The Best Offline No-WiFi RPG Games for the iPhone [January

Alright folks, buckle up and Charge your batteries. This play's going to smack you all the way back to 1999.
First, a recap. WSB has proven to the world that retail matters. With the power of the hive mind, leveraged options trading, and distinctly fragile market conditions, we've refueled a few businesses that were written off by the street. And we made some money doing it. To no one's surprise, the gaslighting boomers called us manic, irrational, and stupid. They hired CNBC to dismiss us, politicize us, patronize us, or accuse us of cheating. They told us to go back to watching Netflix and let the big boys steer the ship.
Fact is, we all know the GME play was no smooth brained fluke. The strategy formed organically, built on a masterly combination of market technicals, narrative, underlying facts, and community research. A few timely events, and we took off to the stratosphere.
Now it's time to let them know that we can also bring things back down to earth. It's time to prove that us lovely commoners are grounded, sophisticated analysts--or at least, we're fast learning newbs. We are measured in judgement, clear in action, helpful to our communities. And we're having some fun. Retail is not a stupid mob, we are a collective social intelligence.
So there's my heartfelt intro, now onto the play.
Two words, and you're not going to like it:Short. Tesla.
I'll give you a minute.
If you just bought $TSLA and think all stonks only go up, you can skip to the comments, turn caps lock ON, and go nuts. Stonks to infinity means hyperinflation. You're a millionaire, and a burger costs 12k. No thanks. So here's the breakdown.
Table of Contents. (That's right.)

1. The Gravity. Hive Mind is Uploaded: Retail Options Control the Delta Hedge.
2. The Mass. All Roads lead to Mars...and Back. Passive Inclusion of $TSLA, the "God Meme".
3. The Playing Field.
4. The Trade.
5. The Risks.
6. The Endgame. Power to the Players.

Let's goo.

I. The Gravity. The Hive Mind is Uploaded. Retail Options Control the Delta Hedge.

Let's start with what we know. We're all poor and the Hedge Fund managers are rich. If you add together all retail investors, our funds would barely tick on the balance sheet of your local BlackRock. There's a reason they're called the 1%.
So what gives? How can a few Reddit analysts and their YOLO followers trigger cascading rallies across multiple tickers, even moving the very SPY itself?
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GME vs SPY, during the Deep Fuckin Squeeze
To grasp the answer, you need to understand one thing about Delta-Hedging. Delta Hedging is what Market Makers do to stay 'risk neutral' while buying or selling options.
It works like this: When a Market Maker sells you a Call option, they also buy more Shares as hedge. That way, if the call ends up being right, they already have the Shares to sell you, and they've made a little profit on the price increase. If they didn't do the Delta Hedge, the Market Maker would have to go out and buy those shares above the Strike Price, then sell them to you at a loss.
There's more to it, but thats all you need to know here.
We saw these dynamics at play with GME. You probably heard the terms Delta Squeeze, Gamma Squeeze, Short Squeeze, etc.
As you recall, the squeeze happened because lots of people started going long GME. The more people went long, the more shares Mr. Market Maker had to buy, which sent the price higher and higher, tempting more and more people to buy in and go long. It's a feedback loop, sparked by a few retail traders at the bottom of the food chain.
As Alex Harfouche, former head of Goldman Sachs' European block trading, keenly points out:

"Basic maths can demonstrate that the massive price moves are not ONLY a function of Reddit retail crowd YOLOing calls turning MMs into delta-hedging chasers. 15% to 20% of daily traded calls become OI (they are day traded) hence have no effect on dynamic delta-hedging. This leaves one explanation to the parabolic moves: when Reddit starts concentrating call buying volumes on some names, some keen observers are using this as a signal and fueling the moves." https://twitter.com/alexharfouche1/status/1355177706292465664

The $TSLA Delta Squeeze has been more prolonged, and MUCH more YUGE, but it follows the same mechanics. The more speculative calls, the more shares Market Makers have to buy up. Price goes up, speculation increases. It's a feedback loop, with little retail at the bottom, deciding everything.
That's the Gravity. Now onto the Mass.

II. The Mass. All Roads lead to Mars...and Back. Passive Inclusion of $TSLA, the "God Meme".

The second turbocharger that sent $TSLA soaring is pure courtesy of boomer mismanagement. They're called passive index funds, like the beloved SP&500. If you're not familiar, these funds track the 'biggest companies' and continuously rebalance their portfolios to hold an weighted distribution of shares.
Once the Delta-Squeeze hit the magic number, $TSLA was signed up to be included in these Passive Funds. This resulted in a astronomical amount of forced buying. For example, the Vanguard S&P 500 index fund, the OG passive index-tracking investment fund, has assets of over $600B. To bring Tesla up to the required 1.6% of its portfolio, Vanguard has to buy about $10B worth of Tesla shares. Just because.
And Vanguard is just the tip of the iceberg. According to Barron’s, “between $5 trillion and $6 trillion are invested in funds indexed to the S&P 500.” Because of arcane indexing algorithms, these funds were forced to buy around 120 million shares of Tesla, worth $80-100B, and divest $80-100B of other holdings, to align their portfolios with the new index composition. That's a whole lot of Buy Pressure.
But that's not it. An additional estimated $6.7 trillion in Active Funds are really just blindly following the S&P500, in a dubious practice called "Closet Indexing". [1] Basically you pretend to be an Active Fund Manager, but just construct a portfolio based on the SP&500 and collect a big management fee. It's the copypaste-from-wikipedia homework of the hedge fund manager world. Def can't go tits up.
So that's the Mass.
It's a whole of lot of money blindly buying up a stock, sending it higher and higher, luring in more and more speculation, despite the fact that the present day business fundamentals absolutely do not correspond. At this point, the bull narrative for Tesla has been whittled down to full reliance on "distant futures" and the cult following of Elon Musk.
I'm not an astrophysicist, but with the Gravity of Retail Driven Delta-Hedge and the Mass of Passive Fund Inclusion, there's a chance that even a small shift in public opinion will trigger cascading downward prices, as the Market Makers reverse and the planetary mass of Passive Inclusion Funds (and all their copycats) desperately rebalance and sell off.
But what do I know, I just eat crayons.

III. The Playing Field.

You might ask yourself--Why would so many Money Managers rely on Passive Indexing, copypasta, or reddit sentiment to do their jobs? Simply put: Because they live on yachts, and think they're too special to interface with the real world. These people have no way of knowing what is actually going on in the lives of everyday people, what we like, what we need, and how we assign value.
Remember: the underlying isn't the Stock Price. The underlying is the business. The actual real world operations associated with the Ticker, how they affect people's lives, and how we the people feel about that. In 2021, Retail will teach everyone this lesson, and many will be butthurt.
​
Tech Cycle Rolls Over. Courtesy of Trader_ferg, read the tweet. https://twitter.com/trader_ferg/status/1359504988960026627
On a way zoomed out macro level, this all makes sense, and is squarely aligned with the Central Banks mandate to undertake new social & economic reform. Part of this reset is the technological reality that accessible Retail Options trading is a far more granular method of capturing sentiment and valuation. With share trading, all a User can do is "Buy" or "Sell". Not much info for the AI to feed off of. On the other hand, with options, a user can provide a nuanced input about their projected Value and Future Timing of the Business. It's like Photo vs. Video. 4D Chess. A lot more data. All it needs is to be wired together and get a few more big Pumps of The Juice--not to make 'all stonks go up forever', but simply to facilitate the transactional throughput of higher order computing.
This is good: A massive Hive Mind of independent rational agents, feeding the blossoming AI with rich realtime votes on the value and future prospects of a Company. The AI needs this. It does not need a handful of overpaid money-managers who have never peeled a banana to sit on their yachts and pick tickers out of hat, or sleep at the wheel while an intern copies the trades of a 40-year-old indexing algorithm. There's too much risk of mis-pricing the underlying, and too many inefficient middlemen. With our help, the Hive Mind can do it better and cheaper, and the Real Big Boys know that. As the old adage goes, together Apes Strong. 🦍🦍🦍
Data from Options trading is just the beginning. Soon enough, stakeholders from across the world will seamlessly participate in realtime corporate governance, valuation, and ownership of the companies that touch their lives. The World Economic Forum call this the Shareholder Economy.
But that's future talk. Q3 2022. Let's stick to the present situation.

IV. The Trade.

I'll keep this part simple. If you're holding $TSLA, start selling the top. What the actual fuck are shares, anyway. If you're new or looking for a YOLO, Puts on TSLA, all year long.
Exact timing? Sooner than you think, maybe Tuesday.Pick your own risk/reward. Don't get freaky behind Wendy's or pawn off your girlfriend's cat.
690 is not a meme. 420 is probably not a meme. 42 is a meme.
And If you believe in the resonant effects of Mass and Gravity: Puts on SPY down to 369. NASDAQ-100 Puts to 10420.
Paper handed bitches too emo to go short: Buy some Steel, limited edition Air Jordans, or a '99 Cherokee straight 6. Collectibles will print for the next decade.
And if you're here bc you really dgaf and just want to Send A Message, throw puts on all the bois that keep ruining society: FB, Google, Twitter, Amazon, etc. Get creative. Trust your gut. If they don't print, at least you die a hero.
Remember, we don't have money, but we're the ones in charge. It's a spiritual choice. Boom. And guess what else, Dennis? We're not "afraid of a market crash" any more than we're afraid of getting shot at in Fortnite. A game's a game. We're already poor, unemployed, stuck at home in your dysfunctional system, eating shitty cold food from DoorDash. (Another excellent short, btw.)
But Wall Street did teach us one thing: you don't need to lose money, as long as you're on the right side of the trade. We see you. And we're capable of sitting back, crackin' a cold one, and surfing this wave all the way down the mountain. We are rising to the occasion, and putting ourselves on the right side of the trade.
If that was all too complicated, just call it the Reverse Moon. All Stonks go up, therefore All stonks go down. Now it's time for Stonks Go Down, so hop on board and don't worry. This Truck is Fully Powered By Gravity--the cleanest energy--the code is live in the matrix, uploading to your braincells as we speak. 100% self-driving, always have been. Turn off the iPhone and go hug your Mom. In the 5th Dimension, we're already Trillionaires.

