From "The Dilbert Principle", under "Virtual Hourly Compensation". As with so much of Dilbert, the specifics may have dated yet the principle remains the same.
"If you have a home computer, say goodbye to purchasing your own diskettes... The only practical limit on the number of diskettes you can steal is the net worth of the company you're stealing from. Your company will go broke if you steal too many diskettes. Nobody wins if that happens. That's why moderation is the key. After you have enough diskettes to back up your hard drive, and maybe shingle your house, think about cutting back."
I was going to write a screed about why I thought Jelly was evil but it turns out someone already did that.
Re:Not the only thing left out: it's for Java only
on
Apache Maven 1.0 Released
·
· Score: 5, Informative
It's technically possible but part of the point of the thing is that you don't have to spend forever writing build scripts to get going. So once there's a set of users writing plugins with better support for (e.g.) C# and C++, sure it'll be agnostic.
Right now it's effectively a Java tool since most of the plugins are for Java (jar, javac, javadoc, junit, etc).
I've been using Maven for the last week or so to see what it's like. You can think of it as Ant's big brother - you use it for automating build systems and all the stuff associated with that like javadoc, reporting, changelogs and so on.
I have mixed opinions on Maven.
On the good side, the console mode is useful. Maven is pretty slow to start up as it's written in Java and the JVM takes a while to get moving - console mode works round that. The site generation plugins are also pretty cool, as you pointed out.
On the bad side, it uses Jelly for its scripting language. Jelly seems kind of evil and I'm guessing the Maven developers think the same since I don't think they're going to be using Jelly for Maven 2.0. The documentation on writing new plugins (half the point of Maven if you ask me) also leaves a lot to be desired. I found I had much better luck just un-jar-ing the plugins Maven was using and looking at those rather than trying to find something out from the Jelly or Maven documentation. It's also pretty much a Java tool - while in theory you can write plugins to deal with other languages, all the existing plugins are very Java-focused.
So in summary, better than Ant? YMMV, depending on your needs.
I just can't let this one past as a +5 Insightful.
So, firstly, cost. Draft play, Rochester draft in particular, is the most skill-intensive Magic format. Cost to play for a day is 3 boosters plus anything the organising event charges, so typically a total of about $15. If you were playing a LAN game tournament, that would probably cost a comparable amount.
If you want to play constructed-deck MtG, sure, you can spend a bunch of money on it. You'd have to spend a bunch of money on golf too to get really good at it, but I wouldn't call Tiger Woods an Athlete of the Wallet.
Secondly, skill. In Rochester draft, players form tables of 8 and take turns drafting cards from a single booster at a time. It rewards skill so much partially because being able to remember every "good" card drafted, between all 8 players, gives you a significant advantage. Remembering all the cards you have previously drafted is also important. And that's before you actually get to play any games.
The skill curve in Magic is not as steep as Chess because of the luck involved, but having watched numerous Pro Tour matches (where the players are among the best in the world) there are still mistakes being made at the top level of play. Just as the best poker player in the world won't win every hand, the better Magic players will tend to win over time rather than winning every game.
At Christmas time, you usually have a bunch of potential players around if your family is into games, so you may want to think about buying a party-type game.
Here's some solid recommendations. My personal favourites out of that list:
Balderdash. Solid party word game. Very little kids will have trouble keeping up, however.
Perudo. Simple bluffing dice game that pretty much anyone can play.
Apples to Apples. Excellent family game.
Pit. A classic trading game. Very, very noisy to play, your house ends up being like the NYSE. Lots of fun though and kids like the noisiness of it.
Boggle. A classic word game. It does heavily rewards skill with word games, so if you have a couple of total word game freaks in the family it may not be that much fun to play with them (e.g. if you wouldn't play Scrabble with them, you might want to steer clear).
Cheapass makes some great games and obviously you can't beat their prices. However, a bunch of their games are long on flavour but short on game balance, so their replay value isn't necessarily amazing. Also note that the games don't usually come with everything you'll need to play; you have to scavenge the bits you need from other games. For example, Monopoly is a good source of money bills for their money-based games. If you're giving the games to someone who doesn't play a lot of games, that may potentially be a problem and you might want to stay away from Cheapass stuff.
That said, Cheapass games I'd personally recommend:
Cube Farm. A simple but elegant strategy game. Ok for novice game players.
Freeloader. Again, great flavour and a nice level of strategy. However, this one is more complicated so you might not want to get it if you're giving it to a real novice. Also very greedy on the number of pieces it needs (30+ different-coloured counters for each player).
