Monte Carlo

Kemal Ataturk, on the war memorial at Gallipoli, and further evidence were it needed that he was an extraordinary statesman. The Turkish don't venerate him for nothing.

^ Nerdrage? Hardly. Bemusement, more like. look at the epic lameness of the product. The Tamagotchi tendency are in the ascendant. As for the "it's not like they are forcing you to buy it line," OK, that's a fairer comment but it's the sort of thing I expect to see in a fan mod, not a piece of desperate revenue harvesting.

What's wrong with a little funnies? The cost.

Booted up Awakenings and got the NEW DLC! pop up. What is it? A bizarre April Fool's Day gift pack for my NPCs. WTF? Honestly, the distance between me and what Bio clearly percieves to be it's customer base gets wider and wider every time they do something like this. It's just craptacular.

I was a reservist for five years, obviously back in the days when it involved digging trenches all over Westphalia waiting for the 'Orange' forces to send 99th Shock Army rumbling over the steppe. For those of you in the know, it involved old-skool steel helmets, soggy '58 webbing, SLRs and puttees. Now reservists are the backbone of all sorts of support functions in sandy, dangerous places. A well-motivated reservist is worth two conscripts in my humble, at least. Maybe I'd tie conscription into the reserves in some way, so that the little loves get gentle exposure to the military. 'Civil Aid' units on the Territorial model for three years... I think it might work. Ten-sHun! MC

^ Old chap, I presume all of these things are down-payment for your liberation from old Bonie, and why you are still speaking Portuguese rather than French. Of course, my historical knowledge of the Peninsula war comes almost exclusively from watching old episodes of Sharpe, usually late at night as an apres-pub treat. So I might well be talking out of my arse for a change. Zut alors! MC

I'm liking it a lot, bourbon is a firm favourite. I wonder what hard liquor is going to do to me though.

I have been suffering from an illness that requires meds that are, frankly, a sonuvabitch when it comes to side effects. I have occasional periods where my day goes seriously Hunter S. Thompson, and as somebody who has assiduously avoided recreational pharmaceuticals all his life it has not made me regret the decision whatsoever. Anyhoo, one of the prohibitions in the early phase of treatment was no alcohol. It is now meds +1 month and I am allowed to have a moderate, infrequent intake of booze. And, ladies and gentlemen, I do like a drink. It's now been a month without one. One. Whole. Month. Four weeks. 31 days. Etc. What shall I have? The anticipation is genuinely part of the fun, it will probably be beer of some description but not necessarily. Please post your most recent libations to see if they might feature in my falling off the wagon. Cheers MC

Nice one, Bio!

Recent historians now look at the vast conscript armies of WW2 with a revisionist eye in a way that would have been objectionable in the 70's or even 80's. The American and British forces of WW2, for example, were the product of liberal democracies. The combat effectiveness, man for man, of these armies wasn't as effective as that of the German, Russian and Japanese soldiers. The theory being, of course, that the latter came from highly militarized, authoritarian societies. That a mere company of German soldiers could halt a US divisional advance for a couple of days in NW Europe tells it's own story. They were done for by a lack of logistics and manpower, not the quality of the Landser. So the society from which the conscript hails is obviously an issue. And at the risk of sounding like a crotchety old git, I wonder if many of the Kids of Today are up for it. Clearly not the ones who volunteer for regular service though, because even a cursory look at the record in places like Afghanistan shows that we can still produce warriors. This is why the small, highly trained professional army always trumps the conscripted horde. Technology is another. Look at the US army - even the lowliest infantry pfc is required to operate and understand a large amount of equipment, tactics, doctrine and rules of engagement. This means that relatively junior NCOs have become even more important than before and the average educational attainment of US army sergeants (equivalent of a British army corporal) is very impressive. Conscripts don't really fit into this, especially not on an 18-24 month service cycle. Personally I'd role them as other people here have mentioned: non-combat logistics, static defence, civil support / emergency response to natural disasters. Having said that, those are still important roles and I suspect that young people might well benefit from the experience. The few that then want to move onto regular military service from that point could then do so, both parties win.

Krezzie is extremely well-balanced, with a chip on each shoulder an' all. I was born in the sixties, all this imperialism crap is nothing to do with me*, thanks. It's like bashing German forumites for the Blitz - not very helpful. All major UK political parties are more or less settled on the EU question - apart from some tinkering with the minutiae. Personally I want to see the UK re-negotiate our relationship with Europe to it's 1974 iteration - i.e. a Free Trade agreement. The EU was started by men desperate not to repeat WW2, a worthy and noble aspiration. It has now morphed into something rather different: a bloated, unaccountable corporatist monster. Of course, in the UK, we shaft ourselves by complying with all these stupid rules. I gaze wistfully over the Channel to our French cousins and can only admire with green-eyed envy at their ability to completely ignore any EU diktat that doesn't suit them. Cheers MC *Although some of it was jolly good, obviously.