V. The Risks

Timing. As far as I can tell, the biggest risk here is timing and scale. The TSLA fundamentals check out: bona fide crap. Price is the only thing that made it to Mars. Market conditions are primed for a steep reversal, It might have even started last week. Product quality is weak, but I can't confirm since I've only seen their cars on Youtube. Big Boys like Ford are coming to bat. Tech multiple is a ponzi.
But we still have no way of knowing how long elevated prices in the sector can last. Usually these things are drawn out like a drugged out bender, until they roll over and quickly collapse. Unfortunately, there are alot of rich fallguys like Chamath and Cathie Wood trying to distract you with Shiny Objects while they show their even richer Masters to the door.
I say fuck it, let's pre-empt, call out the bullshit and get our asses on the right side of this trade before it's too late. I don't want to be the last guy at the party strung out on the couch. I bet you don't either.
But what about the other failed shorts? Yep, lots of hedge fund managers have bled themselves dry trying to go short $TSLA. They neglected to realize the importance of The Vibe, and were generally short TSLA because they didn't believe in the core business or EVs or rocketships or some other arcane boomer technical thing. This time its different. Retail has already cashed the $TSLA stimmy check. Twitter is pwned. We see the smart money moving away, and can call it like we see it. We have learned how the market works, and we've adapted. $GME might not have made us all rich with money, but it made some of us just rich enough to spark confidence in the rest. We can spot the right moves, call them out, and participate in our financial system and economy. Who woulda thought.
But what about More Fed Stimmy? Silly boomer, Fed Stimmy was never about shifting to a paradigm where all stonks go up. It was about a macro return to shareholder economics, an embrace of price volatility, and the necessary technical upgrades to facilitate Big Data sentiment capture from the retail Hive Mind. Didn't you read Larry Fink's 2021 Letter to CEOs? Central Banks have played these games before, Take a look at Japan, or read about the Carry. Weird shit happens. But guess what, Bankers? In reality, you're the subs. I said it before, this is the 5th Dimension. We're gucci; you work for us. Enjoy the yacht and stay out of our treehouse. We don't have all your money, but we have our communities, our friends, our families, and our glorious lossporn. Freedoms so wild you literally could never imagine. Maybe that's why you locked us down, so our lives would suck as much as yours. Put that in your pipe and smoke it.
But what about The Future? Get those crayons out of your mouth. Human civilization is not one pre-order deposit away from a Techno-Paradise-Utopia. The Tesla Roadster took $250k deposits 3 years ago and has still delivered nothing. With $250k in 2018, you could've bought 50BTC and sold 'em to Musk for $2.3M last week. You got played, 'Frisco. Sorry not sorry.
The market is about main street, schools, small businesses, food, and homes. Root canals and babysitters. It's about real fucking people, none of whom will ever be rich enough to upload our brains to a network of satellites floating around Mars. Most of us, even the ones who made money with your dumb 2020 stonks, have had a pretty rough year. The future is wonderful, but there's also this little thing called the Present. And it's proving to be of vital importance.
But what about Internet Fame? No one can sustain infinite economic growth by going on Joe Rogan Podcast or shooting off cryptic 3 word tweets. Most of the engagement on elonmusk twitter is spam. The rest is Cringe. Go Check. On top of that, we all know that Twitter is compromised, that Mark Zuckerberg still has no real friends, and that web2 ad-tech social media is a garbage business model that ends up building worthless propaganda machines and echo chambers. I'd rather chill w my cat and horde Uranium. Whoops.
Unexpected Interventions? As we know, the Powers At Be have a lot of levers to pull. Tesla has been propped up by sweetheart government deals and tax credits. In fact that's the only reason they make any money to begin with. Go read about it.
So there's that: the government might do anything. There might be a new crisis and the gov might forces us to close all our bank accounts, wear chicken costumes, and dance in circles. Government intervention is a wild card. But weirdly enough, I think the Big Banks are on our side, ish. They def need to pwn all our trading data, harness our collective brainpower to go full AI, then cut out the previous generation of complacent middle-market fund managers. So who knows. This is all speculation. I don't work for the CIA. We do know that Michael Burry is short. And sequels sell.
China? Had to throw it in there, bc Biden might be pwned by the CCP and we might already be living in a Chinese colony. If that's true, I got no problem. China is cool, I love China, great culture, great people, the food, all of it. And they'll probably fix our roads! Xie xie! :D
But with respect to $TSLA price action and The Trade, the China Factor could work for or against us. I have no idea what China wants from me. Pelosi did buy some $TSLA Leaps, but that might've been a PsyOp. She's got hella deepfake vibes. Again, No idea. Consult your tea leaves.
But who's going to lose? Who will be the bagholders? As you've probably learned, every trade has a winner and loser. Such is life. There will always be bagholders. All I can say is that this time around, it doesn't need to be us.
If it all plays out according to my Tarot Cards, the Bankers will do what they've done best for centuries, and losses will be socialized across all the boomers with $ in passive index funds. People thought it was safe, but neglected to realize that the lazy overpaid fund managers didn't update their models since 1985. Instead, they let a hyped up trojan horse distort their portfolios and stretch the connection between SPY and the Real World, while in the background a tech-enabled Options market became the new Hive Mind of retail sentiment.
The Bagholders will be everyone who was comfortable and complacent enough to actually believe that if you dump all your assets in a passive index fund then durpa durp all stonks go up.Newsflash: It was a meme. We were kidding.
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Now don't get me wrong: Elon Musk is still weird and cool and none of this is a knock on him at all. He is undoubtedly a genius, and probably embraced these ideas years ago. He's told us many times: the future is re-usable rocketships. Up and Down. Up and Down. Volatility. In the long term, Tesla will succeed and fulfill its mission, and the influence of Musk and his companies will go down in history.
But Markets are markets. Trader_ferg says it best:

Multiple contraction overrides perfect mgmt execution. Your views can prove correct, Yet you get killed. Take Cisco in 2000. If you'd invested based on it: -Becoming a mainstay of the internet -Growing revenue strongly for next decade
You'd have been right. Yet still lost >80%.

Remember. Do not get emotional here, this is fundamental trading. Puts on $TSLA won't hurt baby X Æ A-XII. I know you might be a fanboy. It's ok, we forgive you.
The move is technical, and the point is simple: infinite money isn't a thing. All stonks go down. The markets are fragile; Retail Option Traders are in charge. $TSLA is overbought by a delta squeeze & huge passive fund inclusion. And at this precise moment we're rolling, Because we control the narrative.

VI. Endgame. Power to the Players.

So where does this all lead us? What happens to a world where the market is truly just a video game, fed by a mass of independent individuals riding a play up or down, talking strategy, making friends, and having fun? What happens is simple: markets function better, society is improved, and there is Way More Chill™. One day the social hive mind will cut out the Chamaths and Dorseys of the world and autonomously perform market functions: valuing companies and steering corporate governance in a realtime, decentralized, transparent way. There will still be Shadow Kings, but we might stop stressing about Booms and Busts, horribly opaque corporate governance, and endless media-Induced panics. We just want to play. The system might be smart, but we can always move first.
Anyway, started trading last week, so take this with a spoon of salt. Def not financial advice, but if you've read this far, you know that. Full Disclosure: I drive an '87 Chevy 4x4 and it rips. Only simps buy a Tesla.
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Sincerely yours,
-0xpectation.
​
what up

Appendix. Notes, Edits, and Responses:

Source | Previous table
Note: Some of the question-taker's answers were also removed along with corresponding questions, and they have not been recovered below.

