I look forward to seeing all the questionable accounting and insider trading that the executives of that cancerous beheamoth is beyond a doubt guilty of.
Modding is fine, you bought the box, MS is using its massive fiscal burliness to force its way into the console market, losses they suffer because of it is their own damn fault in the same way that if I sell my Lemonade at a 5 cent loss per cup I can't get angry when someone buys it all.
I do however think, that the modding thing has no place on the x-box live service since the only thing that it does is make cheating easier and god do I ever hate cheaters. Banning people off of that service for mod chipping seems fair enough to me. Voiding the warrenty, locking out software, do what ever you want MS, but don't tell me It's against the law to use my x-box for spare parts or as a cheap server if I want to. If you can't cope with the losses, I suggest you amend your business strategy
Some one told me once, that any person that would spend that kind of money to take their kids to Disney Land/World, is too stupid to realize that the money could be better spent taking the kids to europe, or asia, or some other place that might actually benefit them, and or bring a better understanding of the world around them rather than throw them into a tourist trap designed around the marketing ideal that parents are not very good at telling their kids no.
This is great news. Snot nosed little musicians owe all of their success to the selfless sacrifices made by the RIAA. All rock stars do is get drug habits, destroy hotel rooms, and go on "Behind the Music" after their careers are finished.
Seriously though, wtf? i could sort of understand in the same way that I understand that evil mad scientists want to destroy the world sort of way, if there was any actual money in the process.
All this is going to do is lead to pirated concerts. Bands will be kidnapped and forced to perform for free by angry fans.
I still GM it from time to time, and it's one of the most best evenings as far as RPGs go. Those that still play RPGS and have never played it, do yourself a favor and find it.
Favorites of mine from that game included:
Boom-R-ANG
Lep-R-OUS
Narc-O-LEP
Ret-R-DED
If I am being serious, I tend towards names from other sources (mythology, movies)
Lief (as in Lief Erikson) or Rhetoric are my favorites for male characters, and Arachne is my favorite for female characters. Monsterous characters get named "Speaker to Animals" (on those rare occasians it fits) or "Oberon" (my cat's name) Wizards I always name Yzap, because that is the most wizardly 4 letter name my friend and I could come up with when we played Final Fantasy 1 for the first time all those years ago. . Robot characters always get named Tom Servo or Crow
Often times though, I am not feeling very serious, and this has led to such characters as "MacGyver", (my DAOC Paladin) character descriptive names like "Dwarfy McDwarf", "Druideric Treehugger", and "The Holy Crap". And sometimes nonsense names like "Bog Dogkicker" or "Brock McNugget"
The Mod commuinity is what really makes NWN a treat. I agree that the basic campaign that came with it was not all that great. CLiche and boring at the beggining and the end, though there were some good bits in the middle.
If your looking for some great, user created mods, check out the Penultimate and Penultimate re-rolled series. They are definately worth a download.
This very much lends creditability to the argument that if there is or was intelligent life elsewhere in the universe, there is no guarantee that it would just happen to coincide with the time that we monkeys are hoping around on our world. We may very well indeed be alone if we arived late, or too early to the party so to speak.
It was a pretty game, and it was decent, but very plain, and it got dull rather quickly. Maybe if the expansion is loaded with "80% more FUN!!!!" and "50% less Click!" I may consider it. But personally I find the Aurora (NWN) engine a lot more verstile and interesting.
You walk close to a poster, and your phone suddenly starts ringing, you check it and you see that it has accesed a website with lots of animated GIFs, an annoying MIDI song, and an add for Orbitz promising low airfare anywhere!
The Spam Lobby has spoken. Now that this has been in the headlines for a few weeks, the spam community has gotten it's act together and is gumming up the works.
I fear that in the end, not much is going to change.
What is with all this "opt-out" crap anyway, what it needs to be is an "Opt-in" list. It should be assumed by default that consumers do not want spam. If they want to receive exciting information about a penis enlarger that gives you a larger bust size and a fixed 2.8% intrest rate they could send an e-mail to the spammer giving them permission to mail to them.
A salesman can not enter your home without your permission, why should I be forced to endure advertising that I am not interested in?
