u/Passing-Through247

I've a package the seller says was sent out with no issues while DPD list themselves as still waiting on it. As I'm probably going to get the runaround on this I'll need DPD's answer written and able to be shown to the other party if needed.

To that end how do I contact DPD via Email? Their site is actively hostile to being useful and does not list it.

I think wargames are allowed here?

So I'm early into a wargame idea and the core design goal is to allow people to use whatever 'normal' minis they have, especially encouraging custom built armies. Turnip 28 is in the inspirations.

Since there is no such thing as a truly generic or miniature agnostic game the expectations are stuff that's 28-38mm scale with a normal human equivalent on a 25-32mm base. The design is to be flexible enough I'm sure they could be abused to let someone use a pile of x-wing minis or something. Numbers wise I'm aiming a smaller scale army game.

Anyway to the question. I'm currently sorting out a list of archetypes for units to act as base templates from where each will have a number of points to select upgrades from a self contained list to let people express the character of the mini and army they are making. From the list below what seems to be missing from people's perspective?

Unit Concepts:

Conventional: (designed to create a base template to flexibly represent a generic concept)

• Infantry: Default model type, several bought in a unit.
• Horde: Infantry variant. Weaker with higher model count. Access to more upgrades to take advantage of model count but less for direct power.
• Elites: Infantry variant. Stronger with lower model count. Has more upgrade points to improve them and some more options to represent their elite nature.
• Light Vehicle: Single model with a few extra rules to represent being crewed. Can become several models in a unit.
• Heavy Vehicle: Basicity the Light Vehicle but with better options and more upgrade points. Exists mostly as futureproofing balance and enabling modelling options by having one big customisable vehicle and several smaller ones fit in the rules and not fight over the same rules. Both Vehicles might be folded together with more mutually exclusive options.
• Cavalry Mounts: Using part of a series of rules for stuff like piloting a vehicle or riding an animal. Taken in concert to infantry or elites as their riders. Beyond standard upgrades there is one to reduce unit count to one but get more upgrade points for doing character mounts.
• Monster: Just one big hyper customisable model.
• Combat Specialist: A ‘character’ type option focused on having direct fighting ability. Characters will be able to take a bunch of the odd rules from specialists as well as their own stuff.
• Support Specialist: A ‘character’ type option focused on being able to take a number of odd rules to reprisent stuff that doesn’t fit other Specialist types, medics, wizards, ect. Characters will be able to take a bunch of the odd rules from specialists as well as their own stuff.
• Command Specialist: A ‘character’ type option focused on getting buffing abilities. Characters will be able to take a bunch of the odd rules from specialists as well as their own stuff.

Specialist: (Designed to carry unique rules for filling a more distinct modelling concept)

• Artillery: An immobile model with a ranged attack that needs crew. Upgrades improve the gun, remove need for crew, and add mobility. Might combine with the Vehicle entries or scenery rules.
• Crew: Basicity infantry with lower model count and rules to interact with ‘inanimate’ models like Vehicles and Artillery. Mostly exist to help better model some situations other ideas will cause.
• Kamikaze: Unit that destroys itself to do something, by default damage the enemy. Big choice is in making them one unit or several individual annoyances. Would prefer a less specific name but cannot think of a better one for ‘I run at you and explode’ guys.
• Beastmaster: Another iteration of crew but for interacting with the later ‘beast’ models. A support model to make up for flaws of the beasts and toss in other thematic rules that’d be difficult elsewhere. Can probably have their gimmick and beast rules moved to just an option on other units but at the cost of increasing information density.
• Large Beast: The ‘one big guy’ beast type and stronger of the two, comparable to a middle ground between elites and monster in design intent.
• Beast Pack: The unit option for beasts, comparable comparable to a middle ground between infantry and elites in intent.

It occurs to me I used specialist in two different contexts but those are just placeholder text for internal use right now.

One thing that is unclear but is a covered option is the monster can be upgraded to use mount rules for a character to ride a dragon or whatever and characters can be upgraded to larger bases and better stats to work like a monster (or a monster can be upgraded to take character options. same difference).

