Date: 2009-12-01 23:08 Subject: Designer at work Security: Public

Current game design project for fun at Chez Homer over the Xmas break is Project JiS, where JiS stands for Junta in Spaaaaace. I have some workable ideas I think for something close to the fun ride of Junta, but with more viable game winning strategies, greater uncertainty about who will win, more point to actually fighting, and a different way of handling the mechanics so its not a straight clone of Junta.

Date: 2009-11-29 21:04 Subject: Just the usual Security: Public

Not exactly a sunny weekend.

Landlord installed a heating panel in my apartment, and a curtain rail to help trap heat in the main room. Which should all be useful in six months.

Finished Dragon Age:Origins. Last few hours of gameplay was treacly, all slow and frustrating as the computer tried to handle a bigger cast of actors. Then came a lot of pivotal no turning back decisions. Not exactly a happy ending, but definitely a heroic one.

Went to a book launch on Friday, saw a few people I had not seen in a while, which was nice. Sadly I drank enough to become a bit of a bore I think.

Date: 2009-11-18 22:37 Subject: Yikes Security: Public

Its kinda scary, creating a Facebook page, and having a machine suggest a list of 20 people who might be your friends, and it being right for 15 of them. All I did was tell it my name, gender ad date of birth...

Mainly mucking around with Facebook on account of having to keep up with deelopments in social media for work purposes.

Date: 2009-11-18 17:35 Subject: Purge! Security: Public

Unsubscribing from an accumulation of commercial e-mail lists. Tired of the measurable amount of time spent each week on deleting news about stuff I neither need nor want. Thankfully most of them made the opt-out provisions one click easy - in contrast to various UK agencies where after wasting hours trying to unsubscribe on official websites I ended up filtering them straight into spam.

Date: 2009-11-17 23:28 Subject: Going tactical Security: Public

Following up my last post on ( roleplaying game mechanics )

Next post, I will try and tie that core mechanic into the character generation and reward/progression systems.

Date: 2009-11-17 21:49 Subject: Shoot straight you bastards! Don't make a mess of it. Security: Public Mood: sad

Edward Woodward is dead.

First sighted on The Equaliser, which pretty much nailed the 'bitter ex-spy' image in my head. Last seen in Crusade, but most memorably seen in Breaker Morant. I should probably track down The Wicker Man, as his performance there is said to be brilliant.

Date: 2009-11-17 00:28 Subject: RPG musings Security: Public

Working on my wiki and game ideas, and thinking about what game system to use. While I had good times with different versons of Runequest, I think its time to be honest about the mechanics in that system ( which bug me )

Also, another Ulduar hard mode down last night, Flame Leviathan with all four defence towers up.

Date: 2009-11-16 18:10 Subject: Holidays are exhausting Security: Public

The Buzzcocks gig in Christchurch was good, partly as both the Veils and the Buzzcocks did a good show, and partly because there were a few people there I knew and could chat too. My brother and I arrived at eight and missed the first band comletely, but at least we did better than the punters we met on the way home at 11pm who were en route to the gig and had missed the whole show they paid $60+ for tickets. The Buzzcocks saved their biggest hits for the encore, but they still sounded good and looked like they were having fun. Based on the DomPost review of the Wellington gig as oversold and undervenued with some technical glitches, Christchurch had the better gig.

Party Friday night was low-key, but I got to catch up with a few old faces and meet some new ones. Music was hauntingly familiar of my tastes circa 1993-1995. Stayed a bit later than I should have, and calling a Blue Star taxi at 2.30am was a bad choice as it took 40 minutes for one to show from the centre of town. Nice chat with the Taxi driver though, a former police commander in Afghanistan, who confessed that he had joined the police at 18 because gold braid shoulder boards looked cool.

Visited my grandmother, who still looks frail, but much better than she was two months ago. Spent some time afterwards reflecting on the concept of aging in place.

Spent most of the rest of the weekend playing Dragon Age: Origins. Its a nice successor to the KOTR games, but I am really frustrated at how on normal difficulty I need to chain chug health potions throughout fights, as a dedicated healer cannot keep up with incoming damage and runs out of mana before the fight concludes. Story good, micromanagement bad. The romance options are also amusingly broadminded, as far as I can tell the only NPCs who are off-limits for an invite to your tent are the dog and the mage who is technically dead due to old age and exposure to demons.

Date: 2009-11-08 22:08 Subject: Achievement spam Security: Public

When you finish an awful lot of the in-game quests in World of Warcraft you get rewarded with the vanity title 'Loremaster', and a brown tabard with a giant yellow exclamation mark on it. This is a reference to the fact that the quest givers in game all have a yellow exclamation mark floating above their heads (which turns into yellow question mark when you fulfill the quest's objectives). The problem comes when you sit down, as the way the software shapes the costume texture to the body outline essentially makes it look as if "your crotch has a quest".

