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Reminds me of an ERP (Enterprise Resource Planning) system I implemented once for a customer back in Denmark (many years ago)... To test currency exchange rate calculations, i introduced 'CHICKEN' as a currency code in their system and set up transactions against EUR, GBP, DKK etc. Barter economy FTW The customer was not impressed (no sense of humour)

@Chilloutman Someone out there did read our minds.

Y'all already know that Eurojank RPGs are my comfort food and GreedFall was a significant step up for Spiders in terms of quality over their previous games IMHO. Needless to say, I'm super excited for this. As an aside, Spiders' latest gimmick seems to be slapping 2 words together to form 1 long word. Are we sure they're a French company and not German?

Made my wife lamb loin chops with mashed potatoes and a chanterelle red wine gravy. I don't care much for lamb but my wife goes crazy every time I make it. I also made chocolate covered strawberries with crushed hazelnuts but the chocolate was too bitter for us but that's what I get for trying to use dark chocolate.

I'm now far enough into playing Solasta that I can provide a first report. Personally, I'm loving playing this game. It's finally a game that sincerely scratches my D&D itch. I've also come to appreciate 5e a whole lot more because of this game. I think I will always like 3.5e the most, just because that was my personal prime D&D-playing years edition. But 5e is definitely second-best. The game is extremely faithful to 5e rules, and even such things as held actions and reactions are done beautifully. For a TB game, combat goes by pretty quickly. You have a good amount of options available to you in each turn of combat. The tutorial explains everything very well. The game includes character backgrounds that actually matter, and passive skills and spellcasting outside of combat are used extensively. Verticality and movement in 3D is awesome, including flying, spider climbing, etc. And yes, TA did this first. Larian copied TA for BG3. All in all, a truely delightful gem of a game. For negatives, a very superficial one would of course be that the graphics and character models are not very fancy and sometimes look a bit odd. For some people this may be a big issue. For me, I couldn't care less. It is good enough. The voice acting is fine, though both written and spoken lines could use some more polish in places. The main criticisms I'd offer are party size of only four, no multi-classing, level cap not all the way up to 20, and the game needing more content to explore. For the first issue, this may be the one game where this is okay, because they often attach critical NPCs to the party for certain quests. Early in the game we even get two such NPCs attached, effectively forming a party of six. As for the other three issues, I feel they all will become moot after we get the next DLC or two. TA's approach for this game appears to be to provide the core game plus a complete campaign first, and then release new DLCs every so often with a completely new, standalone, full-sized campaign. The DLC they're working on for a March release is exactly such a DLC. So TA seems to be doing what NwN was originally supposed to be, with TA's terminology being "campaign" in place of "module." You also have available to play user-created campaigns made with the "Dungeon Maker" toolset they have created and included with the core game. These are available in Steam Workshop and can be very easily added to your game. More to come.

i have to go to New York in two weeks. I've been to 39 of the fifty states and nine other countries. Never set foot in NYC though. Why the heck couldn't it be during baseball season? Going to be there for three days. I am trying to convince G to come with. If so we'll extend it to a week and play tourist.

Meh, about the Dune game. Devs making a huge deal about having Atreides in green because they are "true to the book" then make Harkonnen red instead of blue (or blue/orange). Some of the advisors also are the farthest any depiction of the characters has ever been from the book. Take your liberties. But then don't spend all that effort patting yourself on the back for having green uniformed Atreides because you are staying true to the book. Water-fat devs...

A side-point and a caveat: Side-point: I never cared for the first NwN game because I love my D&D games to be party-based and that game, even with the minions you control, just doesn't sway me much. I did/do love NwN2. But, I always loved the 'regular release of modules' game concept of NwN, something akin to the old Gold Box games model. Caveat: I am only at level 3 in Solasta right now. The enemy combat strategies are quite sophisticated. Pretty good so far, I'd say.

Nah, weve got Covid and "supply chain problems" to fall back on into perpetuity.

