Uzzy's page

thejeff wrote:

Notice the "Islamic Jihad" bit there? That's one of those nastier than Hamas groups we keep talking about. I don't think anyone here has defended Islamic Jihad or any of the other more extreme factions.

Again, the basic argument is that if Israel wants peace, they'll get it faster by encouraging the more moderate Palestinians, even Hamas when it shows itself willing to deal, than by trying to stomp out all the extreme ones.

If Gazans want peace, they'll kick Hamas out of power and turn towards more moderate Palestinians.

Yeah, the West Bank is currently a model state for the Palestinians. Nothing problematic there.

Hmm, damn it. I missed Rasputin17's character. Well I'll change that to Marines Errant.

Oh yes, highly interested in this. Lets see what stats I get.

Weapon Skill: 2d10 + 30 ⇒ (3, 10) + 30 = 43
Ballistic Skill: 2d10 + 30 ⇒ (10, 1) + 30 = 41
Strength: 2d10 + 30 ⇒ (9, 3) + 30 = 42
Toughness: 2d10 + 30 ⇒ (2, 5) + 30 = 37
Agility: 2d10 + 30 ⇒ (9, 2) + 30 = 41
Intelligence: 2d10 + 30 ⇒ (8, 7) + 30 = 45
Perception: 2d10 + 30 ⇒ (3, 6) + 30 = 39
Willpower: 2d10 + 30 ⇒ (3, 2) + 30 = 35
Fellowship: 2d10 + 30 ⇒ (9, 1) + 30 = 40

Hmm. Very all rounder there. Think I'll reroll Willpower.

Willpower Reroll: 2d10 + 30 ⇒ (5, 9) + 30 = 44

That's good. Won't swap any stats around. Let's see what Power Armour I get.

Power Armour Roll: 1d10 ⇒ 10

Mk8 Errant Armour, nice. Lets see what history table I roll on.

Power Armour History Table: 1d5 ⇒ 3

Legends of War, interesting. Now which one do I get?

Legends of War Power Armour History: 1d10 ⇒ 8

A Hero's Spirit? Nice. Getting possessed to become awesome, what could possibly go wrong.

Time to roll wounds and fate points.

Wounds: 1d5 + 18 ⇒ (2) + 18 = 20
Fate Points: 1d10 ⇒ 3

Being from the Marines Errant Chapter gives me +5 to Agility, +5 to Strength, a Shepard of Assets demeanour and the Zero Tolerance solo mode ability That's all from Honour the Chapter, Pg 45.

Rolling for my Marine's past now.

Marines Errant Past: 1d5 ⇒ 2

Deck Officer, nice. I'll make my Marine a Tactical Marine. Can I wait on deciding between Bolter Drill and Tactical Expertise, depending on if the party has two Tactical Marines or not? I'll spend the 1000xp in a moment.

Starting XP spend:
500xp on Agility Simple Advance (Gotta go fast)
200xp on Rapid Reload
200xp on Ciphers (Deathwatch)
100xp on Pilot (Space Craft)

Just need a name now, Brother Tulius it is.

Looking at the US prices for the core books killed most of the interest I had in D&D Next. I'll probably pick up the starter set as that's decently priced though.

Itchy wrote:

I think that he's going to be able to talk his way out of this one. It'll take some pretty amazing bluff checks, but I think Durkula will make it.

Plus, I feel it's too soon for this plot element to be resolved.

Depends if Rich has gotten cold feet over the Durkula arc really. But yes, in terms of actual comic strips, it's way too soon for that plot element to be resolved.

Well, yes. Unilaterally using a foreign currency is a type of currency union, in an informal sense. That isn't what the SNP want though. The SNP want, and claim they'll get, a formal currency union with the rUK. They still claim that this will happen, despite the three major political parties explicitly ruling it out.

There may well be benefits of an informal currency union, but there's a reason why most countries don't just adopt foreign countries currencies. An informal currency union would mean that Scotland couldn't print money. It'd be unable to create currency reserves. It'd surrender monetary policy to a foreign institution in which it has no say, the Bank of England. Abandoning all control over monetary policy would be seriously problematic for an independent Scotland, which is why the Fiscal Commission the SNP set up argued against it.