TLDR is the list I made missing any obvious roles that'd need more bespoke rules, I need to work out the design space I need to cover before I continue deeper into the project.

I'm convening up some sultanate models but cannot find a good image of the 'infantry' models together and with other stuff for comparison to work out how big things should be. Mainly I'm starting from WGA and perry stuff for azebs and sappers but have realised they feel too small for janissaries and the yüzbaşı.

My biggest issue right now is I have no idea how big a Yüzbaşı is. I started converging one from an age of sigmar korgos kull but realised just how big that model is even if it fits on the right base oddly well. If it is too big and I don't just decide the guy is just a freak of nature I'm tempted to run him in House of Wisdom as a machine armour Fāris.

To help even out scale I'm also building up the bases of the 28mm guys.

These will be supplemented by 3d prints using bestiarium miniatures The Alchemical Order range for lions, bulls, alchemists, and extra weird guys for the House of Wisdom.

So TLDR I don't know how big an azeb, sapper, janissaries, and yüzbaşı, are supposed to be.

So I'm building the triaxes or whatever the archers are called and have a weird issue. Somehow I've built 18 of them but the spues only have four torso fronts and no backs meaning I cannot build more of them.

I am currently cannibalising leftover chariot crew as a replacement but am I unique here?

I had just sent an email from my Gmail to someone else whose email I think works through yahoo but is not itself yahoo (maybe relevant later).

I got back a reply to my email from "mailer-daemon@googlemail.com" telling me my message was blocked and to see the third party link below for more information. The link was to "https://senders.yahooinc.com/error-codes".

Below it was the following:

The response from the remote server was: 554 Message not allowed - [PH01] Email not accepted for policy reasons. Please visit https://senders.yahooinc.com/error-codes

This seems legit to me but it's new and I downloaded a torrent the other day that looked off to me (I deleted it without opening the files inside and my antivirus saw nothing on it) so I want to run it by people with more knowledge than me. I ran the link through the nordVPN link checker and it came back fine.

Edit: I tried to remove the links in case reddit doesn't like that/if they are dangerous, working on it.

Edit 2: Nope not working

Troubleshooting Edit:

I think what's happened is something on the recipient's Email service changed the other day and it's detecting some of my messages a spam because I send him recipes and that obviously results in a repeated format and random links an automated service could fall out with.

So I've put together a summoning based magic system and want to figure out how clear the logic is to people who are not me. To that end I'm asking, given access to this how would you break it or otherwise exploit loopholes I've left? Assume a tech level of around the period between the world wars. It's probibly relevant that the setting has a horror tone to it

The basics are it allows the summoning (binding) of one of a few dozen known entities, generally referred to as spirits or demons depending on cultural factors. The specific spirits are outside what I'm looking for here and the variety leaves no way to cover them in brief so I will be absent on specifics in what a given spirit offers and instead focusing on the mechanics of the binding itself.

Users:

The users of this magic, Binders in common parlance, are generally family institutions who pass down knowledge of around one-five spirits while keeping their secrets hidden outside their own and rivalling with other similar groups to try limit their influence and ideally learn to summon more spirits themselves. Others are random lone practitioners who have stumbled into knowing a spirit or two by some means. Binders are also heavily involved in archaeology for the rare occasions someone learns to summon a new spirit from ancient records.

Basic Functions:

All one needs to preform a binding, beyond being human, is:

• A circle of sufficient size for the spirit being summoned, there is no maximum size only a minimum. The circle must be on reasonably level land to function. The circle may be drawn, carved, or embossed with no difference in function. Even already existing circles not made for the purpose can function.
• The rune of the specific spirit to be summoned, placed centred in the circle. The requirements the rune must follow are otherwise identical to those of the circle. Generally the rune fills the entirety of the circle.
• The name of the spirit they wish to summon, pronounced out loud and correctly. Volume has no restrictions.
• The circle and rune must be on land or itself made from material that functions as ‘resonant’ to the specific spirit, with each having distinct requirements.
• If the circle and rune are prepared correctly in resonant ground and the spirit’s name is spoken aloud by a human, it will appear and the act of binding is initiated.