Questions	Answers
What is a typical day in your life like?	I get up at 4:30. I watch some YouTube, do some email, work on my writing or similar. I head to the gym at 7, shower and start my day around 8. I work in my home office or shop/lab, code and work on stuff, throughout the day. I could be busy all the way through to 8-9PM if I'm wrapped up in something, but not usually that busy.
the below is a reply to the above
You get up at 4:30 AM? Wow. Have you always been a morning person? Are other people on your team morning people so you decided to start early? I’m asking this because it seems like a lot of successful people wake up very early and work out before starting their workday.	No, I never was until my neck injury. While recovering I couldn't sleep more than about 4-5 hours max and just got into the habit. Since it was so productive for me, I just kept it up!
the below is a reply to the above
Thanks for sharing. I wish you good health.	Thanks!
Did you create Robocopy, or know who did? I use that very regularly and much more efficient than using the GUI.	The secret dirt is that Robocopy was first written by MS colleague Kevin Allen, and he started sharing copies around in 1994ish. From there, and after many iterations and heavy-duty real-world feedback, robocopy ended up in the Windows Resource Kit, and then later merged into the core Windows package. In the beginning, Kevin was a very experienced programmer, but new to the Win32 API; so robocopy was one of his projects to educate himself about Windows programming. Later on, ITG used robocopy to routinely transfer many gigabytes of data around MS global offices, every night; it became very robust and battle-hardened. It is a long time now since Kevin was involved in the robocopy source code at all; it is maintained by the Windows team.
Did you create Microsoft Clippy? Will Clippy ever make a come back?	Noooo... but I was around at the time. We have Clippy now in the form of Siri and Google Assistant and Cortana, but there's no picture. That's all it was though, an early digital assistant.
I read on a Microsoft devblog that when windows got ported to 64bit pinball 3d was not ported because of bugs and the developers not being able to understand the code/not having enough time. It's a shame, because it was such an awesome game and I spent many hours playing it as a kid. Was the code messy due to being ported from Sam and do you think it could have been ported given enough time and expertise?	Basically what I did when I ported it was to maintain the central code "logic" loop of the game unchanged so that it would play just as it did on other platforms, and then "hooked" functionality coming out of it and going into it. So I rewrote the drawing code that did the actual drawing, but not he original code that wanted to do the drawing, if that makes sense. I changed the how, not why.
	That meant, though, that at the very core of the game was a big bunch of code that we didn't touch or monkey with, because it 'just worked'. Apparently sometime after Vista, in 64-bit, there was a collision detection bug in Pinball.
	From what I read, Raymond Chen looked at it and got the general idea of what was wrong but didn't want to touch the fragile old code. Raymond's one of the best debuggers I've met, so it wasn't a question of expertise but of time and resources.
	Anyone on the team could have trivially fixed it I'm sure, but it sounds like no one "owned" the game anymore after I left, and it was more than just a random little bug to fix, it would have required a dev to be assigned to it, and there likely was no one free.
What is your favourite colour please?	Well, I have four cars with blue interiors and I'm wearing a blue shirt and a blue watch and blue jeans. So probably blue.
If my son expresses interest in serious computer programming, where is a good place to start? C for Dummies? (I'm joking and I know terribly little about the topic, only enough to know backend is where it's at)	Python, then Javascript. Build a website!
Hi! Just wanted to say, I still use MS-DOS regularly, on many of my older machines in my collection. Also Win3.x, Win9x etc How do you feel about computers becoming extremely dependent on 'cloud' services? I can still set up an old machine, install an old OS, install old software and have it all up and running within an hour or so, while modern software essentially requires cloud services for literally everything. What happens to that software once some random person out there decides that they don't want to support it anymore? Those cloud services go away? Are you concerned that future generations will not be able to experience anything from this era of computing? Considering computers were designed to be able to continually run the same software over and over as necessary, how can that apply if the bulk of this is lost when the cloud disappears? Or maybe this isn't a concern at all, and I'm just crazy...?	I already have hardware that refused to work because the cloud service that backs it has been abandoned or the company has gone out of business.
	I worry that things become dependent on externals that aren't reliable long term, and I know what you mean... but fortunately Windows, once activated, runs perfectly well offline forever, really.
I'm a fresh graduate with some experience and reading the knowledge you all have in the comments has made me feel very inferior. I only started coding in my university and I don't do it in my past time. Am I doing something wrong? I do enjoy programming but I try to keep a work life balance. Is that a thing in software development? Also did you ever approve a pull request by Bill?	No, as long as you DO enjoy it when you're doing it, you're fine. There's an entire "spectrum" of people in the world and some of us have "special interests" with which we're a little obsessed, and tend to "hyperfocus". I'm one of those people but it's by no means the only way to do it!
	I knew many great programmers who (a) didn't program in their spare time at home and (b) didn't continue to program recreationally after leaving it as a job.
	If you can work regular 40 hours a week as a productive programmer, you'll be set!
the below is a reply to the above
Thank you so much for this! Are there any tips you'd like to give to fresh graduates like me?	If you get a job at a large company like Microsoft, and decide you're not happy, try moving INTERNALLY before looking for another job. You could work for 5 different companies over your career and they could all be Google, for example. Culture goes through and through, but every team has its own.
the following is a later reply	If you can put in a 35-40 hour week of solid work, you'll be fine. There are three buckets: the obsessives, like myself, who work as much as they can. Then the solid pros, who can turn out a ton of quality stuff in 40 hours. And then you have the slackers who surf Facebook at work and read reddit when they should be coding. As long as you're not in that group you're fine, and a balance is important. It is indeed a thing the successful people achieve it. It's not about how much code you write, it's about how much MORE time you spend coding than you want to, and that should be zero!
	Lots of people are in careers they don't practice in their free time, in fact most. So it's a bonus if you're that way, but most people are NOT, so don't despair! You're normal!
If you're still answering, how much of the original Task Manager still lives in the modern Task Manager? Anyway, thanks for the AMA! You're a legend!	I don't know for sure, but from looking at the app, and not the code, I'd expect about 60-70% of it?
Hopefully you’re still taking questions. I get a lot of crap by my peers about command line. Power shell is badass but I’m a cmd guy myself. I know we can do pretty much everything that cmd does in powershell and more, but idk. I like what I like, you know? Where do you stand on this?	Honestly I'd be a CMD guy as well, but I'm really starting to lean towards using bash under WSL.
	Have you ever looked the help for SET and FOR under CMD? It's where we put every piece of extra functionality, since you can't add keywords that might collide with people's script names, etc...
I didn’t use windows after windows 7 for about 5 years. Back in august 2019 I finally rebuilt and upgraded my old PC and installed windows 10. The task manager in windows 10 is so amazing and powerful. I would imagine it’s something you wanted to implement in the 90s but didn’t have the tools or time. Right?	Indeed, I'm a big fan of the current task manager and what they've done with it! I wish there was a Dark mode, I wish it handled file lock tracking, and I've always got wish lists, but they've done a great job with it!
CIA_grade_LSD: Why does the file transfer time remaining progress bar start at like 15 hours and then drop to two minutes and then stick at 99% for five minutes? (An exaggeration I admit. I know you and your colleagues do your best, but I am curious why this hasnt gotten much more accurate over the years.) androidethic: Yes, we need a justification as to why the windows file operation estimations are so random/inaccurate!	They're the worst estimate out there, except for all the others.
	Mac is just as bad. It's a hard problem. I worked on it briefly, and to help solve it I kept track of the average time it had taken for a whole range of operations, like creating, moving, deleting, renaming a file, or moving a block of N bytes, etc. Then multiply by the number of those operations that remain. But even that can be wildly off in degenerate cases.
Do you ever get laid?	Not since your Mom kicked me out.
Why has windows task manager never had a true force quit?	End Process is a true force quit.
What was your team's opinion on linux at the time? And what's yours opinion too?	I like it a lot, I was an early adopter back in 1993-1994 and tried to contribute some code for parsing IIDs, though I don't know if it's still in there. I hope it is, becaue then I'd have code in Windows, Mac Office, and Linux. I'd be everywhere :-)
	Now that we have WSL 2, though, I do most of my Linux work under Windows!
How much of the original DOS code is still in modern OSs?	None whatsoever. In fact, the only commonality at all would likely be the PGM header on disk still traces its original layout to MS-DOS.
	But rest assured there's NO code from MS-DOS inside NT, for example. It was a complete clean-slate design.
Was it you responsible for the atrocious naming conventions in WIN32?	Your username is dhbt12 :-)
What current developments in the world of operating systems are you watching with eager anticipation? File systems and LLVM seem to be the rage right now, at least from where I sit.	Containers are cool to me, like Docker! That's really the biggest development of recent years I think!
the below has been split into two
* What's your compensation?	- Zero, since I'm retired and there's no pension.
* Have you met Bill Gates?	- Yes, a number of times. When I was first hired he had me and a few other recent hires over to his house for burgers and beer and it was quite nice!
What's your opinion of free and open-source software? Broad, I know. I saw your response about WinRAR saying you like to license your software, but do you hold a similar sentiment in tossing a coin to the devs of foss software you might use?	I love it, I just don't have any illusions that making a piece of code open-source somehow leads to higher quality. It makes it more available to me, which is great, but in reality, on a typical project there are going to be 1-5 people who really look at the code and then a dozen the sort of know it to make changes, and then consumers of the code who just call it. I don't see that those 1-5 people are any brighter than the people who'd be responsible for a product in a proprietary environment.
	Now at a certain scale, like the Linux kernel maybe, you've got enough eyeballs looking at it that it makes a difference... that I could see!
What's the idea behind SYSKEY?	As I understand it, its function is to encrypt something called the SAM (Security Account Manager) database. This database stores hashes of user passwords, and is used to authenticate users when they supply their password.
Hey Dave, what do you think the future of the windows OS will be? Is a cloud-based OS possible, potentially limiting computer hardware?	As a total guess, I imagine our experience will eventually be just a UI device locally and everything else happens in the cloud on server hardware. So as you say, at some point your client hardware is "good enough" and then companies compete on the merits of their back-end services.
Do you know Mike Toutonghi? , he used to work at Microsoft, now he started a new blockchain project called The Verus project.	By name and email but not well enough to recognize him at the mall today, I'd say!
If you had to redo windows, what would you most like to change? What do you regret most? What do you like most?	The Format dialog needs to be redone! And Task Manager is likely my favorite...
Android or iPhone? Beer or wine? Ginger or Mary Ann?	iPhone. Beer. Can't it be both? It's an island, after all.
the below is a reply to the above
I figured the iPhone since you have Mac's in the lab. I figured beer also since you can't shift a 4 speed with a glass off wine between your legs. Nice garage BTW. However i wasnt ready for both, it's an island after all. Touche. I tired to compile my first bit of code from GitHub today. I failed miserably. It would install but wouldn't run. I'll keep at it.	Make sure you're in a clean empty folder. Try the code from Episode 11, I just used it so I know that works! Clone it and build it in PlatformIO with no changes, and that'll tell you if your dev environment is set up and working properly.
I cant connect to my cloud, can you download it for me?	I'd love to, but I'm out of paper. Can you fax me some?
What amazes you the most when you compare technology from the 90's to now?	GPUs!
Is it wrong of me to only ever end task manager with itself?	Software Seppuku.
Probably too many comments and very late to the game, but here it goes! I teach Comp Sci at an international school. Would you be willing to give a small webinar talk to my students? They would just be so happy to hear from you as would I! Anyway, regardless, thanks for the many, many hours of enjoyment!	Maybe after Covid, but I'm not a big fan of Zoom lectures! I just did one for the U of R, though, and if you check my channel there are two that I have done for the University of Regina that you might find useful for your students...
	You can email me at [email protected] with info about the school and what topic you would like, etc, and I can see if it's a good fit for schedule and topic!
What computers do you personally at home? Windows? Linux? Mac?	All three!
Why are processes able to hang to the point that task manager is unable to kill them?	At that point there must be kernel corruption or something going on in a driver or well below the surface, I guess. If TM can't kill it, no one can, and it's truly hung.
Did you ever meet the genius who wrote the Space Cadet Pinball theme song?	No, who wrote it? Matt Ridgeway?
Hi Dave, loved the videos on task manager Do you have any thoughts on modern C / C++ replacements like Zig and Rust (respectively)?	I think its cool if memory access is indeed provably safe but you get code nearly as optimal as C, but I've got to learn more about them!
Did you like the windows phone?	Never had one, started after I left, but I heard nice things about the very last one before it went away...
Hi Dave, Why doesn’t File Explorer automatically refresh to show new files in a folder, such as downloads? Seems such an obvious glitch! Also, how do I get the login screen on Windows 10? I push space, esc, mouse clicks, enters... and nothing happens. Then poof, it shows up. Why is this so unresponsive?	It does.
	In fact I know it does, because I have a patent on some of it!
	Not sure why yours wound't be working, your system might have a third party piece of software that has broken File System Change notifications.
Was the time on Microsoft fun?	It really was. I miss the people and the environment, and I especially miss lunch!
i’ve found 15+ 0-days in the shell32 API when doing a vuln analysis of explorer.exe. You can read my work at https://hyp3ri0n-ng.github.io! What’s it like to write really buggy code :P?	I sense that high school was hard for you socially.
I’m sure I remember owning the pinball game as a separate standalone title before it was in windows? Can you explain the deal with that? Or am I misremembering	Plus Pack!
You're a legend, can't believe I missed this. I'll post this here, if you don't answer it I'll have a good copy/paste for later. What are your thoughts on the sethc.exe / accessibility exploit? It's worked as far back as XP, and still works today in Windows 10, last time I checked. Windows Server 2003 and 2008 as well. Is checking the integrity of OS files before they're executed just not a priority?	https://support.microsoft.com/en-us/help/222193/description-of-the-windows-file-protection-feature
Why ctl+alt+delete?	An IBM engineer (David Bradley, I think) picked that combination to serve as a hardware reset. You can't fake it, you can't get around it. The PC knows it's really C_A_D when you do it.
	Why that particular combination, you'd have to ask him!
What's the furthest you've gotten into a project that ended up not panning out? Was it something you really wanted to get working or were you relieved to move on? I'm a student studying engineering right now and reading these answers is extremely motivational; your passion for computers is awesome! Thanks for doing this.	I spent about a year on an early prototype of Media Center that I was attached to but got killed. They did do a Media Center later, of course, but I had started 2-3 years ahead, but couldn't get funding.
Why has the Windows she'll been so bad for so long?	I don't know, but I'll see you in he'll.
Do you still work at Microsoft? Do you still use only Microsoft stuff?	No retired in 2003. I use a lot of MS stuff, but my main laptop is a MacBook and I use a Mac for video.
Do you own any Apple products or use them for work?	I own all the Apple products except the new headphones, pretty much! I'm retired now though!
Is the workculture of Microsoft at the time very different than now? How much does Bill Gates' leadership impact the company? What changes had his departure bring?	It is indeed very different under Satya than Bill, and the changes are widespread. But I left before Satya started, so I'm not really qualified to speak on them!
What are your thoughts on the age old trick of "Opening Task Manager to stop programs from freezing or being slow", is there some merit to doing that or is it just a simple coincidence?	Total coincidence, honest! Task Manager, at that level, is just a windows app with a message pump. It's existence doesn't do anything that solitaire or paint would not also!
	No, but there's a great meme with the Star Wars general about how apps work better with Task Manager open because "fear will keep them in line".
	It's purely psychological, though. TM doesn't do anything by running the calc or paint wouldn't also provide!
Did you work on Windows ME? If so.. What the hell happened to that OS that made it so terrible? I had kernal errors every week.	Nope! My work on the shell would have been backported to it, but I didn't work directly on 98 or M3, other than they used our NT version of the shell code by then I think.
Did you make any contingency for when Task Manager stops responding?	Yes, lots! Check the video the "Secret Life of Task Manager" for more dirt, but there are MANY things it does to help prevent you ever being stuck with no task manager:
	https://youtu.be/f8VBOiPV-_M
If not asked yet If this is correct, as posted in Regina awhile ago iirc I saw a post saying you’re from Regina, Canada Is that true? If so that’s awesome to hear that someone from my local area made one of my favourite no internet game and the basic fundamentals of the most used OS for computers	Yes indeed, that's me!
Why is the documentation for WPA so bad and scarce? I have to refer to Bruce Dawson's years old blog to decipher some of the columns names. Are there any plans to add a comprehensive manual for it?	Windows Product Activation? Columns? Sorry, are you using WPA for something else?
Can I intern for you?	If you know how to write a Material-themed admin-style Dashboard in React, can consume a REST api in doing so, and have some experience with iPhone apps an Unity, then maybe yes!
	I was actually looking for an intern this past summer to write a phone and web app...
how did you assured code quality and readability? did you use static analyzers/ unit tests or what?	Check out the "Secret History of Task Manager" video for a description of "NTStress" and how we nightly tested, but there were professional testers, every line of code was code-reviewed, and so on.
	My understanding is it's quite different now, though!
When you say you worked on Windows activation, was it for more than a day?	That's an odd question. Can I ask why you think it might have just been for a day? Clue me in to what you're hinting at and I'll fill you in on the rest!
Why do I need to press 3 buttons and 1 click to open task manager?	Because you choose to fail!
	You can do it with two clicks or one simultaneous multikey press!
Do you think WPA was a success?	I think so! It helped stem casual piracy, wasn't "cracked" for at least 18 months after we released it, and didn't unduly inconvenience users too often, I hope.
	We were really aiming for the 95% case. Trying to catch the 95% of piracy that is people sharing keys, reusing their own keys on too many machines, getting keys off the web, that sort of thing. I think it accomplished that.
How did you feel about windows 8?	Same way you do.
Who invented the blue screen of death?	John Vert. He said:
	"Back in 1991 I wrote the original code for Windows NT 3.1 that put the video screen back into text mode and the routines to put text on it (and a truly gnarly bit of code it was!). I used the white on blue colors for two reasons.
	* The MIPS workstations we were using for the MIPS port had firmware that presented a boot option screen in white on blue, so it made sense that the bugcheck screen would match.
	* I (and many others) were using SlickEdit as our text editor and at the time its default color scheme was also white on blue.
	I believe Mark Lucovsky wrote the original code that dumped a bunch of text to the screen. This was a bugcode and a stack dump, resulting in a bunch of useless hex numbers which product support would occasionally dutifully transcribe from the customers and include in the bug report.
	There was no "typesetting" as we used standard VGA text mode on PCs.
	I don't know the history of the Win3.1/Win9x blue screens, I think the fact they were the same color is just coincidence."
But can you make sick stick figure death match animations in QBASIC?	No, but I do a mean Bill the Cat ascii art!
How could you?	Sometimes you just gotta say WTF.
	https://youtu.be/a0p7rJsYisw
What are you working on these days?	Mostly on programming tutorials and nostalgic "Windows War Stories" on my youtube channel:
	http://www.youtube.com/c/davesgarage
[removed]	That's me! Went to Miller high, worked at ISM and SaskTel during college, etc!
Here is my question. Im a cuban teenager (17) and my dream is work is be a developer. What kind of mini works i can do for learn programation before University?	Do as many little program tasks as you can, and make sure you complete them, and SAVE them for the future so you can look back!
	Try writing a little program to convert back and forth between roman numbers and regular numbers. Or fund the next highest multiple of 32, or count the number of it bits set in a byte. Or the real difference in seconds between two dates, that sort of thing. Real problems that you have to solve will help a great deal as they act as sort of a "forcing function" to make you get to the very end.
Do you like macaroni & cheese?	Kraft Dinner all the way. And I eat with little packets of designer ketchup.
Wait...you didn't built paint? I'm out.	Nope, sorry. But I owned calc for a while, back when we were adding infinite precision math to it!
Hi, If Microsoft wanted to, they could make it impossible to activate a pirated copy of windows using 3rd party software. So why aren't they making it impossible?	Not sure what you meant by 3rd party software. Are you saying Windows can actually be activated even if pirated? That'd be news to me, but anything's possible.
What was the criteria for “tilt” on space cadet pinball? I played that game for hours as a kid.	Spacebar would add a little "action" to the table, if I recall, and you could strike a balance of adding so much so often... but too much (ie: smash space too much) and it'll tilt.
Did you ever have to interview anybody at Microsoft? If so, what types of questions would you ask back then? What was your interview like going into Microsoft?	Oh yeah, I've interviewed dozens or hundreds I'd bet. I'd like to ask "calibrating questons" like "Give me a funtion that takes a number and returns the next highest multiple of 32" or "count the number of bits that are set in it" to see how their basic coding skills were.
	Then I usually liked to give a problem I was working on to see what it'd be like to actually work with the person.
	I interviewed three times, once as an intern, once as full time, and then once to move to the Shell group. Each as an all-day affair, and very arduous. You have 2-3 hour long interviews in the AM, then a lunch interview, then 2-3 more hour long interviews in the PM, then a supper thing, etc... it's a long day!
ImRandyRU: What have you done for me lately? Edit: it was a joke... dabigchina: NT is the foundation that all modern windows OS's build on, so a lot. Zeusifer: I guarantee some of OP's code still exists in Windows 10.	Most of it, to be honest. As a guess I'd say 75% still there.
Hey man, I had a wicked dump this morning and now my toilet is blocked. Any idea's?	More roughage in your diet.
It was so satisfying to push the 3x5 disks into the slot and have the button pop out, and make a vroom vroom sound. Ah, the old days. What's your favorite MS-Dos game from the 90s?	I actually came to the PC after MS-DOS, so I wasn't a DOS gamer... I suppose in those days it was primarily C64 and Amiga games. I do remember being fond of Sim City, like everyone, but also of a game called "Seven Cities of Gold"...

