Internal Revenue Service IRS Tax News, National Taxpayer Advocate Issues Media Report to Congress expresses concern about continued refund delays in poor taxpayer service. What? How could that be? After the IRS added those two brand new telephone bot options that we talked about just a week ago or so, I thought surely that would solve the problem. In any case, first an attempt at a joke. PropGun2 seems popular these days and I'll tell you what, I've got the need, the need for speed. What's that? Hunter Biden can hook me up with some speed? What? Not that kind of speed you derelict? Man, you're running with the wrong crowd. I don't want to see you going within a hundred feet of that White House again. They're bad influence. Dang, neighborhoods falling apart.   Okay, we're back. What's that Phil? No, no, I'm not going to apologize for my outburst.  I don't. I are 2022-129 June 22nd, 2022 Washington National Taxpayer Advocate Aaron M. Collins today released her statutorily mandated mid-year report to Congress. There's a link to that here. The report expresses concern about continuing delays in the processing of paper file tax returns and the consequent impact on taxpayer refunds. At the end of May, the agency had a backlog of 21.3 million unprocessed paper tax returns and increase of 1.3 million over the same time last year. Quote, the IRS has said it is aiming to crush the backlog inventory this year and I hope it succeeds in quote Collins wrote quote unfortunately at this point the backlog is still crushing the IRS, its employees and most importantly the taxpayers. You go you get them taxpayer advocate Collins as such the agency is continuing to explore additional processing strategies in quote the report points out that the significant majority of individual taxpayers receive refunds quote at the end of the day a typical taxpayer cares most about receiving his or her refund timely in quote Collins wrote quote particularly for lower income taxpayers who received earned income tax credit benefits tax refunds may constitute a significant percentage of their household incomes for the year. Thus, these processing delays are creating unprecedented financial difficulties for millions of taxpayers and outright hardship for many in quote among business taxpayers many have been waiting extended periods to receive employee tax retention credits for which they are eligible in addition to their regular refunds. He taxpayer challenges this year have included return processing delays, correspondence processing delays and difficulty reaching the IRS by phone, but they do have those like two new telephone bot options at least addressing that one. So backlog of unprocessed paper tax returns more than 90% of individual income taxpayers e file their returns yet last year about 17 million taxpayers filed their returns on paper. So obviously they're trying to push everybody to the filing electronically but a significant amount of people still pile file with the paper returns for various reasons. Some choose to file on paper. Some have no choice because they encounter e filing barriers such as when they are required to file a tax return or schedule the IRS cannot accept electronically. So while the IRS has most of the stuff kind of set up to receive electronically you might have some forms or some communications with the tax return that you can't basically attack on very easily to the actual e file tax return and therefore you might be required to file in some cases or think it would be more beneficial to do so in those circumstances. Before the pandemic the IRS typically delivered refunds to paper filers within four to six weeks over the past year refund delays on paper filed returns have generally exceeded six months with delays of 10 months or more common for many taxpayers. The report says the IRS has failed to make progress in eliminating paper backlog because quote its piece of processing paper tax returns has not kept up with new receipts. So obviously their output hasn't kept up with the input here end quote during the month of May the IRS processed an average of about 205,000 individual income tax returns from 1040 per week. Its form 1040 backlog at the end of May stood at 8.2 million with millions more paper tax returns not yet classified or expected to arrive before the extended filing deadline of October 15th. The report says the IRS would have to process well over 500,000 forms 1040 per week more than double its current pace to eliminate the backlog this year quote the math is daunting in quote the report says so while they're basically saying hey we're putting people on overtime and this and that if you look at the numbers they're basically saying they're quite backed up and it's and you know it's if you just look at it realistically it might take some time that's my interpretation to really dig into the backlog it seems to me. So forms 1040 are just one component of the paper tax return processing backlog millions of of business tax returns and amended tax returns both individual and business are also filed on paper the overall backlog has increased by 7% over the past year as shown in figure one figure one status of unprocessed paper returns comparing weeks ending May 22 2021 May 27 2022 so we got the paper returns awaiting processing you've got the original individual business not specified and the total here for 2021 the total was 16 million 8 for the original amended 3 million 2 total paper returns awaiting processing seen 20 million and in 2022 it's going up to 21 million 300 so obviously significant significant increase to to basically be dealing with with the same resources or if you're doing the same kind of processes in place so you would think something might have to change if that kind of those kind of numbers continue the IRS has publicly committed to reducing its paper tax return backlog to a quote healthy end quote level by the end of the year but it has not provided a definition of quote healthy end quote and this is a typical kind of trend that has always been political language but it seems like it's gotten to an extreme these days with this completely vague language or actually time trying to deconstruct language so we can't even communicate in the same using the same words which is kind of ridiculous so whenever they give you some vague thing like ah we've we've added a few new you know telephone options that's going to reduce the tax returns well how much is it going to reduce it what's the thing going to do how is it going to reduce it we've we've added some overtime hours okay well what exactly is the overtime expected to basically do in terms of the output and so on you got to kind of try to nail people down which is difficult when everybody's trying to deconstruct even every other word you say but in any case quote historically the IRS has paid refunds resulting from paper filed returns within four to six weeks uh end quote Collins wrote quote from a paper perspective returning to a four to six week refund delivery period is a reasonable definition of healthy end quote so if you can get back to the turnaround time being where it used to be uh two to six weeks she would be happy with that Collins that that seems reasonable to me largely because of the likelihood the the IRS will carry a large inventory of unprecedented paper tax returns into the 2023 filing season so obviously the problem will compound if if you continue this backlog back into the next filing season where you're going to get swamped with a bunch of new tax returns right and that's just going to increase the problem so Collins issued a taxpayer advocate directive a TAD in March directing the IRS to implement 2d uh barcoding or other scanning technology to automate the trans the transcription of paper tax returns quote today the digits on every paper return must be manually keystroke into IRS systems by an employee end quote Collins wrote that seems very outdated but I don't know quote in the year 2022 that doesn't seem that just seems crazy it sure does uh it is crazy quote the IRS response to the TAD is due on June 27 2022 the report credits the IRS with taken recent steps to address the backlog but notes quote missed opportunities in quote to have acted earlier quote the IRS paper processing delays were evident more than a year ago and the IRS could have addressed them more aggressively at that time and quote Collins wrote you get them Collins quote uh had the IRS taken steps a year ago to resign current employees to processing functions it could have reduced the inventory backlog carried into this filing season and and accelerated the payment of refunds to millions of taxpayers had the IRS implemented 2d uh barcoding optical character recognition or similar technology in time for the 2022 filing season it could have reduced the need for employees to engage in the highly manual task of transcribing paper tax returns that does seem highly manual and ridiculous have the IRS quickly used some of the 1.5 billion dollars of additional funds provided by the American Rescue Plan Act of 2021 the ARPA which was enacted 15 months ago to hire an Australian additional employees it could have worked through the backlog uh answered more taxpayer telephone calls and otherwise improved taxpayer service end quote so I'm not sure exactly what I know there's been a lot of changes on the on the iris side of things in terms of the law but clearly just throwing money at stuff we we know pretty clearly that's not the answer because you could throw money at stuff all day long and it could be just as crappy that's it was before it got out someone that's actually gonna you know line up the money and again they've done some things that are better that looks like they're trying to improve stuff but the efficiency I don't know uh obviously government organizations are not known for being efficient but it seems uh it seems like it could get better I would think so go Collins so at the end of May 2021 the IRS had an additional 15.8 million returns that had been suspended during processing and required manual review by irs employees the suspended returns consisted largely of e-filed returns on which taxpayers claimed recovery rebate credit amounts that differed from the allowable amounts shown on the irs records so now you've got this new issue and of course that was going to cause a problem we all knew it was going to cause a problem because you've got this uh this kind of advanced payment type of thing which is an estimate and so there's something's not going to tie up to the tax return and from time to time or quite often I would think uh in terms of these big numbers so that you know that's going to cause a problem as of May 2022 the irs had reduced the number of suspended returns to 5.4 million the report credits the irs with developing procedures to reduce delays among suspended returns in part by automating the review process however e-filed returns suspended during processing did not generally result in extended refund delays uh and by contrast unprocessed paper filed tax returns have resulted in refund delays of six to ten months or longer so we got the correspondence processing delays when the taxpayer receives a notice and is requested to respond or chooses to respond the taxpayer must generally do so by mail so the iris is a slow kind of snail mail bureaucratic organization they give you a notice they tell you to respond 30 to 60 days and so on so through May 2021 the irs processed 5 million taxpayer responses to proposed adjustments it took an average of 251 days to do so more than eight months that is more than triple the processing time of 74 days in fiscal year 2019 the most recent pre-pandemic year quote when a math error or similar notice is generated in connection with a paper file tax return in quote the report says quote the combination the return processing delays and the correspondence uh processing delays may mean that the taxpayer must wait well over a year to get the issue resolved and receive the refund due end quote so obviously when you're talking about like a correspondence usually the correspondence oftentimes it might just be a mundane thing like oh you had a math error or something like that and we corrected it on our side here's the correction do you agree with the correction they have to get your ascent of course to the correction in order to move forward and apply that correction and if you're