A complete circle and rune together are known as a summoning circle. An active summoning circle exhibits unusual properties. Most significant is an increased durability compared to the base materials and the circle itself being unaffected by the passage of time. The enhanced durability ensures that most natural phenomena cannot interrupt the binding. Dust will not blow away in the wind or ink be washed away with water. This is not absolute however. This durability does not apply against the actions of living creatures that are not spirits, a human or animal can destroy a summoning circle as easily as it’s materials. In the same way active summoning circles repel dust, water, and other detritus that could threaten to block the circle. It has been discovered the enhanced durability of a summoning circle varies based on the size of the rune.

A Binder may summon each spirit only once per day and outside of spirits in servitude may only maintain a single active summoning circle.

The Spirit:

Once summoned the spirit appears in the centre of the circle and may communicate and act freely with the limitation that the spirit and it’s influence cannot exit the circle by the will of the spirit. Creatures, objects, and forces from outside the circle may enter but are vulnerable to whatever the spirit may do. The spirit cannot interact with the material of its summoning circle.

Each spirit is unique but all demonstrate the properties of physical living beings except for where their bodily composition varies. Like most beings the spirit usually has a need for air and can suffocate without it and can tolerate any environment a human can in addition to any tolerances unique to them. A spirit that is killed is simply banished. All spirits appear capable of all human languages known to living humans. Most spirits tire and need rest or sleep as humans do.

The summoned spirit is in truth only a fragment of the whole being. This whole lacks any form of experience beyond it’s own thought. The summoned portion of the spirit is physically identical and has the same knowledge as the whole but only a fraction of the power. The fragment and the whole are mentally one and the same so were the spirit to be summoned by several people around the world all would know what the others learn.

To remove a spirit from the world of mortals it must be banished. To banish the spirit the binder must refer to it by name within sight of the circle and command it to leave the world. The destruction of the active summoning circle also banishes the spirit. Finally should the bound spirit suffer sufficient harm to ‘kill’ it, generally occurring when acting in Servitude, that will serve to banish it.

Services:

The summoned spirit may offer three types of service. It can enter Servitude, bodily acting at the command of the binder. It can offer a Service, preforming one of three tasks. Finally it can make a Deal, allowing the binder to give something up or develop some permanent limitation in exchange for a permanent boon. The binder is under no obligation to choose a service and may instead simply keep the spirit there to communicate with it. Once bound the binder may ask only one of the asks the spirit can offer.

In Servitude, the binder commands the spirit of a task it must preform and a number of hours it is to to work towards that task. The spirit may be given up to one hundred and sixty eight hours of time, one week. If the task has an obvious end the spirit is banished once it is finished, else it will be banished after the duration of the binding passes. During this time the spirit will generally act towards it’s orders but the binder may give further orders related to the first that do not obstruct the one first given. The spirit is compelled to act towards the order given during the initial binding. Through unknown means the spirit knows all information it’s binder knows that would be relevant to the orders it is given. Once the terms of Servitude are made the spirit is free to leave the summoning circle to follow it’s task. From here the spirit is otherwise free willed and can interpret its orders as it sees appropriate. The binder may debilitate the spirit with pain by chanting its name while concentrating on them. To ensure the spirit’s link to the world the summoning circle remains active for the duration of Servitude and can be used to banish it as normal. While in Servitude a spirit cannot intentionally harm its binder.

In Service, the binder states which of the spirit's Services they desire and the spirit immediately makes it so. Those that are immediate are done then and there before the spirit is banished. Other Services that take time will result in the spirit staying as long as needed to carry it out, as per Servitude except the spirit will not go beyond the terms of the Service.

Making a Deal is similar to asking a Service, only the binder must surrender something. Deals leave some permanent impact on the binder or the world. Those sensitive to the supernatural may sense something when a Deal is made nearby. Deals are overall the most powerful benefits a binder can obtain from a spirit.

The spirit must list the Services and Deals they offer when asked by their binder.