Give me the Brain. Less strategy and more luck in this one (not necessarily a bad thing). If you're giving it to young children, skip this one because of zombie-related humour. Male teenagers will probably like it, though.
The Very Clever Pipe Game. Pure strategy, and small enough to be a good stocking filler. Doesn't need extra pieces. It's really a 2-player game though although it claims to be a 4-player game too, so be warned.
Go is one of the "elemental" strategy games, like chess - you see echoes of it everywhere in other strategy games once you understand how to play well.
It is also fairly simple, given that you can reduce the whole game down to 3 or 4 rules. However, it is extremely abstract and in my experience novice gamers are not generally interested in very abstract games - if they can play a game with nice flavour to it, they'd rather play that instead.
So, while Go is definitely an amazing game and one of my favourites, I couldn't in all honesty recommend it as a novice game. It also suffers from being a 2-player game, where at Christmas you're better off getting a game where more of the family will be able to play at once.
For those of you not in the know, the Germans own the boardgame market. Boardgames are a much bigger cultural thing in Germany than anywhere else. Almost all the best boardgames are German in origin and luckily you can mostly get them in English translations. Rio Grande is the biggest manufacturer of translated German games.
For family-style boardgames with a bit of depth, you can't go wrong with any of the Spiel des Jahres (Game of the Year) winners. This is an annual award. As I recall, it's awarded at the Essen Game Festival. Winners tend to be fairly simple games suitable for family play (rather than being aimed at hard-core gamers) while having enough strategy to satisfy the hard-core gamer at the same time.
I have never played a bad game that won the Spiele des Jahres. Some of my favourites that have won in previous years:
Settlers of Catan Manhattan Carcassonne Mississippi Queen
As the parent points out, Puerto Rico is also a fabulous game and I would highly recommend it.
On the minus side, I was wrong on one point: built resource towers no longer take time to activate, it was taken out in the last couple of days of testing.
In competitive play in NS 1.04, a solid (but un-fun) strategy was to spawn-camp the aliens.
That doesn't work in NS 2.0, thankfully.
The biggest change of all is actually the different resource model:
* resources nodes take a while to activate * alien gorges get an equal share of resources compared with other aliens * both sides get resources for kills (even the commander, he gets resources for turret kills)
A little project I've been working on in my spare time is a bot for this game. It's called WhichBot.
Features include a bunch of fancy AI stuff (dynamic navigation, wall-climbing support, pack-based strategies, etc), Linux support and open-source code on Sourceforge.
Important note: we didn't have access to the NS 2.0 server before release, so the current bot version DOES NOT support NS 2.0. We hope to have a compatible bot version up ASAP.
Because videogames are the perceived evil for the youth of today, much as Elvis and the Beatles were for another generation. Hence, anything saying that they could be good for kids will be controversial.
To be honest, the ad breaks are so damn long already that one more ad won't make any difference in terms of dramatic quality.
Exhibit A: I used to watch 1-hour American programs on British TV. However, they'd only take 50 minutes or so to show. "Fine", you're thinking, "that's just because that wacky BBC stuff doesn't have commercials." But no, this was Channel 4, where they _did_ have commercials, just 10 minutes less per hour. I understand that British TV is coming into line with America in my absence.
Exhibit B: Have you noticed that more and more shows actually have a mid-commercial trailer for the program you're already watching in case you did forget what it was? Isn't that a gentle hint that the damn ads are on too long?
There's a report of another plane crashing in Somerset, Pennsylvania, on CNN. It's unclear what the target was or whether it was related to the terrorist attacks.
There was also a report in some media (I think it was in the initial BBC story) that a carbomb went off outside the State Department in Washington - apparently that was false.
If someone 'discovers' a strange new theory of physics and posts details of an experiment to back it up, don't you think that other experiments will be performed to verify it one way or another?
How ridiculous would a crackpot theory have to be if it happened to fit into Star Trek episodes before it wouldn't get posted on/.?
Post this kind of thing if it's a real story. A good time might be after it ever makes it past peer review.
Slashdot Mirror
>Sometimes I feel like the whole Windows vs. Linux thing is like the republicans versus the democrats.
:)
I agree completely. One of them is obviously more evil than the other, but for some reason a whole lot of people don't seem to notice.
From "The Dilbert Principle", under "Virtual Hourly Compensation". As with so much of Dilbert, the specifics may have dated yet the principle remains the same.
"If you have a home computer, say goodbye to purchasing your own diskettes... The only practical limit on the number of diskettes you can steal is the net worth of the company you're stealing from. Your company will go broke if you steal too many diskettes. Nobody wins if that happens. That's why moderation is the key. After you have enough diskettes to back up your hard drive, and maybe shingle your house, think about cutting back."
