Gorth

The music critic has spoken...

The Minority Report says hello

I feel like playing Baldurs Gate 2 again... I have BG1, BG2 and their expansions (both original cd's and from GOG). I remember there was a mod that could enable BG1 to run on the BG2 engine, BGT (Baldurs Gate Trilogy I think). Time to dust off some old Baldurs Gate mod sites 😁 Actually playing... mostly Guild Wars 2 these days. Been hooked, badly so, the last 4 years on that game. Watched a few youtube videos lately with a few guilds, that specializes in different mounts. No kidding. There are guilds, that create some very nice videos of the capabilities. Sadly they're quite "lo-rez" quality videos, because you can gain insane speeds on some of the GW2 mounts and recording software seems to struggle with keeping up. [DRFT] ("Drift") specializes in Roller Beetle racing and [Wing] which specializes in Griffon racing ...and with a Griffon serving as the camera helicopter

@alanschu now that Canada has a land border with Europe (with the end of the Whisky War), I'm sure Canada would qualify for EU membership, more so than some other countries 😂 (come on, Australia is in the Eurovision Song Contest!)

It's very popular in Iran. Everybody loves the Theocracy according to the government.

Turkey is there to remind the world, that NATO is not a collection of Western Democracies 😛

<insert clip of Monty Pythons Albatross skit here>

A few notable ones. The Soviet Union shot down a U2 spy plane (before I was born, so no memory of the event) somewhere in the middle of the USSR Later events (recently enough that I remember it being in the news): The infamous KAL Flight 007 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Korean_Air_Lines_Flight_007 The Americans shot down an Iranian passenger jet which violated Iranian airspace... or the territorial waters of the USS Vicennes or some such https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Iran_Air_Flight_655 And China forced down a US spy plane near Hainan Island. Mostly to a lot of eye rolling internationally iirc, as the Chinese effectively reverse engineered all the interesting bits before letting the plane fly back to the US https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hainan_Island_incident Ukrainian separatists shooting down a Malysian Airlines passenger jet, believing it to be a Ukrainian transport plane flying over "their" territory (because no sane operator would fly over a warzone) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Malaysia_Airlines_Flight_17

Watched the five "OAD's" (whatever that stands for) of Tensura Nikki. I'll save @majestic's eyesight and not post pictures or clips of the swimsuit episode. It was funny though. Rimuru had taught the dwarven craftsmen how to make spandex and the tailors how to make bikinis of it. Lots of skin showing and Rimuru is really enjoying himself... until the guys shows up and start posing in their budgie smugglers on the beach 😂 The latter episodes elaborating on the life of the academy students (the ones Rimuru promised Shizu on her death bed, he would take care of). Teaching, training, good fun. Last episode ends up with the kids trapped in a training dungeon. They arrived earlier than planned and stumbled upon things best not stumbled upon. An undead character (Specter Lord of some such) and his human bandit henchmen wants to kill the 5 kids. The kids easily takes care of the bandits, but the undead boss is another league altogether. As he's about to kill the kids (which I suppose is something undead lords do for kicks), rescue arrives from an unexpected corner. A demon lord (which I know from watching youtube is "Diablo", aka the black primogenitor demon lord, aka 'Noir') says he wants to pay some respect to Shizu (which he met in combat in the last episode of season 1). Saving the kids from certain death ought to do. Then proceeds to completely wipe the floor with the undead lord and humiliate him a bit extra just for good measure. Basically dismembering him first, locking his head in a vice grip and then tear out his innards through his back while he dies screaming. Nothing like good role models for the kids 🙄 Will rewatch the first episodes of season 2 and share (if I feel it worth sharing) later

You still have to wear them on public transports and airports with international connections, but otherwise we got rid of them a while ago. And good riddance too... nice to go shopping without a mask

Feeling a bit under the weather these days... even called in sick this morning (first time in almost 3 years, thanks to lock downs and social distancing). Sipping warm water with honey in it for my poor throat, which feels like I failed badly in a sword swallowing contest 😂 Just in case, I did a RAT test (to check for Covid) and while not a substitute for a lab test, it was clear.

