alanschu

Hehe, me too. It's nice to be on the other side of Hedgehogs. The last time I encountered them was in Silent Hunter 3, and wooo-eee did they suck. Only explode on impact, so they never lose track of where I am, unless they hit me!

That it was. I would like to have seen a move by move analysis of how long each player took, but I seem unable to find anything of the sort

Well, the problem is that it's logged in the "Sunk Ships" screen. There was a couple carriers that I hadn't realized I had sunk (mostly because I'm alt-tabbed during much of the turn phase, and I just let it do its thing in the background). But I wouldn't want to get rid of that screen, because there's a fair share of ships that are confirmed kills (such as that tanker that gets hit with 15 1000 lb AP bombs). In game news, April 1943 marked another time for many refits, so my Navy is sitting back undergoing upgrades. Most battleships have become giant AA platforms, and my destroyers are now equipped with the Mk9 Depth Charge, which is teardrop shaped to sink faster. Hence, it's more accurate. I'm also getting my first wave of Destroyer Escorts, which will be used to both escort (duh!) convoys, but also make Hunter-Killer groups. They are armed with Hedgehogs, in addition to a combination of Mk7/m1 and Mk9 depth charges (the Mk7/m1 are a bit less accurate, but are packed with 3 times the TNT, so if they hit...look out!). At the moment, all US based carriers are at Pearl Harbour, with the exception of a single Light Carrier still at San Francisco.

Well, this wouldn't have been allowed. The rules of the match limited the total amount of time, so moves had to be "relatively" quick. They had a maximum of 2 hours for the first 40 moves, 1 hour for the next 20 moves, and 30 minutes for all remaining moves. If you had time remaining from one area, that time carried over. So if you only used 1.5 hours for your first 40 moves, you had 1.5 hours to play your next 20. Basically, 40 moves must be played by the 2nd hour, 60 moves must be played by the 3rd hour, and the rest of the moves must be done at the 3.5 hour mark. 3.5 hours was the longest possible game.

A bit of me would like all the information to be hidden, so that I don't know what I'm going up against. This is what happened with Midway. Yamamoto though that the Americans were down to just two Carriers, because it thought that the Yorktown had sunk at the Coral Sea. But at the same time, I get a small euphoric feeling when I see that I have sunk a large fleet carrier

I wonder when that came about Volourn. Back in November, they were taking a loss of $126, as per Gamespot as well. I did find a blog that said $76, but that comes before the Gamespot article. Business Week, a mere 1 day prior to Gamespot's November article, said it was only losing $71 per unit, but that's not including the other items that get packaged, and they confirmed the $126 loss that Gamespot did. I imagine the new process for the processor will cut costs (by increasing yields), so that would help. Though that's quite a recent phenomenon too. According to the November article, the cost doesn't include labour.

Deep Blue did not make its moves immediately. In the first game it was a bit more mechanistic, not using more than 3 minutes for a move, but as the game came to a close, there were moves that were taking as many as 6 minutes. Some moves took as much as 15 minutes. Kasparov's issue was that Deep Blue wasn't designed to be a good chess player, but rather it was designed specifically to be Kasparov. He also regretted playing the final game, as he wasn't really mentally into it (as evidence by his conceding defeat after only 19 moves). The big advantage Deep Blue had was that it didn't get fatigued. Kasparov spent more time analyzing the games than any other game he had taken part in, and by the end he had lost his fighting spirit. He also admits that his prior experience with computer chess players led him to some false assumptions about Deep Blue. This was part of the reason why he lost Game 2 (it also led to him speculating that Deep Blue was being tampered with, since Game 1 was more in line with how computer chess players tend to play). The fact that it was making moves that he absolutely did not expect shocked him, and added to the pressure. That's what psyched him out.

That was one item and the only item in BG1. BG2 had a lot of them though. <{POST_SNAPBACK}> And not surprisingly, Baldur's Gate 2 was a much higher level adventure, and not particularly relevant to Mkreku's comment.

Well, the original Baldur's Gate has some +5 weapons if you take the time to kill Drizzt.