going through snail mail and there's a lag between processing the return because of the error a lag between sending out of the letter and then a lag between receiving or processing the receipt of the letter then obviously a pretty routine kind of process that could have been caught by basically the computer just matching up you know like a like a w2 to what you reported on the w2 or something is now being delayed you know more excessively than you would think and that of course will hurt people if they're waiting for a refund so there are currently over 336,000 taxpayers who could not file their returns or receive their refund because identity thieves had already filed a return using their identifying information so these taxpayers must submit affidavits and other documentation to substantiate their identities they now generally must wait at least a year to receive their refunds the irs website states due to ex extenuating circumstances caused by the pandemic our identity theft inventories have increased and on average it is taking about 360 days to resolve identity theft issues again we knew that was going to be a problem you could have predicted that like a mile before because they started spewing out money out out so that means people are going to be filing more fraudulent returns stealing people's identity becoming more valuable so this stuff although it's a big increase that a lot of it you probably could have predicted and you know they probably couldn't have had the same processing times they had before the pandemic but you know it's pretty clear that when you put these in place they're going to have some of these problems can be seen you know when you put it in place but telephone challenges during the 2022 filing season the irs received about 73 million telephone calls so here we go with the telephone but the bots we've got the bots only only one out of ten calls reached an irs employee compared with the 2021 filing season irs employees answered less than half as many calls but the percentage of calls answered remained about the same because they also received less than half as many calls so the time the average taxpayer spent waiting on hold roads from 20 minutes to 29 minutes a comparison of telephone service during the 2021 and 2022 filing season is shown in figure two figure two irs enterprise telephone results comparing week and may 21st 2021 in april 23 2022 so we've got the filing season 21 22 calls received so we got 167 million in 21 73 and 22 number of calls answered by an irs employee 15 15.7 million versus 7.5 percentage of calls answered by an irs employee 9 and 10 but both of these years are within the pandemic years i believe and and so so so you would think you would want to compare possibly to 2019 i would think but in any case quote the combination of more than 21 million unprocessed paper tax returns more than 14 million math error notices eight month backlogs and processing taxpayer correspondence and extraordinary difficulty reaching the irs by phone made this filing season particularly challenging in quote collins wrote tas objective for fiscal year 2023 as required by law the advocates report identifies tas's key objectives for the upcoming fiscal year the report describes 14 systematic advocacy objectives six case advocacy and other business objectives and three research objectives in light of the challenges taxpayers have been facing over the last two years collins wrote the tac will be placing heavy emphasis on working with the irs to improve the processing of tax returns and taxpayer service generally among the objectives report identifies are the following automating the processing paper tax returns on march 29th as noted above collins issued a report advocate directive that's the tad directing the irs to implement scanning technology by the start of the 2023 filing season so that paper tax returns can be machine read and employees will not have to keystroke each digit on the return into irs systems that would be great they think that save a lot of time after obtaining an extension for responding the irs answered answer to the tad now now due on monday june 27 irs leaders have identified they are not likely to implement 2d bar coding because collins has strongly urged them to implement a plan to achieve automation of paper processing in time for the next filing season quote doing so is critical in quote collins wrote quote it is unacceptable that the agency is still paying thousands of employees to keystroke the data from millions of tax returns digit by digit into irs systems creating current processing backlog and producing an error rate and transcribing individual returns last year of 22% in quote so reducing barriers to e filing tax returns some taxpayers still prefer to file paper returns however many paper filers uh perhaps uh perhaps the majority would prefer to e file the returns but are not able to do so so you could say well why do we have all these paper returns when they're trying to e file some of them just might want to file a fake paper return so so be it but others might be restricted in some way to have the e filing so if you can remove the restrictions that would save up time so among the barriers some taxpayers must file irs forms or schedules that the irs does not accept through its e file system some taxpayers must must include attachments appraisals or disclosure statements that cannot be filed by their tax software packages some software packages block returns from e file if the taxpayer overrides certain entries irs systems reject certain returns during e file process and require affected taxpayers to mail their returns instead and some taxpayers live in areas of the country without broadband internet access or lack computer access and thus face greater difficulty in preparing and e filing their returns the report says the irs must reduce e filing barriers so that more taxpayers can e file and there will be fewer paper tax returns to tens transcribe or scan improving the irs hiring and training process in fiscal year 2022 congress increased the irs's overall budget by almost six percent and the taxpayer services report of the budget by nearly nine percent many of the irs challenges stem from inadequate staffing including limited staffing of submission processing and telephone call centers the report says that hiring and adequately training new employees will enhance the taxpayer experience improving telephone service some taxpayers issues issue may be resolved through technology channels and enhancing those channels must be a priority but some issues are best resolved through a conversation and some taxpayers are not comfortable with the technology the report says it is critical that taxpayers be able to reach the irs by phone as discussed above irs employees were only able to answer 10 percent of taxpayer telephone calls this filing season quote if a private company failed to answer nine out of 10 customer calls customers would go go elsewhere in quote callings wrote so obviously when you compare something like a government entity to a private entity it's usually just ridiculous right because the government entity is usually not going to be up to the standard of the private industry because the private industry has the market pressure so it's kind of harder in a lot of cases to run something in a not-for-profit or in a government entity because the bloating of it is is more prevalent because you don't have that same kind of market pressure which is why you know we we as the people that are using the not-for-profit and the government need to recognize this and and act accordingly put the pressure on accordingly and try to try to minimize the need for non-market pressure non-market-based things that tend to get bloated but anyways quote that of course is not an option for us taxpayers so it is critical that the irs increase staffing in its telephone call center to handle the volume of calls it receives irs responses to national taxpayer advocate administration recommendation the national taxpayer advocate is required by statute to submit year-end report to congress that among other things makes administrative recommendations to resolve taxpayer problems section 7803c3 of internal revenue code authorizes the national taxpayer advocate to submit administrative recommendations to the commissioner and requires the irs to respond within three months under this authority the national taxpayer advocate annually transmits to the commissioner all administrative recommendations processed in her year-end report for response the national taxpayer advocate made 88 administrative recommendations in her 2021 year-end report and then submitted them to the commission for response the irs had agreed to implement 61 or 69 percent of the recommendations in full or in part the irs responses are published on the tas website at national taxpayer advocates annual report to congress tracker you could check that out there's a link to it the national taxpayer advocate is required by statute to submit two annual reports to the house committee on ways and means and the senate committee on finance the statute requires these reports to be submitted directly to the committees without any prior review or comment from the commissioner of internal revenue the secretary of the treasury the irs oversight board any other officer or employee of the department of the treasury or the office of management and budget the first report must identify the objectives of the office of the taxpayer advocate for the fiscal year beginning in that calendar year the second report must include a discussion of the 10 most serious problems encountered by taxpayers identify the 10 tax issues most frequently litigated in the courts and make administrative and legislative recommendations to resolve taxpayer problems the national taxpayer advocate blogs about key issues in tax administration you can visit tas subscriptions there's a link to that here to subscribe past blogs from the national taxpayer advocate can be found at most recent in ta blogs there's a link to that from media inquiries please contact tas media relations at and there's an email address and there's a phone number there'll be a link to this so you can check that out if you want to by going to that at the bottom here about the taxpayer advocate service the taxpayer advocate service the tas is an independent organization within the irs that helps taxpayers and protects taxpayer rights the local taxpayer advocates number is in local directories and at contact us there's a link to that here taxpayers can also call tas toll free there's a telephone number that will be at the link if you want to go to that tas can help those who need assistance in resolving an irs problem if the problem is causing financial difficulty or those who believe an irs system or proceed or a procedure isn't working as it should this service is free uh were your voice so there's a link to that here at the irs uh has more information about tas and taxpayer rights under the taxpayer bill of rights so get uh updates to tax topics at you got the facebook link twitter and youtube so you got links to all this stuff and the contact information and that that report is kind of an interesting report to look at because it is someone that's hopefully you know got an independent kind of perspective and is looking at and concentrating in on the processing and working of the irs giving recommendations basically for uh improvement so it is an interesting report if you want to dive into it in more detail there's links to that stuff here there'll be a link to this in the description


