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We finally made it to the Atlas! Look out white maps, here we come!Join the party! Check out our website for more episodes and be sure to follow us on Twitter.www.foreverexiled.comTwitter @ForeverExiled82Path of Exile WebsiteWrecker of Days Builds ListFull Transcript of Episode:Justin: Hey there. Welcome to Episode five of Forever Exile. The Path of Exile Podcast. I am one of your host, Justin A K Tags.Tyler: And I'm Tyler Wrecker of Days. Well, we made it Number five. Yeah. Good. Good. We're doing the best of episodes, Ari.Justin: Yeah, where we're at, like, take 41. RoughlyTyler: way. Our we've been We've been giggling trying to start this podcast for, like, the last hour.Justin: You know, actually, you saying that makes me want to just quickly jumped the gun a little bit because I noticed, if you're one of your notes was just how incredible your giggle is.Tyler: So I obviously listen to the podcast. Once you've finished editing them, Justin does everything. By the way, I just sit here and giggle and make fun of him. But after he's edited and what we get to listen to it, I like to listen to it to see what it, of course, sounds, likes weak and make it better make the next episode better and better and constructive criticism I have noticed now that I really ate my giggle. I sound so lame. Gable. It sounds totally fine in my head. I feel like a manly man when I giggle in my head. But my goodness, when I giggle when I hear from the outside, it's brutal.Justin: So that just shows how impressive it is that for four episodes I've been editing your giggle just to increase the highs. I'm just kidding. I should think this is going to be, like, really high.Tyler: No, this episode I'm gonna Ha, ha.Justin: That is hilarious. Yes, I am. Anyway, that made me think of it. You said giggle. It's your fault. Uh, all right, So tell me anyway, tell me about your build. You've been doing it. I mean, do refresher on your building where you're at right now. Let's let's hear it.Tyler: All right. Um, I finally had some time to gets maps, which was nice. I finished last few acts quite quickly. I like those last acts because there's very few side quest you need to do for extra passive points and finally got endgame. Tried to do it with my leveling gear, which wasn't special. It's not leveling gears, just whatever dropped. So I was pretty bad on resist. Tried to do. I know 5 to 10 maps with it, and, uh, just before the podcast started. I finally capped my resists, but damage is good and survivability would be good. I'm really liking it. I don't know what people are complaining about a lot of fun. Single target damage isn't great, but the game's a lot harder to so anyway,Justin: where you build when you say people complaining, Are you referring to just in general or specifically to your build?Tyler: Sorry specifically for that guide? I'm referring to the which building I do, and I'm doing my sion build. It's Ah, deadeye and inquisitor. It's elemental hit with attached to What's it called? It's still the list of support the ballistic totem support, Lester told him, Supports really weak. You basically need four totems, even though it only gives you three. You have to go find 1/4 told him just to make it worthwhile. But I'm quite liking it. And because you're constantly moving and laying the totems with elemental hit and with crit and with all the extra ailments that air happening freezing and shocking, it's I I really like it so far. I mean, I have a four, a blue four link, and, uh, I've been fine, so I'm excited to get a a nice five link.Justin: Your survivability, though, seems to be at least reasonable. So far, you're reallyTyler: very easy. It was really easy while levelling, of course, ramps up a bit once you get into the atlas. But, um, I had 19% fire resist, and I think 55 or 60 Ah, lightning resist. And there's a lot more chaos damage and oh, my goodness. I redid the graveyard. I did the new graveyard boss fight, and that's cool. I don't know if that was in our notes somewhere, so I don't want to jump ahead.Justin: I don't think I've actually done graveyard yet.Tyler: Oh, the chaos. I just love how viable chaos is. I feel like it's syndicate, but without needing the crazy nurse that syndicate needed for a month straight, it's There's so much more chaos, damage, um, the new I don't really want to spoil it, but for the podcast tried Well, for you, the graveyard boss battle that used to just be you'd go into that crypt, right? And then to be that I mean, it's changed a couple of times now. I think it's a change it again and Now it's kind of like an open crypt area where you fight one of the skeleton bosses that existed in campaign. But then, once you beat that one whole wave of enemies come. And then a second skeleton boss comes because I think you can do that. Different ones, Yes, and I love it. There's shocking to let crazy. They're throwing chaos, damage at you from from range. I really liked it and especially because it's what. But it dropped for me. I think it was my fifth map. I don't know if it's Tier 12 or three. I forget, but it was when you're not really set with your resists. That's a punishing boss battle, and I really liked it. But back to the build, I just finished capping my resists and survivability was pretty easy before, so it's gonna be a lot better now.Justin: Nice and damage with elemental hit and ballisticTyler: clearing is no problem. Single target damage requires some patients, Um, but not only for the impatient, I guess you could say, um, I don't find that for me. I'm used to a slower paced game, and I don't find it tedious by any means. umJustin: Well, you actually, because under a single target apartment, do you think you'll do anything to change single target? Like, do you have any plans for?Tyler: Yeah, right now I'm using a blue Oh, right. Four link. Yeah. I'm using a blue for link right now. So it all it does, it's giving me 7 18% attack speed and 24% elemental damage. So I knew the second I even even if I had a white five link or a nice yellow four link, I don't think it would be a problem at all.Justin: Nice. Yes. So, me, I am doing spectral throw, still sticking with it, and, uh, I'm into maps. I've gotten past all of the, you know, the levelling, all that good stuff. Ah, it's been decent. It's solar cell. Found for me is a whole new breed of playing this game. I'm just so used to, ah, hit endgame by some of the gear that I want to at least make the maps a little easier to clear. Make sure I've got ah, you know, the right resists. But the build that I'm just playing around with is working. Fine. Now that I've got my gem slots set up. I'm still also only running off of a four link chest, so that'll make a big difference once I can do that. And I'm swapping GMP for ah, slower projectile still, which I probably I probably will do through the whole thing anyway. So it's it's been not bad. It's a little a little slow, uh, had huge hiccups as I was leveling and I'm realizing I think I made that. We made the comment that we were chatting that weapons hold. My gosh, Did they ever make such a big difference? Like,Tyler: Oh, and I love it. I love it.Justin: Yeah, it's It's nice. It's just it's I feel different. It's weird that that's different. I mean, you've always needed to upgrade weapons, obviously toe to scale your damage, but I don't know if it's just spectral throw. I don't know if it's if there was a specific change that's made that different, but I have found that without that, that constant upgrade to weapons which, by the way, upgrading Klaus Sucks is brutal. To find Klaus that have reasonable roles, especially cousin went straight physical, it's really hard to find replacement clause Once I've got something that's rolled plus physical and plus percentage physical, I can't It's really, really hard to find something that will improve that.Tyler: Catch him Well, I mean, I know your pain. I'm still using my blue four links. So, um, but it's I just love. I think it has everything to do with just the changes that they made to defense in the how bosses they're scale. All the extra armor and chaos and elemental resists. And for everyone, I just I just love that update where they made them harder to kill, but they don't hit harder. I mean, some of the boss mechanics had changed dramatically, which makes them a lot harder to, But it just makes weapons that much more important. And I love it because for melee, they're much more dependent on weapons than any other type of, um, build. I would say, like if you're doing spells, you can get away with not needing a fantastic wander staff, right? Or don't whatever also you're using. But when you're doing spells, you don't need something epic. It's just great to have opinions. You don't need anything, but of course, it's just mid. Maxine if you want to get a convicting one with sweet rolls Malays desperate for a good melee weapon. And I love that right after they have a melee league, they come out, they buff stuff to make melee weapons Much more important, I think it's really cool. I love how they did it.Justin: It is, Yeah, I think if I had maybe thought a little differently into ah, maybe it may be a different skill, or I don't know if I could have incorporated different types of weapons, but I just I feel like for a solo cell found I made it harder than I needed to because I've just I've struggled to roll clause that are good to use,Tyler: are you? Claw OnlyJustin: while I'm spect into a lot of the claw nodes just for the the engine for the crit. ButTyler: that's that's one of those things than that, I guess you kind of cornered yourself into then.Justin: Yeah, so we'll see. I mean, I'm now, uh, into maps. I've gotten it. Did the atlas. I mean, maze will just jump a little bit too. That is kind of cool. I've again, I'm not super far into it of ah, unlocked out Zana. So she's back. I've had these weird encounters with the the new the new bosses, like have just spawned And I can remember the name of the one that I've seen, but he kind of just spawned in, yelled at me and then took off and it just got the notification to keep following him. And I'mTyler: like, Yeah, I had that and I couldn't see what was happening. The map was still busy and I heard some dialogue. I didn't really know what it was, and yeah, that's to read it at the same time.Justin: So I'm I've noticed that as I've done more maps in that quadrant, um, he's popped up a few times. I haven't gotten much further into how that whole system works, but what I will say is, on top of the hole, okay? Trying to figure out weapons as I'm going along it further to what you were talking about with your build. My God resists so resist to me has always they've always been king. You get to endgame, you get resists. You just have to. I have never felt Maur than this league like yes, you Absolutely have to capture resists. It is especially getting into these these new bosses. Yeah, I don't know if he just happens to be lightning based or why everything is lightning. But after he popped up the bosses, or just like random rare Tze and just mobs would all of a sudden spawned with additional lightning damage, they would put these things on the ground. They were shooting. It was killing me so quickly and I think was in 40 48% or so, which normally obviously that's not great. But normally in a tear to map, I wouldn't be Oh, you know, I really need to be in 75. I just be working to get gear. And as I captured that cap it, I had no choice but to actually start adjusting my gear and what it made a huge difference, which I'm not had a lead like that before. And I started thinking because the first it pissed me off first thing I was like Oh my God, so tired of dying. And then, as I started to, you know, just the gear and especially with SSF, it makes it a little bit harder. But the the ability to now have to actually plan around capping my resists walk, maintaining life and damage. It's actually made it kind of fun. Yeah, it really has.Tyler: Yeah, I'm really a one thing. I totally agree with you. I completely agree with you. And one thing that I think I already mentioned it. But just in case I didn't turn now, only thought it. It used to be that you could just ignore chaos. Resist for so many of your bills until syndicate came along, you could ignore your your chaos resistant. You could just do your three elements. Now I feel with all the different roles they've done, they've added a lot of chaos, damage to some big, big boss battles and a lot of the metamorphose stuff. Specifically, it's almost like you can't get away. You It's always gonna have some sort of chaos. A we it's really made it so that you need all four. Captain. Oh, I used to just do the three. I'm sure many died. Many did. But I'm really finding the value and crafting some of those chaos rules just to at least get to the baseline of 0%. I think I saw this in a lot of chaos. Damage?Justin: Yeah, I have to. I don't know if I found it as, um it's definitely beneficial. I'm not at minus 60. I think I'm at 35 or something. So it's not. It's not zero, but it's definitely better than nothing but it to me. He was not as bad as the I don't know Lightning. I couldn't believe the difference from 48 to 75 obviously that's always gonna be a huge difference. It's just never been a huge difference. A tear to Oh, yeah, you know what I mean? Like, I've always felt like Okay, I'm getting into, like, six. You're seven. You know, it's time to actually start really paying attention to everything. Yeah, this is like it's cool. It's really cool, because that one of the complaints I've had in the past is just end Game now had become stale, so I think it's aTyler: sexy independence all the way through. Maybe we won't think that in the fifth league of this end game, butJustin: yeah, I don't know. I mean, I don't know enough about how the endgame all works yet, so it's kind of hard to say, but I am enjoying The metamorphose stuff is sometimes enjoyable. I've started to get some of the boss ones the ones that you actually collect. I haven't Not enough to actually do much with them. Ah, some of them have been reasonable. But even still, some of them are very, very difficult, Which is good. I don't mind. I don't mind not being able to kill a boss like a meta morph boss. Yet if I made it too strong and I'm like, Oh, God, this I just can't do it. Yeah, it sucks for me. I gotta learn to the next one.Tyler: I've heard a lot of people. Well, whether it's within my guides air on Reddit complained that it's too difficult And