Apparently, this (2022) years Isle of Man TT race was particularly costly with 5 dead drivers and 2 in serious condition. No, not going to link to the crash videos...

Too real mate, too real 🤔

If you decide to visit Australia some day, I would recommend doing it during the winter 😂 Temperatures rarely gets above 22c here in Queensland then 🥶

Also worth noting, "casualty" usually covers troops lost to the army. Some may return later. I.e. the above 800000 Soviet casualties were estimated to be 250000 (nice round number, sources invariably disagrees) dead and 550000 wounded, captured, lost unit cohesion/contact, deserted etc. Effectively unavailable to the army after the battle. Often makes it sound more impressive than it is.

You could argue, the whole disaster around the Russian army's antics north of Kiev was an attempt to preempt the need to occupy the whole country (eliminate the leadership). Nice thinking, poor execution. Like eating a nice dinner with a hammer and a fork...

More like the superior numbers army 😝 Soviet losses were almost 4:1, losing 800000 men (out of a starting army of 1.8 million) to the Wehrmachts 200000 (our of a starting army of 760000). But the Soviet army had another 1.5 million men in reserve, east of the salient to start an immediate offensive the moment enemy was worn down at Kursk. And yes, Operation Zitadelly ("Citadel") was the third largest engagement in WWII after Barbarossa and the one without any catchy names in the far east when 1.5 million Soviets destroyed over 750000 Japanese in Manchuria (600000 casualties), the Japanese surrendered 2 weeks later. All 3 engagements also featuring obscene numbers of tanks and aircraft. Contributing factor to Hitler losing interest in Kursk was the allied landing in Sicily and a new vulnerability on the southern front. Edit: Moved Kursk conversation to the military thread...

This one is really more for the military thread, but iirc, Kursk was the last serious attempt by the Wehrmacht to encircle a large number of Soviet troops?

"I'm the only person here I've never heard of..." 😁

Bought a pair of games on sale at GOG. X-Com 3: Apocalypse (I have the Steam version, but I prefer to have my games from GOG where possible) and X4 Foundations. The latter is a bit of a gamble, because as promising as X1-X3 looked, I never could play the Steam Versions. Sound is completely FUBAR and some of the fun goes out of it if you have to actually mute your speakers completely. I'm hoping the GOG version runs better on post 2010 PC's

Dang, I could have saved the $50 I paid for Borderlands 3 😂 (I never got into the game mind you, writing was a major disappointment after the first two games 😖) Anyone tried Trine 4? I loved the first 3 Trines (fun coop game)

It wasn't me, but a friend shared this on his Discord server...

I feel a bit sad when thinking back to the 70's, for us kids/young teens, he was just a "B Movie Star", featuring in all those old vampire and horror movies. Only finding out the last ten years or so, what a rich history the guy has/had (special forces soldier, stage performer, Tolkien scholar, voice actor, singer etc.)

I know people like to blame the war in Ukraine for the worlds economic woes at the moment. It conveniently showed up when Covid could not be believable blamed for. Both of which in my opinion masks underlying causes for a world economy that was about to implode most spectacularly in 2020 just before Covid conveniently struck (and people could point fingers at something else for explanation) https://www.bbc.com/news/business-61830925 A few numbers from the link: Markets had already been in shaky territory, with the S&P 500 down more than 20% from its January high ahead of the US rate hike this week. ... On Friday, Japan's Nikkei was 1.5% lower, while Australia's main stock market index was down by more than 2%. That came after Thursday saw a sell-off in the US, with the S&P 500 falling by 3.2%, while the tech-heavy Nasdaq dropped more than 4%. The Dow Jones Industrial Average tumbled more than 2.4%, pushing it below 30,000 points for the first time since January 2021. ... In the UK, where the Bank of England warned inflation could hit 11% this year .. When the war in Ukraine ends, a lot of people in positions of power will run out of excuses for why the roller coaster that is western economies, keeps dipping sharper and sharper and more and more frequently since the great depression and the 80's...

I actually found it more interesting to hear about BBC's failed attempts to get access to eastern Ukraine before the war... hence trying to emphasize the article itself and not Lavrov (as funny/sad as it is, the quoted line is probably the first true words he had said for a very long time)