Okay, crop drop. Let's do the real panel now. So how to win at games Now you might be thinking why would you run a panel on how to win a games? Also, you're gonna tell everyone how to win a game.  Why would you need to say that? I argue that the majority of you are not trying to win the games that you play I'm you're playing you're moving your pieces around like I'm gonna win this game I'm gonna win this counter-strike. I'm gonna do this thing, but you're not if you are really trying to be winning a lot more often than you are I know how often you're winning. It's not that often So before we get into this we really have to talk about I'm being very unprofessional and minimizing my slideshow to open Something that I don't have My laptop's like four years old give it a break. All right, so let me give some context in the video You're about to watch right so in the in the 90s, right?  It's a championship, right?  Oh, and we're terrible, right? They won so few games Right that the fact was there was no way they can make the playoffs and if you don't know this right in most sports Professional ones the worst team gets the first draft pick the next year It helps you boost you up right the shittiest team gets the best new players to help them become better and the best That's even wins the Super Bowl gets the last pick kind of like how in power grid if you're in last place You get first crack at the resources, right? So the Jets are so terrible and after every NFL game There's always a press conference and the head coaches of both teams have to go and talk and answer questions of the press Somebody asked coach her Edwards. Are you going to lose on purpose? Right so that you can get a better draft pick next year and his response was famous This is legendary You might hear people play sports people more so than nerd people because you realize sports people are just as nerdy as all It's sports nerd. Yeah, a sports nerd. They memorize every step of every character that they follow in this competitive game The player You play to win the game Just play it just play it The thing about sports You play to win and I don't care if you don't have any wins. You go play to win. You start killing me. It doesn't matter Then it's time you get out This whole conversation bothers me Lot of reasons why you want to play to win and we'll get into all of that So, let's start we have to warn you. This is a dangerous panel. This is a danger zone. Oh wait, they just watched archer Okay, anyway, that's why that was in my head So we're gonna take you to a scary place in gaming if you stay in this room and do what we say You're gonna have some problems in the rest of your life So pretty war yeah, the problems pretty much are that some of the games that you are gonna play are not gonna be fun Anymore right if you just know how to win a game and so to all your friends the game can sometimes become really really boring There are three fundamental traits or superpowers that you're going to acquire, but they are there with great responsibility comes great air hockey So the air hockey problem is very particular to games like air hockey games where there's a high-skill cat But most people do not play them competitively. You will never see these games in the Omega Many of you might play air hockey, you know when you're at an arcade you're at a bar and you're okay at it But you're not good very few people practice air hockey So if you go up to someone say hey, why don't I play air hockey sure and you play and it's a ton of fun But we play our hockey a lot. We're really into air we see an air hockey table. That's actually a good one photon, right? It's got to be a regulation table. Yeah, if we see an air hockey table, it's down.  That's just not fun for them. Yeah, right? It's lonely at the top You also reach this problem Where if you start to be good at games, you'll be better than everyone you play with in your hometown But you won't be pro so you'll be good enough to beat all your friends in soul caliber But you can't win a tournament at PAX so you have almost no one to play games with So be warned. This is the path you're going down The bevegan odor very schlagen z problem So this might be an apocryphal tale But there's a German game designer who was asked in an interview at one point your games are very popular But a problem we see is that it takes a long time people spend forever on their turn analyzing every possible outcome Yeah, the famous game is a choir if you ever played a choir if you sit down and calculate every possible decision In which one gets you the most points in a choir it takes forever It's but you know unless you have a calculator, but even then it takes a while But if you do that you're gonna win, right? The best chance of winning his response was well, I'm doing a terrible accent and I'm translating from German from a story That might not even be real What we do is we sit around and we start to chat move or I will hit you move or I will hit you And if it does not move we hit them they learn their lesson So what will happen to you is one you will start taking your turn especially in board games like that You'll know exactly what to do every turn and all your dumb-ass friends are gonna sit there forever being like This happens to us a lot when we go to like board game night and we're playing with somewhat strangers or acquaintances And they're not like our close friends who play board games like crazy And like I'll know exactly I'll just be thinking during everyone else's turn What I'm gonna do on my turn it gets to my turn and I'm like click click click click click click done But eventually it goes around the table and every time it gets to the one guy's turn usually to your right It's like your way you're like I'll take a nap. Oh, it's my turn Now the tricky part is that there's a lot of reasons for this and the biggest one is that a lot of decisions in games That you think matter don't matter at all They're entirely arbitrary and if you figure out games You'll know when a decision doesn't matter and you won't worry about it. You'll just pick one probably randomly But you can tell then you'll see the people who haven't quite figured this out They'll be sitting there agonizing over whether to throw paper or rock Agonizing well, he might throw scissors So I think I should the worst problem is that you're going to see through the matrix settlers of the time Done game. We've seen through it. We've solved it We'll tell you how to solve it as an example of how this works almost all the board games I own I can't play anymore because I know the solution. I know exactly how to win what's going on There's no fun in it anymore. I don't even make any decisions So We really have to lay a few ground rules to before we really get into this We have to say what these words actually mean, but we're actually talking about the biggest one is game What is a game? I mean patty cake is a game Farmville is a game Yeah, if you look at the dictionary for the word game, right?  It's true. Go for it I think it's pretty obvious which one we're going for here. So physics, right? That's such a cheap gag, but I like that picture a lot So if you talk to game designers, they're kind of two or game players There are two definitions of game that have sort of crystallized into what we all agree upon I don't think anyone in this room would agree that you can say a game is either a series of interesting decisions You might say a series of meaningful decisions instead. For example, Candyland. You don't make any decisions I guess do I play Candyland or not? Do I do I cheat or not? And the one we want to focus on a fair competitive test of one or more skills All games test some sort of skill if we're gonna use that definition So we're thinking about games in terms of a competition I'm gonna bang my brain or my fist or my sword or my something against Scott's equivalent And we're going to fight it out. Yeah, some games are just an obvious You know, it's obvious what skill they're testing like, you know running race Well, we're testing our leg strength and lung power and whatever right, but some games like what skill is this game testing? Patience. Patience is often the thing that is tested in many games. For example, Monopoly Now, what about a sport because sports are actually very different from games in a few key areas for example, I can tell you I have a strategy. You want to hear my strategy? You want how to win hockey? Take the little black thing and put it in the goal And keep doing it over and over again But notice how knowing what I'm going to do isn't the only thing that matters actually doing it also matters There's a skill of doing that. Yeah, you know, if you have a board game or something like that Just knowing what you want to do. Oh, it's a board game. I want to put the biscuit in the basket Boom put the busy mask. I win But if it's a sport, you actually have to be able to do it There's some other physical difficulty. It could even be a small difficulty, right?  I'm saying if there's a left arrow I'm gonna step on that left one. I'm gonna step on the right one I'm gonna do what the game is telling me to do There are meaningful decisions in that regard and that they actually if I don't do them I lose the game but they're not Interesting decisions because I think we all can identify that an arrow pointing left means left Well, you might want to step on the left arrow with the right foot That's a pretty advanced tactic But the key here is that the execution matters now people might be saying, you know, oh, there's the element of physicality That's what you're defining as a sport. So I want to skip a little bit chess Chess is not a sport because if I am quadriplegic, I can still play chess I can say what my move is and someone else will move it a Robot can play chess and the tender to the robot will move the pieces for or tell it where the pieces are on the board You don't you don't get more points in chess by moving the piece faster Or you know movie or throwing the piece and having it land exactly on the right spot I'm just boxing on the other hand as that's a sport Now one could argue that it is a sport because I still have to execute the calculations in my brain And you know our constructs and causality and all that but that's a stupid argument Pretty much the brain is the one muscle that is exempted from the sport definition because otherwise everything comes down to Syloxism and is meaningless counter strike is also a sport because there is strategy tactic involved But what really matters what really determines who wins and you loses is the skill at the specific test The test here is can I click on people's heads and avoid being clicked on my own head? And can I do it faster than everyone else and we can tell you how to win sports There's a very easy formula to winning all sports play them a lot Yeah practice. Yeah, I mean, you know, there's no way you know If the human body right if you want to move the fastest as you can move you need to have muscle memory to where you're not even thinking Right if you play DDR or any sort of rhythm game right when you're first starting out You're actually thinking consciously push this button then strum the thing step on the arrow But as soon as you do it for a few minutes or maybe you know depending on how good you are right or your natural talent is Eventually, you're not consciously thinking the arrows or the symbols on the screen are just controlling your body Your muscles have the memory and you can you can delegate all of that thinking to some subconscious part of your brain It just arrows come in feet move and then that allows you to use your brain to think about things on a higher level Right, so for example when if you're playing baseball, right and you want to be really good at it You know if you actually have to think about your swing And you just don't have it memorized in your muscles Then you're thinking about your swing and because you're thinking about your swing You're not thinking about other things like should I run to second base, you know Where's the you know, what's the strategy here? Bunch right, but as soon as you can have your swing in your muscle memory Then you can think about these strategies in the higher level, you know Do I want to get a sacrifice fly out to the left field and that would you know Elevates you to the next level of gameplay. So if you want to be better than me at Counter-Strike start playing Counter-Strike 10 years ago It's like Street Fighter 2 right, it's like okay, you can do if you can just think okay Here's how to do this combo light light medium heavy attack, right if you actually have to think about the combo Then you have to you know, you're not thinking about which combo was the combo I want to do right now So there are board games as a kind of quick aside that are sports You might have seen us playing jungle speed throughout this convention. These are sports more so than games There are tons of board game sports But if you want to win at games you have to identify and a lot of people don't think about this whether or not What you're playing is a sport or a game and act accordingly if you know It's a sport if you