then there's some people of the mentality that a lake just turn. Just turn the difficulty down like you're not forced to do the hardest one. And if your build can't do it, don't do it on. And then there's other people that think. I've heard the complaints that they should be able to do the hardest ones, and I don't like that I like the you know, it should be terrifying to do the hardest. Have you got all the body parts in the map? It should be terrifying. You should expect it to be a long time or you should I don't know. You know what I mean? Totally beat Easy for you shouldn't expect to do it with mediocre everything.Justin: Yeah, I totally agree to me. It goes back to bay two days and like the early release days where there were some builds just could not do it, you just couldn't. And it wasn't It wasn't something broken in the game. It was something you did just didn't work. And you either adjusted or I mean, then it was start over. But yeah, yeah, I don't know. I've been I've been relatively pleased so far. I mean, I'm pretty early into the tears of the palace, but I found the difficulty to be decent. Uh, I mean, for me, for path of Exile, it's rewarding enough. Antemortem is adding the ability to get a lot of cool stuff that you couldn't get in other ways before you had to do specific league things to do it. So that's kind of fun.Tyler: Yeah, it is. It's It's really cool. I think they've done a very good job. I know that there's glitches for people that are a lot farther into endgame. Unlike us, we're still in our white maps. But, um, I think in terms of stability, this was really, really good. I just, um I forget where this isn't a list. So cut me off. If I'm too far ahead of myself. I just really wish that what they did was introduce this next league. But I love the new endgame, and I'm really excited about it. But to introduce a brand new endgame and then go on a skeleton crew for Christmas, it doesn't make sense to me.Justin: Yeah, but I think that's also for you. Somewhat related to other things. Not just specifically the league. The big leaguesTyler: challenges, but they're they're running into they. Some of the stuff that I'm watching this one is a little bit farther down, but the guy that I watch relax r o l a X on mixer. His issues are very different than mine. I'm waiting for cause I play standard. I'm waiting for the map tab to get fixed, but that's not gonna happen till after Christmas, because they have one person that works on the map tapping there on vacation. So but roll axes. His issue is he's getting to engage with every single character that he makes. He's already on. His fourth character is crushing Endgame, and his issue is that there's a glitch with Final Boss. And I've seen lots of stuff in the patch notes about the final Boss is and how they're glitches and they're not dropping this or they're not. You know, this, that another thing and he can'tJustin: What's the alternative? I mean, you're suggesting that they push of a game changing league to a ah, further release so that they don't have it come over Christmas,Tyler: right? I don't think any time you're gonna have a skeleton crew for two weeks, even if it's just one week, I really especially because it's going to be what, a three week point of the league right? Like this came out December 9. I think it was to have Christmas two and 1/2 3 weeks later, after you've completely revamped the entire endgame, I don't know.Justin: Yeah, I don't know what to me. It's hard, though, because if they come up with a league that barely has any changes just because they're gonna have a skeleton crew. That league ends up being garbage. It's people. People may not play it. I mean, the thing is, if they go, if they go skeleton crew, Firth, whatever it is, 2 to 3. I don't even think it's three weeks, two weeks, three weeks. Someone like that. Two weeks to, um, that's better to me than three months of, Ah garbage league.Tyler: Well, but imagine Metamor for the old Atlas. To me,Justin: that's fantastic. Yeah, I don't know. I don't knowTyler: how everything Woods with how it all works, right, Like, it's been a long time since I've worked in the video game industry, and when I did, I wasn't at the top of the food chain making the decisions with all the decisions that the higher ups need to make. But it's just for me. It's every Christmas. I really don't get to play until the new year, when the league comes out and then it's gonna be the Christmas League, as I call it as a standard player. I don't get to play until January, so it kind of sucks. ButJustin: I don't see the alternative to that, though, and I think that I mean, I I can see where you're talking about in the fact that it's ah ah, huge game changing league and it comes out right before they. I don't know how often else in the year they even have skeleton crews. I imagine it's not very often, but ah, I would rather I would rather it affect the I mean, people may really, really be angry about the fact that I say it or that they may disagree with me in some sense. But it's affecting the people who have a lot of time and have power rushed to end game, which is awesome, like That's cool that they have done it. But I imagine that that portion of the player base is small compared to the players who are still working their way up through be Atlas and you're never going to make it perfect. Old big release almost ever has been Yeah, so there's going to be something that goes wrong to me. At least there's nothing game breaking and even the ones I've read night for league players and but I don't care about standard, but I mean, even on center,Tyler: You're in the minority there.Justin: No, I'm definitely. I definitely know for sure. Not on that. Most of them. I might be in the minority that when I'm definitely not. But even your issue, it's still very specific, too. A mechanic not working. Not all mechanics not working now. Granted, it's a pretty I read that they, like, literally turned it off, right, Like they just turned off the convert button. I thought I heard. Yeah, yeah,Tyler: yeah, they did. It turned off, and it's true. I could play it. I could spend 15 bucks and get a new map stash tab.Justin: No, I don't think you should. And I agree, like frustration that comes from that. But I don't think you'll ever have a league release that's going to be perfect off the bat, even 2 to 3 weeks, and hopefully it's as close as possible. But I read the complaints. I've read the comments that they've made. They're not. It works. There's just some stuff. That's your rape. It's kind of frustrating for such is, but it's not broken. I would rather like I said, I would rather have maybe 2 to 3 weeks of Okay, this is stupid. I'm frustrated. I'm annoyed, and then they're coming back, and they're gonna fix it. Uh, and they still have staff working. It's not like a game. Breaking bugs is just going to go on because they want to enjoy Christmas. God forbid. But yet, uh, if if that means that, okay, I gotta wait 2 to 3 weeks for them to fix something that is really just irritating me versus having to deal with three months of a league that I found boring because they wanted to make sure not to get people upset. I feel like that's maybe worse. Yeah, I don't know, but I mean, yeah, yeah. I don't know. I don't mind it, but I'm not there, so it's not affecting me.Tyler: Yeah, way need to. I need to be more familiar with the endgame bugs that are happening to. But you've almost converted me almost. You may have let them have Christmas tie. Just let them have Christmas am. I am. But have Christmas with the old atlas, all right? Just bored again. So remember last episode we're talking about holy and showing up. I was all mystified. I thought it was fantastic that when you click on a crafting recipe, yeah, she just appears Yes, you know, she'd smoke bombs like a ninja turtle on, comes in and says her little piece and then goes away. I thought that was a really cool little thing. Um, so I hear you've been a little disappointed with the frequency of it. Now,Justin: is it just our last time that we talked about with that when this you first brought this up? Yeah, I think it was just last episode. Yes, So it was. It must have been, cause that's when I finally got some free time to play and every freaking recipe I would zoom in my damn camera, click it. And there were times I think I was even streaming at one point so you could watch, and I clicked it, and I I message you and said you're you're freaking liar. She didn't jump up and you said, Oh, it's because you were standing right in front of it. I was like, Oh, okay, maybe it wasTyler: always your fault.Justin: Now I will just say I was about to go into it. I was in a trial when I got that one. So I went to the next one and it actually kind of irritated me a little bit because the next one I found was within just the regular story of the game. So I moved off to the side, clicked it, and sure enough, she popped up. I was like, God damn it, Tyler was right. Yeah, And she did, like, smokes in. And she says, Ah, I think she said the same line every time. Something about this is very interesting. And then she smoke clouds out. But it's only the more I did it, the more I was watching it. She she doesn't so nothing related to a lab. Nothing related to trials will ever show up. Nothing related to delve will ever show up. And once you beat the game, that's it. She's done. She doesn't show up in maps. WhyTyler: do itjust campaign? I was really surprised. That's dumb. Yeah, whyJustin: I don't understand is that there's no Maybe somebody knows some weirdo lower to the game that somehow stopped actin that she couldn't help you with the recipesTyler: anymore. Well, maybe maybe they'll add it more if it's a new thing that we just have If it's new right and we didn't miss it before, maybe it's just they're adding it in and then they'll be able to add it to more. As, uh, maybe you just would have added, you know, to my previous complaint about having a new atlas. Maybe it just would've added more possible glitches when they were going on. No, no. HowJustin: hard could it have been? Toe added toe labs to delve, too. Maps everywhere.Tyler: Every little thing you add. Construe something elseJustin: does nothing. She's she literally does. She is. She's not even an actual like thing that interferes with you. You can walk right through her. She does nothing. It's like she's not there. It's dumb. Just put it into all of them. I irritated me more so than anything that you told me about it, because I remember it took me. It took me so much longer to get through some of the acts because I would run into them and be like, Okay, maybe, Maybe if I stand a little bit over here. No. Yeah. She doesn't show up in those places through.Tyler: Well, I hate you more than you hate me for Helena, Because you're playing solo Cell found this time for the first time in forever. And you couldn't give me the ridiculous Val City way point.Justin: You know it was you this times you I found it almost right away.Tyler: Oh, I don't even want to hear your solo. No. Found luck with a locked. Why did he lock? Hold your hand and show, YouJustin: know, but But something pointed the way I could tell. I could sense it. It was those fireflies they were leading.Tyler: Yeah, fireflies that don't stack in your inventory. Um,Justin: crabby old man. Yeah, I found I found that when I found thanks for not beingTyler: able to give you $2 city waypoint. I appreciate it.Justin: You have to work for things. That's how you enjoy the gameTyler: Can. The Bell City is really enjoyable.Justin: It's annoying because it not only is it probably one of the most frustrating spots to find it for, but then also, the next level that you load into is the freaking longest set of map or area. I think in the whole game that hope Rose is to get down to the spider. Oh, my God, It's exhausting. it's worse than Vow. Pyramid Way Worse, I don't know why. Maybe it's God's going down instead of up.Tyler: Well, it's twice as long. Yeah, well, Pyramid, I think it's three levels and then you're actually at the top. Whereas when you're going down to the spider, it's three levels and then you're just another second section, and then it's another three levels. If I'm correct, it's I don't mind that part, though. That one's relatively easy to navigate. And there's not a lot of wrong turns, not a fan. I don't mind the maps that get me, Um, but that's just because of my concussion. Symptoms and stuff are the maps with trees and the trees that go in front of the screen. Um, what would be one deal? I don't know howJustin: Jungle is brutal. I actually noticed that just today I was thinking to myself, Okay, we're talking about that whole technology of the stuff is cutting. You go through jungle. The trees do not fade it all, they say, right up in your face through the hole. I was like, Why would they not have these ones fade out? I don't know if it's just because it's older, and maybe it's more difficult for them to do that. But it is really weird to me that jungle, the jungle map Jungle Valley. The maps do not fade or sorry, the trees don't fade. Yeah, it's kind of weird.Tyler: Yeah. And you, old atlas. I would never, ever shaped the ones that had those tall trees that will go in front of the camera. It was just too too nauseated for me.Justin: Would it change it if if it had that effect, where they they weren't really? I mean, that kind of see through,Tyler: um Well, there's that. What was it? Is it Lava lake map that had, um I don't know if they're the same. A CZ they used to be. But the lab a lake when they had caught Eva was a tear 14 or 15 last week. That had some trees. Cem, Cem. Nice apple trees. ErJustin: over there. Just little ones rightTyler: there. Well, they were. They were big, They didn't go all the way up across the screen, and it would have that technology where it would fade so you could see yourself on the other side. That still gets me a little bit, but it's nowhere near as bad as something that's crossing my eyes really fast. Like car driving through and, you know, shaded woods Interest. Bang, bang, bang. Just shade hitting. You left, right and center.Justin: Yeah, it's funny. I just I literally just today was doing Jungle Valley and thought of that. Come on. And then I did. I think it was right after we finished Episode four. Maybe that next day I finally got to play, and I'm I'm running through an area goingTyler: the hell areJustin: these things popping up? My screen is unlike running through killing stuff. And yeah, that's the monster parts