Failed Will Save vs. Pedantry


Off-Topic Discussions


1 person marked this as a favorite.

I just saw someone use the phrase: "pitfalls loom..."

Pitfalls can't loom. They're pits. They do the exact opposite of looming. They can await, they can deepen, they can yawn... g%+ d~#n it, do words mean NOTHING any more?


Well, nothing means something, so there you go.


GAH!


What if the bottom end of a pitfall opens out on the ceiling above you or nearby? Then a pitfall could loom.

Liberty's Edge

I have never even attempted a will save vs. pedantry, so having failed one puts you a step ahead of me.


1 person marked this as a favorite.
Andostre wrote:
What if the bottom end of a pitfall opens out on the ceiling above you or nearby? Then a pitfall could loom.

If it opens, it's not a pit. It's a chute.

Dammit! Failed again!


2 people marked this as a favorite.
Theconiel wrote:
I have never even attempted a will save vs. pedantry, so having failed one puts you a step ahead of me.

I'm trying something new this year. So far, it is not going well.


1 person marked this as a favorite.

Many objects compose a single collective object.
A single collective object comprises many objects.

*eye twitch*

For example, my day comprises a series of failed Will saves vs. pedantry. A series of failed Will saves vs. pedantry composes my day.


1 person marked this as a favorite.
quibblemuch wrote:
Andostre wrote:
What if the bottom end of a pitfall opens out on the ceiling above you or nearby? Then a pitfall could loom.

If it opens, it's not a pit. It's a chute.

Dammit! Failed again!

Well, shoot.


1 person marked this as a favorite.

I watch a lot of sports. In the past year, the new grating sportscaster meme is calling something good in a NON-BASEBALL sport a 'home run'.

No. He did not hit a home run. He threw a football well and the other guy caught it well. No, she did not hit a home run. She vaulted the HELL out of that vault and stuck the landing. And if a tennis player hits a home run, they're definitely doing it wrong.

Seriously, people. Are you so bereft of metaphors?!

Liberty's Edge

3 people marked this as a favorite.
quibblemuch wrote:

I watch a lot of sports. In the past year, the new grating sportscaster meme is calling something good in a NON-BASEBALL sport a 'home run'.

No. He did not hit a home run. He threw a football well and the other guy caught it well. No, she did not hit a home run. She vaulted the HELL out of that vault and stuck the landing. And if a tennis player hits a home run, they're definitely doing it wrong.

Seriously, people. Are you so bereft of metaphors?!

I'm literally besides myself with rage. That's the penultimate failure.


1 person marked this as a favorite.

GAH!
GAH!
GAH!


1 person marked this as a favorite.
Theconiel wrote:
quibblemuch wrote:

I watch a lot of sports. In the past year, the new grating sportscaster meme is calling something good in a NON-BASEBALL sport a 'home run'.

No. He did not hit a home run. He threw a football well and the other guy caught it well. No, she did not hit a home run. She vaulted the HELL out of that vault and stuck the landing. And if a tennis player hits a home run, they're definitely doing it wrong.

Seriously, people. Are you so bereft of metaphors?!

I'm literally besides myself with rage. That's the penultimate failure.

This comment is perfect.


3 people marked this as a favorite.

I understand that colloquial definitions are not literal definitions, but every time I hear someone use the phrase "completely decimated," I die a little inside.

Liberty's Edge

3 people marked this as a favorite.
David M Mallon wrote:
I understand that colloquial definitions are not literal definitions, but every time I hear someone use the phrase "completely decimated," I die a little inside.

Do you die 10% inside?


2 people marked this as a favorite.
Theconiel wrote:
David M Mallon wrote:
I understand that colloquial definitions are not literal definitions, but every time I hear someone use the phrase "completely decimated," I die a little inside.
Do you die 10% inside?

Why, in fact, I did.


1 person marked this as a favorite.
David M Mallon wrote:
Theconiel wrote:
David M Mallon wrote:
I understand that colloquial definitions are not literal definitions, but every time I hear someone use the phrase "completely decimated," I die a little inside.
Do you die 10% inside?
Why, in fact, I did.

Every tenth one of you was cut down by the centurion, I bet.


2 people marked this as a favorite.
Waterhammer wrote:
David M Mallon wrote:
Theconiel wrote:
David M Mallon wrote:
I understand that colloquial definitions are not literal definitions, but every time I hear someone use the phrase "completely decimated," I die a little inside.
Do you die 10% inside?
Why, in fact, I did.
Every tenth one of you was cut down by the centurion, I bet.

Nah, the other nine parts of me beat the tenth to death with clubs.

Liberty's Edge

Steve Geddes wrote:
Theconiel wrote:
quibblemuch wrote:

I watch a lot of sports. In the past year, the new grating sportscaster meme is calling something good in a NON-BASEBALL sport a 'home run'.

No. He did not hit a home run. He threw a football well and the other guy caught it well. No, she did not hit a home run. She vaulted the HELL out of that vault and stuck the landing. And if a tennis player hits a home run, they're definitely doing it wrong.

Seriously, people. Are you so bereft of metaphors?!