Ranking in Idolmaster: Cinderella Girls Starlight Stage is not exactly an easy thing. Since the primary method of point gain for any event is to ‘play the game’, usually the solution is to ‘play the game’ more than everyone else to get the highest rank possible. This obviously isn’t always the case, as Parade has no ranking element beyond SSS rank and Carnival is just a glorified high score ranking. To break it down:

• Parade (SSS): Play the game a lot and play the game really well,
• Groove: Play the game a lot and then after half time also play well,
• Token: Play the game a lot.

…The above is all information directly lifted from a post I made nearly a year ago, where I played M@GIC Forte 2258 times in 174 hours to celebrate it being added to the game, and accidently became a Mayu/HinakoP in the process. At the time I only offered the info I had on Token, and not having officially participated in a high-end groove run felt that it would be presumptuous for me to present my expectations for one. Fast forward nearly an entire year, and I now have a perhaps unfortunate level of experience from ranking the most recent Groove, Never Ends. That said, the strategies I utilised did not resemble what is the expected style of play, so I will do my best to provide all the facts I know about Groove here.
 

Groove Ranking Primer

Groove has existed since the debut of Tulip in Starlight Stage (January 2016?), experiencing several evolutions both major and minor since its original conception. It began life taking a random selection of three (non-collab) songs from one of the three types (rainbow included as a wildcard in all three) and slapping a fourth encore song on the end that required reaching a particular point threshold (called applause) during the first three songs to actually play it. Completing the first three songs would award you points for how high you managed to make the applause go, and completing the encore would award a fixed number of points based on your score rank.
Worth noting that the fourth song is the new one people actually wanted to play the event for, thus forcing them to go through filler to reach it. A popular interpretation of the event said by men wiser than I is that Groove is taking the bus through the bad neighbourhood, having to make three shady stops before finally reaching your destination. From a purely casual perspective it at least exposes the player base to more songs they may not have had the time to explore, challenging them to diversify, and offers the chance to run into cool combinations of songs. However, it often causes problems for people trying to achieve full combos or high score runs on the event song, being forced to play three other songs before it every time they fail, which is very detrimental to those who cannot calm their nerves and extremely detrimental to those just want to play the damn song already.
Anyway, the basic mechanics have changed three times since the beginning;

• February 2018, 2x points option added for grooves beyond the half way point,
• Also, February 2018, applause cap raised from 50 to 100,
• November 2018, Live Party can now earn points for live groove.

The 2x points option being added was particularly innocuous, and in fact changed an old strategy where playing the groove and instantly leaving the encore would be more point efficient. The applause cap being raised is likely in response to continued power creep in cards added since the beginning of the game, making it easier and easier to reach 50. The difference in points received for 50 applause versus 100 on a master groove is only a mere 25 points (480 vs 505).
The real devastating calamity here is when Live Party was added as an option for Groove point gain. This would have been a neat feature to be able to casually rank Groove with your friends if it worked as everyone expected, but for some reason the points gain per minute with Live Party is significantly higher than playing Groove, at least during 1x. This change completely modified the way the first half of the event was played when ranking competitively, going from a solo endurance game into a team-based speedtest.net simulator.
 
The basic mechanics when translated into functional requirements for ranking would be as follows:

• Ensure that you spend all 198 hours (may differ) on playing the game,
• Have the fastest possible device to reduce load times,
• Have the lowest ping for connecting to the server to reduce load times,
• Do not disconnect or die in as many songs as possible in Live Party,
• Have 4 other accounts do the same as the above,
• Get the highest Applause possible in every Groove.

Groove is a wretched amalgamation of two different events in one, meaning you should be twice as prepared (or maybe 5x as prepared) to run it than if you were to run something like Token. Having a multiplayer segment means you need several other people to be as prepared as you as well, where those people also need to abide by some of the rules above (fast device, low ping, try not to disconnect). After that, you must jump into one of the most skill demanding score attacks in the game, where combo is the primary aspect that will determine your applause.
Tie the above with the requirement to have your M1 Mac Mini emulating Starlight Stage, living next to the game server in Japan using a hardline to avoid disconnects, be able to invite 4 of your buddies around to also receive the ping benefits and speed benefits, and somehow remain sane enough to press the Play Groove button after hour 190 and not think the entire game has changed into a limbo designed purely to torture you. You start to see why planning to play Groove in at least a slightly effective manner is not simple.
That said, for every insane person out there willing to take on this challenge, there will always be others attempting the exact same thing. Chances are they’re facing the exact same problems, and have likely already reached out on Twitter to find others willing to suffer with them for the first half. While it’s not possible to fill all of the above requirements with maximum efficiency, there’s usually enough instability in the event runtime to allow for mistakes to be made and still come out on top. Usually.
 