The UK and Ireland have a free movement between them agreement outside of the EU framework, so it'd probably be quite easy to incorporate Scotland into that as well.

It could, if Scotland didn't have to join Schengen. Which is a requirement for joining the EU.

The UK hasn't threatened anything. Scotland can use the pound sterling all it wants, and no one can stop them. Scotland could use the Euro, the Dollar, the Peso.. it could use the Zimbabwean Dollar if it wants.

It won't get a currency union with the rUK without agreement from the rest of the rUK, however.

As I understand it, an independent Scotland would want to be rather inclusive in terms of who is a citizen and who can apply to be a citizen.

British citizens habitually resident in Scotland on independence will be considered Scottish citizens. This will include British citizens who hold dual citizenship with another country. Scottish born British citizens currently living outside of Scotland will also be considered Scottish citizens.

Following independence, other people will be able to apply for Scottish citizenship. For example, citizenship by descent will be available to those who have a parent or grandparent who qualifies for Scottish citizenship. Those who have a demonstrable connection to Scotland and have spent at least ten years living here at some stage, whether as a child or an adult, will also have the opportunity to apply for citizenship.

Source

How that'll work in regards to the EU and border controls is still up in the air, despite what the SNP think. If Scotland were outside the EU once they became independent, then I'd imagine that Scottish citizens in EU countries would have to apply for the right to stay there, or else they could be considered to be residing illegally. Potentially.

Related to the border controls idea, new countries joining the EU have to sign up to the Schengen Agreement. The UK and Ireland are currently not in that agreement, which is why we need passports to go visit the continent. If Scotland were to join Schengen, and the remaining UK stayed outside of Schengen, then that would imply the need for border controls to exist between Scotland and the rUK.

There's lots of exciting places it could be set, but yeah, Tokyo would be good. I've never found the combat in the game to be too exciting, but the world building and the atmosphere is brilliant, particularly in Dragonfall.

Ah, it appears that Spain has said it will not veto Scotland joining the EU, which is more encouraging.

I think this article, which is rather more recent, is less encouraging for the SNP. It would seem that the Spanish position is that a country gaining independence from an EU country would be a new country, not in the EU, and would therefore have to apply for membership from a position of being outside the EU.

As Aubrey pointed out, it is far from an open and shut case. There's no precedent whatsoever for this situation, and there's no nice simple road map for people to follow. There's conflicting laws and articles and all that... lots of mess that would need resolving in the period after a yes vote and before independence. If, as I believe has been stated, this period is meant to last 18 months, I'd be astonished if everything's resolved by then.

I think they've said that they're waiting to see how successful Dragonfall is before deciding what to do next. I hope it's successful, as I've often felt that an RPG like this that sold campaign modules as DLC on a fairly regular basis would be pretty nice. But we'll see.

It's pretty reassuring to not see the Joker plastered everywhere. Time to give some other villains the spotlight.

So, Dragonfall came out today. Anyone else got a copy? It's currently a little cheaper on the Humble Store than on Steam, at least for me in the UK.

Early impressions? Pretty damn good so far.

They would be quite free to institute their own currency, which would be difficult, but doable. Taking a part of the national debt corresponding to their population doesn't make them worse off than anyone else with the same level of national debt. See, when you can change taxes and make trade deals as a nation, there is a lot to win too. If they want independence, they should go for it.

Of course they can institute their own currency, but that's a risk, and the SNP's entire strategy has been to water down any risk and convince the electorate that independence will be easy, with no real barriers. Of course the remaining UK will want a currency union, and of course the EU will welcome us with open arms, with no preconditions on joining.

The reality is quite different though. It's highly doubtful if a currency union would be in the rUK's interest, and the whole EU thing is going to be a right mess. There's no precedent for what an independent Scotland will do, so we don't know what's going to happen regarding their EU membership. Will they have to reapply, and if so, will it be an expedited process or will they have to go to the back of the queue? Will they retain the UK's opt outs? Will they have to join the Euro?

I'm stuck up near Hull. While I was at one of the three Great British Universities, Hull Uni, I ran plenty of games of Pathfinder every week. Now with a job and what have you it's much harder to get a game.

On the bright side, having a job means that I might be able to make it to Paizocon, which would be a lot of fun.

As always, Polandball has the answer to this issue.