Doing this took up most of my weekends over the last two months. I'm not crazy enough to do this with any of my other character's in the game, but doing it with Unity, the first character I generated in the game three years ago, just felt like the right thing to do. Now I need to find something else to do with my weekend's between now and Christmas. Bioware's new game Dragon Age: Origins is looking tempting.

The big cog wheel with the glowing lightbulb in it being held in Unity's right hand is in fact a mace.

Date: 2009-10-25 08:25 Subject: Yet More Examples of English Efficiency Security: Public

So, the Gaurdian Jobs website got hacked.

Dear Dillon Burke,


We learned yesterday evening that the Guardian Jobs website has been targeted by a sophisticated and deliberate hack, which has breached the security of the data on the site. You have used the site to make one or more job applications and we believe your personal data, relating to those applications, may have been accessed.

[blah blah blah]

We have no reason to believe that any financial or bank data was compromised in this incident. However the police advise that those whose personal data may have been stolen in this way should take a number of precautionary measures. These are outlined below:

1) Contact your creditors, even if they have not been affected, so that they can monitor your accounts to ensure they remain protected.

2) Contact a credit reference agency: Callcredit, Equifax or Experian provide suggested steps to resolve the situation and prevent it happening again.

3) Contact CIFAS protective registration: If you think you have been a victim of identity theft you should consider subscribing to CIFAS. This places a notice on your credit file indicating that your name and address may be used to perpetrate identity fraud.

Problems with this

(1) I'm not sure what they mean by creditors. Do they mean banks?
(2) I have never heard of those credit agencies either.
(3) Really not sure if there is anything I should do about this, if anything, as I am no longer in the UK.

Date: 2009-10-24 20:41 Subject: Lebensraum Security: Public

Coffee, fried mushrooms and kransky sausages for breakfast.

Chores done, off to go flathunting. Started badly when agent did not turn up at time and place specified, and when they wandered in 30 minutes later they were surprised that I had not gone to the address they had specifically told me not to go to.

So I looked at some poky flats. In one I asked "How warm is it in Winter" and was told "No one has ever moved out because of the cold." Hmm, I thought to myself "Maybe the axe murderer chased them out." Common themes were tired looking walls, ratty carpet, old furnishings, and a smell of damp decay. There is a special place in hell reserved for the people who manipulate photographs for real estate agents, as I found several expansive looking rooms were narrow and claustrophobic.

Made my current flat look good.

So I went home, rearranged the furniture (not hard, its just the one bed) and thought, "Yeah, I can totally fit two couches and a coffee table in here". If I buy a nice lamp or two, that will help with the light issue as well.

Crossed Tawa off the list of places to think about living in, most pople I know there are moving elsewhere.

Date: 2009-10-20 23:35 Subject: Silly minor injuries Security: Public

I managed to injure myself through the act of placing my keys in my pocket.

On Sunday, I realised I'd left my keys in the door overnight. Silly me. Went to grab them, and thrust them ino my pocket ... and owie! My first reaction was that somehow an insect had perched on my keys and I had thust it into my pocket. One careful squish test later, nope, no insect. Examined the wound, a splodge of orange and a pin-prick of surface skin missing. I can only surmise that I somehow trapped a teeny tiny fold of flesh between two metal keys and then physics of the one in a million variety kicked in. Anyhow, there is a minor itchy swelling of skin which I am watching closely.

Work is a bit more interesting this week.

Still thinking a lot about where I want to live, and how I want to structure my playtime next year between various hobbies. Putting off making definite plans for Xmas, New Year for the time being.

Mucked around on the wiki. A bit frustrated by how often I have to go and look up editing commands for stuff I did a week ago, its just not as intuitive as I'd like.

Various WoW things:
* pugged Trial of the Crusader 25 with my Mage, failed on the Twin Valkyries, but when the loot was divided up I rolled 100 to win a Trophy of the Crusade
* pugged Trial of the Crusader 10 with my Paladin, won the healer mace from the last boss, and then had a weird series of whispers from the non-healer paladin who tried to buy it off me
* tanked Heroic Culling of Stratholme gauntlet for the first time with my scrub Death Knight, and because my guildies are awesome we got to the bonus boss before the timer expired so I get a fourth characer with the silly bronze fat dragon mount (and got to observe how 18 months of mage reflexes of running away from trash mobs make tanking aggressively a real struggle - go forward, don't look back...)
* pugged Heroic Trial of the Champion, and had the Tank tell me I was the best healer ever!
* yes, much puggery, my Horde guild considers it a sin
* having fun with the silly in-game Halloween event
* decided I have enough in-game gold (about 53k horde, 13k alliance), and scaled back my auction house time (which means no more logging onto WoW for 15 minutes in the morning)
* started planning what I'll do in the next expansion (primarily, raid with only one character, not three, thus reducing the amount of time I need to play the game to stay competitive in-game by at least half)

Date: 2009-10-17 18:18 Subject: Flicks Security: Public

Red Cliff was pretty awesome. Definitely want to see the extended version.