Fused Bindings:

Should a spirit encounter another instance of itself or an active summoning circle bearing their rune the summoning becomes unstable, becoming a Fused Binding. This occurs once the spirit has clear sight of another instance of itself or its circle. and the spirit will always seek to do so if possible, irrespective all existing orders.

Should one or more instances of the spirit be within their summoning circle those instances are immediately banished without further effect and the spirit experiences debilitating pain.

Should two or more of a spirit bound in Service become fused both fade from existence for a moment before one ‘fused’ instance appears at the point equidistant between the fused spirits, while one encountering a summoning circle will make that spirit the site of the fused binding and the instance that circle used used for immediately vanishes.

A fused binding has the spirit freed from all orders and become capable of free action as it will. Applying a third or more spirit to a fused binding will further enhance the spirit, improving their physical abilities and expanding the breadth of the powers they can bring to bare. The banishing of a fused binding requires one of three conditions: the destruction of the spirit by violence, the voluntary dissipation of the spirit, or the destruction of all connected summoning circles. In the first two cases this creates a mystical aftershock that destroys the summoning circles in a pulse of force.

On request here are four example Services and Deals:

Services:

• Grant the use of it's mount, a hybrid of elephant, hippo, and boar, to the binder and up to two other creatures as secure conveyance to a selected location. Those the beast bears may bring only what they can carry. The creature is proud and refuses to be a beast of burden. Nor will it stop before there; It’s master is the spirit not the binder but neither can most human artifice stop it.
• The Spirit will masterfully manage the finances of the binder, or a business or household they are part of. This will be done for a period of one month. For this time the spirit will serve with loyalty and the secrets it uncovers will go unspoken.
• The spirit can send one of it's 'children' to spy for the binder. This being is a fist sized golden hybrid of fly and reptile that will watch a target (place object or person) as directed by the binder. It will seek to return to the binder either after it sees that a condition described to it has come to pass such as the passage of time, it sees a specific person pass through a door, or when the sun next rises from the time it is spawned. The creature seems to instinctively know anything the binder does. Anyone may consume the creature to lean anything it has seen or heard. Should the creature be exposed to sunlight it rapidly petrifies alive but may still be consumed if found.
• Supply the binder a phial of shining honey. Those who imbibe this honey will be healed of all poison or disease. Afterword those effected become lethargic and after an hour will peel off their skin to find the physical effects of their ailments healed. This cures the physical dependence of addiction but not it’s mental effects. The imbiber feels a sense of gratitude to the one who gives them the honey and a mild euphoria for about a week.

Deals:

• Will grant the binder the ability to have sight of a specific person or object through concentration in exchange for a cup of fresh human blood, shed and collected in the spirit’s presence. This blood loss does not recover naturally. Blood offered does not need to come from the binder.
• Will grant the binder a solid gold statue in exchange for a treasured memory. The statue is of the binder and at most one other person and may include some of the surrounding area, the whole scene depicting the lost memory.
• Will grant the binder knowledge of a selected foe's greatest desire in exchange for the ashes of a child.
• Will grant the binder kinship to all creatures shelled or limbless in exchange for taking an eternal journey. Snakes and insects and the like will not harm the binder without outside cause and such beings will understand the Binder’s words and the Binder will understand theirs. Failing to travel to a place they have never been before each year will kill the binder through the soirit's 'children' erupting from their chest. Should they survive this, creatures this deal would grant them affinity towards turn against them instead.

So I've on ongoing issue with dishes using minced meat, burgers, meatballs, and the like. I can shape it but the texture never comes together and always works out dry, crumbly, and mushy no matter the recipe. It never stops feeling like just eating minced meat with whatever mixed in. Flavours are fine, it's a texture issue.

The ideal would be bringing things together like the burgers you get when eating out or the meat inside a bratwurst. Something that's stopped being just minced meat.

I have tried resting my meat mixture overnight before using it but it only improved things rather than fixing the problem.

I think some aspect of it is something to do with the particular properties of different meats. I always find this issue especially pounced in the beef/pork mixes most recipes ask for while the time it was at it's mildest was a beef/lamb mix, about 50/50 as I recall.