Personally, I would’ve been happy to see Elan do a Lurtz ‘grab the sword I’m impaled on’ routine, whip out his rapier, skewer Tarquin right through the heart, then lament as his father died: “You just didn’t get it, did you, Dad? You were the side-quest.” That would’ve been a great way to put a ring around this particular plot.

Yes, but that would have shown the OOTS being competent and defeating their enemies themselves. Which we can't have too often!

Apparently Elan mentioned a 'super secret' plan 93 strips ago. Which needed Durkon, for some reason.

This would seem to count as 'a ton of hints'.

I think I'd laugh if..

Anyway, the problem isn't just that it's slow to update, it's that we've had cliffhanger after cliffhanger since Durkon got vamped, with the fight swinging back and forth to favouring OOTS, then Team Tarquin, then OOTS, then Team Tarquin.. there's only so many times that you can raise the stakes before fatigue sets in.

Or V was just telling the gang that the guy in the scarf (chilly) was the primary target (Xykon), so they should focus on him. As explained by Belkar, not four panels later.

Threeshades wrote:

Misery wrote:

I remember reading about the Marketing team for Last of Us not having Ellie on the cover. It was just the guy. The development team had to fight them on it to put her on the cover because she's so important to the story.

Don't know if it was because she was a girl, a kid, or both but I'm glad the developers got what they wanted.

See also Bioshock Infinite. The cover features only Booker DeWitt, even though the main character that really drives the whole story is Elizabeth (despite her not being the player character), she got pushed to the backside "because marketing!"

Do you have a source for that, or are you making an assumption?

As for me, I own scores of video games, new and old, but my favorite game ever is still Silent Hill 3. The protagonist? Heather Mason. Yes, a girl.

Source

It's very depressing.

Quote:

It's similar to the problem in the comic book industry. There have been several titles with strong female protagonists that would pass the Bechdel test with ease. Power Girl, the non_John Byrne version of She-Hulk, Birds of Prey,... they don't sell well.

Female supporting characters are fine. But most of the overwhelmingly male customers don't want to be made to identify with a female persona.

That isn't what I was saying. What I was saying was that major game companies don't take chances with female protagonists, ergo there are few big-selling game franchises with female protagonists; it turns into a self-fulfilling prophecy. Howevere, there are enough (METROID, PORTAL, TOMB RAIDER) to put the lie to the suggestion that gamers as a whole don't like female protagonists in games.

In fact, the number of female gamers out there is huge and growing. A third of CoD's players being women is frankly astonishing given its ludicrously macho ethos (it also explains why they're putting female soldier models and characters into GHOSTS, though with a lot less fanfare than the dog).

If you look at RPGs, I'd be surprised if the percentages of female gamers were not significantly higher.

20% for CoD, not 1/3rd.

I'm not sure if there's actual figures for RPG player numbers, but as a point of interest, 18% of players of ME3 picked Female Shepard. Not sure if that means anything really, but it's an interesting figure.

Mass Effect 3's ending could certainly have used a focus group.

Then again, Mass Effect 3's ending could have done with being run past an eight year old and asking them to point out all the logical inconsistencies and flaws.

I don't have time right now to fully reply to your well thought out post, DeathQuaker, but I would say that, in regards to this..

And it's also notable that okay, 50%+ of women are mobile/browser gamers. But that means a large minority of men are also mobile/browser gamers. Do we say they don't count? Do we say they're not really gamers too?

That I do think there's a lack of accurate terminology here, to be honest. There is a difference between someone who only plays fruit ninja or whatever on a mobile when they're commuting to work and someone who's about to spend close to £1000 on both new consoles next month. That's not to say that the mobile gamer isn't a 'real' gamer, or whatever silly term gets thrown about, but certainly one is a more dedicated gamer. To use a comparison, I wouldn't call someone who goes to one or two movies a year a 'film buff'.

And if anyone says "but the girls're all playing Facebook games, that doesn't count," I WILL scream and hurt things (and no, they're not, and that is both irrationally and ignorantly dismissive of both the women who play and purchase non-browser games (for example look at this article that notes many women are drawn to action adventure games and MMOs) and the MEN who like to play browser games (I think browser gaming is probably pretty widespread amongst the genders and mainstream). Google (or duckduckgo for no filtering) "what kind of video games do girls play" for some interesting answers. Otherwise, if that's seriously what you think, back it up with proof).

