The Loquacious Lord Grimm

Click to reveal.. _________________________ Click to reveal..

Originally Posted By: Aranophobia No souls? Anyone? Turns out, they're high in cholesterol. And they waste away like nothing else.

Legos, snowglobes, and 1st edition hardbacks of books that I have enjoyed, when I can get them. The Missus collects shot glasses, postcards, and china. Suffice to say, together, we have a rather eclectic curio cabinet. _________________________ The Silent Assassin collects moonbeams, screams, and photos of pies. He also used to collect custom-built paintball guns, until the local authorities got involved.

Originally Posted By: Goldenking I'm curious, how does the Spiderweb community feel about The Gods Must Be Crazy? Absolutely love it. One of the many titles that got left out of honorable mention on my list. -does quick research- Alas, can only find it pre-owned, and a little pricier than the entertainment budget allows. And the guy who's trying to sell it for $95 through Barnes and Noble is most definitely crazy. _________________________ The Silent Assassin just sent me a text message, explaining a theory about jelly rolls evolving into cheese danish. The only part that I don't get is the direct jump from pita to sandwiches.

No, no: sleep is an emergency function that occurs when you reach the "low power" state; but it can be put off indefinitely by constantly recharging with fuel like coffee, soda, or a good cup of tea. "Not online" is actually called "Offline", and that's what happens when you die. _________________________ The Silent Assassin is currently "Away", leaving a message saying that he's hiding from Franky the Hot Dog Man somewhere in Siberia. I am certain that this is a misdirection. He is, in reality, "unavailable": the missus saw him climb into the trunk of a neighbor's car.

Offhand: Independence Day Inception The Empire Strikes Back Disney's Beauty and the Beast The Bourne Identity Monsters, Inc. Disney's Aladdin And some honorable mentions: Secondhand Lions Pirates of the Caribbean Forrest Gump Spider-Man 2 Bruce Almighty I, Robot The 6th Day There are, of course, more, but these are the highlights. _________________________ If a survey of his viewing habits is any indication, The Silent Assassin's favorite films are Lon Cheney's Phantom of the Opera, Silence of the Lambs, The Graduate, and Legally Blonde. ... your guess is as good as mine on that last one.

@Aran: Thanks yet again for the archives. Economic Left/Right: -1.62 Social Libertarian/Authoritarian: 0.92 Still hovering around the center, though a little less communist than normal. Ah, the woes of being a free-market socialist Originally Posted By: Sylae Honestly though, I think political tests like these aren't very much use. Maybe they need a z-axis or something They haven't clarified any of those heavily-nuanced-issue questions, so a good portion of our results still rely on what kind of mood one is in, and how each of us chooses to interpret things at the time. (The enemy of my enemy is not always my friend. Sometimes, they're both equally wrong. And sometimes, you don't trust them enough to make an alliance.) I guess I'm feeling a little less charitable than normal. Thing is, I tend to disagree with both ends of the given spectra, for different, conditional reasons that vary upon different, conditional circumstances. That, and yes, it needs a Z axis. If general economic tendency and overall breadth of the state's reach were the only two issues to consider in any vote, then there would never be any difficulty in selecting a candidate. The difficulty, of course, is in finding and agreeing upon the criteria for a third set of parameters. _________________________ The Silent Assassin's Economic Left/Right score oscillates between -4.8 and 7.2, depending on the party alignment of holders of public office at the time of testing. Today, it stands at 3.26. The Social Libertarian/Authoritarian always remains a solid 10.

Firstly: Quote: This is a piece of clothing, generally worn below the waist. Forgetting to wear one's pants is generally disapproved of in most social circles. One of the things I enjoyed most about the expanded info in E3 was the depth that it brought to the world. Descriptors on weapons brought substance and differentiation to the rapiers and broadswords that shared the same icon. Likewise, in-world descriptions of common items (books immediately come to mind) emphasized the reality that the world of The Pit is not as similar to our everyday lives as appearances and romanticism would suggest. Jeff discussed a lot of this lore through pop-ups in A4 and A5, but it was never quite the same as the one-click reveal that "Oh... I suppose I should equip the pants." Secondly: Quote: ...but it'd still mean rewriting a lot of stuff. I think that any such major canonical revelations would bring a sufficient number of members over to do the work. _________________________ The Silent Assassin knows where his pants have been. Or at least, he thinks he knows.

Was my post not extreme enough to convey the sarcasm intended?