Event Preperation

My own preparation for the event saw the completion of, maybe, three and a half of the requirements above? Like I said, there’s a lot of instability surrounding this event, and getting close enough to achieving all of the above was enough to give a chance at a high rank regardless. The rank you end up with is likely dependent on how many other teams of other players were able to be formed for the first half of the event, with very little people choosing to forego Live Party in favour of just playing perfect applause grooves for the entire event, unless you’re a robot. Sorry to all robots out there, but this probably counts as cheating.
I still live in Australia, and must suffer the internet curse I am bound to with horrible stability and slow speeds. Even if I was capable of moving to Japan for a week and playing the game there, there’s the tiny problem of a global pandemic preventing anything like that from being a good idea. Not that it would be a good idea anyway. I would also expect to not play all 198 hours of the event, but more on this later.
I already had an A13 processer in the form of an iPhone 11 I picked up before last year’s December Token that was still in mostly functional condition. Since then, the A14 had been released in the iPhone 12, which would be another accessible upgrade to brainlet simpletons like myself, but it was becoming more and more evident that the increases from device speed were negligible compared to the losses suffered from making mistakes or just from ping. Alternate properties to focus on when selecting the device become apparent, such as the weight when carrying it around for 100+ hours, or the temperature to not feel like your lap is going to get burned from someone spamming the Twitch chat. Worth noting again, the speed of your device will be throttled by the slowest device in your Live Party room during the first half of the event anyway, so if you’re stuck with your pal on his Samsung S5 then you may want to consider buying them a device rather than yourself.
Another addition is to get a secondary device for yourself. This can be used to complete business while still playing the game on the first device; just being careful not to log on in the wrong order and delete your entire play.
Then comes the resource preparation for the two separate parts of the event: The Live Party segment (1st half) and the Groove segment (2nd half). Saying half is a little misleading as the Groove segment is usually always shorter than the Live Party segment, but both feel like they take a lifetime to complete anyway so that’s kind of meaningless.
 
Groove Segment (2nd half)
The Groove part is all about achieving the most applause possible with the least effort. Most of this is controlled by player skill and team composition, but is also assisted by the appeal bonus from the support team. Groove support teams work like normal ones where you get a 50% appeal bonus from the 10 highest appeal counts you have for that type of song (or groove in this case), but with the additional bonus of the Groove type being applied to the cards first. So in the case of a Vocal Groove, the cards with the highest appeal will likely end up being your vocal cards, who receive an incredible 150% bonus to that stat. If you’ve taken a look at your inventory and noticed that one weird card you’ve got with 10,000+ vocal appeal, you should think to yourself: What if I had 11 of these? And one in every colour? Or maybe, you don’t think that, since not everyone has the wallet to make that happen. Nor the stupidity. Or maybe you did have the resources to make it happen, but you spent it all on your Chieri4 instead and it’s a Vocal Groove. You can’t always win.
This is about the only way to increase applause in a passive way. The rest comes down to things that you have to control more actively, as depressing as that is.
The teams you use are going to depend on the circumstances you find yourself in after you have already been playing for hundreds of hours. The objective is to reach 99 applause on every single groove, but this is not going to be a reality, especially after all that time battling with Live Party. In the grand scheme of things, I narrowed down three team compositions that had any relevant difference: High Scoring, Ultimate Defence, and one that sits in the middle of this scale. You can see these teams below:
 

• High Scoring. Syoko5, Shiki4, Asuka4, Yukari2, Nono4.

This team uses Resonance to take full advantage of the stat bonus for the groove and combines several skills with high percentage bonuses for very high scoring per note. The amount of defence on the team is limited to only healing from synergy and nothing else. Worth noting that I had to roll for Syoko5 during the Live Party segment of the event, which was a dramatic endeavour.

• Halfway. Uzuki1, Minami4, Chinami1, Nao3, Rika2.

Offers 3 layers of protection and a plethora of scoring coverage. The combination of Uzuki1 and Minami4 effectively covers 50% of the song for you, while Chinami1 with Tuning and Rika2 with Overload give a near 100% percent resistance to anything other than misses. This offers nearly as much protection as a regular auto team, but scores far, far better. Chinami1 as centre instead of a usual Skill Boost adds 30% extra appeal to the team and gives a better scoring skill, while opening up another slot to use Symphony instead for the far better boost. The only significant difference between this team and the below one is the inclusion of Helen1, which changes the functionality greatly enough to make them worthwhile as two different teams.

• Ultimate Defence. Uzuki1, Rika4, Chinami1, Nao3, HELEN1.

A variant of the above team that allows full auto during the encore song. This team setup worked in principle but when optimising it for vocal attribute, cracks started to show. The centre effect only existed on Cool cards, Helen is the only Damage Guard of her class who is also Cool, Nao3 and Minami3 (both Cool) are the vocal equivalents that sync on 9 seconds with Uzuki1. There was no efficient way to fit a Passion in here without sacrificing either functionality or appeal. I decided to swap Minami4 for Rika4 in the end. Again, having a secondary device to complete business during the groove section can be done while autoing the encore with this team for no loss of appeal (and very little loss of time). This is probably one of the best scoring options to take while still being able to auto, and whether or not this had been figured out by other players was a mystery, but I like to think very little of myself so I assumed I was not alone.
 
Understanding the line-up in these teams requires understanding the minimum required of the player to achieve 99 applause. The most effective method is to keep one’s combo high for the majority of the Groove, trying to only break combo towards the beginning of the first song or the end of the last song to benefit the most from the ridiculously high multipliers offered around 1000 combo. The other effective method is simply having absolutely insane scoring potential per note, where any combo saving pieces are removed in favour that you’ll hopefully just gorilla your way through most of the song and end up with a bunch of applause anyway. The High Scoring and Halfway teams above try to fill those two ends of the scale.
A defensive team ideally can score 99 applause while also giving the player additional benefits, such as the ability to auto the encore song where applause no longer matters. This usually required running one of the many Damage Guard SRs that have a high uptime but low activation chance alongside one of the many cards with a centre effect that raises the chance of skill activation. Since the colour of the groove is random, you cannot plan in advance to use the type of damage guard that corresponds with the groove and get the free on-type chance activation bonus of 30%. It’s also not advisable to change teams too often, as this obviously wastes precious time. Note that while using a Skill Boost in the centre slot would be the expected solution, the existence of the Cross Type cool cards give a 35% bonus to skill activation which when combined with cards like HELEN we can create teams with 100% skill activation chance and still receive additional benefits such as more appeal bonus and a better active skill, since Skill Boost is massively outclassed by Symphony in this day and age.
Beyond that, the only plan for groove is to pray you aren’t too brain dead to play.
 
Live Party Segment (1st half)
I kinda dodged talking about planning for Live Party and talked about Groove related preparations first instead. The reason for this is that I while I did indeed achieve the requirement of having a setup that allowed as little disconnects and deaths as possible, and I did indeed have a full Live Party room with 5 accounts capable of doing the same, I was missing one crucial aspect that I did not explicitly mention. I did not have 4 other people to play the game with me.
I didn’t mention it since it’s technically not required.
 

How not to play Live Party

Cheating is hard to define. I’m not starting out with a vague statement like that to imply I may have cheated, since in reality all I did was solve a problem with a much more convoluted solution due to my extreme lack of trust in other people and myself. I did not realistically expect to get 4 other people to assist me to play a video game for ~100 hours straight, and instead of investing time into making friendships where someone would offer to help me in that situation, I instead spent it all on planning a solution that would give me full control of my fate at the cost of sanity.
I present the Rank 6 Shift Project.
Lovingly named after a certain level 6 shift project which also involved having countless clones die for the sake of one achieving great power, the basic setup was to prepare 4 other accounts that had access to the correct cards with the right potentials to form an auto team in Live Party, and do so on relatively fast devices in a setup accessible by one person with knowledge that they would still need to live as a human during the hours of operation.
What you can see in this image of it in action is 4 iPad Minis, 5th Generation assembled within a large tray with enough room for charge cables to be inserted or removed as necessary. These devices were chosen as they have a relatively fast processer (A12), have a large screen size for ease in pushing buttons, and are ‘cheap’ to afford ($600 AUD). Having all the devices have an identical aspect ratio was important to avoid confusion around the location of on-screen buttons, and to avoid speed throttling by having even one device with a slower processer. Having a high battery life was also desirable as being forced to keep this thing plugged in for too long was not ideal either.
As you’ve probably already figured, yes, this was not a smart idea and I cannot defend my decision. I will continue to explain it however.
 
Live Party Mechanics
The actual mechanics behind how this abomination replaces other players is more than just surface deep. In a regular Live Party room, you would have to complete the following steps to make it through one whole cycle, which would repeat thousands of times:

1. One player hosts the Live Party room.
2. Four other players connect via code, friend list or public lobby.
3. Each player that is not the host hits the Ready button, chooses whether or not to play with stamina, and accepts.
4. The host starts the Live.
5. A random song is selected and all five players are given a fifteen second countdown that can be skipped by all pressing ready again.
6. The song is loaded, played and the results are determined and shown in a secondary screen were players are again given a fifteen second countdown that can be skipped by all pressing ready again.
7. All players continue through the various results screens before being either returned to the lobby, or kicked back to the Live Party main menu due to disconnecting.
8. Repeat from step 3.

This is modified to be the following when controlling 5 accounts:

1. …
2. The four players who are not the hosts forcibly quit and reopen the game, cancelling the rejoin option when prompted.
3. They then manually rejoin the room as in step 2, while the host completes the live and skips through the results screens.
4. Repeat from step 3.

If one player is in control of all 5 players, there is several issues that need solving to not only ensure you can get through a loop, but can do so at a competitive speed. Having all devices be the same ensures that as little mistakes are made as possible when it comes to pushing on-screen buttons such as the Ready Up and Continue buttons. Where possible it is best to avoid having to press buttons all together, or to only do so when time permits. Ideally, you’d play without the use of stamina so the extra players never have to refill, but taking the extra time to check the tickbox is a significant loss of time in the thousands of live party games you’ll have to play. Not to mention that stamina can be refilled in slow time while reconnecting to the room and waiting for the host to finish the live. Since those accounts are already ready and waiting, it is easy for the host to spam through the results screen where the other players are listed as disconnected, and be returned to the lobby again. This also means that the speed of the other devices only throttles the start of the song loading times, and will have no effect on anything at the end of the song.
All devices would be operating on the same network, so it would suffer the same weakness as any other room should connection break, as failure to connect on even one account would break the flow of the room. Having the host device have access to a roaming mobile network as backup allowed me to avoid any connection hiccups which are a severe threat when playing, as connection errors during Live Party are not well understood and can lead to numerous errors such as being stuck in the Live Results screen unable to continue or randomly closing the room and not giving you any points for the play. Another common issue would be if the host starts the live before all accounts are ready, leaving one out and adding in a random from the online queue instead who probably breaks the team comp with his Nanami N card used for fan grinding. This is largely avoided with this setup since all 4 accounts are typically readied in the same hand motion before moving to the main account to start the live. It’s technically an advantage, and I will take any advantage I can get with this disastrous set up.
 