picking up. Yeah. Is that I'm sure people listening to it Or like what a whiny baby like it's alreadyTyler: faced. I'm sorry. Fix happen hour later, but what do you think of it?Justin: Uh, I I do like it. Obviously, I actually this is just me being a turd. I'm not a big fan of the way it shows up, because it and maybe we'll just take a bit of getting used to playing more to get used to it. But it throws me off for some reason, a little bit And maybe it's just cause I'm not playing a very fast build. I'm not moving super quickly through the map or through the zone. There's something about the way it pops up that just throws me off from looking at what the drops are to the interest at part going up. But I I love it. I absolutely love the fact that I don't care what it does. I don't care what flash my whole screen. The fact that it I don't have to be. Oh, I don't have to go and pick them all up is so much better. Yeah. You like it?Tyler: I like the animation. Yeah, I like it. I don't get distracted with it. I don't get it mixed up with other possible drops. I really like it. And the thing that I I don't know if this was how it used to be, because you and I have progressed slowly, but whether it was added new or not, I love that when you're about to go through a portal or a door. Um, what's his name shows up.Justin: Oh, yeah, kind of warns you.Tyler: Yeah, but I like that, you know, because I'm going to go through and I'm gonna clear the map. How I normally cleared I don't go out of my way for any lead content if it's going to be, You know, if if there's two monsters left and I'm missing one body part, I'm not going for it. So it's nice when I'm vote to go into this or I'm gonna portal. Oh, that he shows up. He's like a Okay, let's use up your pieces. Yeah, I like it. I think it was a very it was a gamer's choice, You know what I mean? Whoever came up with that idea, it was it was the gamer in them that came up with that. That was really convenient.Justin: Yeah, I think it is. Good, cause I would probably forget Maur often than not if if he didn't do that, and I'd probably load the next map and be like, damn it, I forgot to use up those parts. So that's at least good. Now, did you Did you get Ah, Did you get your Christmas gift from G, which I feel like you should take away from you? I feel like people who are complaining about them going to skeleton staff don't deserveTyler: a gift. I don't maybe. Oh, everything. Oh, they deserve a wicked Christmas. Well, old Atlas.Justin: So what you're saying, though, is the people that stay working what I'm saying? That'sTyler: qu'est er of words. No. Um, no, no, no, no. Not at all. Not at all.Justin: Did you get you get from them there? It was one of the boxes. Right.Tyler: Okay, well, you got I do not. What? But it was white.Justin: So I on on that same topic, because I I did get, um, a gift. I got the white, uh, missed, I think for the for your base, The white It's like, OK, but I also I decided I was going to do the grand sanctum pack because I really like the wings. And I like the outfit. That was the thing is the $60 pack. I'm still I'm still boycotting. Currently, there their core packs. I just Maybe I might really I might buy this the snake one just because it's, you know, it's it is a little bit unique, but I just can't I I was like, Well, I don't see myself going this time for there's no shirt. So why spend 240 bucks? But ah, it So I bought the couple of the boxes. I have 55 versions of God. What is it? The blink. Ah, it's one of the skills that they went there. No, no, no, it's Ah, it's not whirling blades. It's something Blade. What is it called, anyway? It's I have five of them. I hate that. That's the one thing that drives me crazy. You know, all I want is a damn portal. I think I've opened maybe 20 boxes, so not like a ton, but 25% of them have been the same thing killing me, G.Tyler: But I got to say, normally I'm I'm portals, is what it kind of revolves around for me. You know, you need to have a nice portal that matches the set. And because it's so much bigger and brighter, that color stands out to the others that you can get away with footprints that don't aren't the exact shade of white or green that you're looking for to match your set. You know what I mean? Because it's much farther away and it phase and it's busy, but portal portals really stand out there there the whole time. You stand next time for a while. The grand sanctum support pack is so nice that I'm gonna get it, even though I don't like at a normal that could match it.Justin: Well, give me a portal that you have because there's portals that mattersTyler: and that really, I don't think so. Well, sometimes it's also it's not just the color. It's also the action that the portal does, or the colors and how it goes. You know what I mean? AndJustin: wings air really cool with it, though.Tyler: I love it. I love it. I'm, uh I'll be getting it as soon as we're done.Justin: I'm actually using some of the white armor that I got from the boxes with the grand sanctum, but, uh, yeah, I I don't remember. I do have two of the white floaty mists. Uh, you can put in your base. I also I don't think you've seen it yet, but I have I did get that new base, butTyler: so did you.Justin: Yeah, the completely I did it mostly because I knew it would drive Ethan crazy. And so I loaded it up. I put it in there with absolutely nothing. And I just spaced the characters out, and I When he walked by my office, I was like, Look, check out how awesome this is. And he was upset right away. And I told him it's going to stay like that All league. I'm not gonna put anything down. If anything, I might put like a fire pit for some random reason. Like one fire pit.Tyler: Well, it's cold in the stars. Yep. It's gonna look awesome. So you can sit cross leggedJustin: and put all of my petsTyler: so they can float around. And don't forget you're missed.Justin: Oh, yeah. I should put down that white mist. I'm gonna put it in a corner just so that when people visit, I'd be like, Hey, did you see there's twoTyler: also you. I'll even give you a discount. But you've got to go in the mist.Justin: There's two of them up there, but I love that they give those little boxes. I think it's fun.Tyler: Yeah, they're very generous company. And every time I realized that we've complained about something in the game that I don't like or you don't like, I feel really bad. I don'tJustin: feel bad, and I think it's good. It's I don't think we're being fixed. It's no, I get it. ITyler: get. It's constructive. But I still when I really when I remember that it's free and everything's free. I feel like a prick.Justin: Well, I mean, you're a prick, but it doesn't mean that they're doingTyler: anything wrong. I'm not the one that went solo. Cell found. You're a prick.Justin: Yeah, but you also said that they don't deserve a merry Christmas.Tyler: No, I said enjoy your merry Christmas with the old Atlas.Justin: I think I think it isTyler: you not being able to give me the Val City waypoint is way worse than anything anyone else has ever done toJustin: me. I think that merry Christmas box makes up for the bugs. So two people complaining about the bugs. At least you got a box,Tyler: right? And he didn't play peewee a Christmas. You're not a real fan. Anyway. It's true, right, Britta?Justin: At least to log in. Get your freaking box.Tyler: You did have to be in game to get it. Well, you couldn't click on it on the website.Justin: Yeah, but you didn't have to be on that day.Tyler: I remember.Justin: I got mine today, I think because I didn't go on you saidTyler: you were on yesterday. Yeah. Yesterday I was able to finish my just for the box. No, no, I was able to finish an actor to yesterday. I think it was yesterday that I got two maps. Who? I think the boxes logging in until January 6.Justin: Oh, yes. I didn't think it was just the single day that that would be a jerk. Move. Geez, like,Tyler: Well, we're a little Bell City. Wait points a jerk. MoveJustin: How? We're at home enjoying our Christmas. If you don't log into the video game on that day, you don't get it. Uh,Tyler: enjoy your family, Bond.Justin: Yeah, I don't think anything we've said is mean spirited. And yeah, I think we're fair. We're now We're nice people in general, right?Tyler: Well, one of us, one of me. That's true. Yeah.Justin: So that's why did I look through the post that they made because they had put up a post about like, uh, some of the known issues that they were going to deal with, But I didTyler: nothing in there really,Justin: like, stood out to me like Oh my gosh, I can't play this. I will be honest. There is one that says the convert maps button in the map stash tab has been temporarily disabled as there were problems converting to the new layout. I'm not trying to be a jerk, but I laughed so hard when I read that. Why fly? What? You've just popped into my head instantly. I don't know why you just made me laugh. I was like, Oh, but they're listening. Listen,Tyler: every time the game updates whether waiting for you and I hate how long steam takes to frickin update a 30 makeup date. But anyway, when I'm I mean, it gives me 10 hours. Thank you, Steam for being able to check the patch notes every time I'm just control f that I see my console game updating him like, Oh, well, maybe because they group their patches together for Consul cause they don't promote us frequently. I don't know how it works in the console back end, but that's really do. And so then I'm like, Oh, sweet, Maybe maybe a new one came out for PC today, and then I control control F on the patch notes for Xbox. You mad? I'm excited. It'll happenJustin: yet to me. When I read through this stuff there was, I think only one that maybe kind of popped out to me is like, Okay, this is actually something they need to work on. And it was releasing legion generals during legion encounters can cause a client crash. I think something that can actually crashed the game, that that's a bit of a problem. And that mostly just cause we both dealt with leagues where I mean you, especially where that was an issue. So I can I can, you know, I can see that a little bit. But when I look at their posts that they put out and this is days before Christmas, I think this one popped up. I don't rember who posted it. Uh, it still impresses me like they're legitimately looking into stuff. They know stuff there, and they're gonna fix it. And the stuff that I was reading was not game breaking. Besides, the fact that the client could crash that that to me is a bit of a big deal. I had an issue with one of the valves side areas. Who cares? It was not a big deal. It took into when I when I exited, it didn't bring me back. So where I had entered into the map, I actually thought it was cool. Yeah, I don't know. The rest of the stuff wasTyler: even something like Metamor. Fosse's not being able to be frozen were used to Boss is not be able to be frozen. It was just chill, right, Right. So I, you know, even with something that was frozen dependent, you're getting a very good chill on them, especially because it was buff. So that's not even a big problem either.Justin: Nothing stood out to me where on and again, that could have been because there have been stuff fixed that were more game breaking that I just never encounter because I hadn't gotten up there. But I didn't really stand out to Mia's thes terrible things.Tyler: Yeah, I can see the There's a There's an issue where the awakened cast on Krit um, is creating cooled elms where when there shouldn't be any, I could see that being a big issue for builds. But at the same time, you don't need the awakened jewel to have a successful build. SoJustin: you're already having a problem with an awakened version of a skill? Boo hoo. I don't feel bad for you. Even a tiny bit. A tiny bit. Put the cast on. CreatedTyler: for not to drop.Justin: Sure, I'm thrilled. If it didn't work on the lake first week of a league lunch, I wouldn't be like you wreckedTyler: my bill. No, you haven't. Go put the normalJustin: one in the one you used all the way up until you found that one. Yeah. Yeah, I saw. I don'tTyler: know if anybody's actually complaining about it, but we did see it on the bug report,Justin: right? I imagine it's probably because somebody complained about it. Ah, but yeah, I just It made me laugh. Yeah, there were. There were some really fun, uh, things that I saw in in red It actually in the last couple of days that made me laugh or not laugh with smile there. Only because I get so jealous I still haven't seen exults this league. Nothing cool has dropped yet besides garbage unique ce which is still fine. But the critic I that posted he did ah ah Contains a valuable gym. He got to You got enlightened and empower both level force. They dropped as a light on level four. Empower little for. And there was other stuff too, but oh, my gosh. I was like, What? The hacky. There was a screenshot of it, and I'm thinking in solar cell found I would leave in a heartbeat. I like buying stuff through a felon. I'm getting stuff, but it was crazy. And then, uh Okay, So there. Did you see? I don't know how often you check credit, but there was a helmet that somebody posted that was crafted. This was It was it was with that the ah, the awaken, her orb. So where you combined the two things? Now I feel like this is a lot because this helmet just Oh, man. Perfect. It's a meat. Well, yeah, it used to be. I mean, it sucks now because zombies are terrible, but Okay, I'm just gonna read through it.Tyler: I don't think they're terrible, ByJustin: the way, we're talking about a bone helmet. Yeah, Minion steal. 