know that I have to flick little things and then have mooses or elk run across them You better practice your flicking right so lesson number one if you want to win at sports practice So we're not going to talk about sports anymore We're going to use board games as examples throughout most of this because they really the mechanics are there Physical and elegant so that no matter even if you're not good at math you can see the entire game You can manipulate it directly you can hold the entire abstraction of the game in your mind So they're kind of the perfect way to teach how to win at all games I have to go over a few more definitions Griefing is simply when you are playing to get something other than what the rest of the players are trying to get You're not playing to win the game if you ever play a game with anyone and you aren't trying to win You are griefing them just as badly as if I stab my teammate in the back and Counter-Strike. Yeah I mean there's a thing called utility right utility is what you want in the game It's the carrot right Counter-Strike you want your utility is to either you know Let's say it's a DE math you either want to bomb the other guys or kill them all right If you're trying to do something else like I don't want to do that. I want to jump on every crate once Find the glitch and go up above and walk on the sky So what we have here is a mismatch of utility I'm trying to win the game like Herm Edwards tells me to Scott's dicking around my games no longer fun All griefing just comes down to disparate utility now some games are designed better than others For example people grief and Counter-Strike because they're losing and they're bored But that's a topic for another discussion Another very important concept before we get into the actual strategies of how to beat all these games is that you have to Realize all games in the world every possible game There is no exception to this breaks down to one of these three in the end Every game is how they're solvable completely random are entirely arbitrary. I remember solvable doesn't mean solved Right solvable breaks down into solved and unsolved right so there are games that are yes They are solvable games, but we have not yet solved them for example checkers We talked about this in the panel. We just did but many people weren't there for that checkers is a solved game relatively There's a weak solution to checkers in that if from a starting position Both players can force the game to a draw no matter what the game is solved and eventually we will solve it completely And prove that mathematically someday chess will be solved the games don't hide anything There's a limited finite number of possible states in the game. So the game can be solved There's an absolute perfect way to play chess checkers go. Oh, she take tacto any game like that Random Yahtzee is a random game at its core. You are making decisions. I mean I have to decide all right I rolled four sixes should I go for that fifth six you could take the 24 or you can go Oh, you mean if you have another role you're gonna go for the Yahtzee But do you score in the four of a kind which is a lot of points or do you score in the four sixes up top? Now if you're smart at all, it's obvious what to do in Yahtzee You're never sitting there thinking. Oh, should I take the Yahtzee or should I put it all in chance? So The game of Yahtzee comes down to complete randomness among skilled players now if you're playing with unskilled players They're going to lose a lot because they're not playing the game perfectly But once you are playing the game as perfectly as the decisions the game affords to you allow The core of the game is all that matters and in Yahtzee and Monopoly the game is 100% random once everybody's on the same page Settlers of Catan is a random goddamn game Once everybody is playing settlers the way that we will tell you how to play it, right? The winner will be determined by the role of the dice now because in settlers every turn you're rolling to that dice to determine Where resources come out maybe one guy is unlucky and he's on the 12 somehow, right? Well 12 could come up like three or four times if it happens that guy's the win All right, just because nobody else is going on the 12 because they playing the odds They're playing you know to give themselves the best possible chance of winning, right? But everyone has the best possible chance of winning you all have the same chance and then randomly one winner will be determined So we've played settlers. I don't know hundreds of times for a couple of years This is our first tournament board game We played it a lot and we really liked it and we got really really good at it We kind of figured the game out and I entered a national settlers of Catan tournament Yeah, Ubercon like five or six something years ago I'm an old man and at this convention I joined the tournament and I win the first round Handily when the second round handily we're in the quarter-finals everyone now is smart just like us We all sit down. They all know settlers every single game There were four quarter-final games ended with one person winning with ten points and every other person having nine and a guaranteed 10th point on their turn There is no way any one of those players could have made the game go differently Other than by sabotaging the game by not trying to win and losing on purpose or do a gigaboo Jones We'll get to jiggaboo Jones in a little bit jiggaboo Jones is not technically cheating Arbitrary games Paper rock scissors is an arbitrary game. I can try to be psychological. I know Scott motherfucking loves scissors Nobody plays like that now there isn't interesting algorithm out there. It's a tic-tac-toe It's online where you can play against it It'll figure out how non random you are as a human and start to beat you But that's a separate thing this game is entirely arbitrary No strategy paper rock or scissors is better than any other strategy other than the dick punch followed by running away with this wall But that's meta play So there's no way for me to say my choice of rock is better or worse than my choice of paper or scissors So as a result my decision is meaningless You'll see players like we said in the beginning who haven't figured this out in much more complex games agonizing over completely meaningless and arbitrary decisions in games much like our friend physics He chose poorly So we're gonna tell you how to win some goddamn games We're going to tell you exactly how to win games and we have a name for each one of these strategies the first one The shortest path this might seem obvious, but people don't do it if you play a brand new game You've never played before especially a very complicated German board game. There's a lot going on. It's got resources. It's got money It's got buildings. It's got you know little cards. It's got little animals It's got all sorts of stuff going on right?  No, look at what gets victory points if victory points is what you use to win Kaleus is a game where you acquire victory points So if you look at the board, there's all these buildings you can build and all this stuff But that whole top section is the castle and if you put stuff in the castle victory points come out That's like the basic way to get victory points. Now there may or may not be better ways to get victory points I know one guy once beat us with the jeweler. It was like an extension card He was able to get gold and diamonds into the jeweler and he kicked our asses But there is an obvious direct way to win So if you're playing the game for the first time and all your friends are playing for the first time They don't realize that the shortest path is the way They're gonna play with all the stupid crap all over the board and you just do the cheap Obvious thing that won't work necessarily against skilled players, but we're guaranteed against unskilled players This is what you want to do when you bust open a game for the first time look for the victory condition Victory points usually in German game like this and go for that as hard as you possibly can What's the easiest way to get victory points do it over and over and over and over again? Yes, I win Puerto Rico is a good example of this Puerto Rico is a game where you get buildings all these victory points But there's a captain and it lets you take goods and turn them into victory points If you just rush the captain and captain captain captain captain Craftsman to get goods captain to sell the goods craftsman captain craftsman Yeah, you have to do the do the little machine crank the smallest machine that prints out that the most A lot of smart people like you will think oh, but everyone knows that so they're gonna obviously do the more advanced strategy There's more likely to pay out in other situations others people will do the same strategy as me and dilute my victory points Nobody does that out there Try the thing Kayla's room or trying to win those people out there So play the game Kayla's with your friends teach them the game and just go in that goddamn castle and ignore the whole rest of the Now cheap is not cheating right so so what is cheap right cheap is something that's usually a game design flaw Right because when we look at games we tend to think the most powerful strategy, right? The thing that does that helps you win the most should be very hard to do right if the card That is worth 10 victory points cost one gold and the card that cost one It's worth one victory point is ten gold that's messed up because no one's ever gonna buy The you know to cheat the expensive card before a few points right so a cheap thing is when someone screws up in game design And there's a very easy strategy something that is incredibly simple to do and incredibly obvious that is incredibly powerful Right as it goes to more powerful than weaker things like if M. Bison's jab did more damage than the incredibly complicated ultra attack That would be cheap and it would be a problem So for example staking now in a board game you have rules the rules of the game to find the game as long as you Not violate the rules you are not cheating it is not cheating to snake because in a video game The rules of the game are the code and the code allows snaking if there is ever a game That has a really cheap strategy the game is fundamentally broken and if you are playing to win You should be using that strategy as much as you can The biggest stick so if you're playing game and You like this is a good example Carcassonne and I have about an 80 90% win rate at this game It is nuts, but basically the way it works right is you know We talked already about you know the the obvious strategy get victory points, right? But some games like Carcassonne also have ways to take away victory points from other players So not obviously not obviously or prevent other players from getting victory points to make it more difficult for them to get victory Points right so when you're we have to do is you to think about a little bit of math Right this move gets me five points This move gets me three points, but it takes away six from the second best player Which makes it actually a total of nine points So that's the better move because you don't care about the guy in last place is not gonna beat you anyway Don't spend your time taking him So to win Carcassonne Every the game is simple your draw card a tile you play it and everyone draws one place where you're very little Like your input to the game is very small one tile at a time So if there's a tile that gets you a ton of points Use that tile to get a ton of points if you can't get more than one point with that tile And you have nothing better to do with it find the biggest way to Royally dick the person who's most likely to beat you in the game If he's about to build a ten-point castle and you put a road pointing into it And now he never finishes that ten-point castle You've just probably taken five points away from him There was no way you were gonna get five points is making your road one space longer If he's got a giant city you stick the citadel in that it doubles the points But it removes the condition of points if you don't finish the city and then just make sure he never finishes that city The king maker and the king breaker. These are very important strategies in games So in El Grande this is a game It's actually a great game for learning kind of all these techniques