Downtown Khazan: Ice Cold Utopia

[Sharpandpointies]

Okay, I got some info. The ads are sponsored by The Partnership to Fight Chronic Disease. Here is a link to the ad and some info.

I'm still very skeptical.

Okay, so this ad is an interesting little bit of politics, from what I can determine.

1. There IS a drug that's approved in the US - was fast-tracked for approval - that works really well against CF: Trikafta.

2. It needs to go through Health Canada before its approved - this is normal in Canada, and similar to the whole FDA thing in the US.

So far, so good.

3. The ad fails to mention that in the US, you need to shell out $311 000 dollars every year for this treatment. In Canada, it could be about $400k every year. But that decision has yet to be made.

Wouldn't it be NICE if the US put better controls on Prescription Drugs? And Canada, as well, though we seem to do a 'slightly' better job of it (insulin)?

Basically, there's more bureaucracy happening up here...but there's more to the story.

4. The company itself - as of when the article was published - was basically (according to the article) not actually APPLYING to sell it up here, because they don't like the idea we might cap the price at a lower level. Note: this has changed since that article was published, and they've now put it through the rest of the system.

Now it seems to me that yeah, that's terrible that people with CF went without the drug in Canada for a few months more. It also seems to me that it's at least in part the fault of the company, given they make the decision whether or not to apply, and this one is avoiding that decision because they don't get to make a gazillion dollars profit on it. It's also exceedingly misleading, in that great, the drug is available in the US...for families with really, really good insurance (I guess? I don't know how that works in the US) or willing to pay 400K every single year.

And that situation HAS changed since the article was published.

I mean, as of now Health Canada HAS approved the drug. AND it runs about 300-360K (Canadian dollars, so while ridiculous, that price is STILL less than the American price). And so far Ontario, Alberta, Saskatchewan, Quebec, Prince Edward Island and Nova Scotia have stated that they will cover all of the drug costs, British Colombia already has it covered under the 'Expensive Drugs for Rare Diseases' provincial process, and every other province (that leaves three: Manitoba, New Brunswick and NFLD) is currently discussing it and planning to implement it. Out of the three territories, Yukon has also announced it would cover it and it's in discussion for NWT and Nunavut (which will already likely cover it for elderly patients).

So, Edit: 96.4% of Canada (by population) is fully covering the drug, with the rest preparing to follow suit.

Canada doesn't have a great pharmacare system, I will warrant. Out of all of the countries with some form of public health care, I think we're the ONLY one who doesn't provide free Pharmacare (for which we can blame the Liberal government, who have - yes, also under Trudeau - promised universal pharmacare for about 30 years now - I am not kidding - and NEVER followed through thanks to lobbying from big Pharma. We can also blame the Conservatives, who have had governments in that time, but being fair they never campaigned on universal pharmacare, soooo...).

However, blaming all of this on Canadian price caps when a fair chunk of this comes from the greed of the company is...*wiggles hand*...no.

Especially since now Canadians - ALL Canadians, not just ones with special insurance plans - will be getting this drug for free (barring the few places listed, who are on their way to following suit I imagine - again, currently 96.4%). Whereas in the US, it's $311k per year, hopefully those needing the drug have a good insurance that covers this sort of thing.

Basically, the ad feels like propaganda against Biden putting in price caps.

[Sharpandpointies]

I'm going to look over some of these things later, Siriel. Thanks!

There’s quite a few changes in advantages.

Some advantages have been boosted, like Acute Senses is now +50 rather than +30.

They’ve removed Natural Learner 3 completely.

And Elan’s been nerfed hard. Gone from 20/45/60 to 20/40/50 (which means Elisabetta actually has 33 CP worth of Elan, among her various other bullshit advantages at age… 13 or whatever).