While the story by which a character becomes who they are is essential to the character's development, it is not as important as the story of how they develop into who they become (aka, the main storyline). In a situation like this, while it is nice to know how a character gained x points in item lore, it is more important to understand how these points can be used to reflect on the character's personality and motivations. Likewise, while the reason why a certain character was Exiled is an integral part of who this character is, how they respond to Exile and what they choose to do about it is more significant to the story at hand. The best part about backstory is that the details can be made up as you go along. @ IFZ: If one little offhand joke ruined your experience, the foundation must not have been very good to start with Then again, looking for the Oceanic survivors in Avernum could be quite... entertaining. _________________________ The Silent Assassin is motivated to warn you about the incoming Snergle invasion. If you have to ask what Snergles are, it's too late. They've got you already.

Obviously, one is an assassin sent for crimes not committed, one is a reluctant badass who has been orphaned by the cruel Empire, one is the heretic who got what they deserved, and is repenting, and one just happened to be in the wrong place at the wrong time. Others that they meet along the way are the Gallant Soldier of Fortune, the Mysterious Mage who is Actively Avoiding a Rather Mundane Confrontation, the Lawful Stupid, the Noble Slith, the Nephil Theif, the Completely Innocent Companion who turns out to be a Spy, the Guy With a Big Sword who is Obviously NOT Compensating for ANYTHING, Jack Shepherd, John Locke, and of course, That one Underworld Native that for No Reason Whatsoever Got Selected as Part of the Surface Explorers. ... I may have to add that Completely Innocent guy to my cast for Adventurer's Journey. _________________________ The Silent Assassin points out that while copper makes a pretty blue flame, putting it into solution is much more time consuming than applying a pie to a face. This, of course, has nothing to do with my asking him about why the fridge was disassembled and strewn throughout the bunker. Again. I don't know why I even bother.

Real Estate Photographer. _________________________ The Silent Assassin is also involved in independant weapons and stealth research. So if you hear a random set of flip-flops in the night, and notice the strong scent of pineapple... it's probably your imagination. Best not to dwell on it.

Originally Posted By: Randomizer South Korea has some people that have similar problems where they play for days without doing anything else. I thought that was called "vacation"? There is a difference between addiction and lack of self-restraint. And while the latter may lead to the former, as long as the company in question is not drugging/subliminally influencing/otherwise enforcing their product through questionably legal means, the company is not at fault. Instead, the fault lies in the inability of the individual and those close to him/her to discern an imbalanced or destructive path through life. A gambling addict or those close to one, for example, can easily note time spent gambling, the amount of losses or wins, and see that something is not right. Why does the same not apply to other activities? While some gamers, like myself, may be involved as a hobby, or for entertainment, one would think that it would inevitably be revealed by outside sources that the amount of time devoted is destructive. I myself have had to learn limits on when I can and cannot start a title game, or an online match, or such, because I know how easily I can get sucked into it: It's pretty obvious when time passes, and you end up late for key events, or forgetting projects, and stuff to that nature. Doesn't mean that since I've learned these lessons, I haven't spent three-day periods doing nothing but playing a new title release (or replaying an old favorite) in my pajamas with the lights off, subsisting on pop-tarts and orange juice. Sometimes, it's fun to take the days on which you have no immediate responsibilities shutting out the outside world and doing nothing of consequence. But shirking only works when you've got nothing to truly shirk from. Did the plaintiff in question not have responsibilities to attend? Or relationships to maintain? Or did he simply not care, did not consider the consequences of his actions (or, more accurately, lack thereof), and is simply trying to push the blame and the consequenses elsewhere? While it is a good business idea for any piece of entertainment to be both enjoyable and time-consuming enough to prevent the audience from enjoying the competition's product, the way that we spend our time is inevitably up to us, and we have no one to blame but ourselves. _________________________ The Silent Assassin likes fuzzy bunnies. He also likes lAong walks on the tarmac, handing out candy to small children, and sneaking into your room in the middle of the night, on the off-chance that you'll wake up and scream for his video camera.

Today, in the US, is Labor Day. In recognition of this federal holiday honoring labor organizations, let us take the time to recognize the laborers among our ranks... Or, in lieu of that, just post your job. _________________________ The Silent Assassin is in the business of making your life interesting. Also, remember to check your closet tonight.