because it has almost every German style of game Mechanic in it. It's an old game. You can get it for like 40 bucks They have a box all these in El Grande It's kind of the game theory kernel blotto game You're distributing your dudes all over this board and every province has points like the first place guy in that province Gets like five points in Valencia. Yeah, second place gets maybe four points and third place gets like one point Every province is different now in this game the way it works is to get control of a province You usually have to kind of work with someone else anytime. You're getting points. You're also giving points to someone else somehow So what you want to do is find the dumbest guy at the table and give him all the other points So if me and Scott and two doofuses not to mean that any of you are doofuses I was pointing that guy back there So us and two doofuses Scott's probably gonna beat me. I know he's the best player at the table other than me So what I'm gonna do is say rather than having a 25% chance of winning in an absolute world Maybe have a slightly higher chance because I know I'm better than everyone else I will split my points between myself and the two doofuses to deny Scott points So I'll go in with those doofuses all the time. Yeah doofus I gave you 20 points and I got 10 for myself and Scott got nothing It's usually in a lot of games, you know There'll be a move available to you that gives you like 10 points and it gives no one else any points And that's a great move, but it's pretty hard to pull off that move. It's expensive because the game doesn't have a cheap mechanic It's not broken right, but there's usually a lot of moves that are available That's like three for me and three for another guy or four for me and three for another guy So you just have to choose that other guy and that other guy needs to be the worst guy at the table Because giving the last place guy three points. It doesn't really hurt you giving the second place guy three points kills you You can't do that. So what you do is you make a king you king make yeah, you're not becoming the king You're making some doofus the king. You're the vizier, right?  So they go and rob the same gas station again And there's one dude There's street fights in this movie like five or six times and this one guy has a philosophy if there's ever a fight No matter how many people I'm fighting I pick one guy and I attack only one guy Because if you try to fight a mob of guys right maybe they'll hold you down Maybe you'll do a little bit of damage to all of them if you pick just one You're setting that guy at a hospital big time and now everyone is afraid of you A group of people comes at you right and you're like attack only one And I hope I'm not the one and they all run away It's kind of like Sean Connery in the back of a prison in the prison truck in the family business Where he you know he looks around who's the biggest baddest dude in this room and head bucks him and knocks him out Same exact thing so if you ever go to prison Right this is the idea that the sip the order of play which usually in games is clockwise If it's a weird game like a Steve Jackson game is counterclockwise Sometimes it's random, but whatever the turn order is matters a lot writing tic-tac-toe. You want to be x you don't want to be old So we played El Grande a lot That was our first real game after settlers of the time and we started to figure the game out We started to figure out that there's this state that the game gets into like four rounds before the end That determines who wins absolutely So everyone jockeyed to make the first move four rounds before the end and then we didn't even need to play after that So people realize that because you bid around clockwise Sitting to the left of a dumbass gave you a much better chance of pulling that off Now in many games like Puerto Rico the example is that play goes around clockwise You never want to be doing the same thing as the person who goes before you because he will always front run you If I'm trying to craft in captain and scops trying to craft in captain like craft Captain so I get the benefits of his crafting and he doesn't get it because I got the captain he did all the work I get the payoff Now in other games you want to look at like say there's multiple paths to victory like you can go for the gold Or you can go for the brick and wood if someone else is already going for the brick and wood You don't want to do the same thing they're doing even if they don't go before you necessarily Because if two people are competing for the same scarce resources neither one of you is more likely to win It's like you're our great if one guy's doing the coal power plant Don't do the coal power plant You got to do the oil or the trash or something else because otherwise he's gonna buy up all the coal And it's gonna become really expensive So you have to pay attention to who goes before you who goes after you you have to decide What is my strategy you have to you want to pick a strategy that either no one else is doing or that you can front Run the doofus to your left on You also when you're about to sit down to play a game you want to fight for you know musical chairs situation Yeah, El Grande got bad I got to the point where I'd sit down and Scott would get up and move that I would get the move Scott would get up and move If you have to if everyone is smart start determining seating randomly or play a different game This is also why it read any German game people forget to read the wholeness of the book in every German game It says how to determine the starting player It'll say something like the youngest player the oldest player the Most recently You should use those rules because otherwise someone smart who realizes that if I go first in this game I'm more likely to win if I go last in this game I'm more likely to win they'll just say oh you guys can go first So what you should do if you're playing Puerto Rico three player always the last We're I'm pretty sure that if everyone plays optimally the third player in a three player game of Puerto Rico Will always win Always that corn helps a whole lot. We played Puerto Rico like a hundred two hundred three hundred times over the course of one summer five or six times every damn day No one ever won unless they were the third-place player Branksmanship so this isn't the greatest game Chrononops, okay, so in this game is something that can happen with the paradoxes right if there's too many paradoxes like 13 paradoxes The whole game will end in a horrible horrible universe destroying fashion and everybody loses So everyone's score at winning is zero as opposed to I win my score is one and everyone else's score is zero So say you're one away from the paradox that ends the game There's no reason for you to ever fix that because if no one else fixes it you all lose You're no worse off than everyone else if you fix it You're denying yourself points making sure that you don't win just so some other doofus can win the game Yeah, I mean it costs an action it costs resources to fix this problem That's a shared problem among everybody right it's the tragedy of the comments, right? Oh, man, you know this park is really dirty the park belongs to everybody if I clean up the park I'm spending my hour of you know time cleaning it I could spend my hour in the park you get to spend his hour enjoying the clean park that I cleaned up, right? So I mean in real life that doesn't work, right?  I'm not doing anything Tell me exact move to be like you on your turn you're gonna put your thing there Otherwise, it's a hundred percent sure look this and this and this and this room will win I'm definitely not going to do it. You must do it Let him know because otherwise they might be not if they're not too smart They might not realize this is going on. It's basically a cold war. You've got nukes. So you don't care He's like all right.  This is actually very important in games Now if you are smart players, don't just don't reveal anything Don't you know have a poker face wear sunglasses wear a ski mask do whatever you There's a game Tigger's new freadies It's one of Puerto Rico is the best German game ever designed Tigger's new freadies is my favorite game ever and in this game You have tiles of four different colors in that little screen the tiles are hidden behind your shield No one is supposed to know what tiles you have or how many for a while I was winning an inordinate number of these games against Scott and the reason for this was I would hold My tiles like a hand like a poker hand. So they were just in a little hand I kept a little pile behind my shoe I noticed that every time Scott had three or more if the color came up He would he would look down and he would go like this from the top and grab that pile So I knew whenever he came in from the top He had three or more of that tile most of the time if he came in from the side. He had two or less It worked really really well Scott learned his lesson and you know He was able to avoid that but your friends are not as smart as you because you now know watch your friends You're playing straight he go just watch what they said up They're gonna put the flag down first. Yeah, or like I'm playing ticket to ride, right? So I'm playing and I'm like hi is he gonna be I'm worried like I want to build those tracks But it's gonna take me two turns if he gonna build those tracks there first Look at the dude's eyes look at where they're aiming on the board people look at the spot They're gonna make a move so if you can look at them and look at the board and see where they're looking That's what they're making a move. So it's like oh, he's looking at California. I'm safe.  He's looking at New York make the move now El Grande was where we really figure this out because it has secret spinners That's the mechanic where everyone will pick a province on a secret spinner and reveal them simultaneously So because the province all have names look at everyone's eyes and they'll be looking at it And they'll be like and they'll zoom in because they can't read it because everyone has bad eyes. Oh, Valencia And you'll know all right. They're gonna go to Valencia There's actually one game it's not a great game But it does have some cool stuff in it that actually solves this problem fury of Dracula is a game where Dracula is hidden movement He's secretly moving around Europe right and the thing is you would think Dracula will look at the map And then you'll know where Dracula is because he's looking at where he is because he wants to know where you can go The game actually comes with a separate little mini map that Dracula can look at like this So that Dracula will not reveal his position by looking at the big map We have tried there's almost no way to figure out where someone's looking So if you're attracted to make sure you're looking at the little map never look at the big one ever Also, you know do tricks say the name of a province say the name of a strategy Try to draw out what the other people are doing most people are not that good at this and will totally reveal What's going on and you also you got to play the double-up game, right? If you if you're gonna go to New York look at California a whole bunch Is someone else to be like oh, he's definitely going over there once they see you look in there And they just like and then make your move over to the right now more importantly And this is probably one of the biggest pieces vices we can give you whenever a decision is random or arbitrary Actually act randomly Citadel is an arbitrary game. It's a poison in the Cup game, but it's really fun I'd recommend it, but the way the game works is you have a set of Cards that determine the role you're going to take and there's a lot of psychology as to who's gonna take what role For example, there's a role that you build a whole bunch of crap So if someone has a whole bunch of money, they really want that role There's another role that steals all the money from whoever you want meaning the guy who has a whole bunch of money He's gonna build a whole bunch of crap So if I play the thief on and I send what I play the thief I say I'm robbing the builder if Scott had taken the builder. I get all his money. He can't build anything So people would you could never take the good cards because people knew you're gonna take the good cards It was just a