Beadle has some better insights into new stuff these days - he's on the Discord a lot, and I'm not. But I agree - Acute Senses was bleah in the old rules, bringing it up to +50 is actually something useful. Natural Learner 3 was grossly overpowered (though for ONE skill, less-so - it was basically just a little silly to spend 3 CP on getting 'ridiculous at one skill' in a short time. I feel 'Natural Learner in a Group III' is one that needs to go, having seen what Natural Learner in a Group II can do with Knowledges, Social, or Subterfuge skills). And I'm pretty happy with Elan being lowered as an advantage (Eli would be 15 in the new Core Exxet rules, as they're doing One Year Later kind of things).

I, for one, like the Core Exxet 1.0 skill rules (the six skill bonuses and the two natural bonuses). Mileage may vary.

Here we go, I've only done the advantages for now but hopefully this will be decent.

Anima Advantage Tier List(s):
General Advantages
Elan
Ki-related Advantages
Magic-related Advantages
Psychic-Related Advantages.

I haven't played in quite some time, so comments are welcome.

Must check this out. Sadly, later - it's all blocked at work.

Since invocations you already have a Pact with don't have such dreadful consequences for failure (since they specifically ignore the normal summoning rules)...

This is another good reason why I like Invokers. ^_^

*: The fact that it summons a being of opposing nature to what you wanted actually works out in your favor if you were trying to summon something particularly dangerous. If you fumble summoning a demon and get a powerful angel instead, there's decent odds you can just apologize and explain that you're trying to stop some fiendish scheme and they'll let it go with a warning. Likewise if you summoned some neutral creature, you can probably talk things out. The fact that the creature isn't immediately hostile is a strong mitigating factor to the consequence.

This is always a good point.

[Tami]

Okay, so this ad is an interesting little bit of politics, from what I can determine.

1. There IS a drug that's approved in the US - was fast-tracked for approval - that works really well against CF: Trikafta.

2. It needs to go through Health Canada before its approved - this is normal in Canada, and similar to the whole FDA thing in the US.

So far, so good.

3. The ad fails to mention that in the US, you need to shell out $311 000 dollars every year for this treatment. In Canada, it could be about $400k every year. But that decision has yet to be made.

Wouldn't it be NICE if the US put better controls on Prescription Drugs? And Canada, as well, though we seem to do a 'slightly' better job of it (insulin)?

Basically, there's more bureaucracy happening up here...but there's more to the story.

4. The company itself - as of when the article was published - was basically (according to the article) not actually APPLYING to sell it up here, because they don't like the idea we might cap the price at a lower level. Note: this has changed since that article was published, and they've now put it through the rest of the system.

Now it seems to me that yeah, that's terrible that people with CF went without the drug in Canada for a few months more. It also seems to me that it's at least in part the fault of the company, given they make the decision whether or not to apply, and this one is avoiding that decision because they don't get to make a gazillion dollars profit on it. It's also exceedingly misleading, in that great, the drug is available in the US...for families with really, really good insurance (I guess? I don't know how that works in the US) or willing to pay 400K every single year.

And that situation HAS changed since the article was published.

I mean, as of now Health Canada HAS approved the drug. AND it runs about 300-360K (Canadian dollars, so while ridiculous, that price is STILL less than the American price). And so far Ontario, Alberta, Saskatchewan, Quebec, Prince Edward Island and Nova Scotia have stated that they will cover all of the drug costs, British Colombia already has it covered under the 'Expensive Drugs for Rare Diseases' provincial process, and every other province (that leaves three: Manitoba, New Brunswick and NFLD) is currently discussing it and planning to implement it. Out of the three territories, Yukon has also announced it would cover it and it's in discussion for NWT and Nunavut (which will already likely cover it for elderly patients).

So, Edit: 97.8% of Canada (by population) is fully covering the drug, with the rest preparing to follow suit.

Canada doesn't have a great pharmacare system, I will warrant. Out of all of the countries with some form of public health care, I think we're the ONLY one who doesn't provide free Pharmacare (for which we can blame the Liberal government, who have - yes, also under Trudeau - promise universal pharmacare for about 30 years now - I am not kidding - and NEVER followed through thanks to lobbying from big Pharma. We can also blame the Conservatives, who have had governments in that time, but being fair they never campaigned on universal pharmacare, soooo...).