Much of that is due to the growing popularity of social and mobile games like “Angry Birds,” “Farmville,” “Minecraft” and “Candy Crush” — addictive casual games that can be played on smartphones or tablets and don’t require a heavy commitment of tens of hours to play. More than half of all social and mobile gamers are women, according to industry research firm EEDAR, but surprisingly as many as 30% of women play more violent games like “Halo,” the group found. “Call of Duty” counts around 20% femme players, while “Grand Theft Auto” is around 15% for the whole franchise, their creators say.

Source

Looks like.. yes, women play more mobile and social games, but are a minority for Halo, COD and Grand Theft Auto.

Special mention should probably be made towards the new Tomb Raider game.

Consider me biased and maybe a bit uneducated towards other games, but I don't think a game with a female protagonist has had such a high level of story quality as this game had.

I don't think it was just about attractiveness either, which I think hurts the whole argument to a degree, but it was just a fantastic, action-packed game that had some real emotion-turned-hardened character throughout it. It could've been done with a male protagonist, but I can't imagine it would have been done nearly as well.

I don't think it comes down to Lara being protrayed as "weak" either. The opening cutscene stresses how survival instinct is the key theme, and those cut scenes are powerful.

The game does explain why there's no female thugs ** spoiler omitted **

Personally, I found the Tomb Raider game to have a shallow, cliched mess of a story that had no characterisation in any of the characters aside from Lara, who's character goes from normal girl to mass murdering psychopath in a few moments. It didn't help that the gameplay was mostly lifted straight from the far superior Uncharted series.

Which is a shame, because the previous games were quite enjoyable.

Lovely

Yes, I agree with the critics that the methodology is incomplete, but there does appear to be something to this.
Remember, I am the OP of this thread.

Sounds a lot like the work done on showing a link between violent video games and violent impulses in the real world.

Uzzy wrote:

Adamantine Dragon wrote:

If you believe that the "universal health care" in Europe and Asia is actually providing health care without interminable delays and rationing of procedures, drugs and services, then there''s really no point discussing it with you.

And when that starts happening here, I suppose you'll be surprised. Oh well.

This is entirely true. As we all know, Stephen Hawking would have died if he had to use the NHS.

I hope that was sarcasm. Because, ya know, facts.

:)

Being British, about 9/10s of everything I say is sarcasm.

If you believe that the "universal health care" in Europe and Asia is actually providing health care without interminable delays and rationing of procedures, drugs and services, then there''s really no point discussing it with you.

And when that starts happening here, I suppose you'll be surprised. Oh well.

This is entirely true. As we all know, Stephen Hawking would have died if he had to use the NHS.

I'd have thought a better way to film the book would have been to have two seasons, with the first season ending at the end of volume 2 of the book.

But hey, if they pull this off, then it'll be one of the best shows of next year.

Finally got this last week, and finished the story mode last night. Very enjoyable game, and I'll be eager to get 100% on it at some point in the future.

I was a little disappointed that we didn't get to have more heists in the single player mode. A few more minor ones where you could build up the skill of your crew (and maybe get to know them) would have been nice. As it was I just used the same few people on each job, as there were so few heists that I didn't want to risk one of them on a less able crew member.

Uzzy wrote:

Looking briefly at the CBO's own figures, it would appear that the Bush era tax cuts added a total of $1.6 Trillion to the national debt. Interesting..

Another way of looking at that is that, when compared with the total, simply re-instating them cannot pay off the national debt by itself -- not even close.

Of course. It would be folly to think that. (It would have more of an effect than simply combating fraud though!)

But it is equally folly to think that you can balance a budget by simply cutting expenditure. Revenue has to be increased as well.

Looking briefly at the CBO's own figures, it would appear that the Bush era tax cuts added a total of $1.6 Trillion to the national debt.

Interesting..

It's a petty political device used to blame the President for reckless spending, despite the boundaries of that spending being assigned by Congress. That's really all it is. It's a pointless relic of a time when the US President had more control over the purse strings, but now that's no longer the case, so the debt ceiling is meaningless.

Unless you want to crash the world economy through insane bickering, that is.