poison cup situation. So Scott does a very meta play thing one game. He's holding up the cards He puts them down shuffles them cuts the deck picks one randomly doesn't even look at it and pass them to the left We never played Citadels again. They take the merchant or is he playing it safe taking the magician? I don't even know what I think The Rock Paper Scissors is an arbitrary you should take randomly right and that way no one be able to guess what you're doing And you have the best odds of winning now in this game Scott did something that is so close to cheating So what I did is I realized these morons weren't shuffling the cards So I fanned out the cards in my hand and I know they're numbered so it's one to three or six seven eight I selected one right answer to me the month and I handed them to the next guy and I go he fanned him out He took the third one shuffling either. So it's like he took the six one That one round that one game Scott was like Neo in the matrix and the rest You just took the thief Pete you just took the merchants like what that's specific trick I guarantee will work on all your friends So by Citadels and you play Citadel shuffle the cards before you draw even if you're not drawing randomly just shuffle them up Behind your back if you have to so meta play now We're using the colloquial definition not the game theory definition like we're using in the previous panel But I'm gonna use the same example. I use I'm sorry to the people who were there So we're gonna play chicken, you know the game where we're both in cars We're gonna drive at each other at a hundred miles an hour if I swerve and Scott doesn't he wins Oh, yeah, if he swerves and I don't I win if we both swerve we both lose if neither one of us works We both die So there is a way to win this game. So we're sitting there. We're ready to go I look at Scott. He looks at me. I rip my steering wheel off and throw it out of my car So so the real game of chicken is who rips out their steering column first I got a secret wrench hidden under the dash So then it comes down to the fact to think about that the game by his decision matrix was Swerve or not swerve and there were you know multiple possible outcomes his decisions now are swerve or die Into not sort of just like we were talking about you know, the Blocking of the other guy, you know is gonna win, right? I know that he is not going to prevent our friend from winning the game Therefore it's up to me because he threw a steering wheel up You can do this in any game where you pick roles or cards You can take a card and say I'm playing this one to throw it down and that's it Like I'm not going back. There's no way for me to undo my move You can also do it very subtly and very cheaply in games like Vinci which was remade as small world It only works over the course of multiple games.  There's a lot of strategies and tactics that don't exist in higher levels of play For example when I play against doofuses Say they're next to my bomb. I'll pick up my bomb and go like I'm gonna attack him and I'll change my mind and put it back down Now a smart player there weren't won't work against me if you didn't move it you didn't move See when I play the number one thing you gotta do in Stratigo is never ever ever attack anything that has not moved If you know it is moved then it is not a bomb and you can attack it if it is not moved Absolutely do not attack it whatsoever under any circumstance. There's no reason to ever ever do that now secondarily You never ever put your one piece your most powerful guy next to a piece you have not identified Because it might be a spy. There's no reason to ever risk your one piece So never ever ever ever put him next to a piece you know what it is It seems simple people don't think of these you lose your one piece the other guy still has it game over Let's talk about setup. Most people put all their scouts in the front. That seems like an obvious strategy That's the worst thing you can do because they're guaranteed to die against anything You want to save your scouts in the second rows that they can go and after you clear out the guys in the front lines You can see what's in the back if that's how you find the bottom or more importantly That's how you find the spy you have a line of scouts in the third row Just waiting because they can attack across the whole board anytime an unidentified piece comes out moving forward Hit it with the spy sorry You would not believe how many spies I have caught by that and once you have taken out the other guys spy You're basically visible because once the other guy knows where your one is and your one isn't dead because you didn't put it next to any unknown Pieces right so you once you're one once they know where it is They'll start trying to move the spy towards it especially with far away So what do you put in the front row?  Yeah, the other thing is like you know, okay So you got these pretty much three columns because there's two lakes right? So it's like where you got to send a big army up one or two with the columns You know hide the bomb somewhere back there right first of all hide the bomb randomly right that way there's no way the guy can Psychologically figure it out don't like when you're setting up the board right some people just they set it up like one piece at a time They're probably gonna put the flag first. So watch Here's my one piece then they put all the bombs like spread out and then they fill in all the pieces They put toward the end are their goons because you'll see I'm just kind of putting them all over the place kind of semi-arbitrarily You know that's where the goons are watch them set up and place your pieces deliberately and pretty randomly Now we're gonna teach you how to beat on the skilled players because that's what you're interested in no one out There is really good as strategic.  And also, messed it up. I'm not going to forget that that's just one, that's just three, that's just five. Every PCC you've got to remember, the exact duration of the game is very important. If there are numbers there, remember them. No cards. No cards. It's not cheap. It's just really, really cheap. And also, right, so you need to actually remember where the one is, where the two is. But at the same time, make the other back for that clean showroom. Same few turns, move to the one and the two and I'll say to you like, why don't you move my monkey sack? You're going to move the three, right? It doesn't matter. Move your guys in a big circle for a while for no reason. It's fine, because I know where each one is. Or when you're going to look up for a minute, take your turn. Now he is, he is legitimately going to say, what did you move? He says no, what did you move? He said you got to go backwards. He will probably go back to what that means to us. Because of his weird psychology, you actually didn't see him move. Uh, that's what I'm going to say about this.   And it's over again. You'll broke yourself then when you broke your own decisions in the course of the week.


Hey guys today we take a look at another new sniper rifle to BL3 which is exclusive to the guns, love and tentacles DLC and it's called the school masher. Has it gone guys my name's dpj and today I bring you another BL3 video if you do enjoy it leaving a like really helps me out and subscribe if you do want to see more. So this new addition to this game the school masher was previously seen in the pre-sequel where it was known as being a super rare beast but then I believe it was a six times variant firing six bullets per shot at the cost of one and but then I'm pretty sure it lost damage and accuracy after every shot or every crit shot but no one caught me on that. In Borderlands 3 slightly different it's a five times variant over here and as much as I have tested this it doesn't actually seem to lose any damage after each shot accuracy though I'm sure does slightly decrease even though it's bad as standard but looking at this thing's damaged people you can see just how powerful it is this variant doing 2938 times five per shot per single bullet consumption that's close to 15,000 damage per shot people I mean wow I don't think there is any other sniper in a game that is capable of hitting this hard. This one at 92 zane after 100% trial damage while Sentinel is active this alone basically doubles this thing's power which is just ridiculous. So this another member of the jacob sniper family where we already have other amazing jacob snipers in the game like the wedding invitation which is now limited to being a max level of 53 at the moment and we also have another new addition to this DLC being called the Unseen Threat which is a sniper I do love so how does this compare to them well straight away this thing on paper and in general use is way more powerful there's no two which ways about it but in saying that I actually don't feel it's a more efficient weapon and this is coming from someone who uses zane only. Using this against grave ward yes it deals much more damage in short bursts but because with the wedding invitation it gets its ammo back into its clip with a crit shot and the Unseen Threat has a much bigger magazine size and way better accuracy I do feel those two indeed deal more dps in this thing when we compare them as standard weapons but people but and this is a big but there are builds out there flak mainly which can do much more with weapons like this and make the most out of crit hit beasts due to his capabilities with ammo consumption etc etc so there are particular builds on particular vault hunters where the school smasher will not be touched by anything but me being a zane main as of right now I would probably take their wedding invitation and Unseen Threat over this for general use there's no two ways about it I mean looking at this thing against grave ward you can see the damage it's capable of laying down it's stupid powerful for sure and I can see this becoming a true metal weapon there is no doubt about it it is on another level sniper wise and damage wise for sure this is more powerful than most things in this game can offer I mean even a katoa sniper as much as that is a beast of a weapon damage wise with that particular build I'm talking about with the school smasher I'd say this would be on another level now at the moment I don't know where this thing's dedicated drop is I do know it's a world drop though via research and online as this variant you see here was sent to me by my pal range is mad 69 so could it do him but for sure guys I do feel the school smasher sniper is on a level by itself one paired with a build which utilizes ammo regen and crit damage if that's a build you have trust me people this is the weapon you must get it's just me and being a main zane such builds ain't really possible yeah I can extend this mag slightly but the reloading between clips the non-possible spam drew you to that low accuracy means you have to be patient with shots which in reality makes it less efficient in dealing damage for me but even I can see this thing's potential it is off the charts so yeah guys my overall thoughts on the school smasher a welcomed return in my opinion it's definitely putting the right build the most powerful sniper in the game I'd probably say it's one of the most powerful weapons in the game too and on that note guys we have come to the end of the video if you guys enjoyed it leaving a like really helps out if you're new around here want to see more boardlands be sure to subscribe and if you never want to miss a video or upload you can turn notifications on by hitting that bell button but guys thanks as always for stopping by hopefully you enjoyed the video and hopefully I will see you on that next one


You have what we call drop stones. Drop stones are basically rocks, bevels or even larger, which are transported by glaciers and sea ice. And when the glaciers or the sea ice melts, the stones just drop on the sea floor. They would have been picked up by the glaciers, so they are all shapes and also angular, frequently. And we have to remember that other icebergs, when they float, only one seventh of the iceberg is visible above the waterline. So in order for you to see drop stones, you need to know that you've had quite a substantial amount of water. And then here's an example of an angular drop stone, a pebble that is found in a very fine mud. And the two usually don't go together.