Interesting. Don't suppose you know what version it was, just out of curiosity?
I happen to know of at least one AAA game which used Java - it used it as a scripting engine.
Nihilistic's Vampire: the Masquerade - Redemption, back in 2000. As I recall, in the Gamasutra postmortem, they commented on how well it worked out for them.
Sadly, I don't know what JVM they were using - but they did say in the postmortem that they didn't write it themselves.
I was going to write a screed about why I thought Jelly was evil but it turns out someone already did that.
It's technically possible but part of the point of the thing is that you don't have to spend forever writing build scripts to get going. So once there's a set of users writing plugins with better support for (e.g.) C# and C++, sure it'll be agnostic.
Right now it's effectively a Java tool since most of the plugins are for Java (jar, javac, javadoc, junit, etc).
Maven Subversion support (haven't tried it myself).
I've been using Maven for the last week or so to see what it's like. You can think of it as Ant's big brother - you use it for automating build systems and all the stuff associated with that like javadoc, reporting, changelogs and so on.
I have mixed opinions on Maven.
On the good side, the console mode is useful. Maven is pretty slow to start up as it's written in Java and the JVM takes a while to get moving - console mode works round that. The site generation plugins are also pretty cool, as you pointed out.
On the bad side, it uses Jelly for its scripting language. Jelly seems kind of evil and I'm guessing the Maven developers think the same since I don't think they're going to be using Jelly for Maven 2.0. The documentation on writing new plugins (half the point of Maven if you ask me) also leaves a lot to be desired. I found I had much better luck just un-jar-ing the plugins Maven was using and looking at those rather than trying to find something out from the Jelly or Maven documentation. It's also pretty much a Java tool - while in theory you can write plugins to deal with other languages, all the existing plugins are very Java-focused.
So in summary, better than Ant? YMMV, depending on your needs.
Wow, a chance to post the obligatory Penny Arcade links, be on-topic and reply to this excitingly off-topic thread at the same time...
Ok, it's time for me to own up. I'm the one creating all the bugs you're talking about.
Acne? Bug in face.cpp.
Flat tires? You guessed it, tire.cpp, line 5572.
Girls who say no? That's not a bug, it's a feature.
[quote]E3 exists for two reasons.[/quote]
For large values of two, it appears.
Your points are valid, I just couldn't resist...
Is there any point in asking questions?
We all know we won't have a high enough security clearance for the answers.
I just can't let this one past as a +5 Insightful.
So, firstly, cost. Draft play, Rochester draft in particular, is the most skill-intensive Magic format. Cost to play for a day is 3 boosters plus anything the organising event charges, so typically a total of about $15. If you were playing a LAN game tournament, that would probably cost a comparable amount.
If you want to play constructed-deck MtG, sure, you can spend a bunch of money on it. You'd have to spend a bunch of money on golf too to get really good at it, but I wouldn't call Tiger Woods an Athlete of the Wallet.
Secondly, skill. In Rochester draft, players form tables of 8 and take turns drafting cards from a single booster at a time. It rewards skill so much partially because being able to remember every "good" card drafted, between all 8 players, gives you a significant advantage. Remembering all the cards you have previously drafted is also important. And that's before you actually get to play any games.
The skill curve in Magic is not as steep as Chess because of the luck involved, but having watched numerous Pro Tour matches (where the players are among the best in the world) there are still mistakes being made at the top level of play. Just as the best poker player in the world won't win every hand, the better Magic players will tend to win over time rather than winning every game.
As the sole N-Gage proponent so far on the topic, I'm afraid you have to get the link.
At Christmas time, you usually have a bunch of potential players around if your family is into games, so you may want to think about buying a party-type game.
Here's some solid recommendations. My personal favourites out of that list:
Balderdash. Solid party word game. Very little kids will have trouble keeping up, however.
Perudo. Simple bluffing dice game that pretty much anyone can play.
Apples to Apples. Excellent family game.
Pit. A classic trading game. Very, very noisy to play, your house ends up being like the NYSE. Lots of fun though and kids like the noisiness of it.
Boggle. A classic word game. It does heavily rewards skill with word games, so if you have a couple of total word game freaks in the family it may not be that much fun to play with them (e.g. if you wouldn't play Scrabble with them, you might want to steer clear).
Cheapass makes some great games and obviously you can't beat their prices. However, a bunch of their games are long on flavour but short on game balance, so their replay value isn't necessarily amazing. Also note that the games don't usually come with everything you'll need to play; you have to scavenge the bits you need from other games. For example, Monopoly is a good source of money bills for their money-based games. If you're giving the games to someone who doesn't play a lot of games, that may potentially be a problem and you might want to stay away from Cheapass stuff.