What if every punk on Counter Strike could have charges pressed on them for acting like a complete git?
"LOLZ I 0\/\/|) j00!"
"Oh you think so? BAM! eat Subpoena 1337 boy! your going jail!"
"|\|00000000! "
Sometimes I like Randi, while there are a lot of whackos out there willing to beleive anything without being able to produce a grain of proof its nice to see that there is someone just as whacko coming at the subject from the opposite direction.
And then other times, he proves himself to be just as blind and arrogant as the people he seeks to debunk when he makes snap statements and dismisses without properly investigating first. While he is right in the long view, his reasoning as to why its wrong, is flawed.
This is going to be the rubber ducky that took on the shark. While I am rooting for the rubber ducky in this case, I know the shark is going to eat it.
The only thing I can hope for is that the Rubber ducky gets stuck in the Shark's colon and gives it cancer.
Let me choke down my own disdain for the RFID tags and day dream up some benefits. Remind me to flame myself later:
1)Theft: If goods are registered to your name, it makes their return that much easier in the event they are stollen. Suppose someone steals my underwear. When the cops bust the smuggling ring, my boxers can be quickly returned to me since they will be registered in my name.
2)Ease of checkout: Picture this: your at Wal-Mart, it's 4 pm and 40000000 are standing in line waiting for the 2 cashiers to ring them up. With this system, it may be possible to just walk past a terminal and it will scan and catalogue every item you have (including the ones your trying to steal) and then you just swipe your card and your out of there! Whats more, if you just bought the new "maxim" but you don't want people to think your some kind of knuckle dragging mouth-breathing missing link, they will be none the wiser to your purchasing habits. (though Uncle Walton will know)
3)Cost/efficency: Since store inventory is tracked in real time, they can place orders before items are out of stock so you will always get the items you want. Also, since it will be harder to steal from the store, prices are likely to go down a little bit since the employees will find it much harder to give 5 finger discounts to friends.
4)Fun with HERF guns: If you have built your HERF gun, you can use it to set peoples' underwear on fire as the EMP causes the RFID tags to become white hot. Imagine the fun!
Not really. The differences between 3.5 / 3.0 and the bulk of the precessor versions are easily as noticable as the differences between D&D and any other RPG
I didn't say they were the same, but mechanically they are. Examples? Armor class, 1/2 ed you have a number that starts at 10 (unarmored man sized target) that decreases as it gets "better" AC -10 is very well protected, etc. You have a THAC0 score, that gives you a number, the lower the better, that you subtract the targets AC from to arrive at the roll needed to hit them.To hit an AC 10 target with a THAC0 of 20 (1st level character) needs to roll a 10 or better
In 3/3.5 ed they just combine the THAC0 and the AC to just straight out give you the same value. AC 10 is the base, and the number increses as protection gets better, but the number is the same, 3rd ed just does the math for you.
In either edition, a first level fighter needs to roll a 10 to hit the naked guy, a 15 for that naked guy in chainmail, or a 17 if that naked guy invests in platemail. 90% of the weapons and items in 3/3.5 have the same effect as they did in 1/2 ed (long sword does 1d8, mace does 1d6) So the framework is the same.
Even skill checks are basically the same. In 2 ed you had NWP's (skills) that had a target number that you had to roll under on a d20. Guess what, 3/3.5 is the same thing, but once again the math is reveresed. an average task has a DC around 20. Well? a 4 in the skill means I need a 16 or better on the roll, or I have a 20% chance to success. in 2 ed If I have a 4, I have to roll a 4 or less, which is OMG! a 20% chance.
What 3/3.5 did was change saving throws, and introduce feats, and prestige classes which were positive improvements.
Call it semi-professional interest, but what exactly are you finding "unbalanced" about the game? Sure you're reading the rules right?
My first reaction to that statment is that you were trying to insult me. Perhaps you just haven't played the game enough to know all the ins and outs.