Going on everyone. What are we doing Sam here with lint sports cars ripping 23 bowman's best university football delight five box break number 12 random Team style, so look again at your random results as always Can find these on the website under the results that was well as a link in chat. So good luck here everybody Let's do it Got an air horn you put a rubbish keeper there. I'll get a soda It's riveted. Oh shoot. Can you change the bag real quick? Good luck here everybody Tom accord For Ohio State and gold tray Benson to 54 Florida Thanks, sir. Yeah, got Oranda Gaston on the refractor 275 Johnny Wilson nice one there Florida State NFL guy this year 299 Oranda Gaston for Syracuse all other That is blue Braylon Trace to 150 going to a Washington Red Travis Hunter 5 of 10 for Colorado. Congrats on that CU buffs. Hell. Yeah, man. We'll get that into a mag. It's kind of nasty. I'm not gonna lie going to John K in Colorado Good stuff. They're John Travis Hunter True red to 10 Jadon up is refractor auto For Cal Dallin Hayden 3 of 25 Ohio State looks like a red auto note Yeah, 10 of 10 Javante Barnes on the red auto for Oklahoma. Congrats on that. Oh, you Oklahoma rockin here everybody got Prism and select coming up after this prism and select Got Drake may masterpieces. There you go. Shane Drake may action for in Jalen DeLora or J. Din DeLora one of 25 Orange for Arizona got Javante Barnes refractive to 25 Trey Benson for Florida State 16 of 50 Devin as a rocku for Boston College all I put cards and mags ladies and gents Camerizing 150 all there Got a rendez-gaz into 100 Zero-degree a kick negative five low negative one high. Yeah. Yeah. Oh, yeah, we're in trouble Robbie Ashford refractor for Auburn Gold elements of the game Marvin Harrison, Jr. Auto 28 of 50 there you go. Ohio State nice one there OH IO. It's not good shape Ty Simpson 12 to 75 elements of the game for Alabama Congrats on that one Alabama and now Nick Singleton to 25 need for breeze in there There's a Mecca Agbuca 31 of 50 It's cold in the mighty, Missouri says mr. That's right Robert Poisson coffee Don and your team are facing off against each other Dolphins and Chiefs play each other meaning Anthony and Sean steams are going against each other this weekend film off of God we win Tonight in you play Corum We're at Michigan 250 ties Simpson for Alabama God to 150 Damian Martinez all other to 100 Grant Wells Vatek all other God Joe Alt nice one there for Notre Dame God 9 of 10 Cooper Dejean White corner white corner white corner Nice one there for Iowa's that'll be all other Just cheated writing the storylines this week. I know will Howard Jersey auto For Kansas State. Yeah, we remember what happened last time we face up against Donnie's team last year Honestly though, Coco, honestly, I'll be in my mahalm Jersey this weekend says quicks. Oh Can't talk to him anymore. Oh printing plate auto that is I grabbed one Richard Reese for Baylor one-of-one grabbed it on accident Sorry everybody Kid club Nick gunslingers for Clemson and orange Joe Milton 2325 Tennessee got Justice Ellison wake forest To 100 Caleb Williams Boarding. What's up, buddy? How are we doing to 150 is Eli Holstein? That's true. He did Apologize to 75 AJ Swan, I'll be wearing my tour Jersey To 100 Jerry on take you are you working during that game Saturday? No. Oh, that's right. Yeah Gold 35 a 50 AJ Swan for Vanderbilt and Robbie Ashford refractor auto for Auburn Grats on that one last box of the break. Good luck here, everybody. See something big It could be a thickie here. Oh, yeah, it's a thickie It's a thickie Bo Nick's masterpieces 8 of 25 on the orange for Oregon and Caleb Downs 5 of 25 for Alabama. Okay, we got Blake Cormor fracter Yellow to 75 a leak Benson go Coco To 100 bucky Irving for Oregon Dorian Singer to 99 for USC and to 150 Michael Pratt for Tulane Coco time. Oh, since Robert was on coffee Don Do the guy a wrench got a 25 chop Robinson for Penn State with a master work. Oh, yeah. Oh, yeah. What was that from boarding? Nice one there. We got Drew Aller Grats on that one going to Penn State Fair fair fair. Yeah And Cade Club Nick to 49 two-colored RPA or patch auto for Clemson I don't hate Jason either But I got a little tired of them. Yeah, but I do this weekend. Oh, yeah I don't do for the break everybody quick recap here Had it to 99 under Dorian sing Blake Cormor and a Gaston 75 Johnny Wilson Benson AJ swan to 50 Thai Simpson Trey Benson a Bucca as a rock unit 25 Nick Singleton Joe Milton Jaden Dolora Trey Benson bow Nick's and a 15 Caleb Downs Have a good one, Brandon. Later, man Cade Club Nick chop Robinson drew our AJ swan a Robbie Ashford will Howard Richard Reese one of one Joe Alts Jaden at Robbie Ashford Thai Simpson Marvin Harrison Down Hayden Javante Barnes and to 10 Cooper Dijon and to 10 true go true red 5 and 10 Travis Hunter I do it for the break everybody. Thanks again for the fill up next is that one's probably fun The mixer


nobody dies of old age. That's just shorthand to say that the processes of aging damage your body to the point it could not function anymore. Maybe they led to a specific disease like Alzheimer's or maybe just to the generalized frailty that made you fall into the high-risk group for COVID-19. Either way, aging made you more vulnerable to health threats and one of them ended up killing


Hi, so I'm trying to figure out how to get my eyes centered on this thing, but that's okay I just finished watching Dawn of Justice that man versus Superman and you know what I tell you There have been some mixed reviews and a lot of the reviews haven't really been all that good from the critics Let me tell you something. This was a fun movie. I Enjoyed it now. I got to tell you the truth coming into it. I worried only about one thing These days it seems like all the superheroes have to have a lot of angst and there's just a lot of grittiness and everyone is so depressed and mean and whatever and You know, that's not what I really grew up with I grew up where Superman was all powerful But he was always just nice and he had a good environment Sure, you had the bad guys But everyone else was just pretty cool and I grew up kind of with the same type of Batman But in this case here You know Batman I Gotta tell you Ben Affleck played Batman. Well, he looked good and Henry Cavill, I think that's how you say his name. I'm not really sure he played Superman. Well, you know what? I think that everyone was good in this movie Gal Gadot as Wonder Woman Fantastic Amy Adams. Oh my god Amy Adams is just too darn hot and Even Jesse Eisenberg, you know what the previews showed him as this really just strange creepy guy He actually played that part pretty well way better than I was expecting So I don't want to totally give it away, but let's just say that obviously you've seen the trailer So, you know that Batman doesn't trust Superman being all powerful So he in essence finds a way to steal the kryptonite from Lex Luthor that I didn't necessarily see I knew because of the trailers that He would have some kryptonite, but I hadn't realized that he stole it right from under Lex Luthor's nose. So that was pretty incredible and You know the scene where you see him kind of beating Superman up I'm thinking wow now in the trailer some of the scenes that you saw turned out to be flashbacks So that was the stuff that was really happening And that was kind of interesting to see and then this creature God my goodness. That was an ugly thing And it was it was just a pretty incredible movie. I had a very good time I watched it in 3d i max and I couldn't really imagine seeing this movie any other way except in 3d i max So I had a good time. I thought it was fun It was a lot more fun than I was expecting it to be based on what I was hearing You know the critics said there may have been too much CGI and whatever. I'm sorry. Are you kidding? How are they supposed to blow up all those buildings and have all those all those explosions and things without CGI?  This movie was fun. I enjoyed it a lot You know one of these days I'm gonna really figure out where the camera is on here anyway I enjoyed it a lot and you know, we'll see where that goes But I wanted to do this in the car my very first one in the car I don't see me doing a lot of these in the car because I can't even figure out where the lens is that I'm Supposed to be looking at but I just wanted to get this out there So if any of you guys saw down of justice Superman versus Batman, let me know what your reviews are Let me know if you thought it was actually more fun than what the critics were saying or if you thought there were just too Many things lacking and that's all I got right now. So y'all know who this is. I will catch up with you later


Good morning, Simon Traders. Good to see you all. Happy Wednesday, everybody. How's everybody doing this morning? Good to see you, Bill. Good to see you, Grant. Mark, everyone. Welcome, everyone on social media. Looks like, again, a nice little pre-market. Again, we got a nice little move on this VVOS stock, a nice little pharmaceutical stock doing pretty well. What are we up right now? Up about 175% of $7. It's a nice little move from nine. I mean, I know everyone comes in right around this time. We saw that pretty early in the morning, but if you log in around 7.45 and you saw this thing up already at 7, you missed it at 9, but things going up really nice. The only concern I have about it, like always being a good trader, is we've got to have a game plan and we've got to make sure the stock is tradable. But we'll talk a little bit about that. There's a bunch of good stocks that are moving. Before we do that, like we always want to go over what we talked about, what happened yesterday. We had a couple of nice little stocks that moved. Yesterday was kind of weird. We have like these late things that came in the afternoon and some of them are starting to trickle in into this morning. The RDHL was really, really cool. This RDHL, I'm gonna put it back on my watch list, but we had the stock was at a dollar and it ran all the way about 250. You could see it got halted a couple of times. Nice little mover. I know some of you guys caught on to it a little early on that had a big move so far this early this morning, but I would be really cautious on it. Did I find my watch list? No, I took it off RDHL. Just gonna put my level four and see what we got going on on this one. But this one doesn't look terrible. Spread's good, good movement. It was kind of slow. It moved pretty nicely right around here, but let's see, it's testing these big support levels at three. I know three was at big resistance levels and wow, we got a big iceberg order here.  