Gorth

For me, it's very simple. The friends I play online games with love Steam. That means we games we play online, are either MMO's or Steam based for the ease of use when teaming up for co-op games. If a multiplayer/co-op game doesn't fit one of those 2, it will get the pass from us and we will look for other games. Not because of any love for Steam, but because it's just games and none of us likes to have many launchers installed. I'm the "worst" of the bunch because I have Origin installed besides Steam. No Ubi stuff, no Battlenet, no whatever. Edit: That included a bit of a half truth as I did have battlenet installed for a while when trying out the free version of WoW. It disappeared together with Wow again.

In which case.... bye bye sale

I'm going to lose a lot of time some day... question when is the release date???

From left to right, top row... Human Scourge (Necromancer), Sylvari Reaper (Necromancer), Human Chronomancer (Mesmer - think illusionist/sword master combo), Asura Holosmith (Engineer), Charr warrior (base warrior class) Sylvari Tempest (Elementalist), Human Mirage (another Mesmer), Human Druid (Ranger specialization), Norn Berseker (warrior) and lastly Norn Firebrand (Guardian). Humans are... humans Asura are diminutive rat like beings with too much IQ for their own good, they got the egos to match Norn are 3 meter tall human like beings Charr are ferocious, cat like beings, totally committed to their legions Sylvari are the youngest race in the setting, the first ones awakening about 25 years ago, spawned by The Pale Tree, who is the mother of all Sylvari The game has so much lore, so much background material and a very expansive wiki. Took me months just to get a basic overview. Fascinating world though. Edit: The basic premise is a bit like Mass Effect, a race of ancient, all powerful Elder Dragons wake up, destroy the world and devour all magic energy, become dormant when it's all gone in a repeating, millennium long cycle. In the base game, they are either stirring or just awakened and as the player, you need to create alliances to pool the forces of all factions, races, orders etc. to beat the first opponent.

Just like when I played swtor, I seem to have this habit of creating alts in Guild Wars 2, more alts, many more alts... way too many alts I thought it could be fun to put just *some* of them next to each other, comparing sizes and appearances (and practice my image editing skills). Not all classes represented, just the most used characters at the time of writing. Yeah, those game character editors are worse than Sarlacc pits

Nier: Automata is where I "re-learned" to use a controller. I used it for some PC games years ago but then reverted to mouse/keyboard for a while Edit: I did take a bit of practice to get used to the dual stick control again, one stick controlling character movement and one stick controlling your point of view and aim

What I get from the article so far is, Napoleon was the best baseball player Edit: On a serious note, a good general for me is one that given the context and circumstances, can achieve the stated goals at the least cost to his own side. Some do it by out thinking their opponents on the day, some do it through long term planning, some do it through sheer recklessness and some through sheer luck. I know, no such thing as luck in war, but some make their own luck by stacking odds in their favour

The not so subtle art of auto-foot-shooting.... Trump dealt blow as US trade deficit jumps ... Instead, Donald Trump goes into the presidential re-election race having failed to deliver on his campaign promise to close the US trade deficit. Part of the problem is Mr Trump's own tax policies. They boosted US consumption and a lot of that spending went abroad. This happened as growth was slowing in other parts of the world, contributing to a rising dollar. That made US exports more expensive and less competitive. ...

Would you trust an A.I.? When Bots teach themselves to cheat

I wanted to buy that game on Steam.... especially at 50% off. Almost did it when I noticed it said uses 3rd Party DRM, Denuvo (sp?). Bought a few other, smaller games instead ("The Turing Test" and "Space Rangers HD: A War Apart")

Some people like attention.... judging buy the constant tabloid style posts.... Which Tabloid Lies Sell the Most Magazines? Edit: I guess an existing thread on the subject of Anthem already existed. Merged and renamed.