I don't know if it was a slip of the tongue or deliberately (if so, kudos to her)

Not shown in video, but apparently they have a tentative release date of June 2022.

good to hear things went reasonably well. your vaccine reluctance were well earned. personal, we had a terrible time with our initial shingles vaccine side effects, but we didn't end up in the icu. our adverse reaction to the shingles vaccine did not keep us from getting the follow-up shot, but we were dreading having to roll up our sleeve for number two. can't imagine what our reluctance would been like if were the result o' a hospitalization instead o' just the worst night we can't recall. heck, we ate bad artichoke heart dip +30 years ago and we literal become nauseated by the smell o' artichokes even now. serious, it's been decades. the discovery roasted artichokes prevents cancer would have us holding out on partaking longer than otherwise reasonable. HA! Good Fun!

Had a very light fever overnight (enough to make it a bit of a restless sleep) and a slight headache today (not enough to bother with a painkiller). Not too shabby I suppose. Three shots of mRNA in a period of a little more than 6 months... I wonder if there by now are any original Gorth particles left in my body?

That isn't really how science works... it's a constant search and refining of knowledge. You can put a little Nurgle sticker on the side of your truck for every person you bring down

If you have Toybox installed under "Class Specific" in the Bag of Tricks tab you should see a checkbox for "Witch/Shaman: Cackling/Shanting Extends Hexes by 10 minutes (Out Of Combat)" which should save you a load of time.

I'd argue that a dual weapon setup would be better with a Rogue/Barb since most Rogue Strikes are Full Attacks and so is Barbaric Smash (which raises the chance to really kill with it which is important for the refund), but it's not that important. By the way: kill by DoT (for example Barbaric Smash + Blood Frenzy + Deep Wounds) will trigger Blood Thirst, but it will not trigger Barbaric Smash's refund, even if the DoT was the result of a Barbaric Smash. So if you used Barbaric Smash and the enemy barely survived, he will die with the next tick, but it won't refund your Rage unfortunately. Also often enough the DoTs would kill weak enemies that I planned to hit with Barbaric Smash right before the smash landed - which costs the Rage but does nothing. It can be annoying sometimes. One has to watch that and maybe sometimes just switch targets. It would have been cool if Barbaric Smash put a short-lived effect on the enemy so that the Barb would get a refund if the enemy died in that short period of time and not only from the direct smash. But anyway: the combined DoTs in general are potent and cool. Like when you apply some DoTs to several enemies and then turn to some others - and when the first ones die from bleeding out you get Blood Thirst procs. Can even be used when fighting single tough enemies with weak ads. Back to single class Barb: I think players vastly underestimate the usefulness of either Driving Roar or Dazing Shout. I think a multiclass Barb is more interesting and often more potent to play to the way to the higher levels, but once you reach PL 9 with a SC Barb (PL 8 with a Furyshaper) it will pay off imo. Luckily, with all DLCs installed, you can play a fairly long amount of time after reaching PL8/9. Using both shout abilities in combination with Blood Thirst (and so on) is potent debuff/CC + great damage all in one piece - for only 1 point of Rage and short casting times. And when you are going against large mobs the combo of big AoE Daze/AoE knockdown + damage + potential refund via Blood Surge is so much fun imo. But... against single targets it's not that useful I have to say. Unless you use a Chanter with summons that you can kill for Rage (Blood Surge) and 0 recovery (Blood Thirsty). So maybe one has to be certain about the role the Barb or Barb/something should play. Multiclasses can be a lot more versatile. If the goal is indeed to use Heart of Fury then there's of course no alternative to single class. And in my experience single class Barb is good - unlike some other classes like for example Fighter or Paladin (when not using Devine Retribution with summons) - and it's worth playing. One last though: as I said one can do wild stuff with HoF and Barbaric Retaliation, but it often involves weird combos. For example when using dual mortars and also involve Combusting Wounds and Avenging Storm. That's not a very stereotypical Barb setup of course. However, it's fitting for some dudes - for example Serafen as SC Barb. But HoF is also nice for debuffing in an AoE - for example when using a Morning Star with Body Blows (and Spirit Frenzy): -35 fortitude in an AoE can be very useful. One can also combine HoF with club + flail and lower Will and Reflex by 25 in that AoE (cool for Furyshapers who are using the Fear Ward mostly). Or use Ngati's Tusk with maxed Survival and lower enemies non-deflection defeneses just by being there (Hunter of Hunters aura) and lower deflection with the pike modal + HoF. What I personally really liked in my SC Furyshaper run was to combine Battle Axe + modal + Blood Storm with Barbaric Retaliation and the Blood Ward. I needed stellar AR (Patinated Plate and so on) to survive all the initial melee crits, but all the DoTs I placed on the enemies took over eventually and outhealed the damage. Dazing Shout helped a ton, too.

