Amentep

There used to be a number of prominent women posters on the old Black Isle site who just never transitioned to Obs boards (or who did but never posted much). Tess, Quixotic, GM, Aurora, and...um...the woman who ran her own irc channel and had multiple handles that for whatever reason I can't remember any of). That said, I seem to remember a few women from that time who took gender neutral handles and never really advertised they were women too, so as not to garner negative attention.* Mind you there are a lot of guys from that period (Onkel, Rayt, slowtrain, that young guy who was the first community mod whose handle I'm blanking on) who didn't come over or don't post any more either. I had a point when I started this, and I think the thing is that maybe there are more women posters here who either lurk or who don't advertise they're women because they don't want the extra (unwanted?) attention they feel they might get? *when we first got avatars on Obsidian and I picked an avatar with a woman on it, people assumed I was a woman and started hitting on me in PMs - strange but true!

From what I gather, their attitude is that its not a 'fund my life" kickstarter because there is an end product (the game) that is promised out of it; I'm not sure that I necessarily agree but I can see their argument, at least.

http://www.indiegogo.com/projects/grimoire-heralds-of-the-winged-exemplar?website_name=grimoireforever Funny, that link is for a game called "Grimoire", not "Wizardry" (and yeah, I know the history, but Grimoire isn't Wizardry 9, its Grimoire).

I think - reasonably - any Joe not part of the strike team could have survived. Sure CC says that they destroyed the Joes, but at that point they thought they'd killed all of the strike team too. Not unreasonable to think that others would have survived (if they want them to).

I'm not sure what you're experiencing. When I quote stuff i get a quote box and a scroll bar on the right and no problem room-wise. Also the quote box has an arrow on the right that allows me to expand the box. Perhaps this is a browser issue (or I'm misunderstanding your problem)? I only use BBCode to clean up quotes (because doing it outside of the code doesn't seem to work right always). It's mostly trying to do quote splitting, with the forum software hating anything more than 3 three separate quotes, and being tough to get those separate quotes. Yeah without switching to the coding, the system doesn't seem to add a space after quotes making it hard to type between multiquotes. it also seems to be real easy to accidentally delete the quote coding while working on editing a quote if you only want to reply to a part of it.

I'm not sure what you're experiencing. When I quote stuff i get a quote box and a scroll bar on the right and no problem room-wise. Also the quote box has an arrow on the right that allows me to expand the box. Perhaps this is a browser issue (or I'm misunderstanding your problem)? I only use BBCode to clean up quotes (because doing it outside of the code doesn't seem to work right always).

I want a soft-serve ice cream cone dipped in chocolate...

Yeah Yum! Brands is big on maximizing space (the nearest KFC to me is housed with a Long John Silvers, another chain Yum! divested themselves of like A&W). I dunno if the change was with trans fat or not - I know McDonald's fries don't taste 100% the same since they changed to lower trans fat.

They're cutting the chicken pieces differently at KFC. Not sure exactly why, but its difficult to tell 100% whether what you're getting is a breast or back piece (sometimes it seems like you get part of both). I've even had one where they left the neck on. A&W was bought by Yum! (who, IIRC own KFC now) and didn't do well for them so was sold to some of the largest franchisees, as I recall. Dairy Queen's always been an independent franchise chain with little of the top down management you see in other Fast Food Franchises; they tend to vary wildly between locations in my experience. Not familiar with Foster's. The internets comes up with a company called "Fosters Freeze" (apparently one of the classic restaurants built around soft serve ice-cream like my fave Zesto's here). Not sure if that's the company you mean though -looks to be a California only restaurant.

Er, they released them on DVD already. At least in the US; sure they were direct-from-laser disc copies, but they were released on DVD.

Carmine Infantino - probably best know for working with DC's The Flash and his stint as DC's publisher - passed away. http://www.comicbookresources.com/?page=article&id=44738 Also passing this week was George Gladir, co-creator (with the late Dan DeCarlo) of Sabrina the Teenage Witch - http://robot6.comicbookresources.com/2013/04/george-gladir-co-creator-of-archies-sabrina-passes-away/ As well as Fred creator of Philémon - http://www.lobservateurdebeauvais.fr/article/02/04/2013/puiseux-le-hauberger--deces-du-dessinateur-fred/6855

RIP Roger Ebert. He was always one of my favorite reviewers - one of the few who seemed to enjoy genre movies.

Yeah I hope that 1313 can find a home - more importantly I hope the employees can find new jobs quickly as well.

Yeah...well I didn't suggest that so I'm not entirely sure what your point is. In short, and to be perfectly clear, I have no problem with optional modes you suggest and I'd imagine most players aren't going to get upset they add extra difficulty at their choice. And if there was a "click here to have no level scaling, ever, in PE" I'd be pro that too so people could get what they want out of the game. That said, I'm not against scaling the critical path within a small frame of levels as Josh suggested. They expect you to hit the critical quest around level 5-8, making that encounter work for 5-8 level parties. If you're below 5-8 or over 5-8 you have to deal with the challenge/lack-thereof. Seems to me that isn't an unreasonable design and a lot better than the "level one rat in a sewer becomes a level 100 Wererat with Adamantine Armor and a vorpal sword when you visit later in the game" level scaling which is - I gather - the thing most people dislike about level scaling. Further to this, I can understand how people will - in ignorance - complain about games that allow them to do things that give them sub-optimal play - including professional reviewers. Its hard to click "Trial of Iron" button (presumably with a description like Heart of Fury mode) and claim ignorance and get much traction. Note I also have to say, I really don't care if reviewers do complain about the "difficulty" of the game. But I can understand from a designers perspective why you'd want to consider what kind of play experience the player will have on the critical path if the game isn't terribly linear.