Live Party Autoplay
During the actual song playtime, if a player achieves 30% of notes as misses, the game automatically disconnects you and you receive a 20% penalty to event points. If this happens to the host, the room crashes and needs to be remade. If you die, you aren’t disconnected but you suffer a 50% penalty to event points. Playing on Master+ is required for the highest event point gain, and Passion has the overall fastest songs. Since Live Party teams still operate similar to a regular team (just without a guest) they are also capable of functioning as an auto team. The major difference is that centre effects no longer apply to every character, and instead apply individually to each character regardless of whether they are in the centre or not. This means that Damage Guards that previously would not achieve 100% activation chance could do so if they had a centre affect that gives an increase to activation chance. Cards with 60% chance to activate their affects could already achieve 100% through the on-type bonus of 30% and also the flat bonus from skill potential. Also, notably, score has no affect on the event point gain in Live Party, so you can get a C score and still walk away with maximum efficiency.
With all this in mind, the auto team I replicated on 5 accounts looked like this. Both Passion Perfect Locks are used which offers a 12s/15s setup. A full analysis of all songs reveals that 12s/15s is nearly as robust as the much more popular 9s/12s, with the weakness being that it is safer to play for the first 12 seconds (until first Perfect Lock activation) rather than only the first 9. Since scoring is not an issue, 2 Damage Guards are taken to absolutely ensure death is avoided. Skill Boosts were best for their high uptime, and would still achieve 100% activation regardless of type/colour since their own centre effect still applied to them despite not having a tri-colour team. The timer on the Skill Boost was not relevant, as long as it’s not 7. Ew.
So that’s how it would be. While this is still autoplay, it is potentially more thought-demanding than playing the game normally would be, since all 5 accounts need to be constantly managed to ensure no error is made when re-joining, that they all still have plenty of stamina, that they are not about to run out of battery, and that they are all accessible once the live is complete. This resulted in less than 1.5 minutes of actual auto-time where I did not have to do anything, and 1 minute every loop devoted to hitting ready, starting the live, closing the game, reopening, and re-joining, and playing the first few seconds of the song on my main account at the same time.
I again must repeat, this is not an ideal solution. Having 4 other players back you up and do these tasks for you as was intended is the only strategy I would recommend after trying this, and at least makes you feel like less of a degenerate since you didn’t have to create 4 imaginary friends.
 

Event Run

I already knew that I would be at a disadvantage due to using the Rank 6 Shift Project as a substitute for actual players, both in speed and in mental capability. Staying awake for a long time is incredibly hard even when just autoing a token event. If you’re trying to do the same while needing to keep the mental aptitude to manage 5 accounts at once, you have a much, much more difficult situation facing you. I was under the impression that the ‘measurement’ of remaining focused over long periods of time in sleep studies was known as Vigilance, but I don’t know if it’s fair to put this in the same category. This isn’t something you’ll have people doing research on in any official laboratory anyway, unless it’s happening in some secret underground Starlight Stage lab as we speak. The same place where they developed Haruna2.
What I’m trying to say is that while I would appreciate someone calling the application of this strategy impressive, the reality is that it’s incredibly stupid.
Knowing this disadvantage, I had to plan for as little sleep as possible but still enough to make it through the Live Party section while maintaining sanity. Thanks to the assistance of Zhu, the best in the business when it comes to supporting terrible decisions by rankers, we had prepared a 7-hour-max sleep cycle that would use three sets of sleep; 2 hours, 3 hours, and 2 hours as the expected breakdown. These sleep times would be spread to get maximum advantage of feeling refreshed and to attempt to avoid the usual problems when staying awake for very long periods, such as microsleep choking and total mental shutdown.
Sometime within the first few days the game server went down for about 30 minutes, which I used to get some sleep which overall felt kind of useless and only made my head cloudier, so thanks for nothing Bamco/Cygames. Other than that, I had two hours sleep half way through the Live Party segment, and 3 hours of sleep before the beginning of the 2x Groove segment, with a potential 2 hours of sleep to use during that groove segment if required.
Usual strategies such as quick 2-minute naps in between auto plays were less and less effective due to the immediate mental requirements of setting up the devices after waking and would often lead to making mistakes or just falling back asleep immediately.
My Brother came to stay with me for a few nights to help me out, since he’s a great guy. I feel bad since I made the implication (and truly thought) that I could do other stuff while playing, but this quickly turned out to be impossible. Fortunately, he managed to find plenty of ways to entertain himself, so I really hope he didn’t waste too much of his time here.
The painful reality sets in day by day, where you notice just how boring ranking Groove is. When your hands, brain, and eyes need to be near constantly occupied by the game, there’s really not much you can do outside of continuously managing your game state. I don’t particularly have much to add to the Event Run section because of this; I can’t remember much of what I did since I didn’t really do anything. Just play the game. And often not play the game, due to completely forgetting how to do so on two separate occasions.
 

Results

I often try to keep my personal opinions away from posts like these, beyond inserting the occasional joke that requires a PhD in the history of #cg_general to understand. It is an achievement post technically, but just like my last one about token events I found myself talking mainly about the hard facts of Groove and the strategies that can be used to combat it, not very much about the actual ranking experience from my perspective. I think an entire essay could be written on the psychology surrounding the desire for any human to willingly stay awake for 200+ hours straight, which would be best left completely separate to strategy discussion like this.
But this is a results section, and I haven’t even talked about what result I got, nor why I even chose to rank this event in the first place. I don’t know, it’s got a Cinderella Clock in the background, I guess? I like clocks? Karen and Fumika are pretty great? So are the rest of the singers?
Maybe I just wanted to test the Rank 6 Shift Project to see if it actually had any competitive viability. The conclusion I’ve come to is technically yes, if you’re not in the weak ~99.9999% of the population who can’t seem to stay mentally sane after hour 150, like me. Did I even have a choice? It’s not a muscle I can exercise, or a technique that can be mastered. Every time you want to ‘practice’ you potentially do more damage to yourself and don’t improve at all. You either can, or you can’t. Or you can cheat, I guess. I once again made countless mistakes during the event, many of which are my own fault and are somewhat expected to happen over the course of the event, but the major ones are all tied into the approach I decided to take to even be able to compete in the first place. I didn't even get rank 6, so the name of the technique is a big lie.
Despite everything I just said, I paradoxically still had a lot of fun. I don’t think anyone helping me had fun, I don’t know if any of the runners around me did, but I sure have some interesting memories from the experience. While I didn’t have much community support during the run since I did it in secret, I’d like to thank a few people who have given me information or support in the past (either directly or indirectly) and who have generally been great people to know of:

• Zhu, and the gods in his stream chat,
• Rayvur, for giving me a goal to sink to,
• Lolicore, for being aware that I exist,
• Rafe, for still managing to provide useful information despite not playing the game anymore,
• Dwr3k, and the others in VC (looking at you morstain) for doing god’s work and hosting a CG anime rewatch.

 

Fun Stats

• I earned 16.8 million fans over the event, raising me from a total of 764,079,984 to 781,869,928. This is nearly identical to the 16.5 million fans I earned during my token run last December.
  • My breakdown of fans across Cute, Cool and Passion has evened up a little where Passion was falling behind, with 249, 296, and 235 million respectively. Cool needs to calm down a little.
• I leveled up 0 times, from 500 to 500.
• I have no idea how much gold I earned since I went from 68.9 million to being capped. I haven’t even tried to empty the impossible amount left over in the present box.
• I had 63k jewels prepared, which I knew was more than enough, but I could not doubt the possibility that Syoko5 would be a relevant card to roll for. I’m not sure how much I spent in total on the event and Syoko, but I only have 17k left now.
  • I saved some jewels by using 6,450 stamina from bottles. I still have 21,620 stamina left over in bottles.
• I got 3 memory keys from live party drops.
• I gained:
  • Only 1544 rookie trainers, despite selling 4000 of them in fear of capping.
  • 360 trainers, 160 veteran trainers, 18 master trainers.
  • 158 cute earrings, 134 cute bracelets, 34 cute tiaras.
  • 243 cool earrings, 145 cool bracelets, 33 cool tiaras.
  • 2253 passion earrings, 1173 passion bracelets, 235 passion tiaras.
  • 1692 shoes, and I went from 8k dresses to being capped.
• Natalia, featured on the passion auto team I used, earned over 2 million fans during the event. I only bring this one up because she’s pretty much the only idol I used that wasn’t already 10 million or above.
• I pathetically attempted to use my Live Party Emblems before the event taking them down from 900k to 722k. I ended up capped half way through the Live Party period.