3 ed gave people a lot of freedom in their character design, but the problem is, that there are a lot of feats that are very powerful, and in certain combinations they can be used to make hideously powerful characters. (the Ranger/Rogue dual-weilder springs to mind) Other feats on the other hand, are boderline useless (most of the Meta-Magic). As a DM I never let people just build and pick whatever feats and prestige classes they wanted, because it got out of control all to quickly. You would end up with a super tank melee guy, that in order to challenge them, you need to throw things out that could ahniliate the other characters instantly. Throw in some of the optional texts that gave new races and classes and good luck keeping things reasonable if you don't tone it down. I forced my players to work their characters training into the story and I even forced them on quests and so on and this went a long way to keeping things honest.
We had this group of 4 character all named Nyarlathotep, we all wore purple robes and skull helmets, and we would arrow the bejebus out of any fool that dared walk between Vesper and the dungeon of Covetousness. Ah those where the days, kill the newb, steal his stuff, dismember the body and keep all the heads in a big bag. We all lived in the same dorm so we used the phones for voice com as we pillaged, and back then, most of the people that played were on dial-up so our school connection was much faster and almost lag free.
Well since some bastard Level 3 Rogue/Sorcerer stole my books (He had a hide skill of +10, my spot was only +4) I guess I might as well buy the new books....
Honestly though, anyone familiar with the system can adapt any edition into any other edition. While cosmetically 3rd edition changed a lot for 1st and 2nd edition, deep down they are the same game with very similar mechanics.
As a DM I liked what they tried too do with 3rd, but there was just too little balance and way to many opportunities for players to create super-characters, while others who were more creative and less concerned with min/maxing were left only passive roles when it came to combat. I never trust the books anyway, I change most of the rules and my players still have a great time.
Slashdot Mirror
Can they just go bankrupt already?
I look forward to seeing all the questionable accounting and insider trading that the executives of that cancerous beheamoth is beyond a doubt guilty of.
Modding is fine, you bought the box, MS is using its massive fiscal burliness to force its way into the console market, losses they suffer because of it is their own damn fault in the same way that if I sell my Lemonade at a 5 cent loss per cup I can't get angry when someone buys it all.
I do however think, that the modding thing has no place on the x-box live service since the only thing that it does is make cheating easier and god do I ever hate cheaters. Banning people off of that service for mod chipping seems fair enough to me. Voiding the warrenty, locking out software, do what ever you want MS, but don't tell me It's against the law to use my x-box for spare parts or as a cheap server if I want to. If you can't cope with the losses, I suggest you amend your business strategy
And with that one line the whole problem is laid bare.
Some one told me once, that any person that would spend that kind of money to take their kids to Disney Land/World, is too stupid to realize that the money could be better spent taking the kids to europe, or asia, or some other place that might actually benefit them, and or bring a better understanding of the world around them rather than throw them into a tourist trap designed around the marketing ideal that parents are not very good at telling their kids no.
This is great news. Snot nosed little musicians owe all of their success to the selfless sacrifices made by the RIAA. All rock stars do is get drug habits, destroy hotel rooms, and go on "Behind the Music" after their careers are finished.
Seriously though, wtf? i could sort of understand in the same way that I understand that evil mad scientists want to destroy the world sort of way, if there was any actual money in the process.
All this is going to do is lead to pirated concerts. Bands will be kidnapped and forced to perform for free by angry fans.
Nick Danger indeed.
With every new version of Nethack, I name my first character that.
I know that game!
I still GM it from time to time, and it's one of the most best evenings as far as RPGs go. Those that still play RPGS and have never played it, do yourself a favor and find it.
Favorites of mine from that game included:
Boom-R-ANG
Lep-R-OUS
Narc-O-LEP
Ret-R-DED
Me too:
Erik The Cleric
Piter the Fighter
Izard the Wizard
Granger the Ranger
Melf the Elf
Mork the Orc
Funk the monk
Keef the Thief
you get the idea....
no better way to annoy a buch of people that take the whole naming process seriously
If I am being serious, I tend towards names from other sources (mythology, movies)
Lief (as in Lief Erikson) or Rhetoric are my favorites for male characters, and Arachne is my favorite for female characters. Monsterous characters get named "Speaker to Animals" (on those rare occasians it fits) or "Oberon" (my cat's name) Wizards I always name Yzap, because that is the most wizardly 4 letter name my friend and I could come up with when we played Final Fantasy 1 for the first time all those years ago. . Robot characters always get named Tom Servo or Crow
Often times though, I am not feeling very serious, and this has led to such characters as "MacGyver", (my DAOC Paladin) character descriptive names like "Dwarfy McDwarf", "Druideric Treehugger", and "The Holy Crap". And sometimes nonsense names like "Bog Dogkicker" or "Brock McNugget"
The Mod commuinity is what really makes NWN a treat. I agree that the basic campaign that came with it was not all that great. CLiche and boring at the beggining and the end, though there were some good bits in the middle.