I'm literally besides myself with rage. That's the penultimate failure.
This comment is perfect.

*Takes bow. Nods head, smiling with gratitude. Begs forgiveness from fellow pedants.*


Theconiel wrote:
*Takes bow. Nods head, smiling with gratitude. Begs forgiveness from fellow pedants.*

*fails Will save*

NEVER!


I’m just here for the chips.


Waterhammer wrote:
I’m just here for the chips.

Yeeessss?


1 person marked this as a favorite.
Erik Estrada's Stunt Double wrote:
Waterhammer wrote:
I’m just here for the chips.
Yeeessss?

That’s correct. All the kinds.


quibblemuch wrote:

I just saw someone use the phrase: "pitfalls loom..."

Pitfalls can't loom. They're pits. They do the exact opposite of looming. They can await, they can deepen, they can yawn... g#+ d++n it, do words mean NOTHING any more?

I suppose they could loom if the pitfall is actually a mimic. Or if the pitfall had been previously bitten by a radioactive Douglas Adams.

If the pitfall was lined with giant spider webbing, then I guess that technically the spider did the looming.


Unless your species is one of them there 'hive minds' don't be using the phrase 'group selfie'.


1 person marked this as a favorite.

Another one that's been bothering me recently: you don't "fire" an arrow, you "loose" or "shoot" an arrow. (Some exceptions apply, however.)


1 person marked this as a favorite.

I'm on a news boycott until someone tells me a journalist has said:

"Tragic news tonight as a local man unknowingly kills his father, has sex with his mother, finds out about it, and pokes out his own eyes."

Or some variant thereupon.

Tragic != sad, horrible, disastrous, deadly...


3 people marked this as a favorite.

In all fairness, I presume, since Aristotle complains about that sort of thing in the Poetics and how some of the writers in Athens were letting tragedy down, that it might be an age-old problem.

*Glances at title of thread.* *Looks worriedly at her roll and double-checks her Will modifier.* XD


1 person marked this as a favorite.
quibblemuch wrote:
Unless your species is one of them there 'hive minds' don't be using the phrase 'group selfie'.

One might argue that the definition of a 'selfie' is that you take it yourself of yourself with a handheld device, not that it must contain only yourself as a singular subject. So 'group selfie' is merely a convenient way of saying that one 'took a picture of oneself with a handheld device with onself as subject + (other subjects)'.


Bjørn Røyrvik wrote:
quibblemuch wrote:
Unless your species is one of them there 'hive minds' don't be using the phrase 'group selfie'.
One might argue that the definition of a 'selfie' is that you take it yourself of yourself with a handheld device, not that it must contain only yourself as a singular subject. So 'group selfie' is merely a convenient way of saying that one 'took a picture of oneself with a handheld device with onself as subject + (other subjects)'.

One might... except the British have thoughtfully coined the phrase "ussie" to refer to that exact situation. There WAS a solution, people chose not to use it. WILL SAVE FAILED!


2 people marked this as a favorite.

Back in the days of photography, if you took a picture of a group of people; it wasn’t called a “themsie”.


1 person marked this as a favorite.
quibblemuch wrote:
Bjørn Røyrvik wrote:
quibblemuch wrote:
Unless your species is one of them there 'hive minds' don't be using the phrase 'group selfie'.
One might argue that the definition of a 'selfie' is that you take it yourself of yourself with a handheld device, not that it must contain only yourself as a singular subject. So 'group selfie' is merely a convenient way of saying that one 'took a picture of oneself with a handheld device with onself as subject + (other subjects)'.
One might... except the British have thoughtfully coined the phrase "ussie" to refer to that exact situation. There WAS a solution, people chose not to use it. WILL SAVE FAILED!

There are plenty of good solutions to linguistic demands that are not widely employed despite their usefulness. Tok pisin has some very nice inclusive/exclusive pronominal constructions which not used by the rest of the English dialectal spectrum, for instance. While I agree that 'group selfie' is a suboptimal choice, it isn't without internal logic and precedent.


I concede both points and withdraw my pedantic objection.


Probably less pedantry and more just me being wrong, but this bugged me: I need to clean out my sock drawer and refresh my hosiery, so I started browsing online for something fun, only to be met with, among other things, "solid sheer" tights.

Now, I understand that what they're getting at is "unpatterned, but including more exciting colours than flesh tones and black," but given the range of skin tones, let alone the desired diaphanous effect once one puts the damn things on, *I* would think anything sheer introduces too much variation in effect for "solid" to be quite the right word.

If I wanted a solid colour, I would get opaque tights, and if I just wanted a particular hue, I would get a monochrome pair, I think? Or just "colourful" rather than "patterned." (:


Perhaps they meant the thermodynamic phase? Like, you wouldn't want liquid tights as they would eventually slide off and it's hard to imagine a gas being sufficiently tight to qualify as 'tights' (although I'm sure there must be some corner case of compound + pressure that would work).

Community / Forums / Gamer Life / Off-Topic Discussions / Failed Will Save vs. Pedantry All Messageboards

Want to post a reply? Sign in.
Recent threads in Off-Topic Discussions