TIP #0: (THIS TIP IS FOR CHRISTIANS) ABSOLUTE SURRENDER IS THE ONLY WAY TO TOTAL FREEDOM
We can do anything if we're more willing to suffer(abstaining from pleasure is a form of suffering) than to feel pleasure.
But even more than that, we can do everything and anything IF we plug into the power source daily, meaning that we spend daily time with God in prayer and reading of the word. Most people, who suffer from this addiction, suffer, because they aren't giving God any room in their life(by giving Him time through reading the Bible and praying).
And even MORE importantly(now comes the most important point), we usually fall into sin because we haven't really wanted to surrender some part of our lives to God. Once we surrender ALL to Jesus, He considers Himself allowed into our lives, and will change our lives. Jesus is a gentleman. He never forces Himself into anyone's life, or barges in through the door of our hearts. He knocks, then sits down and waits... then He rises up, and knocks again. He knows we're there, but until we come and swing the door of our heart wide open, letting Jesus see ALL the garbage there is in our lives, and until we say, "Lord, here it is, this garbage dump is my life", the Lord won't be able to smile and step in, get a mop and a duster and whatever else, and start humbly cleaning our lives with the water of the word of God. FIRST comes TOTAL and ABSOLUTE surrender that manifests as opening our ENTIRE LIFE to God, saying to Jesus that He's allowed to do ANYTHING that He wants in our lives. Without this, there'll be no change in our lives. Absolute surrender is the only way to freedom... a surrender that doesn't take back the surrender made. Go all the way, or fail the day... and the other days, too. But it is impossible for us to WANT to surrender to God. We must ask for the WILLINGNESS to surrender, and it WILL be given(this ALWAYS works, if we just REALLY ask God to give the willingness to surrender all, and mean it... or if we ask for the willingness to be willing to ask for surrender... or if we ask for the willingness to be willing to be willing to ask for surrender... You get my point)
I speak this from past experience. I used to play video games a lot, but I always felt a deep conviction that it wasn't right. However, until I surrender to God and said, "Lord, you're right. I don't know if there can be life without video gaming... but if I must die, I'll die." Six months after that surrender, I was absolutely free from pornography and masturbation... but it took a surrender in an area of my life where God's hand still wasn't allowed to reach. It took a decision to surrender ALL to God, and THAT let God do HIS ALL in my life, according to the power that resurrected Christ from the dead:
Romans 8:11 But if the Spirit of him that raised up Jesus from the dead dwell in you, he that raised up Christ from the dead shall also quicken(make alive) your mortal bodies by his Spirit that dwelleth in you(meaning: He will help us to live according to God's will, and not after sin. Check out Ephesians 2:1 to understand what we're being resurrected from).
8:12 Therefore, brethren, we are debtors, not to the flesh, to live after the flesh.
8:13 For if ye live after the flesh, ye shall die: but if ye through the Spirit do mortify the deeds of the body, ye shall live.
8:14 For as many as are led by the Spirit of God, they are the sons of God.
What is the area of YOUR life that God is calling you to fully surrender to Him?
TIP #1: (THIS TIP IS FOR CHRISTIANS) STAY CLOSE TO GOD
The closer you are to God, the less you sin. The closer you're to God, the HARDER it is for you to sin. That's the source of strength in this struggle. We're really using PMO to replace proper relationships, INCLUDING OUR RELATIONSHIP WITH GOD. Going on nofap heals relationships, and it should FIRSTLY be used to repair our broken relations with God. As we press into God's things, and start falling in love with His character as we start spending time with Him(no relationship works without two people actually spending time together; time is the stuff that relationships are made of) via reading the word of God and prayer, we're changed more and more into God's likeness(to be like Him in character). This ACTUALLY MEANS less sin, plain and simple, because God's character of love is the antithesis of sin.
TIP #2: (THIS TIP IS FOR CHRISTIANS) GENERAL ADVICE
Sexual temptations usually become stronger when we remain in the situation. It is very important to remove oneself to a situation where it's practically impossible for one to fall. And one should NEVER listen to the voice in the head that says: "You'll fall eventually, better do it now!" The reason why so many fail is because they don't trust in GOD to bring them through the impossible(meaning: they trust the devil more than God. This can only be fixed by actually SPENDING TIME with God, and LEARNING to trust Him in the temptations). It is my experience that not only CAN He help us through the impossible, but if we leave our lives in His hands, He will also GIVE that strength to go through EVERY temptation, even IF He has to give supernatural strength to do it. His word promises this:

1. Cor. 10:13 There hath no temptation taken you but such as is common to man: but God is faithful, who will not suffer you to be tempted above that ye are able; but will with the temptation also make a way to escape, that ye may be able to bear it.

AVOIDANCE is the best strategy when dealing with temptations. Willpower struggles always end up in failure, UNLESS there's no way out(because then God is responsible for sustaining us IN the situation, if we have sought Him first daily; we can't expect God's power to work for us if we don't actually care for HIM one whit. This journey is one of love, but if there's no mutual love, then what's left? One SHAM[fake] of a relationship.)
If the following commandment is followed, God will follow His part of the covenant:
Deuteronomy 6:5 And thou shalt love the LORD thy God with all thine heart, and with all thy soul, and with all thy might.
6:6 And these words, which I command thee this day, shall be in thine heart:
Why must we keep God's commandments in our heart? Because the Psalmist, when inspired by the Holy Ghost, promises the following:
Psalms 119:9 BETH. Wherewithal(old English for HOW) shall a young man cleanse his way? by taking heed thereto according to thy word.
119:10 With my whole heart have I sought thee: O let me not wander from thy commandments.
119:11 Thy word have I hid in mine heart, that I might not sin against thee.
To seek God with our whole heart means to not depart from His commandments, His word, and His truth. It means to integrate it into our lives, so that God's Holy Ghost can help us WORK the works of God. It means to hate sin, and to continuously to seek God's wisdom on HOW to remove sin from our lives.
If we pray(and keep praying) and expect God to answer, He will(over days) give us more and more wisdom for how to deal with our sins and addictions(KEEP A NOTEPAD WITH YOU TO WRITE DOWN ANY INSIGHTS GOD MIGHT GIVE. I'm serious). But prayer has a secondary purpose. It changes us so that we WANT to run away from sin, and so that we can receive God's help when it comes, and not despise it. The help can come from humble sources. I DESPISED nofap when I first found about it... and it required God's work in me to fully embrace it, and go all the way. God has many times worked in my life through the means that I most despised... sinful means are a no-no, of course, but if something is logically good, but also scripturally sound, then we have no reason to reject God's help to us, even if it comes through humble means.
​
TIP #3: RELAPSES OFFER INFORMATION ABOUT YOUR ADDICTION
In a weird way, relapsing can offer you important information(don't take this TOO literally, as relapsing is still HARMFUL): it tells you WHERE your issues are. Once you defeat those issues by figuring out WHY you relapse when you do, and by forming counter strategies for each of those ROOT REASONS, you'll be able to get a lot further on nofap. Once you've created successful counter strategies for all the reasons why you keep relapsing, you'll automatically become free(IF you don't compromise what you've learned from your relapses).
Go take your diary/word file, and start doing your homework according to the assignment I gave above. Your intention is to start problem solving your current problems. Once you have a counter strategy for a problem that causes you to relapse, you can "test-drive" it on your next nofap streak(I dislike this word, but I'll use it for now). If it works, you won't relapse to that trigger anymore. If it doesn't work, polish the counter strategy according to all the new information/insight that your latest relapse gives to you. EVERY RELAPSE IS A CHANCE TO LEARN WHY YOU ARE ADDICTED, AND HOW TO COUNTER THAT CIRCLE OF ADDICTION.
​
TIP #4: CONSERVE YOUR WILLPOWER; IT IS A PRECIOUS RESOURCE IN THE BEGINNING OF NOFAP
Your willpower is very limited at the beginning of nofap, and it builds up slowly. Because of that, you need to begin by CONSTANTLY AVOIDING ANYTHING that might trigger pornographic thoughts or urges in you. Start a diary and list in the things that cause you to feel urges. Remove those things ENTIRELY from your life. That is a surefire way to success. As your brain clears up, you'll be able to form even more definite strategies for avoiding the reasons behind your relapses(ah, speaking of which... ALWAYS write down your relapses, and the REASONS why you relapsed. Try to create workarounds for each of these reasons behind your relapses, so that you don't relapse in the same way ever again. If your workaround fails, polish it until it works. Each relapse will offer you more information about how YOUR addiction works. Gather information, and apply it properly. Nofap is information warfare, and knowing yourself[TRULY knowing yourself, honestly and without allowing yourself to lie to yourself] is the key to victory.)
​
TIP #5: YOUR CHOICES TODAY MAKE YOU THE PERSON YOU WILL BE TOMORROW
"Make the changes that you want to see tomorrow today." Basically, if we want to be free tomorrow, and to resist the temptation tomorrow, we must resist temptation today. Only by resisting the urge today will we know that we can do it tomorrow, because we know that we didn't give in on the day before.
But if I don't have the willpower to resist the urge today(because I want to give in today, and start tomorrow in proper), then I'll give in tomorrow, too. The change that's not undertaken today never manifests tomorrow. Today's actions are the seed for tomorrow's habits.
...Maybe I should've made that my catchphrase: "Today's actions are the seed for tomorrow's habits." Tomorrow's habits grow naturally from today's choices. If you sow the seeds of discipline and effort today, then(even if you fail at times), you'll reap more discipline and effort in the future. You gotta sow a seed to reap. If you don't put in any effort, you're gonna remain an addict all your life. You gotta start sowing resistance, and you'll grow more resistance.
It's as simple as that, really. A spiritual, but also practical principle of life: you get what you sow, except amplified.
TIP #6: NOFAP IS A JOURNEY OF MAKING NO COMPROMISES
Nofap is all about the tough choices. If you can make all the tough choices, you'll be VERY successful on nofap. Many people fail on nofap because they COMPROMISE. If you NEVER compromise, you WILL become free on nofap. That's just the nature of the game. You can increase your ability to never compromise by learning it little by little(in the little things of life, day by day). Make your bed ever morning. Learn to do it ALWAYS, no matter what. Then, once it becomes a habit, move onward to another useful habit. Make it a habit. Take up another useful habit. Doing this will constantly increase your willpower reserves until eventually, done properly, you'll be able to conquer even PMO, because you've learned DILIGENCE.
ALSO, get rid of your R18 Reddit. It's a compromise. You can't leave open doors like this into your life.
The rest, you gotta learn by studying everything about nofap. Try googling "your brain on porn", and click the first site you see on top. That site is such a GOLDMINE of success stories and nofap guides. Do your homework, but remember: you cannot masturbate safely. Don't go back to it. Nofap is a lifestyle. It won't end.
TIP #7: YOU ARE WHAT YOU EAT (MENTALLY SPEAKING)
Remember that your mind consists of what you feed to it. If you read books or if watch movies or TV shows with erotic content,your brain becomes more... active. Same goes for sexual fantasizing, IF you are in the habit of doing it. The best ways to get your mind out from the gutter are:

1. Don't think(as in, push away and cut out the thought immediately when you become conscious of it. Once you do this long enough, it becomes a second nature[it's a VERY good habit for safeguarding your mind from temptation]).
2. Train your eyes to always look away from questionable content. Don't let your eyes linger on scenes of questionable content, and if you turn away, don't look at the content for the second time(the first look can be accidental, but the second look almost never is; this is a good guideline to remember. ALWAYS AVOID THE SECOND GLANCE).
3. Activate yourself physically(by, for example, doing household chores, exercising heavily, or engaging in a physical hobby[fe. drawing or playing music, which require you to activate your body]). Physical activity has the tendency to RESET the mind, and it helps with intrusive sexual thoughts.

