Sponsored Magic that debt is power borrowed from your sponsor. Where is the narrative basis for debt for "self-sponsored" magic? That's the most critical part of the question and the thing that no one seems to have answered.

The only reasoning I've seen for it is something to the effect of "drawing on inner reserves" but if that's the case that should just be a houserule that all players can do, although that's really what Fate Points are for in the first place. Fate Points are a resource management system. If there's no downside or restriction on taking on debt then you've basically wrecked the core mechanic of FATE.

[Haru]

And that's kind of my point. If your epic fights are lasting four exchanges, you're probably throwing the wrong kind of encounters at people.

It continuously sounds like you came in here to tell people that they are playing the game wrong.
I'm not saying that's what you intend to say, and I don't intend to bully you out or anything, far be it from me. It's just that this is how it comes across to me right now, and it isn't making a good first impression.

I'm just saying that it's a houserule.

A lot of DFRPG is houserules. The RAW itself suggests to come up with stunts and powers etc. yourself, and I wouldn't really call that houserules.

I feel like we should maybe cut off part of this thread and put it in a new discussion thread about self sponsored magic, since the original question seems to have drowned a few posts ago.

[umdshaman]

It continuously sounds like you came in here to tell people that they are playing the game wrong.

I have continuously said that this is my OPINION. Ironically this is exactly how Sanctaphrax sounds to me. But its impossible to have a disagreement without sounding like you're saying the other person is doing it wrong. Because that's exactly what you're saying. I will note that my first post in this thread was "Here's how I suggest doing it instead". Not "You're doing it wrong", just "I think this might work better". Once we got into "self-sponsored" magic itself, that's when I inevitably sounded like I was saying "You're doing it wrong", because... well... I kind of think "self-sponsored" magic IS doing it wrong. Doesn't mean people have to agree with me but I've had as many supporters as detractors and everyone is entitled to have a different opinion from anyone else.

I feel like we should maybe cut off part of this thread and put it in a new discussion thread about self sponsored magic, since the original question seems to have drowned a few posts ago.

I'd be okay with that. I tried to bring that up a few posts ago, but I honestly think OP has stopped watching anyway.