If your looking for some great, user created mods, check out the Penultimate and Penultimate re-rolled series.
They are definately worth a download.
This very much lends creditability to the argument that if there is or was intelligent life elsewhere in the universe, there is no guarantee that it would just happen to coincide with the time that we monkeys are hoping around on our world. We may very well indeed be alone if we arived late, or too early to the party so to speak.
Please see the line above
That and perhaps read what I said again because clearly you have no clue as to what I was talking about.
It was a pretty game, and it was decent, but very plain, and it got dull rather quickly. Maybe if the expansion is loaded with "80% more FUN!!!!" and "50% less Click!" I may consider it. But personally I find the Aurora (NWN) engine a lot more verstile and interesting.
I can't wait for Phone Pop-ups!
You walk close to a poster, and your phone suddenly starts ringing, you check it and you see that it has accesed a website with lots of animated GIFs, an annoying MIDI song, and an add for Orbitz promising low airfare anywhere!
The Spam Lobby has spoken. Now that this has been in the headlines for a few weeks, the spam community has gotten it's act together and is gumming up the works.
I fear that in the end, not much is going to change.
What is with all this "opt-out" crap anyway, what it needs to be is an "Opt-in" list. It should be assumed by default that consumers do not want spam. If they want to receive exciting information about a penis enlarger that gives you a larger bust size and a fixed 2.8% intrest rate they could send an e-mail to the spammer giving them permission to mail to them.
A salesman can not enter your home without your permission, why should I be forced to endure advertising that I am not interested in?
Online liability, what a scary idea.
What if every punk on Counter Strike could have charges pressed on them for acting like a complete git?
"LOLZ I 0\/\/|) j00!"
"Oh you think so? BAM! eat Subpoena 1337 boy! your going jail!"
"|\|00000000! "
hmmmm
How would we all feel if they started doing this in the U.S./Canada/U.K./please don't flame me I can't list everybody?
In the U.S. at least the Patriot act would certainly allow for it (though the courts may not see it that way if it went to trial)
It was at least nice of the Russians to let the terrorists know that the encryption was off. It is important to be considrate even in times of crisis.
Sometimes I like Randi, while there are a lot of whackos out there willing to beleive anything without being able to produce a grain of proof its nice to see that there is someone just as whacko coming at the subject from the opposite direction.
And then other times, he proves himself to be just as blind and arrogant as the people he seeks to debunk when he makes snap statements and dismisses without properly investigating first. While he is right in the long view, his reasoning as to why its wrong, is flawed.
This is going to be the rubber ducky that took on the shark. While I am rooting for the rubber ducky in this case, I know the shark is going to eat it.
The only thing I can hope for is that the Rubber ducky gets stuck in the Shark's colon and gives it cancer.
Let me choke down my own disdain for the RFID tags and day dream up some benefits. Remind me to flame myself later:
1)Theft: If goods are registered to your name, it makes their return that much easier in the event they are stollen. Suppose someone steals my underwear. When the cops bust the smuggling ring, my boxers can be quickly returned to me since they will be registered in my name.
2)Ease of checkout: Picture this: your at Wal-Mart, it's 4 pm and 40000000 are standing in line waiting for the 2 cashiers to ring them up. With this system, it may be possible to just walk past a terminal and it will scan and catalogue every item you have (including the ones your trying to steal) and then you just swipe your card and your out of there! Whats more, if you just bought the new "maxim" but you don't want people to think your some kind of knuckle dragging mouth-breathing missing link, they will be none the wiser to your purchasing habits. (though Uncle Walton will know)
3)Cost/efficency: Since store inventory is tracked in real time, they can place orders before items are out of stock so you will always get the items you want. Also, since it will be harder to steal from the store, prices are likely to go down a little bit since the employees will find it much harder to give 5 finger discounts to friends.