Wow, big one. Check this one right here. Look at this. 184,000 share buyer right now and what price is that? 250, okay. So 250 is right here. That makes perfect sense. All right, so we're gonna keep an eye on that one. Putting that back on our watch list. Couple of the ones I've made some big moves. We had HNRA. Now I like this stock for one reason. It was a good bottom fish and the stock was all the way up here. You could see it was at 1090. I talked about it. I said I was talking about yesterday. I kind of love bottom fishing. Stock came all the way down to $1.50, unfortunately, but it made a nice move in pre-market, but then it kind of died. But what happened is that going into the afternoon, you could see it build a nice little Falstow flag right around three o'clock, had a big pop at the 330, randomly to $4, big, big move on that one. I don't know if I'm really crazy on buying it now. I will put it on the B list just in case because remember yesterday, we found a lot of these stocks and I say it all the time. It wasn't a good pre-market list and then all of a sudden these stocks are on the B list and the B coming on the A list. So that one moved up pretty nicely. This one was okay. A firm was awesome. This thing has just been a great swing trade and it had a big sling shot here early this morning and it was on the watch list. I hide these things right here. Had a big little, you could see it moved right down here and all of a sudden had a big pop right around 10 o'clock. It just kept making higher highs and then at two o'clock, it just made a really nice move from 31 all the way to 3250. That will move pretty nicely too and coin just like, I don't know what else to say. You know what? I've just so ticked off because I had a lot of shares of it and I sold a lot of it. I bought some of it back but I bought very little of it. Just paying an extra 20, 30 points more just drove me nuts but that stock did just, what am I gonna say? It's doing great. I'm getting a little nervous on the move. I mean, the stock, you could see it right here is testing some big resistance levels back here of last year, back in May which is at $29 price range. So, you know, it was a little bit of a gap fill. Once it broke through here, it didn't really have any big resistance levels and that's where it went up to that next level but we got this big price. If it breaks out, this thing could go to 150, okay? But coins going back on the watch list, once again, it's on our swing trading list so that one's been doing absolutely great. Tesla had a big move yesterday too and that one also being very strong and also this one, I mean, we got this one back on list, the RDHL. Now, a couple of things that, news that is going on going on for today. First of all, did everyone jump on the Black Friday deal? I mean, I don't know, I mean, this is your biggest deal that we got going on right here. It's right on the front page of our website. I'm just gonna bring this up really quick and just show you what got going on. Biggest deals that we got going on right now on Black Friday, we got the Traders Summit, we got the webcast, we got the coaching, we got everything going on. So listen, if you have not bought or looked into it, talk to education advisor, you got payment plans you could do.  Let's put this link up there for everyone to show. Go to Black, Cybertrain University, Black and look at those great deals. Once again, the deal ends tomorrow, okay? So, jump on it before everything shuts down, all right? So just want to kind of remind everyone about that because I know a lot of you have been waiting for a while for those Black Friday deals. So go out and explore it. Let's talk about what's moving today. So anyway, everyone probably heard the big news on GM. That is great news, okay? And when you look at GM, I mean, listen, it was $68, what is a better investment than in yourself, right?  So when they do buybacks, that is fabulous, amazing news, okay? When they do that, that is probably the best news that any company could come out with. Now, what did they say? They announced a $10 billion, is that what they said they're gonna do? And a 33% dividend increase? I mean, that's phenomenal. That is great, great news. So anyway, is it too late to buy it? Hell no. I mean, look where the stock was. It went all the way down here at 25, it's only at 31. I mean, we're getting close to resistance. I could see it get testing these 34, you know? I mean, we're almost there. Did I put it up over here on level? Yeah, I did have a level four. So I'm just gonna share what we got going on here on level four. We got some sellers at 10,000 right here at 32, but you got some buyers right here here at 31. I'm gonna scroll all the way out. Big ladder effect on the bottom, 29, 29.50, 30, 32. So not only can we use level four and level three for day trading, but we use it for our swing trades, okay? I don't see anybody out there up until $40 at 10,000 at all these program trading. And that's only in pre-market. Imagine when the market opens up, that's when these things are gonna pick up. So that one is looking phenomenal. VVOS, we already have it on the list.  And I don't know about you, but if I was up 150 to 9% and I can't do a trade until the market opens up because I have the wrong brokerage account, I think you might get some selling, but we'll keep an eye on once it opens up. The RDHL, you could see it, biggest volume lead, it trades 17 million shares. I just totally just realized that. I don't know why I didn't see that when I saw it before. That is a great, great volume leader right there. This one on the other hand, Big Boo and 28% volume's a little light. Rover, what's going on with this? Rover Group, same range Rover, is it? I don't know what Rover Group is, but I'm really curious. But it looks like a buyout, I don't know. Looks like it just got gapped up right here from 8 to 11. Doesn't look like it's going anywhere. I'll put this on. It's not going to be on our big watch list. We'll keep an eye on it, but as of right now, 350,000 shares. Usually when you see something trading like that, that's not really a good sign. That's usually a quick sign of a buyout. Y-O-S-H, what's going on with this one? 24,000 or 500,000 shares. Very, look I had, look I gapped up and came back down. I probably scratched that one. All these, you could tell by the charge, it was very, very, very spotty on their orders. All right, we're past 10%. Let's go over here on the losers. What we got going, wow, this thing's getting crushed. Is this an IPO? I mean, is this a pharmaceutical stock? Down 70%. I think it just broke all the time lows. What's all the lows right there? Dollar four, oh no, no, we still got some supports. All right, I'm game. I always like, we didn't break it yet. And New York Stock has changed. GameStop, my God, that company's still around. GameStop is moving. I wonder if that's happening. So we're putting that one on our list, GameStop. We had a lot of fun with GameStop. So if GameStop is moving, I wonder if AMC's moving. Not really. Is this an FL, is that, that's not Footlocker, is it? Yeah, it is Footlocker, it just came up. Yeah, Footlocker, I saw news came out on it yesterday. Something came out on Footlocker yesterday, so it was up a little bit. Was it earnings? I don't know what it was, but it looked like whatever came out yesterday, they liked it. The stock got crushed, went to 25, down to 15. That was a great buy. Now it looks like a little bit of a gap fill right here, but it looks like it's getting to some big resistance levels. Who put this on the B list? FL, I haven't, you know what, I never, I only remember when I ever last traded Footlocker, so I don't know how it trades, so I'll be a little cautious on that one. Boyan, he's all kind of not looking pretty good as day trades. This one, we know why it's going down, because it was up big yesterday. This one, big on the big percentage, and it becomes on the big losers. Wow, this thing got crushed, JBL. Wow, 130, down 105, big slingshot, but we're not trading that stock right there. All right, so I think we got pretty much, I think we got a good list right here. And what's going on with the Dow right now? We're up about 100 points. We're getting close to that big, big resistance levels. We still don't break all time, fixed to a highs, but we're getting close to this big resistance level back in, was that back in July? Yeah, that's where our highs are, getting close to it. All right, so we got a pretty decent list, so don't forget, couple of things really quick before we go, Black Friday, all right? Go there, shop it, talk to education advisors, see if there's anything on that list that you want to do, maybe you want to join your cyber group here, maybe you want to come to the summit, maybe you want to upgrade to be a Platinum student.  And then we got class that's going on today, phase one is lesson three and four going on today. So if you are a student, please make sure that you get your, we'll see you in class, remember you gotta learn before you can earn. If you're watching on social media guys, you could always come and join us. And you know, you got that little QR code up on top right there. You take your phone, scan it. I see a bunch of you already starting to scan it right now. If you're watching on YouTube or what do we got you guys on? Instagram, Facebook, Twitter, all of them. So we'll see you if you want to come join the trading room you're more than happy to. All right guys, good luck, happy trading. We'll see you when some market opens up, all right?


Recognitions of novel decision and of marked ancestor shall not be held elsewhere than in the counties to which they relate. And in this manner, we, or if we should be out of the realm, our chief justiciar will send justices through each county once a year, who, with knights of the counties, shall hold the sed of seizes in the counties, and those which cannot on that visit be determined in the county to which they relate by the said justices said to hold the sed of seizes, shall be determined by them elsewhere on their circuit, and those which cannot be determined by them because of difficulty over certain articles shall be referred to our justices of the bench and determined there.