i'd imagine that the oil could be completely omitted and the result would still be great, especially so if you subbed the heavy cream for coconut cream instead of soy milk (but i also often use soy milk to add creaminess to recipes and find it works great, if you are willing to reduce it a bit more).

I started doing some bodyweight exercises, and have noticed my strength increasing quite a bit (newbie gains). Before wfpb, I would do literally hours of cardio each day to try to maintain my weight while eating all of the fatty stuff I used to enjoy. But that wasn't sustainable, and I'd eventually stop hitting the treadmill each day, then stop going to the gym at all, and my weight would bounce right back. I had previously focused on cardio so much because it was the best for burning calories, while resistance training doesn't burn nearly as many, but now I feel like I can incorporate a lot more resistance training and it's not a burden on my schedule.

I feel fantastic, have much better mental clarity, don't get drowsy at work at 2pm. My resting heart rate is much lower. It's pretty surreal how much of a difference it has made in such a short time.

I've been pretty struggle-free. I guess that is because I went into this with the mindset of improving my long-term health instead of just trying to lose weight. Other foods just don't appeal to me so there's no temptation to fall off the wagon.

That said, I did have some extra weight to lose, even if I wasn't intentionally trying to reduce it. A lot of it covid weight, but it's been 1.5 years now and I'm down 60 pounds and slimmer than I was before my bad habits started during the pandemic. Nearly all of that came off in the first 6-8 months or so, and I've been maintaining my weight since.

I basically follow a McDougall/starch-based diet, which makes the most sense to me conceptionally. I don't avoid salt or sugar, but eliminating oil was absolutely necessary to get where I am now.

INDEED!

except once you get to ng+. then you only need to play the minigame for one affinity node, but everything else can be bought from the new vendors using unused bonus exp.

after a bit of frustration, when it first clicked on my first playthrough i was like "omg i have to tell everyone this game is awesome the battle system is genius"

they're not that bad, definitely not as bad as, say, getting spoiled on the seventh party member in xc1, but the xenoblade community has been very vigilant about avoiding spoilers so i'd like to keep that tradition up here :)

the enel video i would recommend to a newcomer is https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GEksqxaML58. i like it a lot better than the chugga video personally actually as far as explaining combat goes.

and i just rewatched both of these videos since it had been a hot minute. the only thing i would add is that you must view your blade's affinity chart in order to unlock nodes on the chart. if you see the notification that you completed the requirements, but don't go back and view the affinity chart, that node will remain locked and no progress will be made on any nodes following it.

the in-game tutorials suck. they are misleading, and even the good ones you can't see again in the menus later on. i think
chuggaaconroy's video (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=b8P7KhFSA2w) is probably a decent place to get situated. enel's videos are also outstanding for mechanics but he does have some party member spoilers in them, and most are focused on postgame anyways.

elon only gets to do all of his crazy antics because he took the company private. but reddit is attempting to IPO? huh?

and this is precisely why i haven't deleted my reddit account yet

and this is precisely why i haven't deleted my reddit account yet

I've never had any issue with this boss with more ether-focused builds (melia, riki, and ether 7 are great). I didn't even realize it was notorious for being difficult until after i had beat the game lol.

The "Agnus Battle" theme is the best normal battle theme for me. Hard to name a favorite if we're talking about boss themes too. Maybe Death Match with Torna.