Times like this make me glad we have the Westminster system. It has it's faults, but nonsense like this couldn't occur.

SO what are the ramifications for you if this continues and no deal is achieved? Where do you go from here? What do you do? Do you become economic refugees and attempt to cross illegally into Canada?

Remember reading in history class about the Great Depression? Well, we won't have to look in books to see how bad it was back then, we'll just have to look outside.

Eh, you guys don't need to establish a new parliamentary system. Just send some MPs to Westminster, swear allegiance to the Queen, and all this will be sorted out in a day or two.

Uzzy wrote:

LTSpike wrote:

Ahh, so you're for the indefinite maintenance of a grossly bloated government? You do know where the money comes from to support that, don't you? The thing the lefties are most scared of with this is that it will show just how much of the government is simply unnecessary...

Is that the Government with or without the essential services that have been protected and carry on regardless? It's one thing to cut access to national parks, but quite another to stop paying the military, police officers, firemen..

Only one of out of your three examples is federally funded . . . :P

Yeah, I know. Point still stands though. State Government is still, you know, Government.

Ahh, so you're for the indefinite maintenance of a grossly bloated government? You do know where the money comes from to support that, don't you? The thing the lefties are most scared of with this is that it will show just how much of the government is simply unnecessary...

Is that the Government with or without the essential services that have been protected and carry on regardless? It's one thing to cut access to national parks, but quite another to stop paying the military, police officers, firemen..

I like the fact that both Ward and Skye had valid points. She was stirring the pot without regard as to what would happen, but that doesn't negate her point about self-appointed saviors hiding things from people.

True, and I do hope they explore those ideas at some point, rather than just have SHIELD as the out and out good guys.

Decent enough start, and it'll be interesting to see where it goes. I'm hoping that we get just a bit of moral dubiousness, given the whole 'secret government agency given infinite money and no legal oversight' thing that SHIELD has going on, but I'd be surprised if we got any of that.

I'm expecting a lot of monster of the week stuff, at least to begin with.

Looks like someone nailed what the script was talking about.

Quinnicide

Still, I'm sure that the last panel is far worse than what Harley got up to in her latest comic.

Yeah. It certainly could be an interesting thing to do, if that's what DC were aiming for, but it looks like this will just be another throwaway atrocity that undermines the character and the general coherency of the DC universe.

Besides, Palmiotti has already said that the new Harley Quinn ongoing will be lighter in tone, closer to the old Power Girl series (drawn by Amanda Conner)

At least Harley's latest appearance involves wacky hijinks. You know, like

So it's all good really. DC aren't competing with Warhammer 40k in the 'who can make the most grimdark universe' race or anything.

Uzzy wrote:

I reckon once Xykon hears about him being called a 'sub-boss', he'll teleport over to Tarquin's room, kill him, then teleport back and continue the fight with the OOTS.

A fitting death, I'd imagine.

Tarquin is the most savvy character in OotS history. If it came down to him vs. Xykon, I wouldn't count Tarquin out.

He's also cocky and not expecting anything like that. He thinks of Xykon as a sub-boss! He may be very genre savvy, but he's blind as to his actual importance in the world.

Also, mechanically, he's a high level fighter vs an epic level sorcerer.

I reckon once Xykon hears about him being called a 'sub-boss', he'll teleport over to Tarquin's room, kill him, then teleport back and continue the fight with the OOTS.

A fitting death, I'd imagine.

Oh goodie. Another 50+ comic sidequest coming up. Looks like our theories about this ramping up towards the endgame were wrong..

Urban Adventures Handbook/Thieves Handbook. Full of stuff for rogues and bards, urban adventure tips, ideas on running a thieves guild, cons etc.

Regarding Nale getting resurrected by Tarquin, I very much doubt that Nale would accept that. After all, he wants nothing from his father.

I do hope that this is the leadup to the endgame, by the way. Tarquin and the Empire of Blood can wait for a post OOTS comic series/one shot book, I reckon. Lets get to the OOTS vs Xykon for control of the last gate.

Andostre wrote:

Interesting thought: How hard is it to build a new gate?

Considering the architects of the previous ones?

Epicly.

Well, we know that the dungeons surrounding the gates were epicly hard to build. But the gates themselves?