Well if we choose to stay here, would have to tear down the drywall in a couple bedrooms, insert wall insulation and use that "soundproofing" drywall (it's denser/heavier or something) and see if that makes enough difference. Has anyone done something like that, does it really make much of a difference? Stuff like those foam wall squares ppl tack on walls wouldn't work, I see them as hard to clean dust collectors. >.> My allergies have also been very bad up here for whatever reasons, not fond of that. Also, would you like coyotes with your golf course? Neighbor asked if we had cats because (outdoor) cats around here supposedly don't last long with coyotes around.

I saw an interview on the news here the other day, where a Danish guy (with heavy Danish accent) told the reporter, it was recommended by the government, therefore probably Ok to do so. I couldn't help burst out laughing, thinking about how some of our US forum members here would react if somebody said the same on US tv about the US government There is a difference though. Although the Danish government controls many aspect of life, they are probably also one of the most scrutinized governments. The press, the independent auditors, the independent courts etc. are always (and I mean always) looking them over the shoulder and checking their every move, every action and every penny spent (and on what). It's these checks and balances, combined with transparency, which allows people to have a degree of trust in the decision making process. Why would I want to live in Denmark? Too cold and too boring

Speaking as an Australian Christian, I absolutely despise the Australian Christian Lobby.

Well Bruce maybe you'll be interested in the other 'Big Story' in Australian 'Politics', which is that the most recent outgoing Australian of the year Grace Tame, was found to have once... taken a photo with a bong! DUN DUN DUN! https://www.news.com.au/lifestyle/real-life/news-life/brilliant-response-to-grace-tame-bong-photo/news-story/54cff740ed0c851666f8faa72b9ddbc2 Some backstory. Grace Tame was a victim of child sexual assault, and later became an advocate on behalf of other victims, and due in part to her work, a law was changed. The law previously disallowed victims of child sexual assault to speak about the crimes committed against them; this was theoretically to protect them, but it didn't really do that very well. Grace was presented her Australian of the Year award or whatever it's called by the PM, Scott Morrison. The Liberal Party had recently had a sexual assault controversy of its own. It was not handled well. Grace made no effort to pretend she was happy to be near the leader of a political party who badly mishandled a sexual assault allegation. There followed much pearl clutching by various people about how Grace should be more gracious and smile more etc, which eventually culminated in The Daily Mail digging up a photo from 2014 with her next to a bong.

I knew it, bloody price gougers at Oxford University, lets hang them all from the street lights! Besides being the first time my gut instinct had let me down this badly, I would at least feel good with myself, that I did what I thought was best for my fellow man. No, I probably wouldn't trust the CDC in the US, I sure as heck dont trust *anything* the current Australian government tells me, but you know who I trust? The health authorities in my old country, whose advice I've been following since the beginning of the outbreak. They don't give a flying (beep) about big pharmacy companies.

The Australian Federal Police Raids- on three media organisations. What sparked them. IGADF Report ('Brereton Report') on Australian SAS conduct in Afghanistan- pdf, and long. 2021 update. And for balance, the report on the allegations of war crimes by the New Zealand SAS ('Operation Burnham'; TLDR definitely killed civilians, probably didn't meet the criteria for a war crime though the systematic lying about it was a very bad look. The guy who wrote the exposé on that has definitely been the target of SIS spooks before and since, too). That should give Bruce some light reading for the next few days.

Kendrick Lamar?

Shame 'Pac wasn't able to attend due to COVID.

Im slightly miffed that OBJ got a ring. I dislike that dude. EDIT: Also

I guess it's good the Rams won because had the Bengals won it would have been highway robbery. That 75 yard TD was the most blatantly obvious offensive pass interference possibly in the history of the NFL. It was so egregious that it should have counted as 3 penalties (not to mention been called). Anyway, Joe Burrow is terrific but they desperately need to get him an O-Line. The Bengals pass protection was effectively nonexistent.