Well, it's impossibleness is related to the "simplicity" of the game of Chess. Checkers is also dominating (to the point where human champions no longer play it), whereas Go is patently stupid, to the point where human champions won't play it because it's too easy. I'd also argue that there are other things that will sell games more effectively (since these companies are in it for the money). Particularly graphics.

Chess is a pretty simplistic game when you sitback and look at it. All states are defined clearly, with clearly defined move possibilities. It's also a small scale game. Go is also an easy game, but it's board is many times larger than a chess board, so AI chokes on the branching factor. The state space of a 3D strategy game is significantly larger. Good AI is also very computationally expensive. SOmeone seems to be venting in the general direction of Medieval 2: Total War :D

Unfortunately, I have God's eye view of the sinking of ships. I write it off as being intelligence coups, since there is a SigInt screen that reports various troop and ship locations, and occasional movements as well, incorporated right in the game.

I thought the XBOX 360 was a loss leader?

That's because there was another post after Volourn's by Blank, that is now elsewhere.

I'm guessing that this post should be somewhere else.

Yeah. The game prefers to do nighttime naval bombardments, as it lets the ships run away the next move phase, so as to distance itself from land based aircraft. There's also nighttime air attacks, but I've had such little success with them that I rarely do them. Though one time I did get a torpedo into an aircraft carrier, usually I come away with zero hits. Well, usually I come away with out any contacts whatsoever. Apparently if there is a ship on fire at night, the chances of getting attacked goes up dramatically, both from ships in the same hex, and planes flying night missions. EDIT: And it seems luck is back on my side. A Catalina spotted a Carrier near New Guinea, so my B-24 Liberator squadron loaded up with 2000 lb GP bombs, and blew it to smithereens! And I just got word that CV Akagi, which was part of the assault on my now sunk carriers, just sunk near Truk. Woo!

It's not too bad. 3 of the ships lost will be replaced. Two carriers (and better quality Essex-class carriers), and a Cleveland class Cruiser. I did get some torpedo blasts in, which may sink something before it gets back to port. Maybe not. Japanese damage control is hideous compared to the Allies though, so I may still get some ships sinking. I did kill pilots though, and the pilots would have been highly experienced. Japan doesn't get much for trained pilots, and their level of training gradually goes down as the war goes on. I'd declare it a victory for Japan, but not as significant as they may have wanted. Operationally, and strategically, I am still winning. I just captured Rangoon, and Burma is almost completely liberated. UK battleships are now operating out of Rangoon, and the close proximity to many Japanese bases lets them do bombardments by night, and return safely to port before sunrise. Limited vulnerability to Japanese aircraft! Troops are currently preparing to clean up the rest of the area, and soon I'll have land based aircraft (LBA) able to patrol the Gulf of Siam, and tips of the South China Sea. I'll also be able to attack industry, and resource centers.

Come and get me!

I've been a part of sites that have encouraged recruitement, but stated straight up in the terms of use that any instances of spamming would result in immediate account termination.

I wouldn't say he's necessarily a bot. But he's definitely advertising. There's a refid in the link he gave. I wonder if Gametrailers has a policy about spamming...maybe he can get his account removed.

He does.

Yes.

Well, I just got absolutely slaughtered in an engagement just west of Wake Island. It seems as though the Japanese have taken offense to my carriers raiding their convoy lanes, and had a Carrier task force with at least 5 carriers in it. The CV Hornet, CV Wasp, and BB South Dakota were all sunk, and the task force escorts are decimated, and likely to not survive another encounter. CV Saratoga and Enterprise are nearby, but they are retiring to Australia. CV Lexington and Yorktown, with two CVEs and 3 battleships are in the area, and will switch their operations to carrier hunting. New keels for a new CV Wasp and CV Hornet have been laid down, but I won't get them for another 500 days or so. No replacement for the South Dakota.

It wasn't counterfeit money. It was still legal tender. And I was 6.

It doesn't help that the American quarter is the same size and everything as a Canadian quarter. Maybe it's different now, but I remember a looooong time ago, many moons ago, but I could buy pop from the pop machine using canadian coins when we were in Vegas.