TIP #8: CONSIDER USING A HABIT TRACKER SOFTWARE
I remember using a habit tracking software for my nofap process, and BOY, it really gave me motivation, because I could assign myself goals that were unrelated to nofap. That gave such a great boost for my nofap journey, because I was constantly progressing(even when I relapsed quite a few times while learning the process of nofap), and that made it easier to shift over to the new lifestyle instead of staying in the PMO-lifestyle, because I had a LIFE outside of nofap.
Some people will REALLY be able to benefit from from this advice: Use a HABIT TRACKER SOFTWARE... but AVOID GAMIFIED HABIT TRACKER SOFTWARE, as games are oftentimes addictive and addictive behaviors feed into each other(by activating the same neural pathway. This means that gaming, tobacco usage and/or drinking alcoholic beverages can increase PMO urges; this has been confirmed multiple times by different people).
TIP #9: THE TRAP OF OVERCONFIDENCE
Be wary of the feeling of overconfidence that strikes around days 50-120(and a little beyond, sometimes; NEVER DROP YOUR GUARD, even if you get past 90 days on nofap). That time period is known for LIGHTNING-FAST RELAPSES(I have heard of five-second relapses, that's how bad this time period is), because you'll feel invincible and you'll feel like even committing PMO won't make you relapse(DON'T GIVE INTO THAT FEELING; it's a LIE). This period of overconfidence results from a temporary imbalance in your brain chemicals, and it'll go away eventually. But if you give in to that feeling of invincibility(to commit PMO), you'll deflate like a pricked balloon(meaning: you'll relapse MERCILESSLY and TOTALLY).
STAY ON YOUR GUARD, and make sure to watch your thoughts. WRITE DOWN YOUR NOFAP VALUES, and NEVER deviate from them. That's the only safe way to get through this period(it's generally easy to navigate through this period, EXCEPT for the insidious thoughts of overconfidence. Be careful about them, run away if tempted.
TIP #10: ADDICTIONS FEED INTO EACH OTHER
Caffeine(to use an example) gives urges in most people, because addictions feed into each other by activating the same neural pathways, so caffeine(being an addictive substance) increases PMO urges. Same goes for other addictive behaviors and substances.
This is because addictions often come in "clumps"(smoking and alcohol being a classic example), so we're often indulging in addictions(either addictive behaviors or substances, all of which produce dopamine) within short time frame from each other... and this is why the brain ends up associating these behaviors TOGETHER, and thus they end up activating the same pathways in the mind. By indulging in one addictive behaviosubstance, we usually increase our appetite for other addictive behaviors/substances(often stronger ones).
TIP #11: WET DREAM/NIGHTFALL DOES NOT COUNT AS A RELAPSE(!)
Having a wet dream isn't only a sign of you being healed(being in the process of healing, I mean. Depending on how long you've been on nofap without relapsing, you're probably not FULLY healed yet) from PMO, but it's also normal and IT DOESN'T CAUSE A RELAPSE. Many people struggle with this idea, because they feel fatigue and other feelings of relapse from nightfall, and they don't realize that these feelings of fatigue/depression will go away faster than if they had resulted from a relapse. Eventually, these feelings of fatigue and depression don't even happen anymore after nightfall.
WARNING: Keep in mind that you might get stronger urges on nightfall days. These will go away in one or two days, just survive until then. They WILL GO AWAY.
Also, please keep in mind that, at first, it might take you as long as 7 days to recuperate from nightfall(if you've been REALLY addicted), but eventually the amount of recuperation days will grow shorter and shorter. In three months, they'll be a non-issue, and you'll stop being embarrassed about them, too.
TIP #12: START LIVING THE RIGHT KIND OF LIFE TODAY
To heal from PMO addiction, you need to make your recuperation life more desirable than PMO. It's challenging in the beginning, but it gets easier as you keep going. Keep adding the RIGHT THINGS into your life(good hobbies, good friends, good exercise, work on your relationships, etc.), and you won't want to go back to PMO. ALSO, HELP OTHER PMO ADDICTS WITH THE INFORMATION AND EXPERIENCES THAT YOU'VE ACCRUED OVER TIME. As you help others, you'll notice that, for some reason, you'll start getting help yourself. It's a divine law.
(FOR CHRISTIANS:) Also, make sure you're giving time to the Lord in serving Him practically in the field of the gospel. As you start helping others, you're giving God more reason to help you. Also, by giving yourself to the work of the gospel, you're also setting your life in the right order, so that God can bless your life because you're not wandering away from Him and His ways anymore. As you work(with God) on conforming all areas of your life to be more in line with His word(the Bible), you'll experience constantly increasing strength and help in your struggles. Just remember: NEVER COMPROMISE.
TIP #13: GOING ON A DOPAMINE FAST HELPS TO GET PAST THE INITIAL HURDLE(THE FIRST THREE WEEKS)
Going on a "dopamine fast"(google it) helps with preventing urges and putting you in a more peaceful mindset.
TIP #14: BEWARE THE DAYS 50-120 ON NOFAP
This time period is known for OVERCONFIDENCE and LIGHTING-FAST RELAPSES. Your streak can be over in five seconds if you're not careful, because you'll feel overconfident and you might start thinking that you wouldn't relapse even if you did PMO. That is a false, FALSE idea. You'll relapse as surely as a bear will die if nuked. No amount of macho and overconfidence can survive the PMO nuke. Stay clear of the ground zero by avoiding the thought patterns that result from overconfidence: the idea that you're invincible MUST BE AVOIDED AT ALL COSTS!
Keep your guard up. Copypaste this tip into your nofap diary(a word file or something like that, preferably), and you'll have an easier time looking it up if things get difficult. You're still going to experience growth and healing, but DO NOT sell this streak(which should continue until you die, if you want to remain happy) for five seconds of pleasure. Relapsing is a slippery slope that leads to pain and suffering that you have already forgotten. You MUST remember from where you've risen, and to do that you might need to write down the pains of relapsing(IF it doesn't trigger you).
Fight well. Keep going. There never was anything good about PMO, but life on nofap is different. Stick to it.
TIP #15: (THIS TIP IS FOR CHRISTIANS) THE PRINCIPLE OF PROGRESSIVE SURRENDER
We all must search God's will in our lives and conform our lives into His will. As you start obeying God in areas of your life where you feel like you CAN apply willpower, your willpower will increase and then you'll be able to apply it in areas of your life where you previously had NO willpower. As you conform to God again in these newly opened areas of life(or, as the case might be, areas of life that you've neglected to live godly in), God will give you strength and power for even more areas of life, and eventually for fighting against PMO. It's a growth process. Allow God to grow your faith by being faithful in applying it for the things that you HAVE enough faith for. By doing that, God will increase your faith so that it you can reach out for new things and apply new promises of God into your life. BUT YOU MUST START WITH WHAT YOU HAVE, AND NOT WITH WHAT YOU DON'T HAVE!
TIP #16: UTILIZE "PAVLOV'S BELL" TO PICK UP THE RIGHT HABITS
I suggest you to make a LIST of all the things that you need to do, and that when you get an urge, you run to that list and start doing EITHER one thing on the list, or the topmost activity on the list(I recommend the LATTER version; varying up boring AND interesting tasks is recommended). Preparing the list in advance allows you to avoid wasting precious seconds thinking up something to do after an urge strikes. EVERY SECOND MATTERS WHEN AN URGE STRIKES(which is why no time should be given to thinking anymore at that point; one should simply go and act based on premeditated choices, instead of preconditioned actions. These premeditated choices will eventually become preconditioned actions, at which point you're basically putting Pavlov's bell to good use when you apply this tip as intended).
TIP #17: TRUST IN GOD
You're not supposed to feel God's answers. You get them from the word of God. You need to trust that God hears and answers, since we first receive God's promises from the Bible by faith, and in time we shall see them become reality. However, faith comes first(and reading the word of God INCREASES our faith). Same goes for our trust in God. You CAN make progress. You're NOT going to relapse when you're most vulnerable, IF you trust that God can and will take you through it. The problem with us is that, too often, we listen to the doubts that the devil feeds into our minds, and we BELIEVE them INSTEAD of the word of God. God promises us that temptation CAN NOT make us fall into sin and that NOTHING can make us relapse if we receive His word in 1. Cor. 10:13 for what it truly is. The problem is, because the devil knows that God will lead us through the impossible parts(because God has promised so, and He cannot lie), he(the devil) will try to make us relapse BEFORE the impossible part so that we won't see God come through for us. I went through this struggle once. I REALLY wanted to believe the Bible, but I had doubts. Eventually, I figured that God would either keep His word, or He would be a liar. I wanted to see which one was the truth. So, I went all in, resisted relapse until I faced the impossible odds... AND GOD LED ME THROUGH THOSE ODDS(at the time, I felt immense urges and I knew that very soon I couldn't control myself... and then, JUST when my strength was about to give out, I felt a pure peace, and the urges couldn't affect me less; God had miraculously come through, but His coming through required me to resist the temptations that I COULD resist, and then God did what I COULDN'T do. I did my part, and only then, God did His), and established me on my nofap journey so that I had my first experience of nofap success back then. Although I relapsed then, that experience encouraged me to trust in God, and eventually, because I knew now that God's word WAS trustworthy, I became free.
All power lies in faith, in trusting God's promises from His word, and spending time with Him DAILY. If we abide in Him, His power abides in us. If we don't... we don't have His sin-conquering power. His word is ABSOLUTELY true. Will you take ahold of it today?
TIP #18: IS MASTURBATION HEALTHY?
They say that masturbation is healthy, but that's proven untrue in the light of recent scientific studies, according to which excess dopamine can cause mitochondrial damage via oxidative stress, lessening your body's general energy levels and, if the state of dopamine toxicity continues too long, potentially causing cancer(because the mitochondria are responsible for suiciding mutated cells, so if a cell's mitochondria don't work properly, the cell kind of suicides in a more messy way, spreading cancerous matter over nearby cells... thus spreading the cancer).
So yeah. The commonly advertised slogans about masturbation being healthy are really like the tobacco of the previous century. Doctors used to prescribe it for asthma(can you believe it?!). In the end, it sure didn't heal those asthmas, but probably created quite a few. Now we know that tobacco is one of the topmost killers in the world. I'll leave it to you as to what we should call masturbation.
TIP #19: TAKE A VIDEO OF YOURSELF AFTER A RELAPSE(BUT DON'T ALLOW ANYONE TO SEE IT, EVER)
Take a video of yourself right after you relapse(or even a voice recording) and explain how you feel. Then the next time you feel like relapsing, look at your video/voice recording and remember how you felt and ask yourself, "do I want to feel this again"?
This really is how you face the truth. Use those negative emotions from last time as a reminder on why you are on this journey and why you WILL NOT relapse.
TIP #20: THE MORE STEPS YOU MUST TAKE TO RELAPSE, THE LESSER THE CHANCE OF RELAPSE
I guess we must still keep adding info into this file. Here's a principle that addiction management uses: the more steps there are between you and a potential relapse, the less desirable it is to take the first step towards that relapse. Basically, if you can make it more undesirable for you to even take the FIRST step towards your relapse, you'll be preventing a lot of harm! But first, you must KNOW your weak points; that's why you learned RULE #2("journal your relapses").
Here's a practical example of how to do this practice:
You're the type that relapses because of your iPhone or Android phone(for obvious reasons). Now you want to create some distance between yourself and your phone, because you always relapse THROUGH using your phone. You first try keeping the phone in another room, but you notice that you still relapse. Then you have a greater idea: you're gonna sell your IPhone/Android and buy an older style model without a proper internet browser. Now you've effectively killed your chance to relapse via phone.
Basically, what we're introducing here is the principle that YOU MUST MAKE YOUR RELAPSE AS DIFFICULT(preferably impossible) AS POSSIBLE. Become your worst nightmare(in a good way). Get creative. Ask friends for the worst, most malicious tricks to keep you from relapsing. Bar every metaphorical window to PMO, every door and even the chimney. Create every safety precaution that you can imagine, and write down every bit of advice you get. You're going to start a lifestyle of information gathering, so that you can keep applying counter-PMO measures into your life.
This, my friend, is FORTIFYING your life against the intruder that is PMO.