20%. Increased is the, uh,Tyler: got Ah. So a max. ImplicitJustin: max. Implicit of minions deal. 20% crease damage plus three toe level of soccer Did Minion Gems socket of gems. Air supported by level 18 million. Life soccer. The gems air supported by level, 18 million damage. Now, if it stopped here, you've already done really, really well. Like, really, really? Well, like last season. Last league. Oh, my God. You could have bought 20 years. It everybody wanted every freaking minion thing. Now, yeah, we're gonna continue on. Minions have 19% increase Max life minions deal 20%. Increased damage, 5% reduced manner. Reserved glow. And he had the intent on it for flesh offering. Granting an additional 21% increase. Attack speed for flesh. And then he had craft. That was insane. Lightning resist.Tyler: But nuts it is. Of course, it's incubating something just to make it even more exciting.Justin: I it just seemed fake when I read it. Yeah, I was like, Oh, my God. I would like last league. I would have liked just two of those options to force their six good things on there.Tyler: I can't tell you how much currency I've spent on console trying to get a plus three to the level of socket 1,000,000 Jim's. I still don't have it. I am trying everything. The craft. I'm going crazy. I make I I can't do it. I can't do it. And then here's this year's this.Justin: Yeah, it's just I don't know what he was crafting. Four. I did Rhea little bit about the threat, and the guy who actually crafted it kind of came on. It was like, I don't know what to do with this, which made me laugh because I would be the same way. I would have been really upset that I didn't have it last league because, I mean, it's awaken. Or that's new, though, isn't it? I mean, you couldn't have really done it, but still,Tyler: no, but it doesn't have to. I mean, I know you're against how zombies were were cut down a bit, this league, but that's not so. I'll be specific by any means. No, I know. But so respect all Dominion buffs from last later still applicable. That thing's crazy but still insane. It's still absurd. That's something like, even if you had a mirror, you would just put that somehow on display just so that you could look at it sometimes,Justin: yeah, It's crazy. I couldn't believe it when I was reading through it. So cool. Yeah, I wanted to just give a quick show boat. We've gotten some pretty cool feedback from people that have been listening and people that have given us some advice and some constructive criticism. You know, the lovely kind, But I want to just give a shout out to all those people and, ah, we don't have a list of everyone, but we're going to start making a list because it's it's a really big deal to us. It really helps us figure out what we should do better for the next ones. And let us know that people enjoy the time that we share together, you know?Tyler: Yeah. No, it's It's been really cool. It's been a lot of fun. We're only five episodes in, but every episode has been listened to more than the previous one, and it's ah, it's exciting to see how it goes, but it's ah oh, we just want to say a big thank you to people that do find this enjoyable, and we definitely would value your feedback for sure. So I know we said at the end of every episode. But just to emphasize, if you tweet us at forever exiled 82. Just positive feedback, negative feedback. Whatever it is, we do want to make this a really good podcast for you and something that lots of path of exile players would really enjoy it here. So let us know what you think. We thank you very much for listening to all the episodes that you already have.Justin: If it's mean we'll start a Twitter war straight up. That's right. Fight to the death of Twitter. All right, cool. Well, listen, Thanks for everybody listening. This, uh, this has been a lot of fun. This was Episode five of Forever Exile. The Path of Exile Podcast. I am one of your host tags, A k a JustinTyler: A key. I'm Tyler, also known as Wrecker of Days......ThanksJustin:  Check out the show Notes below. To find more information on today's episode, you can find us online at www dot forever exiled dot com as well as on Twitter at forever exiled 82

What? You've never been in the nether before? You know you can't sleep, right? We're not supposed to give our opinions, but listen to us talk about it for half an hour. Then you can decide if it makes sense why we don't want to go back. Not convinced yet? This podcast is available for free! And that's a great price. --- This episode is sponsored by · Anchor: The easiest way to make a podcast. https://anchor.fm/app --- Send in a voice message: https://anchor.fm/twin-brain/message

Hunters HD Gold is the Official Eye Wear of USPSA and Steel Challenge anecdotally I have seen their eyewear showing up all over competition shooting starting with where I first saw them at the PCC and Rimfire Championships. If you are aware of Hunters HD Gold odds are you have met my guest Brian Conley. Speaker 1: [inaudible].  Speaker 2: Hey everybody, and welcome back to the Cindy cast on this episode we've got Brian Connolly from hunter's HD gold. They're the official eyewear of USPSA and still challenged. And anecdotally I've been seeing their eyewear showing up all over competition shooting, starting with where I saw them first at the piece of seat and rimfire championships. If you're aware of hunter's HC gold, odds are you've met Brian.  Speaker 3: He's joining us now. How are you doing Brian? Hey, what's going on? Gosh, it's been a, it's been too long since we've been in the dirt together. It's been over a year at this point. It has and I'm have not been back to, um, where we met and um, it, Lucas all arranged so far yet this year. That was a pretty long ago. Yeah. I mean, just to be straight, I don't think anybody has, I mean, I went there twice last year, so I'm not missing, I logged 21 days in that house last year. Well, I never got the pleasure of I'm staying in the house. I had to drive to Warsaw every day, so I got it. Yeah, it's um,  Speaker 4: I, oh, sorry. I got my dog, Lucy here. Who is going to come here? Cool. Get in there. You're going to take a little break. Come on. Oh, you're all over my stuff and we're going to have to drop an edit in here. You're working loose Kendall up. There you go. All. Alright. She is a  Speaker 3: business associate and my secret lover, but um, she's a pain in the ass sometimes. All right, so here we go. So yeah, you know, Lucas, um, it's an interesting thing. They, um, you know, I was involved. So last year I was involved with um, strategic mash design and a couple of other companies that were doing major events and um, I got into it on the, well they wanted me to do media, which translated to, would you also do our prize tables? Wow. Yeah. So I did six last year and um, and then, you know, and it was, I learned a ton. It was totally worth the, the mental exercise. And at the same time, I don't think you'll see me doing that again. I can understand that. I actually had to, um, had the joy of walking a prize table for somebody this year when they weren't gonna be able to walk it.  Speaker 3: And I decided that was the first and last time I want to do that as well. So yeah, I definitely have my, I want to talk about prices with you a little bit cause you guys have been really gracious, but you also have kind of a spin on that that I really like. Um, so then we can talk about a little bit later in the cast as we get deeper into, um, hunter's ht gold specifically. But tell me before we do that a little bit about you, like you started out in insurance, is that what I've, I'm gathering, I've been in retail management since I was, um, 21. Okay. And I, I'm 48 now. Got It. I used to tell everybody I sold everything buddy insurance back. And then I had a friend of mine who was, um, owned an insurance company and he says, Hey, well go get your, go get your license and everything and this and this. He had a  Speaker 5: practice. He was starting up an insurance. I was like, well sure, why not? So 50 exams to the hardest test. I still keep those. I'm insurance licensed current today. He'd taking the ced seat CD be correct. Can't talk, taking the credits every two years to keep my license current in the state of Alabama. So I've got a backup plan. If I ever got to go back and sell insurance, I'm not going to lose my license cause I think now they're requiring a lot more to get your license and insurance, everything else. So every couple of years I walked back into a classroom and take eight hours of credits and um, fulfill those. But based on how everything is going now, I don't really think I'm gonna have to go back down that path. And You Thompson know you guys are having a great run and uh, well so tell me like how do you go from now you, you were born and raised in Alabama, right?  Speaker 5: Yeah, I was born in Tuscaloosa and in 92, um, moved up in Birmingham. I had been in Birmingham area every since. And, um, you know, I got, you know, like I said, I went to school and, um, at the university and, um, when in criminal justice and had a path set there for me but never really finished. Once I get into retail sales, um, got a call from the local police department that I was gonna go work for. And um, they tell me my starting salary, I think back there was going to be 16, five, and at that time in retail management as a young manager at 21 years old, I'd made I think 30 something thousand dollars. So I might've, I made a commitment in our decision and saying, well, I'm not gonna, um, turn around and look back. I can make this much more money and not get shot at.  Speaker 5: And, um, then that's kind of the path that shows every since I got that. And I would, I would imagine there's more than one human being that made that calculation in their lifetime between laundry is one of those things that, um, I've never been in a situation where I haven't had gainful employment based on being in that kind of environment. Had to change jobs a lot because in retail management, the way you may got a pay raise was getting recruited by somebody else certain or changing in a career path to sell something different. So, um, lots of, um, lots of training through that, through the years being able to go from different positions. I've managed and sold everything from, um, let me see, you know, video contents backward guy started in 92 selling big springs and camcorders and after five years that company closed up, they wrote about Tandy Corporation went to go manage your radio check and then I didn't like selling the parts that made the big screens when I was selling the big screen.  Speaker 5: So I got out of that and went to another type of sales. But I've managed everything from targets to the best buys to being in the wireless industry for multiple years. And then, um, then I was in of course like we just talked about selling them insurance with a, um, insurance agency. And then, um, my current wife's ex husband at the time, you know, called me about wanting to do their marketing and, um, stuff for the lab that I worked for now. Yeah. And, um, that was kind of an interesting blend, but we had a great working relationship and, um, started doing marketing in the lab business. So I went from the selling retail to, I'm talking directly to ophthalmologist, not Tom Matricis about how to, um, improve their sales in their field and quote unquote selling the accessories that were up. Because in the optical world, the essential, these are, you know, ars photochromics colors, tans, anything, you know, something besides just the normal thing that insurance is going to cover.  Speaker 5: And I did that for four years and then, um, got involved with, um, I'm all over the place. But then I got involved with, um, two other friends that were, one was a Napkin kinda strain. One was an older gentleman that I've known forever or 15 years now that was in the wireless industry. And we went together and bought some hunting property. And that was in back in, um, 2013. Um, place called triple forks hunting. We do executive hunts and stuff like that. So I had all these tools at the lab and I wanted to make myself a hunting lands and I wanted to, you know, something to enhance my hunting, you know, for what I was doing. Cause I had, um, prescription outwear and I kinda had all the, all the fun toys to play with at the lab to design something. And that's Kinda, you know, the beginnings of where I've got, you know, where I am now.  Speaker 5: So it really cool. So that's optical prescription lab, which is the, the lab, correct? That's correct. And incorrect. Triple fork hunting LLC was something you created in 2013 it looks like. Yup. Yup. That's correct. And that's where we basically, we didn't just want anybody with a hunting license and you know, a gun to come hunt. We wanted to open it up to corporations or a place for them to bring their employees and um, and really have a place to, you know, bond and um, team build based on the, you know, you know, to build the relationships with either their clients or their employees and works extremely well. And one of my business partners is still running that more. I'm not running it as much based on where hundreds HD go does that now. So I'm lane is really stepped up and made a difference for that, keeping it going on the side.  Speaker 5: So cool. I'm always curious about something. So you're, you're, I mean at this point, whether you intended to or not, you're heavily involved in the firearms industry. Um, and so, well you're not selling guns. You're definitely directly marketing to that group with both the hunting and the, the, the hunters HD gold. So did you grow up with guns? Did you, how'd you fall out? This is, my dad had guns and um, we always use, I mean, we used to only brought them out. Usually when we traveled, it was kind of the time he put the gun in the, you know, in the trunk. And we traveled to Texas to see his family and my mom's family in Fort Worth, you know, Dallas area. And that's how I remember about growing up with the guns that don't really have the history of out shooting guns myself. I just remember my dad would always take guns out there and trade with some relatives and stuff like that. Um, October of 2011, my, um, father passed away and we stayed with him the last two years of his life. I'm helping him. He died of, um, cancer and he was in a situation where, um,  Speaker 1: yeah,  Speaker 5: that's where I inherited, you know, seven guns that he wanted me to have guns. You know, why? Um, grandfather was the mayor of, um, Bessemer, Alabama for 18 years. So he had these guns that bought a shot, guns and um, all these 11 Remington, 11 hundreds that were, um, back from the fifties and sixties. And how all these pictures with, um, local, um, celebrities, we'll call it the, um, bear Bryant's and stuff like that of shooting these guns and out shooting together and doing a bunch of 'em dog hunting and stuff. So there's a lot of history with these guns that I inherited. And that's Kinda what got everything started. Cause every time I look at sharing, we're talking or something, I always like, you know, you realize your fathers, you know, started this back in 2011, just had no idea where I was going to go. Yes.  