It would not be difficult to have RGB customization. If you could do it with your UI menus in a JPRG in the mid 90s there's no reason you couldn't in a PC game in 2014. While I *think* it would be easy, not being a game programmer who has worked with any of the Obsidian programs they're using I don't *know* that its easy so prefer to hedge my bets.

Trial of Iron can lead to people dying and being horribly frustrated because they have to start the game from 0... oh wait, they selected the mode for it themselves. Right, in a perfect world people would take responsibility for bad choices. Unfortunately, in our world, people wandering some place and ruining* their experience in the game by either making it too hard or too easy for themselves leads to poor reviews, snarky videos and lots of accusations of "Obsidian can't balance their game properly" and "Obsidian's QA is hopeless". At least that's my experience. *I've never thought a game being too challenging or too easy was a deal breaker when it was my choices that made it that way, but that does not seem to be the case for all people.

If the option to change is trivial to implement I'm all for it as mentioned previously (Violet for allies! Yellow for enemies! Chartruse for neutrals!) But the default colors (and thus the only selection circle colors if creating a "change circle options" is not trivial to do) really should take into consideration red-green and yellow-blue color blindness (which, I believe would make the enemy-ally choices something like red-blue or yellow-green or something)

I'd imagine its vague simply because of the stage of production with regard to how many optional and critical areas/encounters there are - I could be wrong. I don't mind the kind of level scaling that he mentions (only on critical path, only within certain narrow constraints). In someways I can see it as a "damned if they do, damned if they don't" proposition. No level scaling can lead to people encountering things to high level for them and complaining or doing so many side quests the critical path is a cake walk and then complaining the game had no challenge but level scaling will have people complain as well because it exists. Of course I suppose you could argue trying to do something just to avoid complainers might not be worth it or something.

Yeah I was iffy about Shadowrun Returns (never played the previous SR video games, only marginally familiar with the P&P setting). But if it continues to shape up well it'll certainly be worth getting ont he backend.

And all other areas, that are on the crit path, will scale by level? J. E. Sawyer on a previous thread about Level-Scaling said: I think we've said this before, but the only things we're likely to scale with player level are crit-path special encounters and even then, only within a range of levels. E.g. take a boss like Sherincal in IWD2. Maybe you'll encounter her at 5th level, but it's possible you could encounter her at 8th level. If 5th-8th is the most common range, we'd scale around that, but if you encounter her sub-5th level, you'll have to deal with the difference. If you encounter her at 9th or 10th by some x-treme XP mining, it will be a little easier for you. The reason to scale the crit path special encounters is to allow for the fact that not everyone wants to do a lot of side content. Some people want to (largely) stick to the crit path with minimal side quests. When it comes to the optional/side content, there won't be any scaling at all. Rats in the cellar will still be rats and may explode from your mere presence and the dragon Chrysophylax will probably burn you to ashes if you mosey up to his lair at 3rd level. See the full thread at - http://forums.obsidian.net/topic/63017-level-scaling-and-its-misuse/

Ah well, the Eastern Carpenter Bee that we get here looks like a giant bumblebee here locally (although not fuzzy on the abdomen - a bit hard to notice when you're ducking for cover thinking that's a wasp out of the corner of your eye). Many different types of Carpenters though as well as bumbles (the ones here are distinctly smaller than the similarly colored Carpenter bees).

I got Tomb Raider, X-Com and Bioshock Infinite. Tomb Raider is quite grabby in its immediate pull; played it a good bit yesterday because the story has natural hooks. Love X-COM but can already see I'm going to be in financial trouble fast (always my problem with strategy games - I suck at managing resources) and Bioshock Infinite looks really good (haven't gotten enough into the shooty part to know how that's going to do with me yet).

One dead center in my forehead (taken care of by a receding hairline...except for like three hairs that spring forth in different directions from that spot on my head) and two on the back of my head. Pretty much makes trying to have any kind of hairstyle other than "cut very short" an exercise in frustration (or rather expensive in use of hair products). That's on top of having motley beard hair (brown! red! blonde! now with grey!) that's thicker on the neck than on the face (awesome if you're planning on being a politician in the 1830s-1870s or so, not so much today) and the fact that my sideburns grow in different directions (possibly due to another cowlick) making one side look cool and rakish and the other as if I tried to grow muttonchops and failed miserably and well, frankly, you can see why I welcomed baldness from an early age. Thanks mom! EDIT: Aren't the "large bumblebees" Carpenter bees looking for wood to bore a home into?

Watched HOTEL TRANSYLVANIA. Laughed so much my face hurt. Ow.

Makes me want to fire up Arcanum myself in someways.