However, blaming all of this on Canadian price caps when a fair chunk of this comes from the greed of the company is...*wiggles hand*...no.

Especially since now Canadians - ALL Canadians, not just ones with special insurance plans - will be getting this drug for free (barring the few places listed, who are on their way to following suit I imagine - again, currently 97.8%). Whereas in the US, it's $311k per year, hopefully those needing the drug have a good insurance that covers this sort of thing.

Basically, the ad feels like propaganda against Biden putting in price caps.

Thank you for the insight.

[Sharpandpointies]

Thank you for the insight.

There's likely more to it than what I've found and said, but still.

No worries. ^_^

Also, I got the percent wrong (it's 96.4, not 98.7, forgot NFLD, they'd probably make a joke about that and say 'everyone does').

[Sharpandpointies]

I don't know, let's ask Bill/Jack.

Being fair, Bill/Jack didn't blow everyone up because he messed up a summons. ^_^

As written Eriol punishes you for doing anything that's in keeping with a law. I'm almost certain the intent is for your character to not care about the law, hence calling for a GM ruling to make it not quite so.. insane.

Agreed.

While some of the Beryls and Shajads are kind of...weird in their prioritizing (read: appalling), as a GM I feel that penalizing followers of Eriol for not murdering, abusing, and stealing from all and sundry because there are laws against doing so is utterly nonsensical. ^_^

[Sharpandpointies]

Also, Siriel, your PM box is full.

[The MunchKING]

Being fair, Bill/Jack didn't blow everyone up because he messed up a summons. ^_^

No but he did it a LOT, which makes "one per session" seem a bit low.

[Cthulhu_of_R'lyeh]

Being fair, Bill/Jack didn't blow everyone up because he messed up a summons. ^_^

One might argue he failed to summon Common Sense.

[Siriel]

Also, Siriel, your PM box is full.

Cleared up some space.

[Sharpandpointies]

No but he did it a LOT, which makes "one per session" seem a bit low.

He did a few rolls, but having looked back at Bill/Jack (the summoner, not the later character with the same player) he didn't actually do a LOT of summoning stuff. Was the psychic who was always using his powers.

[Sharpandpointies]

One might argue he failed to summon Common Sense.

I think that was kinda going around.

Before people think that I'm pointing fingers without considering my own rather less-sensible choices, I DID make up a character with a specific combination of purchases that 'granted' her a non-zero chance of turning on the entire group (Orochi blood) and obliterating them* (Orochi blood + mildly ridiculous Ki Dominions for her level).

Almost did, too.

Common sense was clearly not working well when I decided on Tasha for my character.

* probably not Garon, but non-zero chance of getting him as well.

[Sub-Zero MKA]

Was the psychic who was always using his powers.

And it got him no-scoped out of nowhere haha

[The MunchKING]

He did a few rolls, but having looked back at Bill/Jack (the summoner, not the later character with the same player) he didn't actually do a LOT of summoning stuff. Was the psychic who was always using his powers.

I thought he tried to summon a monster to help fight Cruela Deboy, then had to banish it, summoned the Decapus twice, and...

...

Huh. I thought there were more, but thinking back on it, I couldn't think of any.

[Sharpandpointies]

And it got him no-scoped out of nowhere haha

Arrow in the head. Bad luck with that hit. Thank goodness for Taren (as always).

I thought he tried to summon a monster to help fight Cruela Deboy, then had to banish it, summoned the Decapus twice, and...

...

Huh. I thought there were more, but thinking back on it, I couldn't think of any.

Went through a lot of the game again a short time ago. Bill/Jack didn't actually summon a lot, like you note. I mean, he DID do some, but it wasn't all the time.

[Siriel]

Went through a lot of the game again a short time ago.

I'd love to hear your thoughts with hindsight. Maybe I should try to scrounge up my memories of the (intended) plot, to let you all know how silly it was.

Also sorry to hear pastebin is blocked at your workplace - i thought posting it there would be less annoying for people than posting a giant list on the forum.