IMO barbarian works much better as a MC. Berserker/devoted is a very powerful melee combo who can use Clear Out as a cone version of HoF and has some very good weapon choices (Lord Darryn's Voulge, Amra, Karaboru). Berserker/troubadour is also very powerful if you decide to use Grave Calling and spam Chill Fog by killing your own skeletons (however it's not really a melee build). Another great combo is rogue/barbarian - with a 2h weapon he can easily spam Barbaric Smash and also trigger Blood Thirst (if you have a priest who can cast BDD, then a berserker/streetfighter with Voidwheel is devastating).

Part of the problem with gathering proof of war crimes is, Scott Morrison and his government sic’ed the federal police on the news outlets and seized pretty much all of it (what was available at the time) because it was too damaging for the government (didn’t fit their narrative of good vs evil) edit: not sure if good link, sucks doing on a phone while in bed https://amp.abc.net.au/article/11309810

"Unfortunately, some of the new battle encounters we designed didn’t convey our intentions properly, and we felt like the new enemies and their mechanical features needed more balancing."

He's not deploying the military.

Also, can we ever have Valentine's Day without reference to that greatest definition of love?

For the optimistic take:

P:K and P:WOTR are exceptionally buggy games. P:K is a lot better these days, like years of patching later, but I'm pretty sure there was widespread expectation about WOTR being buggy as hell. Nothing about Deadfire/PoE even come close to comparing - whether its game mechanics functioning, engine stability, or just general "being able to complete the game." People still bought WOTR in droves. edit: i have a beefy gaming PC, and in the late game of WOTR I cannot get higher than 30 fps and I pretty much have to run in turn-based mode because the stutters are so unbelievable (and even in turn-based mode, an enemy turn will go by where I have literally no idea what happens because the game freezes for like 5 seconds while trying to resolve what happned). edit: also, Obsidian having a reputation for having buggy games did not prevent Outer Worlds from being one of their best-selling projects ever (I believe someone said only F:NV beats it, which was a follow-up to a famous IP). edit 2: not going to deny that Obsidian has a reputation, but this goes back to my main point to underline in any discussion of sales. An explanation has to be consistent with other data points. People bring up bugginess/instability as a deterrent, ok, but then you have to reconcile that with other games, Obsidian or not. If you can't reconcile that, maybe you end up with a better explanation (e.g. Pirate theme is an interesting recurrent theory and in fact I will note that current marketing [e.g. steam hero image, ultimate edition box art] seems to play down the piracy/nautical angle quite a bit).

Can I interest you in the teachings of Pastafarian?

For me, this is as it should be. Your class choices should be irreversible. Respecing should only be for changing your choices of abilities, skills, spells and the like, if that. Whatever happened to the concept of living with the choices you make? Isn't that at the heart of roleplaying?

"Valentine's Day is very commercial so we shouldn't lose track of the real meaning of this special day. The day native Hawaiians stabbed Captain James Cook in his colonising neck on Feb 14, 1779" Note: To be fair, Cook wasn't a coloniser per se, just an explorer. But explorers of that day and age tended to get followed by the colonisers. And from what my hazey memory recalls, it was a lot of ups and downs that caused it. Crew of his ship grabbed wood for repairs, apparently not knowing it was from a sacred ritual area of the locals. The locals responded by capturing a ships cutter. Cook tried taking a local chieftain hostage for its recovery, and it all went **** up.

Space Cobra Episode XII: "Osorubeshi Saishūheiki" aka "The Dreadful Ultimate Weapon" When last we left Cobra, he was himself left flatfooted as he was outsmarted by Sandra, leader of the Snow Gorillas, to the Ultimate Weapon. "Shiny!" All in all, a pretty satisfactory opening adventure, IMO.

Hmm, looks like that all of the Wii Us in the world were bought up by the bunch of Osbidianites

fast travel would ruin the spirit of this game. Ziplines are good enough.

create a lean-to and set your spawn in the area you expect to struggle