4)Fun with HERF guns: If you have built your HERF gun, you can use it to set peoples' underwear on fire as the EMP causes the RFID tags to become white hot. Imagine the fun!
Not really. The differences between 3.5 / 3.0 and the bulk of the precessor versions are easily as noticable as the differences between D&D and any other RPG
I didn't say they were the same, but mechanically they are. Examples? Armor class, 1/2 ed you have a number that starts at 10 (unarmored man sized target) that decreases as it gets "better" AC -10 is very well protected, etc. You have a THAC0 score, that gives you a number, the lower the better, that you subtract the targets AC from to arrive at the roll needed to hit them.To hit an AC 10 target with a THAC0 of 20 (1st level character) needs to roll a 10 or better
In 3/3.5 ed they just combine the THAC0 and the AC to just straight out give you the same value. AC 10 is the base, and the number increses as protection gets better, but the number is the same, 3rd ed just does the math for you.
In either edition, a first level fighter needs to roll a 10 to hit the naked guy, a 15 for that naked guy in chainmail, or a 17 if that naked guy invests in platemail. 90% of the weapons and items in 3/3.5 have the same effect as they did in 1/2 ed (long sword does 1d8, mace does 1d6) So the framework is the same.
Even skill checks are basically the same. In 2 ed you had NWP's (skills) that had a target number that you had to roll under on a d20. Guess what, 3/3.5 is the same thing, but once again the math is reveresed. an average task has a DC around 20. Well? a 4 in the skill means I need a 16 or better on the roll, or I have a 20% chance to success. in 2 ed If I have a 4, I have to roll a 4 or less, which is OMG! a 20% chance.
What 3/3.5 did was change saving throws, and introduce feats, and prestige classes which were positive improvements.
Call it semi-professional interest, but what exactly are you finding "unbalanced" about the game? Sure you're reading the rules right?
My first reaction to that statment is that you were trying to insult me. Perhaps you just haven't played the game enough to know all the ins and outs.
3 ed gave people a lot of freedom in their character design, but the problem is, that there are a lot of feats that are very powerful, and in certain combinations they can be used to make hideously powerful characters. (the Ranger/Rogue dual-weilder springs to mind) Other feats on the other hand, are boderline useless (most of the Meta-Magic). As a DM I never let people just build and pick whatever feats and prestige classes they wanted, because it got out of control all to quickly. You would end up with a super tank melee guy, that in order to challenge them, you need to throw things out that could ahniliate the other characters instantly. Throw in some of the optional texts that gave new races and classes and good luck keeping things reasonable if you don't tone it down. I forced my players to work their characters training into the story and I even forced them on quests and so on and this went a long way to keeping things honest.
thats all the energy im going to waste on this.
An often overlooked series that is one of the most Solid, well developed and best of all entertaining FPSs since Half-Life.
Great to see some things that don't suck see sequels.
There you go reminding me of my days on UO!
We had this group of 4 character all named Nyarlathotep, we all wore purple robes and skull helmets, and we would arrow the bejebus out of any fool that dared walk between Vesper and the dungeon of Covetousness. Ah those where the days, kill the newb, steal his stuff, dismember the body and keep all the heads in a big bag. We all lived in the same dorm so we used the phones for voice com as we pillaged, and back then, most of the people that played were on dial-up so our school connection was much faster and almost lag free.
God we were bastards.
Sing together now!
We're on the rooooad to hentai!
Well since some bastard Level 3 Rogue/Sorcerer stole my books (He had a hide skill of +10, my spot was only +4) I guess I might as well buy the new books....
Honestly though, anyone familiar with the system can adapt any edition into any other edition. While cosmetically 3rd edition changed a lot for 1st and 2nd edition, deep down they are the same game with very similar mechanics.
As a DM I liked what they tried too do with 3rd, but there was just too little balance and way to many opportunities for players to create super-characters, while others who were more creative and less concerned with min/maxing were left only passive roles when it came to combat. I never trust the books anyway, I change most of the rules and my players still have a great time.