Speaker 5: So that kind of got me involved in, you know, collecting guns and um, and getting started there in 2011. And that's what caused me that, you know, back here in the, um, previous presidency where I was wanting to say anyway, he bought some property and, you know, I have a place to shoot this and train and you know, hot and, you know, and everything else that was being, you know, jeopardize back in the, um, the 2000, you know, late 2000. Yup. Years of that. And, um, that's kind of where everything got started. And then when I actually had a gentleman, when we were building the lake at, um, triple forks hunting and, um, had a gentleman, Marketo bulldozer, it, it was moving dirt for the lake and he comes up to me and goes, hey, I need you to get me some more of this wasp spray.  Speaker 5: Um, that looks like it's in Pelham, Alabama. And I was like going, Huh, it's in my backyard. Sure. I go and look into it. Yeah. And, um, so I took this can, it was, um, kind of rainbow wasp spray. So I took it to the building and um, had to be buzzed in. They weren't open to the public and I was like, I walked to the door and I was like, Hey, I want to buy this wash spray. And I'm like, well, we really don't sell to the public, but hold on one second. And they went back in the back and then gentleman came out and he was like, where'd you hear about this? And I want it just to go on a bulldozer and I'm no, Port Alabama handed it to me and said, you know, come get some. He goes, well, we really don't.  Speaker 5: Some of the public, you know, but, but however, you know, here's the icing on the land of Basaam and you know, so forth and I'll let my business card with you before it's hunting. And he gave me his, um, and um, I went off on my merry way and went online and ordered some. And um, then about, yes, about a week later, if not yet, not that long. Um, the one of the owners of Rainbow Technologies, Larry Joe steely junior called me up and says, you know, hey, I see that you have a hunting camp and, um, so forth and tell me about that. When did that process, and he actually booked a hunt with his brother and one of his employees to come out there during hunting season. And then, um, we become a cane. You know, Franz went after, did the hunt together in the early fall, late fall season when the hunting season was starting.  Speaker 5: And, um, he saw the lenses there that I had used. I'd made up some just some demo stuff there as you want to use tested with, um, you know, people that were coming to hunt. I'd already was testing the lens with some game wardens, stuff like that. You know, just trying to get their feedback and stuff cause I was made a lens that, you know, allowed me to see a lot earlier in the mornings to hunt and in the state of Alabama hunting hours of defined 30 minutes before sunrise and 30 minutes after sunset. These were actually bringing in enough light to be able to hunt during those hours when it's pretty dark. So having the hunting property, I'd already made friends with a bunch of the game wardens cause I wanted them to be, you know, the places, two hours from where I live. So I always wanted them around the property to be able to keep watching what was going on and gave them full rights to come out there anytime they wanted to.  Speaker 5: They saw some suspicious, you know, come hang out at the place and you know, using this, it's kind of your home base. So that met Larry and Larry come out there and did a hunt and he got me involved in them. He goes, you ever do any competitive shooting or anything? And I was like, no. And um, he was doing cowboy action shooting and not a time slap, you know, single action shooting to Saudi SAS. And he got me involved in that and I was pretty intrigued cause I always, you know, like I said, I was collecting guns that look like this was going to give me another reason to, um, to buy some more guns, which I was all about. So got my cowboy outfits together and um, we got me at, um, an 1873 navy arms of Winchester that had been ridden and um, couple of Ruger voke heroes that we'd set off to have tripped out.  Speaker 5: Um, stoker double barrel shotgun and I wish you can. Cowboy action shooting was a blast. And I've had these lenses I've made there and I'm using them. And couple of locals there were like, what are you wearing? It's awesome. And made Larry Joe some of course, and he was all about it. And Larry Joe steely, if you don't recognize that name, he's the gentleman that now alone still target paint. Oh Man. That's the correlation there. This is before still target pink was even created. Yes. So if this time, you know, he was telling me, you know, I'm thinking about making a paint for the steel targets, he saw a need there. And um, the locals were all kind of intrigued about what I'd done with these. Lindsay goes, I really think you got something here. You gotta to see what you can do with it. And I started getting more intrigued cause I was already, I was kind of, you know, thought about going down the hunting road and I was doing a couple of, I didn't do any shows.  Speaker 5: I was visiting a couple of 'em, you know, directs expos and stuff like that. Just trying to see what was going on and made it a couple of visits to shot show with, um, some of my friends that start arms, they're hearing best from Alabama, about 20 minutes away and became good friends with them. So I was, you know, intrigued in what was really happening around the lands and what kind of feedback I was going to get. So I went to shot show a couple of years before it was, um, anything just to see if anybody was offering something I'd already created in the lab and make sure I wasn't walking into something that was already there. So why create something that somebody else is already putting out there? And there's already a market that's already been exposed to it.  Speaker 5: Um, come to find out there was nobody that was putting a traffic's lands together with a photochromatic combination. And, um, so I was even more intrigued to see where this would really go. And then I guess about a year later, Larry Joe Staley Jr was running, you know, had his thing going with still target paint. And he had called me up and says, I think I found a way pressed again and the competitive shooting, I was like, what do you mean? You know, everybody, you know, Sass already knows about it locally. You talked about something that goes, no, no, I think it's something bigger. Even with this thing called steel challenge. He goes, he had met a, he had met a competitive shooter named Steve Foster out of Georgia and was thinking about putting a team together. And um,  Speaker 1: okay,  Speaker 5: he asked me if I wanted to, um, sponsor the team. I was like, well sure, what does that, what do you want? What do you want to do? He goes, well, I'm just very, we put them all in hunters, HD gold. Well I'll put a Jersey together and we'll get your, you know, logo on the Jersey. And I said, sure, why not? Sounds great. And um, that's Kinda how I got involved with, um, steel challenge. Really cool. Wow. Oh my goodness. An interesting, you know, why do you get into it? Cause I had no idea what I was doing and I was, you know, I knew what I was doing on the land side, but I had no idea what the, um, competitive shooters of steel challenged was. I knew about Calloway shooting cause I've been doing that for about, you know, six or eight months, you know, once or twice a weekend.  Speaker 5: And I had a lot of fun with that. I didn't really think it was going to go much farther. And I was focused on the hunting side. So we were already testing a lot of products at triple forks hunting. I was obtained up with, um, Pradco, they're here in Birmingham as well and they all, they all Moultrie summit on tree stands Code Blue Night and hell game calls a lot of other brands. Yeah, I had come pretty close with veil and still close with them. Today. I'm testing their products out in the field and I'm had a lot of those guys, you know, helping me. Um, did some testing with hunters HD going and having some other avenues with on the hunting side. You know, with, I'm trying to get a hundred HD go to see what kind of um,  Speaker 5: way I could break into the industry. You kind of see what that looks like with my, with my lenses, but I'm meeting, I'm stay, you foster kinda change that entire direction. I kind of told the hunters I'll be back with you later. This is something that's really happening now. And Steve Foster had actually told me that um, he was always finished in second and third and once he got a hold of the 160 go and he was actually finishing first, that's the only thing he changed. Found that kind of, you know, intriguing because I didn't realize, you know what, I was really opening up to the competitive shooters to find them a shooting at vantage. I knew we had one in cowboy action shooting, but the targets are a lot closer and there's not much distance involved. It was just about more of transitioning and being able to work a leap or action and reloading your shotgun fast regardless,  Speaker 3: regardless of the platform, regardless of the game. I think Jerry Mitchell, he says it best is like you can see it fast, you can shoot it fast.  Speaker 5: Yup. And that's what [inaudible] when we were thinking about slogans, we were going through that, my wife and um, we were going back and forth cause one of the things she said is you can only shoot as fast as you can. See that's what it is. That's what it is. She always wants to put something together with the lenses being able to change in the eye. And she actually came up with a slogan as well. They changed so you don't have to. So that was kind of, you know, that kind of told a story about you know, the land without, you know, getting too much into it just because I have a lot of people would still walk up to the tent today when I traveled and I go, what is this? They changed it. I'll have to, and it just opens up the story. So it's working real well.  Speaker 3: That's really good. Well, okay, this is like, you just opened up like a bout a thousand conversations. Okay, good. So first thing I want to say is, is I've been, I've been in the firearms industry now for Ah, well, let's see. I've been really engaged as a consumer for about seven or eight years now and I've been engaged as a service provider for let's say five or six of those years. And I can't tell you how many people stumble into their careers. Like I just was looking for something for myself that worked better. Alex gun works. Great example. That guy just wanted a gun that worked better for himself, made a gun work great, kept making him. Um, you know, I'm here, I hear this over and over and it's really interesting to me how few people in the modern games are, um, on the gaming side of things.  Speaker 3: Uh, started with hunting and started a lot. I mean like, you know, you and I both grew up, like I didn't grow up around guns and sound like you, you know, you had him in the House, dad had him, but no, it wasn't like you grew up shooting every weekend or he lived on the farm shooting all the time. Um, and just how many people have like really who have really advanced the sports significantly come from like a whole different world of um, you know, uh, firearms used to saw post 18, you know, um, it's fascinating. But let's do this. I um, so when you were starting to develop this lens, so let's just explain this to those who you know, I'll give the simpleton. So for those of you who aren't watching this on video or you've never seen 180 gold lens is a essentially a very bright yellow lens, not unlike what you've seen in inexpensive, um, lenses.  Speaker 3: Like, if you just saw somebody walking by, you know, you find that like you buy the three pack, there's the smoke, there's the red and there's the yellow and you throw away the yellow and you take the smoke and the red with you out to the right, you know? Um, and so it looked kind of like that, but then you put them on and instead of it just liking everything, like super vivid and uncomfortable. Cause when I wear yellow lenses, I'm just like, I mean it's just like I'm being assaulted by light. I don't like it. You put these on and it takes a second. Especially if you haven't worn them before and then you sort of like, I don't know, you're like relax into this. Just sort of flow a light into your eyes all day. And what you don't notice is they're photochromatic so they're adjusting and the amount of light they're letting in based on the conditions outside, which is something like, you know, if he told me his photochromatic I immediately would be thinking of my brother's like 1978, you know, a glasses that he wore that were just not cool by even 1978 standards does that.  Speaker 3: But as a shooter, as a competitor outside all day long and all kinds of different light, you know, light's always changing and you're either switching lenses all day long or your, you know, you could wear these and they give you that all day sense. And I, I use them all the time. Um, I have them, I mix them with a couple of other things and I want to talk about that with you in a second. Cause I've recently gotten into this tactical games thing and um, I think I need a specific set of la or like frame for that. I got it. I'll talk to you about that, maybe offline, but like, um, cause I've got, I w you know, you made me, you gave me a set of the archers right away, the day that we were out there and um, at, I think that was PCC championships, there's a PCC roll championship.  Speaker 3: Give you a pair of orange shoes to wear around. I wore, Oh man, I wore them all. I wore them for the two days of the event. And see for me the biggest issue I have is I'm always transitioning back and forth between shooting the guns and dealing with cameras and electronics when all that kind of stuff. So like I'm changing things now. My eyes have gotten a little a showing off my, you know, readers right now, but my eyes in the last couple of years have significantly, um, diminished and quality. But I'm, I'm always switching back and forth between glasses, between what I'm shooting with when I'm working with, you know, polarized glasses, make my screen look like crap. Um, you know, there's a lot, whatever you go back and forth. So like I where it's just become kind of a thing for me. I've always got three or four pairs when I'm going to shoot and do cameras.  