That said, Cheapass games I'd personally recommend:
Cube Farm. A simple but elegant strategy game. Ok for novice game players.
Freeloader. Again, great flavour and a nice level of strategy. However, this one is more complicated so you might not want to get it if you're giving it to a real novice. Also very greedy on the number of pieces it needs (30+ different-coloured counters for each player).
Give me the Brain. Less strategy and more luck in this one (not necessarily a bad thing). If you're giving it to young children, skip this one because of zombie-related humour. Male teenagers will probably like it, though.
The Very Clever Pipe Game. Pure strategy, and small enough to be a good stocking filler. Doesn't need extra pieces. It's really a 2-player game though although it claims to be a 4-player game too, so be warned.
Go is one of the "elemental" strategy games, like chess - you see echoes of it everywhere in other strategy games once you understand how to play well.
It is also fairly simple, given that you can reduce the whole game down to 3 or 4 rules. However, it is extremely abstract and in my experience novice gamers are not generally interested in very abstract games - if they can play a game with nice flavour to it, they'd rather play that instead.
So, while Go is definitely an amazing game and one of my favourites, I couldn't in all honesty recommend it as a novice game. It also suffers from being a 2-player game, where at Christmas you're better off getting a game where more of the family will be able to play at once.
For those of you not in the know, the Germans own the boardgame market. Boardgames are a much bigger cultural thing in Germany than anywhere else. Almost all the best boardgames are German in origin and luckily you can mostly get them in English translations. Rio Grande is the biggest manufacturer of translated German games.
For family-style boardgames with a bit of depth, you can't go wrong with any of the Spiel des Jahres (Game of the Year) winners. This is an annual award. As I recall, it's awarded at the Essen Game Festival. Winners tend to be fairly simple games suitable for family play (rather than being aimed at hard-core gamers) while having enough strategy to satisfy the hard-core gamer at the same time.
I have never played a bad game that won the Spiele des Jahres. Some of my favourites that have won in previous years:
Settlers of Catan
Manhattan
Carcassonne
Mississippi Queen
As the parent points out, Puerto Rico is also a fabulous game and I would highly recommend it.
On the minus side, I was wrong on one point: built resource towers no longer take time to activate, it was taken out in the last couple of days of testing.
On the plus side, here's the complete changelog for NS 2.0.
In competitive play in NS 1.04, a solid (but un-fun) strategy was to spawn-camp the aliens.
That doesn't work in NS 2.0, thankfully.
The biggest change of all is actually the different resource model:
* resources nodes take a while to activate
* alien gorges get an equal share of resources compared with other aliens
* both sides get resources for kills (even the commander, he gets resources for turret kills)
A little project I've been working on in my spare time is a bot for this game. It's called WhichBot.
Features include a bunch of fancy AI stuff (dynamic navigation, wall-climbing support, pack-based strategies, etc), Linux support and open-source code on Sourceforge.
You can find it at whichbot.com.
</plug>
Important note: we didn't have access to the NS 2.0 server before release, so the current bot version DOES NOT support NS 2.0. We hope to have a compatible bot version up ASAP.
"Why the hell is this considered controversial?"
Because videogames are the perceived evil for the youth of today, much as Elvis and the Beatles were for another generation. Hence, anything saying that they could be good for kids will be controversial.
To be honest, the ad breaks are so damn long already that one more ad won't make any difference in terms of dramatic quality.
Exhibit A: I used to watch 1-hour American programs on British TV. However, they'd only take 50 minutes or so to show. "Fine", you're thinking, "that's just because that wacky BBC stuff doesn't have commercials." But no, this was Channel 4, where they _did_ have commercials, just 10 minutes less per hour. I understand that British TV is coming into line with America in my absence.
Exhibit B: Have you noticed that more and more shows actually have a mid-commercial trailer for the program you're already watching in case you did forget what it was? Isn't that a gentle hint that the damn ads are on too long?
There's a report of another plane crashing in Somerset, Pennsylvania, on CNN. It's unclear what the target was or whether it was related to the terrorist attacks.
There was also a report in some media (I think it was in the initial BBC story) that a carbomb went off outside the State Department in Washington - apparently that was false.
If someone 'discovers' a strange new theory of physics and posts details of an experiment to back it up, don't you think that other experiments will be performed to verify it one way or another?
/.?
How ridiculous would a crackpot theory have to be if it happened to fit into Star Trek episodes before it wouldn't get posted on
Post this kind of thing if it's a real story. A good time might be after it ever makes it past peer review.