^ Indeed. But I am talking about now, not then. Madison flags, Sarah Palin and Tea Parties are no doubt very enervating for the tectonic right-wing plates of the Republican / Conservative movement. For which, I add, I have some sympathy. They won't however get Joe Voter supporting the GOP anytime soon, the Republicans face up to the fact that a page has been (probably irreversibly) turned and go with it. or face extinction as a credible political entity. This is the context in which I see the Republicans responding to the Bill. Naturally, recently deposed political parties always return to their core activist base after the storm. But at this point in the electoral cycle the GOP should be moving out of that and wondering how to build up support. They ain't, as far as I can see, doing that. If they really want to screw around with the moveon.org remnants camped out in the West Wing they should brazenly steal some of their clothes, park their own tanks on their lawn (etc). Cheers MC

My country hasn't had compulsory military service since the early 1960's ("National Service"). People who did it naturally have mixed feelings (my father, for example, hated it but claims it was the making of him) and the operational benefits to the regular army towards the end of the scheme seemed, to be blunt, negligible. Western European governments seem to be dumping conscription for small professional armies (when people are disdainful of regular soldiers I remined them that the alternative is conscription, one of the many reasons I am grateful to veterans). My question stems from a an oft-heard barroom phrase - "Bring back National Service!" How many forumites here have undertaken compulsory military service? What did you think of it? Was it a waste of time? Did you feel any benefit from it and have your views changed as you've aged? For the others here, what would you do if your country introduced compulsory military service for 18-20 year olds? Would you go to prison rather than serve? For the purposes of my question, imagine your country is not at war and the service was not necessarily combat arm / operational (my view is that modern conscript armies would be a hindrance on the battlefield, including rear echelon roles). Cheers in advance, MC

Caveat Emptor. Obama was upfront about what he sought to achieve when he ran for office. He won. I write as somebody who doesn't share Obama's politics and has yet to be particularly impressed by the man. But you can't say that he hasn't delivered what he promised, unusual for a 21st Century politician. As somebody wrote recently, the rugged individualism and excitement of the American Dream is all very well, until you get diagnosed with cancer and have no health insurance. But there is a problem - in the UK the Left (who invented socialised healthcare) are destroying it with managerialism and social engineering. Which is their own manifest destiny - every function of the state must not only deliver a core service but also prosletize Frankfurt-school Marxism. As Alanis would no doubt erroneously warble, isn't it ironic? So, rugged individualists of the US, a word from an English conservative with Libertarian leanings (the small 'c' is deliberate), socialised healthcare as safety net = good. Socialised healthcare as comprehensive vehicle for social engineering = bad. I fear you will get the latter from the Obama iteration of the Democratic party. Republicans, if they want to get with the programme, should triangulate the issue by forging 'safety net' light-touch healthcare whilst fighting tooth and nail the leftist version. Cheers MC

Oh, and last night I had the misfortune to watch Righteous Kill. Let's get this straight: You are a director. They give you Robert De Niro and Al Pacino and ask you to make a NY cop movie. And you screw it up. Wow, that's like missing a barn door with a pump gun. I mean, you've got to be trying to screw it up.

Took the sprog to see How to Train Your Dragon, which was the best movie I've seen this year. Honestly. Hurt Locker? Meh. Dragons? Yay! It's a bit strange that all the Vikings had Scottish accents (except for the younger Vikings, who were all American, WTF?) but it sort of worked. Cheers MC

"How much can you possibly know about yourself if you've never been in a fight?" - Tyler Durden, Fight Club. "A liberal is a person so open-minded his brain fell out" - anon, although I use it quite a lot. "A Conservative is a Liberal who's been mugged - a Liberal is a Conservative who's been arrested" - also anon, and pretty much on the money. "Stand by the river long enough and you will see the bodies of your enemies floating by" - anon, Chinese (of course). "I feel sorry for people who don't drink - when they wake up in the morning that's the best they're gonna feel all day" - attributable to Peter Lawton or one of the other Rat-Packers. "Remember, your personal weapon was manufactured by the lowest bidder" - Murphy's Law of combat. "Never attribute to malice that which can be explained by stupidity" - O' Hanlon's Razor "The enemy advances, we retreat; the enemy camps, we harass; the enemy tires, we attack; the enemy retreats, we pursue

Medieval Total War 2...England, naturally, bejaysus the Irish are a tough nut crack on VH/VH (Kingdoms GC mod). DA: Awakenings... why can't I gut Anders the moment I lay eyes on him? Men of War... can't get into the groove and the first mission on normal difficulty involves driving a very slow tank through a very long gauntlet of well protected AT guns. Meh. S.T.A.L.K.E.R... now it might have dated graphics but it is very atmospheric. The scenery is so... normal. Which is what makes it spooky. It's ten times spookier than FO3, not that FO3 is meant to be spooky I suppose. I am having a break from Company of Heroes, it was too much of a time-devouring habit.

^ I'm hoping that there are tunnels later on.

I bought it. Installed it, ported in an old character from the DA epilogue (luckily wearing the Legion armour, so no underwear-clad melee), booted up the game. I expected a bit more of an intro, but instead I was pitched into combat with my new NPC friend. We make mince-meat of a Darkspawn ambush that a level 10 party would have aced. Then I speak to my new NPC who is a 21st level fighter with a 1st-level attitude. The dialogue was meh. The combat was meh. I turned it off and played Medieval Total War 2 instead. I think I'll go back to it and enjoy it, but at the moment I'm not in the mood for some reason. The first bit of the game fails to grab you at all, it's just so.... familiar.

In the shops this game (DELUXE EDITION!) is on offer for UK

The countdown is for the new five-dollar DLC that enables you to use the other DLC items you already paid for in Origins port over to the XP.

The Two Worlds thread is all about one of us picking up a game that was released a while back, universally loathed, yet enjoying it anyway. I am just about to install STALKER, which I'm sure you all realise was released shortly after the end of the Nixon administration. I'll let you know if I like it. What reasonably old games (I mean older than 12 months... this is the future, right?) should we be playing, if we missed them first time around?

Basics, Bioware.... basics.

Have been lurking on the thread at the Bio boards about why you can't port DLC weapons and armour into Awakenings. Chris Priestley's 'explanation' was, to say the least, disingenuous.