Speaker 3: I always just wear the eight hundreds HD gold now cause they just worked perfectly for both. Um, and the only negative is occasionally I've got to flip them up so that I can like make sure my color balance is correct before I start filming something. I have on a couple of occasions gotten an under saturated shot cause my lenses were exaggerating the Co, you know, so much the color richness. So, um, and I just, so I use them all the time and you've got a couple of friends here up in town now. Like A, Dustin Sanchez is one who is wearing your lens now and um, and they're released. We made him a pair of custom pair as well. Yeah, I know. I know we're all were us three gunners or a bunch of premadonnas or like I can't possibly wear  Speaker 5: in shooting sports offhand. That I think I learned that the hard way at the PC works with PCC world championship and everybody goes, Oh, all righty.  Speaker 3: Yeah. Well look, I mean, and I, you and I had a pretty cool interview. If you go to the huck origins youtube channel, there's an interview of the two of us that I did, um, at the PCC champion. No rimfire we met at PCC, but we did that when it rimfire and I'd had some experience then with your lens and that's when you made me the ones in the Oakleys. I was like, I love these lenses. I don't like the frames. Okay. Whatever. So, and we've had this conversation, we don't need to rehash this, but um, so you made me a set of Oakleys I took a set up. Yeah. I think I took a set out of my car and sent him with you. And you made a set of Oakleys for me with these lenses. And those were the ones that were, I mean, I literally wear 'em all the time.  Speaker 3: That where I'm driving around I where I'm there, they're kind of my constant rotation. If I'm wearing black boots, I'm wearing my hunters h g gold for wearing brown boots. I'm probably still wearing my Oakleys, but you know, so, um, so that's Kinda like I'm a pretty simple guy. It's like my glasses go with my boots. Um, but, um, and then I wear them, you know, all summer. I am also setting up matches I'm doing. And then I shoot the match and they work all day for all of that. And we run right up until nine o'clock here in Minnesota, which this time of year we're getting to the point where it's almost dark and I'm not switching to clears, which is just huge. Um, I can't, I wouldn't tell you if there's an advantage per se, um, in my shooting, but I'm not at the level where like any, especially any more where like you, I would notice such a subtle difference.  Speaker 3: Right. You know, not, not a hundred thought at first place, you know. Um, and so, but I will say that just from a personal comfort level, they're fantastic. And then I wear 'em all the way home in the car because I have like a blue light thing. It's like I tried to get my s I'm really conscious of my sleep and um, and they block some of the blue light from my car all the way home, but I could still see and drive and they blocked glare. So they just kind of cover me from the moment I leave the house till the moment I come home and I never, the glass is just managing that. So that's kind of like the layman's term of what they're doing. But I'm curious from your standpoint, like what was the design philosophy like? I mean, I know you tried a bunch of different things, but what did you finally end up with? Well, there was a lens that came out  Speaker 5: how many years ago? Back in the light, I guess early two thousands and then went through the probably 2010 or left. And that was a, um, company that had put out a actual actual shooting and hunting lands that had been discontinued. And that gave me an idea where to start at, because when I was talking to my wife about what I wanted to do, she goes, I think there's already something like this out there. I said, well, why is it not being, you know, talked about? And she was like, well, doctors don't, the aren't talking about it because they aren't asking their patients lifestyle questions. They're just trying to get through as a general thing. They're just trying to get through and do the eye exams and try to control what insurance is going to pay him. But they're not selling multiple pairs of glasses. Right. And that's something we deal with every day still today in the optical industry.  Speaker 5: You know, trying to get doctors to talk about more lapdog questions. Because when you get into people's, you know, what they do besides, you know, just going to work every day, you know, they need glasses for different things that they do. And if you're on a computer all day, there's a computer lands. If you're playing golf, there's a golfing lens. If you need no shooting and hunting, we now know there's a hunting lands. If you are driving, there's a driving lens that helps out for different things. And I'm fishing of course you need Polaroid polarized lenses and fishing and you need prescription polarized lenses and you know, you can find that by actually talking to people. And that's what I kind of brought to the optimum industry with all my years of experience in retail was qualifying a customer to really, you know, talk to them and find out what other needs they may have than just needing quote unquote glasses.  Speaker 5: And that's what gave me the idea of running into so many different things, whether it be with a hunting lands, because you know there's a lake, I don't know how much you want to remember. I'd probably do somewhere, but going through all the R and d of the one away lenses that this thing I'll work cause I know work. Yes, I like this, but no I don't like this. And then, you know, we, we threw away a lot trying to find the right combination of what we wanted to do and, or what we wanted to accomplish and what we wanted to accomplish was, um, one, we knew that the base of being tribex was superior to plastic or polycarbonate hands down because tribex by itself is lighter and stronger than plastic or polycarbonate, and also allows 43% more light to pass through the lens than polycarbon now.  Speaker 5: Okay. Wow. We knew the only other optics that are better than tribex is glass. And we didn't want to have glass anywhere around any including my own, anywhere near around our eyes as something catastrophic happen because glass, you know, shards and just is a disaster for your eyes. Yeah. That's not that dog will hunt. But believe it or not, I still see people wearing Kostas every day when they go shooting. And that's just, you know, I like coach. I, there's that role with that coach is a great brand. So [inaudible] jams. There's a lot of great brands out there in the [inaudible] industry, but those are fishing glasses. And that's how they marketed. But people still use them today because they want the, you know, the big C on there, you know, they're on their truck when they go hunting. That's just part of it. Totally. But if you stand around any three gun match, you rimfire match anything where the steels be in shot, you're going to eventually end up a wipe and blood off your face from a frat.  Speaker 5: Yeah, exactly. And when I went to my, when I went to Sherri and I said, this is where I'm wanting to go with this, I really think I've got something. And um, she goes, well, where the hell is our liability? I'm not taking a company. We started back in 1977 and gets screwed up or something. We just coming up with and I was like, oh, well that makes sense. I said, hell no, I'll get back with you. So about two days later, I got back with it. I said, I figured it out. We're gonna do everything. And um, OSHA safety frames and all the lenses. We're going to do an ansi standard 2015 cause most of the cyclins that are out there, only 2000, three, 2010 and we're going to take it all we 2015 and she says, well get me the OSHA certificate and you can go from there.  Speaker 5: And um, about six months later I got everything approved going through a lot, some more trials and this working and not working and paying a lot of money to have a bunch of lenses come back to me and didn't pass and trying to figure out why and put other coatings together and other solutions together to finally get the certificate. And um, we move forward at that point. And that's what informed the original selection of frames. Correct. Is the ocean rating. That's, you know, that's why we have the frames we have, cause they're all Ziad, seven plus one and z 87 plus two for prescriptions. And that's the difference than our frames are. And you should have saw the frames that were out when we first got started. We'd come along on frames because you know, there's no such thing as a sexy safety frame. And now wife to this day still hates these frames as a huddle.  Speaker 5: And the new velocity that we just came out with was another frame style that finally came out that we worked with the manufacturer to get some that were listening to us to try to get some things like we want. And that's kind of where we're at now. And I've got some, still have some frame manufacturers I'm working with up in New York area that are, you know, tried to design more and more stuff. That is, I'm quote unquote getting more of a more photo friendly. Here's your commitment. Those to stay OSHA approved with all of your frames. It is okay. And the reason being is is it's about safety. We're talking about safety, we're talking about protecting the only two eyes you're gonna have period. And you know, do we have some stuff out there? What? You've got one that's not us framing. We have the conversation, it's got the same properties, it's got the same thickness, it's got the same everything. But you've got to remember, I can't put an anti rated frame and a non safety frame. So conversation I have with you, you got the same thing. It just doesn't have the Ansi markings. Correct. It won't, you know, based on what OSHA has put in front of us, it will not, you know, provide the same protection. But conversation is, is this the same thickness as the same everything you know, it should, you know, just don't have the same, you know, Angie ratings on, yeah.  Speaker 3: So does that, does that make it impossible to have a, a lens that has no w you know, sorry I say this better. Does that make it impossible to create an OSHA rated lens that doesn't have any frame around like the bottom half for example?  Speaker 5: Not at all. There's one thing about it, there's not an interchangeable lands out there that is OSHA approved. I got now. Now that was saying that we are working on some things now on a model that's going to roll out if everything still goes as planned in January of 2020 yeah. So we have been, we've got some things in testing. We're still waiting to get some stuff back from, um, the writings. But there is that OSHA approved, you know, rimless frame that we are working on. That's going to be a game changer for almost to get into the shotgun world more. And also to get in a situation where we can deliver what you and all the other shooters you're telling me, you know, hey, what can we do to get nothing at the bottom? What can we do to get nothing, you know, there, so we're working on that.  Speaker 5: Um, that's gonna be a whole different, um, level of taking it to the next level for hunters HD because one of those things that's going to be, you know, we've still got to worry about the, um, the safety, but we're trying to listen very diligently to every, you know, shooter we can to get the feedback. Cause when I do demo days, I do it for two reasons. One is to go out there and use the Lens, you know, I know what they're going to like about it, but I want to, I want to hear more from the shooters that don't like it. Yes. Can I tell them that? Because if this is where I can take the brand in the future, does it mean it's going to happen tomorrow? No, but if I get enough feedback on a certain area, just like we were talking about now with rem lists, then guess what?  Speaker 5: The future is bright. We're going to have a rimless site, the frame going as planned. And when you talk about that then you're talking about different shapes and different things best. Let's make clear, it's not going to be just a one piece frame. We've talked about one piece lands, we talked about that before, that that's an injected molding process and it's all, you know, call the carpet. There's a lot of things there that, you know, we're limited to the blanks of the, of the, of the lands itself at 80 millimeters. You know, it's gonna have to still be two separate lenses, but it's going to be something that is going to be, you know, lighter and uh, keep the same strength as well.  Speaker 3: Well let me, let me dig into this a little bit cause this is like really interesting to me personally. And I, you know, and I don't know if others will enjoy it. And that's not really why I do this. Um, so, so really cool. So like I would say, you know, arguably, well first of all, there's, there's a lot of great conversations and I want to exclude a handful of things to begin with to make life really easy and fair for us to have a conversation. So, um, I let me say this anecdotally, I am standing at Ahrens and arms, which is an awesome gun shop here in town. We sell lots of high end equipment, lots of high end guns. If you want three gun gear, you're probably coming or USPSA gear, you're probably coming to us, right? And they'll, um, I can't tell you how many people are like, like, I mean, just like, uh, obsessing about the details between two or three, $2,000 optics for their rifle.  Speaker 3: And then they tell me that and I asked them what shooting glasses they're wearing and they're spending about $45 over the counter. And I'm like, ew, this doesn't matter. Get the cheapest thing possible. Cause you know, if you're not gonna look through a good lens. So we can, we're excluding everything in the, in the lower cost categories for the most part in this conversation. Right. And I say that because, you know, this is one thing about a hundred days she called. This is not an inexpensive lens, right? That's correct. Yeah. And so this is somebody who's looking for a very high end, very tailored lens specifically for what they're up to. Now you go into rim fire or steel challenge shooters, they're always living with a single focal point with their eyes or sh or directly through the glass and they're making small adjustments, right? They're not having to like calculate targets, you know, 90 degrees to their left in order to see where that's happening before they break a shot and move.  