Date: 2009-10-16 07:48 Subject: Ping Security: Public

Anyone interested in going to see Red Cliff at 2.50pm tomorrow (Saturday) at Reading Courtney Place?

Its a John Woo movie, about the battle of Red Cliff. Being ignorant round eyes we get the cut down 2.5 hour version. Think of it as the Chinese Gettysburg in terms of historical importance.

Date: 2009-10-14 00:06 Subject: Hmmm Security: Public

Decided not to apply for a new job. Maybe next year after we finish Youth Parliament. Long phone conversation with mother, she said better to move flats instead, and then started searching through TradeMe listings for me...

Long chat with comms team at work yesterday.

I was asked to peer review a paper on social networking, all that web 2.0 stuff. Which I did, and then I started expanding on the implications not brought out on the paper (and that the paper was making a roll out argument based on audience impact when it was really a roll out based on cost to launch).

I got asked how I knew all this stuff about how the internet really works, as opposed to how government agencies would like it to work, and I just said "Well, I have had an email account since 1993". I thought it best not to mention Gresham's Law, and how often I have seen it come into play.

Still, posible niche role for me at work, researching the interaction between technology and young people.

Also, everything sounds more evil in Russian (via Erudito).

Date: 2009-10-11 02:27 Subject: Heuete die welt, morgens das laundry Security: Public

Work continues to suck. On Friday I peer reviewed punctuation for an hour, double-checked some fertility statistics, and then spent the rest of the day reading about meso-american architecure (pyramids!) and human sacrifice in the Aztec Empire. Monday will see me having a frank exchange of views with my manager about whether or not I should apply for a job elsewhere in MSD.

Lease here runs to 22 November. So I need to figure out what I would like to do as regards living arrangements by first week of November. I have been offered cheap digs in the country, with driving/riding lessons thrown in (ponies!), but I'm not sure thats the best option for me.

Two-Healed 10 man XT hard mode. And it was really hard.

The weather, it also manages to suck. Cold and wet. Not at all conducive to expeditions to distant suburbs.

Went out. Tried to have a good time. Got hit on, repeatedly, by some gay guys. Went to the bar and told Dave "I have $20, give me something that will make me forget the last half hour". I got a mix of wild turkey and absinthe, with decorative elements. While it was good, it did not get me to sign up with the foreign legion.

Date: 2009-10-05 23:59 Subject: Yawn Security: Public

Today I set the parental controls on WoW to kick me offline if I'm playing after 11pm most nights.

Work is still slow and dull, and my team appears to be changing from a pure policy role to an operatioal policy role, about which I am ambivalent.

Other than that, I spend most of my time trying to avoid feelings of self-inflicted misery.

Date: 2009-09-29 00:14 Subject: Mix it up Security: Public

Roster screwup saw my mage not get invited to my Horde guild's raid tonight. Pretty much human error, and I know mistakes happen, but it still made me sad.

So I consoled myself by grinding out old-era quests in Silithus in order to qualify for one of the "you play this game too much" achievement titles, but not the you-play-this-game-so-much you get to display 'the insane' title after your character name. Sure, my character overpowers the locals, even in pure heal mode, but all the quests into cave-like hives filled with bugs still creep me out.

Then my alliance guild, in which I am a casual member, asked if could come heal a 10 man raid for them. Smashed some bosses, wiped a lot, but felt much happier at the end of it all.

Date: 2009-09-23 23:55 Subject: Timing Security: Public

So

I go to email my brother the news that while I have tickets for gig, there will be no Peter Murphy ... and I find an email from him that he has just broken up with his girlfriend.

Meanwhile, in WoW, two of my guildies decided to throw wobblies. Which is unusually as its a largely drama free guild, and having one of the raid groups Main Tanks start guild-quitting her characters was really stressful.

At work, I continue to do data entry, website maintenance, and acting as an extremely expensive and slow form of google search for the public.

On a positive note, I'm finding that writing in short bursts on the wiki works out well. Yesterday I figured out the basics of doing tables.

Date: 2009-09-21 19:06 Subject: LFM Security: Public

My Horde guild, Carpe Jugulum, on the US Proudmoore server is looking for two more players to join our raid group. Ideally looking for a healer and a DPS. Current raid group does not have a full-time shammy, warrior or hunter.

Application information is here.

Current progession is 12/14 U10 and 2/5 ToC 10, starting to work on U10 hard modes.