Stem cells strike back! Better than snake oil apparently. Now curing Cancer and HIV at the same time! Well, it does look interesting. I guess next question will be, can they make it affordable? https://www.bbc.com/news/health-47421855

Speaking from personal experience, England and Germany both had some rather outrageous taxes that are not included in the "official" tax rates if you check google for what their respective tax rates are. England (possibly the UK, not sure) has this thing called Council Tax, which is calculated on the councils estimated monthly rent value of a property. Germany has compulsory health care insurance, calculated based on your monthly income. Adding an extra 250-500 Euro (yes, for one person) monthly tax to the officially listed national tax rates. No idea what the monthly medical insurance is in other countries or how they are calculated.

Saying I love you Is not the words I want to hear from you It's not that I want you Not to say, but if you only knew How easy it would be to show me how you feel More than words is all you have to do to make it real Then you wouldn't have to say that you love me 'Cause I'd already know What would you do if my heart was torn in two More than words to show you feel That your love for me is real What would you say if I took those words away Then you couldn't make things new Just by saying I love you More than words La di da, da di da, di dai dai da Now I've tried to talk to you and make you understand All you have to do is close your eyes And just reach out your hands and touch me Hold me close don't ever let me go More than words is all I ever needed you to show Then you wouldn't have to say that you love me 'Cause I'd already know What would you do if my heart was torn in two More than words to show you feel That your love for me is real What would you say if I took those words away Then you couldn't make things new Just by saying I love you La di da, da di da, di dai dai da More than words La di da, da di da, di dai dai da More than words La di da, da di da La di da, da di da, more than words La di da, da di da, di dai dai da La di da, da di da, more than words (oh uh uh uh) More than words

I've been playing some Borderlands 2: The Pre-Sequel lately with 2 friends. The Handsome Jack clone is just hilarious when trying to act with the real Jack's charm. His flirting attempts are worth a good laugh at times.

At least the latest breed of spammers leaves a trail of 'Edited by...' when retroactively updating approved posts with commercial links sprinkled in there randomly.

Guild Wars 2 has a number of seemingly weird (and not so weird) achievements. Besides 'Chairs of the Realm' where you have to try sitting in 42 (made up number) different chairs all over Tyria, it has a master diver achievement where you have to find both obvious and well hidden diving goggles, put them on (yes, your character actually strips down to their underwear when putting them on) and survive a dive to a spot somewhere below you. At higher levels, the dives gets harder, not just to find the goggles, but to hit the intended target. In this case, half a kilometer down at the bottom is a Greek style amphora where you have to hit the opening. Just about large enough for a character to slip through.

Speaking of timeless... they don't seem to make music like this anymore

Not quite as old as Strauss' music, but some things are timeless.... like rock and roll. I *think* Chuck is around 70 on the video. Not bad for a old guy, Bruce Springsteen has the look of a flabbergasted teenager in the company of his idol...

Mistake #2.... assuming that "Iraqis" had a sense of national identity. I do think that one goes on the account of countries like England and France though, when they divided the old Ottoman Empire according to their own interests. If not of any interest, then the proverbial "lines in the sand", drawn straight with a pen and a ruler on a paper map, disregarding local history, religion and ethnicity. I'm not a fan of nation states and much less of nationalism, but the assumption that everyone else would think the same way was just old world arrogance (I think Gromnir explained the shortcomings of such assumptions better in one of his posts a bit further up).

Post war mistake #1 (second Iraq war) was a complete ignorance of how much Shia and Sunni hate each other. I know people love hating on Iran these days, happily ignoring the very same shortcomings in Saudi Arabia, because one has been labeled an enemy and one a friend. How does the saying go? With friends like these....

Space Marine Occulobes next!

Trump should just put up a wall with lots of "gaps", where people can pay with Visa or Mastercard to pass through. It will be as effective as a solid wall, yet result in "Mexico" paying for it. Win/win Sorry, it's Friday and it's been a long week.

I guess I'm technically "Ancient" although I really only feel like an Immature Adult