Speaker 3: Right? There's certainly not dealing with what we're dealing with, whether they're looking through the top of their eyes and the bottom of their eyes, depending on the angle up and down, they're dealing with [inaudible] long range rifle shooting. So, um, then we kind of get into like what's out there in the, you know, premium marketplace and really there's only a couple. And I would assume you hear a lot about Oakley in your world, right? Just cause the Oakley's the, um, the painless, you know, there's a lot of ranger arms, there's a lot of Nice stuff. Yeah. And they make two lenses. We specifically see a lot of in our world, which is the flax, which is a two lens interchangeable model. And then the tombstones, they have a couple of versions of the wraith and whatever. Um, and I have a set of the tombstones that I use.  Speaker 3: Those are my primary, if I'm doing lots of shooting on multiple angles at different, you know, targetry and all kinds of stuff, that's one of my go to lenses because it's lightweight wraps around the head and I've got completely unobscured vision anywhere. I might, you know, angle the gun short of like shooting down through my feet, which doesn't happen very often. Oh yeah, it has happened, but it doesn't have ever happened. That's usually a result of some sort of catastrophic mistake. On my part where now the only way that you can engage the target is on my back through my legs. Um, but that's a hasn't happened. It has. Um, and that's, I go to that Lens for that very specific reason. So big terrain matches lots of running, lots of open space. That's something I'm wearing. Um, that's the only other shooting lens that I wear besides the HD Gold's now.  Speaker 3: And, um, and so for me, that's the one thing about these glasses that I, you know, and even with my Oakleys, which are perfect, um, that's the one time that I don't wear them. And that's just because I just don't have the Mo. I mean those, I think the wraith and the, the tombstone line has got arguably the most field of view available without obstruction on the marketplace. So I'm not sure where I'm going with this other than to say like, how are you dealing with that? Um, cause you're, you're convincing three gunners, slowly but surely, I'm starting to see these things show up. Um, you know, obviously it's an objection you're dealing with. What is the conversation like around that?  Speaker 5: Um, take them to trial. Yeah. Really, really tight. Come and try him. Um, cause I, and I've had this conversation with some shooters, I won't mention their name, but because they are very, they do a lot of training and they're very specific in what they do. And I don't want to get involved in some detailed conversations. Yeah. When the, when you try them and you use them and you put yourself in a, and when I, I'll back up 20 seconds, I'll tell you, I'll tell them to take them with them off the stages. Yeah. Well the walk that, you know, they got to 10 minutes so I'll take, take them with the law at this stage. No, I can, when I did a lot of matches, especially three Golytely, they've all been championships. Nobody likes to change gear in the middle of the match. Correct.  Speaker 5: I get that they're already there. They're there to win. They'd been practicing. So take them and try and when you want the stage. And that's my soft approach to saying, put them on, see where the contrast is and when you walked the stages, you know, walk and see exactly what's happening when you move your head with these lenses. Um, come to find out with the new velocity that we have, um, that we just came out with in January for USPSA Ayers gives a lot wider view than people imagine with a smaller lands. And that's a little bit more wrap on it. But  Speaker 1: yeah,  Speaker 5: people are finding out, you know, when they, when they see me at the [inaudible] that can put them on, they're like, well I can see this. I can see that. Well of course you're not engaged in high heart rate, high situation, the timer's not going off and your focus is not where it needs to be, which is through your optics, where your sides, um, when this happens for lack of a better vision, for lack of better words, tunnel vision and your direct focus has taken over. Yup. You don't notice anything but what you're looking at and what's your end game? 100% I call alligator brain. There, there is transition period where you have to cut your eyes and be ready for the next target. But it doesn't really affect that either. On some of the frame styles we have, there are some, we had their closed off and that's, you know, it's not good.  Speaker 5: But I always tell people, you know, we have the discussion when I go to these matches, you know, they say, well, what's the difference? I was so, all the lenses are the exact same. So the only differences yet and what we're looking for in a frame, they pick this up. I'm like going, that's not gonna work. Try this one. And I'll put them in. I push towards the gauge, the aviator, um, for the, for the 70s, you know, look, or the either the velocity because I know the rat allows a lot more. Yes, you can get it. I have fun with all these, you know, [inaudible] it doesn't bother me when people say, well, I look like a, you know, an old, you know, seventies, you know, you know, porn star, it doesn't bother me. You know, it's not my fault. They have a mustache. That's right.  Speaker 5: But oh wait, we have a lot of fun with it. But truth be told, it's once we get past the vanity, which is not easy to do. I want, I want people to focus on the lens. And when people try and when they go out and use them, they're like, you know, they come back going, well I didn't notice any of the sides. You know, I don't want to look at somebody and say, well you're not gonna notice that when you shoot, cause I don't shoot myself. I just know based on what the eyeball does, I don't want to get in people's, you know, I not tell them what they're gonna say or how they're going to see it go track theirself. And I guess getting back to the answer, your question specifically is just go demo it for yourself. Go try it. Um, does it work every time?  Speaker 5: No, but I get the feedback I need where I can take it to the next level. And, um, when, you know, like I said, what's going to happen come January is going to be, you know, a lot of people coming back around and saying it's time for me to try it again. Well that's really good. So let's transition just a little bit. I mean the one thing I've really noticed cause I, I did a little dive on like the overall like um, know like I would for any company that solicited my business, the marketing firm, right. This is just do a little dive in like what, where you are, where you're out there in the digital space and all that. And you know, I mean you have a decent presence on several sites but I mean the main thing that you've seem to be doing is you're out there every weekend at the match, putting the glasses in people's hands.  Speaker 5: Is that the last year primary strategy for the company? It's, it's one of those things where when I talk to Sherry about it, I said I've got to go educate people on lenses and technology. You can't do that. You can, but nobody's going to just take the time to go to the benefits page 160 and go and study that. I mean, it's there, everything's there. But to be able to actually talk to somebody about it and actually say, well, why is it doing this compared to this? And I get to talk about the technology to people and educate when I go to these matches. I'm not, you know, this sounds crazy. I've been in, I've been in sales my whole life. I'm not there to just sale. I'm there to educate and build relationships. Yup. That's what it's all about. I've been doing, you know, I have so many people don't have some people walk up that are in sales saying, why didn't you ask for the order?  Speaker 5: I'm like going, they're not ready to buy yet. They're going to let you know. I can get, don't get me wrong, I can sell it better. I've been doing it all my life, but I go out there and I start selling and promoting and putting somebody in a position where they're going to go home and go, what the hell did I just buy? Right? Then you have buyer's remorse that for sure in the social media world that we live in today, you know, that can kill your writings real quick. You don't want that. And that's one reason why when I do demo days, there truly is no pressure. My job is to educate, let people experience it. And even on the prescription side, I actually make your prescription before you buy it and you get to demo with your prescription as well. There's nobody ever heard of this before, and my wife goes, you've lost your mind. I've got doctors that don't pay their bill. I said, you don't these shooters, myself being a shooter when I got started. Yep. The, we're different and we're not going to be known as that individually. We're not gonna be known as that guy or that person that didn't pay for something. And especially Zuni world. It's a very, it's a, it's an amazingly huge shooting world, but it's a small world when it comes to somebody doing something or not supposed to do  Speaker 3: blows me away. I, it's one thing, I mean obviously you've gotten to know a lot of shooters now and you've, you've come to a conclusion that um, that many do. I mean, I take a, I'm like the only game in Minnesota that'll take a credit card for a matching and I don't ask people to sign, which is obviously a, a liability from a business standpoint. Never even crossed my mind. I'm like, we don't, we don't  Speaker 5: either. It's just one of those things that, you know, I always have people ask me all the time, you know, especially I get a lot of emails and everybody goes, what's the warrant? I'm like going, well, what it a warranty warranty? A warranty is nothing but a state of mind. Correct? Correct. Okay. I've sold extended warranties to all the places I worked. I've sold warranties, I've sold, I've sold people a state of mind. And the reason being that there's no actual warranty listed on the website is because warranties don't have to really be curated until somebody take it takes advantage of something. Now let me tell you what I mean by that. My philosophy, when somebody catches a frag or something happens, they contact me. I'm just gonna replace the Lens. Yep. No questions asked. Um, if somebody sends me a pair of glasses that have had, um, I can, I can we say lenses every day by our doctors that returned stuff for warranty.  Speaker 5: It's where the manufacturer, we are the warranty. We handle everything. Yep. So seeing lenses come every day, I can tell when a lens has been abused. You know what I mean by abused is leaving it just on the dash your car in extreme heat, um, cleaning it, um, and causing scratches because of clean. Um, we see everything and that people try to put my people a lot smarter than me in the lab here. You know, we know how to identify things. So when I talk to people about, you know, cleaning, you know it with, they come with cleaning instructions, like they come with a, they come a z clear, which is a cleaner, an atoll fogging agent, you know that, you know, we try to do anti fogging in house. I have all the tools to do it in the house, but there's another heating and cooling process that causes us to fail Ansi standards.  Speaker 5: So we had to find an outside source and I met up with um, Chris Ward who owns z clear and then that's why we package everything and hunter's HD go. Was he clear? There are specific things we put in place with every part of the process to be able to try to overcome the objections before they become objections. And I've had people that have brought me lenses before saying I've got this stuff in here. I can't get it off the lens. Am I going? Yeah, this is where pretty much you cleaned your lenses with your jersey, where your shirt, which is the worst thing to do because every bit of dust and dirt that's on that Jersey is going to get in there. And that's what scratches and this, it's when you're using that, I'll talk to them. I say, well take them back. I'm still replace them for weed because I'm here to, I mean I'm not here to sell another pair of lenses every time someone has a problem or I'm here to, you know, build customers for life.  Speaker 5: So I'll tell them, you know, well next time before you clean your lenses, take whatever liquid you have, be it, um, water, kool-aid and Gatorade poured on lenses cause there's a hydrophobic top coat that's not gonna allow anything to stick to them. Then clean them with the stuff that we provided. And then, you know, here's a new, you know, here's your, here's a set of lenses and replaced no charge. If this happens again, I'm gonna charge you $2,000. So it's just, you know, cause we've had, you know, it's all a part of training happens. Um, so, you know, we, I have fun and I'm not just dealing with, you know, if somebody has a problem, it's just not a customer. I said it's a person. I've met some person I've come to know and we have, we have a real life conversation just like we just had, you know, she's like, this is, this is how you, how you can overcome this in the future.  Speaker 5: Don't do that. It's so clear. Cause I see you out there and there's just, there's always a line of people to come talk to you and check them out and figure it out. And part of that is, I also have been, I don't know if you're still doing this, but at least the last season you were doing like a custom set of glasses for each, for each. Yes. I still, I still do that. Getting Ready to, you know, not when I'm sure this podcast is going to be produced, I mean published, but I'll be somewhere else this weekend with another custom pair everywhere I go. And um, that's, that's part of the fun because it does two things. One, it brings people to the tent to see what I've got. Cause I don't ever release any pictures of it until the day of. So people want to come see what I've put together and I gathered their email address for any kind of, you know, a future marketing's or any new product releases.  Speaker 5: What's a good way to, you know, the catcher that on the business side, I'm always have people all the time ask me, you know what, they email me all the time. I said, I don't have time that, you know, so you may get an email once or twice a year about product, you know, a new product update or something that's happening in the, in the, in the honey hundreds HD gold world. But, um, those are mine to keep and I'm not going to sell in anybody. So, um, I've had people ask me in the industry, you know, hey, can I get, you know, have some email addresses for this and this? And I'm like, no, I can't do that. Just like the, when I became part of the USPSA I talked to them and I said, do y'all have an emails out there that can market to, and it's actually in their bylaws, the answer's no, which is fine.  Speaker 5: So I still had to create a way to, you know, build my own list and um, my list I feel in some cases is better than their list because um, if they're not at the award ceremony, the only way I'm going to contact and let them know is through email cause I'm not collecting phone numbers or anything else. So they, they're, you know, they're inclined to give you their correct email address. So when I do have time to send out an email about a product release or what we're doing on youtube or whatever we're doing, um, which has happened, not all think, but once this year when our first time I contest the beginning of the year that lasted out the entire year, they actually emailed everybody. And when are, when I sent out that email, I had a pretty high, I mean, think my open rate was like 80 something percent. So that's pretty high based on talking to other people that are only getting 20 or 30% of their open rates. So kidding. When I email somebody, it's like, hey, you know, it's not very often and you know, we all get those emails two or three times a day from the same company and we, you know, they just become like, I just need to go away. They just see everything and you stuff  Speaker 3: that's a real markable number. Right? That's like, I mean, when we were marketing my mom, uh, my family's been residential real estate for a very, very long time and she was very early on in the email marketing and when we were sending out emails, you know, like 2005 to 10, somewhere in there, 70 to 90% open rate was like pretty awesome. Right? Uh, but now 70 90% is like three x. They did not it. Like I told you, when I go meet all these people, what am I doing? I'm, I'm making friends, I'm building relationships. How many times you open an email from your friend [inaudible] it's all about building that relationship. Well, the other thing too is, I mean, I don't know if you're aware of this, but like I, you know, if you went to American Express and you asked them for email addresses that were as fine tuned as humanly possible to get, um, to get like the right client, right?  Speaker 3: You'd pay like five to $10 per email address. Wow. And that's nothing compared to how refined they are when they opt in directly to your company. Right. So when I tell my clients, for example, is like on your website, wherever you're at, consider that every time someone gives you an email address, it's like they handed you a $5 bill and that's on the bottom of the value of it, right? And you start looking at these assets. I mean, we've got companies that have 10, 12,000 email addresses. I mean, that's a 50 or $60,000 minimum asset that people have built up over time. Um, you know, look, I mean you're not in a position where tomorrow going to come along  Speaker 5: and say you can't market anymore on Facebook because you're a, you know, you're in the protective. Oh really? Some of the tags I've done, I've had some stuff taken down before. Just people shooting competitively based on maybe a Hashtag. I don't know what it was, but they said it was something I promote. Um, firearms or something I liked going and actually challenged it. I'd actually challenged it one time when I tried to boost a post that was um, nothing but the um, it was a youtube page when I looked at that. When I do now, I go around and I, when I'm doing everything, when everybody is shooting, I'm just sitting in a tent. Yeah. I have chosen to go out there and get videos of people shooting and capture like you to use your words that I heard you use a year ago. They're Disney world moment.  Speaker 5: Yeah. And I took that from you, kind of go capture, I take videos of people and at the end of the end of that day, I go put on a youtube page for free. I'm not making money off of Youtube. They're there for them to download their self. Yup. It's a way, you know, to do, you know, promote that. But when I promoted at one time on the 160 go youtube page, they shut it down. And based on my, um, promoting the sh, promoting ammunition and stuff like that, it was weird. So I counteract it and came back and said, I'm promoting safety prescription. I'm promotion to safety, protective eyewear, just like the list that eight other companies that were same thing. And it came back. And finally, you know, I, I won, I won my, uh, you know, I've had my problems too. Robin had the same problems over the hour.  Speaker 5: But when I, you know, I'm very careful on what my hashtags are now. I can't put certain hashtags on there when I want to boost something. But it's one of those things that, um, I'm waiting for the day and I'm always out there looking for something that is, we're not being shadow banned. We're not being, you know, I can go type in, you know, looking for certain companies out there and I actually have to type in the company. Exactly right. Or it doesn't even pull up anymore. He used to get tight, hey, and there's angle lamination and all these other companies at Chi, everybody's right there now. It's like you type I and it's like, nope, nope. You have to type them specifically what they are to get them to pull up now. Yeah. Is that the answer? Is that the way they're doing it now? I guarantee you that's what they're wanting to happen. It could be. It could be either. So my philosophy on all this stuff is I don't get romantic about any of it. I just look. The fact is, is if I had a new company tomorrow that sold guns and I could get away with two months of Facebook advertising before they shut me down, I do it in a second. Um, it was earlier this year actually, that for whatever reason, because we run tests pretty much monthly. Yeah. On Google, on Facebook and places like that.  Speaker 3: Or I just, I've got a couple of hundred bucks this kind of rolling all the time to see if I can get ads through and Google all of a sudden just all my gun ads got through. So we just quintupled down on that for like, I don't know, three or four months. Then all of a sudden we started getting disapproved, disapproved, fine, whatever. I made like 300 grand in the process. I'm not for the companies that I, so I'm just, I just don't get romantic about it. Cause the truth is, is that's just what, where we're at. What we're dealing with and still today, Facebook is, is one of the great arbitragers for your dollar in advertising. And, um, the one thing I'll tell you though is you can get a f an advocate at Facebook. So you've, if you got a couple of ads that have been knocked down, you can apply for an advocate.  Speaker 3: And once you have an advocate, if you're a proven product, they go through and do all the research and you guys aren't selling anything. What you want to make sure is there's no, like there's no, you know, like right now, uh, if I go to your page, I'm at a hunter's ht gold and I go to your, uh, ba Ba ba Ba ba. I was at your testimonials where, yeah, you've got your gold team partners and I can link right to a Chi, for example. And he sells guns. So what you might want to do there is if you were to, it's like one degree of separation you've got to put in place, right? So you could create a page for your website, for each of your, where you give it, like, uh, so the click through goes for a Chi, goes to a page on your site that has what you think of, you know, stuff about a Chi.  Speaker 3: And then there they can click over and go to your, um, to their page instead of having just directly to the correct. And if you do that and the advocate clears all that, then you probably will be okay. And you can run ads all day long and you can still do what you want to do, which is promote your, you these companies, right? And so, um, and you get that in place. Uh, you know, there's some like kayaks holster companies, technically holsters or not banned on Facebook, but try to get an ad out on a, on a holster. It's like fricking impossible. So you got to go through the process and get an advocate and go through the whole thing. And the problem is most holster companies spend a lot of time promoting guns and they don't realize they're doing it. And all they have to do is just do a little clean up and get their house in order. Now look, I don't want it to be that way. Right? But who gives a damn what I want. No, my job is to make money for my and see. Right?  Speaker 3: So, so, you know, and I, I just don't get too romantic about it. And the thing is, if, you know, my competition out there is going to be upset about it all day long and just not pay for advertising on Facebook, they're welcome to do that. But the truth is, is I'm gonna win right at the bottom line. And so I just don't. So are they shadow banning? Probably. Are they making life more difficult for us? Probably, but I don't spend any time thinking about it. Right. You know, and do I want to give my money to a company like that? No. But the truth is, most of the companies I work for are well south of $10 million a year. So, even if you had a $10 million company, your ad budget being 1%, it's gonna be, you know, that's a hundred grand, right? Right. If your ad budgets 3% is $300,000, tell me where you can buy that kind of exposure for 300 grand.  Speaker 3: And I'll do it. It's certainly not the backpage at USPSA front sight magazine. That's correct. So that's where I started to, you know, I start to look and I'm like, well, in the, in the big cost benefit analysis of marketing, um, I just bet ponies and I'll bet whatever pony is gonna win the best of my ability. If I have an option between a winning pony and another winning pony that doesn't, you know, um, put us in third gear all the time. Um, then I'm going to, I'm going to pay for the one that's open throttle. Right? But, but at the same time they don't exist. Right. So it's interesting. Okay. So, look, we covered a lot of stuff and I got a couple of things I just got to ask you because one thing we do a lot on this show is, um, is we talk about how we get our business done and you are traveling like basically every weekend, nine months of the year from what I can tell. What's your, what's your like, what's your key, like what do you like, what are your go to things to like, you know, keep your life in order to keep your business in order. Any tips or tricks, you got hacks we like to call them. Um, it is to, um, one, stay real with yourself. Really good.  Speaker 5: And that's what I mean by that is not just with business but with, with home and everything else with life. Um, Sherry is, um, very, very supportive and everything I'm doing, I

Samuel L. Jackson is one of the most ubiquitous actors working today. So, given he's returning to screens for the fourth time this year with Shaft, Adam Thomas and Thomas Mariani are here to do a double header of films from his filmography alongside returning guest Shakyl Lambert of Seequels podcast and OneOfUs.net! First up, our good film is The Caveman's Valentine. What? You've never heard of the classic mystery/thriller where Jackson plays a cave dwelling homeless man trying to solve a murder before? Well, neither ha 2/3rds of our crew. Then, our bad feature is Jumper, in which a teleporting Hayden "Anakin Skywalker" Christensen is hunted down by a bleach blonde Jackson. Together, our trio compare the integrity of Samuel's wigs, drive Adam to his breaking point and pick the films for next week's episode on Pixar. So jump right into this episode before Samuel L. Jackson starts cursing at you! To stay up to date about the podcast, follow us on Twitter @DEDBpod, our Facebook page and send us feedback at doubleedgeddoublebill@gmail.com! Remember to vote for our bad film pick on the 2019 So Far episode by June 19th! If you like the show, please subscribe to or rate us on platforms like iTunes, Spotify or Stitcher!

What? You've not subscribed to our podcast yet? Inconceivable! On this week's episode we dive into the mythical land of Florin, sworn enemy of the land of Gilder, to learn about the love story between Princess Buttercup and Westley. We're talking, of course, about The Princess Bride from 1987. Whether it's sword fights, quicksand, large rodents, or Fred Savage playing video games, this movie truly has something for everyone. Take a listen, and you'll see how this classic has earned its place as one of our all-time favorites. 

Episode 45 proves we're not a bunch of commercial low brow animals! It's The Cook, The Thief, His Wife, And Her Lover, as chosen by comedian Matt Burke(@heymattburke)! What? You've never heard of it? Well neither had I, but then I watched it, and my body split into two beings - one saying "Of course I'd never heard of this!" and the other saying "Why hadn't I heard of this?" AND GUESS WHAT - They were both right. This is the "artsiest" movie we've done so far, by far, and it is polarizing. The talented and beautiful Helen Mirren stars alongside Michael Gambon and Alan Howard. This movie's got a lot of sex and violence and an NC-17 rating...but what'd we think of it? And what'd it make us think of? Stream it, download it, digest the podcast and check out the movie! Subscribe on iTunes and hit us with your opinions on Twitter (@flixbookclub) or a comment on the Soundcloud page.

The Weather Man, Tomorrow, and Sand Bird face off thanks to Felipe Nunez. What? You've never heard of these superheroes or villains? Well, that's because we made them up. We're down host, up a Kevin, and Cho was a ho. Remember : 1) All abandoned warehouses sit on cliffs overlooking the sea. 2) New-age-hippie-junk-science has [...]

Stop us if you've heard this one before, but musical guests are like buses. You don't have one for 128 episodes and then two come along at once. What? You've heard if before? And it doesn't really work as a joke? Oh God.     No worries, still plenty of time.    On this week's show:   ++ One Life Left welcomes 8-bit superstars Sabrepulse and Natty to the studio. They chat! They bleep! They play the hits!   ++ One Life Left announces a SECRET SPECIAL EVENT for London listeners (or those dedicated / foolish enough to travel down on the 23rd). Listen for details.   ++ One Life Left talks about cricket.   Musical contributions include little's scale's brilliant Bitshifter cover, The Rapids by Fighter X and our studio guests. Share and enjoy.   See you Monday, live on 104.4 FM or podcast later in the week. Add us on Twitter! We'll tell you all our secrets, promise.    Ste, Simon and Ann xxx

Take a trip with us up to the Northern Georgia mountains for a visit at Life Teen's Covecrest camp in Tiger, Georgia. What? You've never heard of Tiger, Georgia? Neither have I, and I've lived in this state for more than half my life!