1. What is your name? The Penultimate Lord Grimm 2. How old are you? As of this posting, three weeks short of 24 years. 3. Where do you live? New Jersey 4. What is your favorite color? Green 5. How many phones do you own? Between my wife and I, 6. But only two are in use. 7. Wait, what happened to question six? It visited the Richard White forum. 8. Someone has just loaned you a time machine that can take you to any location on the planet during any time period. Where/when do you go? I go off to my office in the future, where I shall steal all of the plans for the great technologies that I shall shortly invent. 9. If you were forced to change your PDN to something completely unrelated to its current form and your original username, what would it be? Visionary 10. If you could transform at will into any living animal, what animal would it be? A housecat. 11. It's ninja sliths versus pirate nephilim. Who should win? The robot Vahnatai, of course. _________________________ 1. What is your name? The Silent Assassin. 2. How old are you? Old enough. 3. Where do you live? New Jersey. 4. What is your favorite color? Pink. 5. How many phones do you own? 0. 7. Wait, what happened to question six? Don't reveal trade secrets. 8. Someone has just loaned you a time machine that can take you to any location on the planet during any time period. Where/when do you go? To Rome, just to watch it burn. 9. If you were forced to change your PDN to something completely unrelated to its current form and your original username, what would it be? Lettuce. 10. If you could transform at will into any living animal, what animal would it be? Are we allowed to change back at will? 11. It's ninja sliths versus pirate nephilim. Who should win? Ninjas. Always.

In addition to locale, design, and other aspect of the overall portrayal of the exotic underworld, one must also consider the selection of the main characters: an audience could care less about the Lava Dome or gremlins if they cannot empathize with the people doing the exploring. It might as well be a nature documentary, otherwise. That said, the difficulty becomes in selecting a cast of characters that both accurately portrays what one would expect to be the "normal" party selected in these games, and that the target audience can connect to on an emotional level. One possibility is using the four prefab characters as leads, as they would be faithful to the source material, and would also be easier to manage from a writing and production standpoint than a group of six, as seen in the Exile prefabs. The only problem that I can see with using the prefab party is that each unique player has had and will have their own unique experience(s) with this party, and certain choices in character development will inevitably clash with the personal experiences of the fans of the games. Alternately, then, the six-person party, as seen in Exile 2 and 3, would give a fair spread of characters to which the audience can relate, as well as emphasize the exotic world by including both a Slith and a Nephil in the party, instead of just the Slith given in the A2/3 prefabs. The difficulty here lies in maintaining a party dynamic while exploring individual sets of relationships. Consider your favorite television program: more often than not, sets of characters will be separated into smaller groups in order to advance character or plot development. This is not possible with the generic party as Avernum presents it (though, obviously, it's probably better to ignore that aspect of the game for a television series). Also alternatively, it may be more wise to abandon the prefabs altogether, and create a set of characters based on roles, archetypes, and audience expectations, instead of playing as close to the source material as possible. This allows for fans of the game to maintain their unique experiences while enjoying a portrayal of the world and story from a different perspective. Finally, even in character development, we must choose an overarching goal for the writing in the series: is this merely to portray the underworld, or are we looking specifically to tell its story? Are we trying to expand Spiderweb's fan base, or expand the ways that it can share with the world? Is this a full port of Avernum to the screen, or is it an adaptation? Or is it a combination of any degrees of these? _________________________ The Silent Assassin reminds you that character isn't everything: large explosions are essential for the success of any media venture, cult, drama, radio, film, or otherwise.

Blades of Ermarian TV series. A ragtag team of mercenaries gets hired out by seemingly random forces and stop great atrocities and demon invasions, travel back and forth through time, participate in every single key event of the age, and get lectured at by the full gamut of various archetypal villains. They will travel through areas exotic and mundane, above and below ground, here, and there, and everywhere else. Eventually, a sinister overarching plot emerges, involving the overthrowing of the Empire, a group of all-powerful mages who think that world domination is too boring, and a strange arch-enemy who has vowed to destroy the world with philosophy. The series ends when the world implodes because these mercenaries have reached a level of skill that the universe was never designed for. Alternatively, the series ends when the group reaches Querbel Valley to help with a small Nephilim problem. _________________________ The Silent Assassin notes that while this post was made in jest, a Blades-type serial, given the proper overarching plot (as opposed to a roam-around-doing-good premise), design team, and budget, could go a long way. He also notes that the Sci-fi channel, or SyFy, or whatever they call themselves now, has been trying and failing for many years. Oh well.

Originally Posted By: Txgangsta If the tower of the magi already exploded, he'll be at portal keep or fort emergence, though I don't know which one or where. There's a spare room in the guest suite in Fort Emergence, two doors down from where you begin the game. Solberg and X can be found there after the Tower Crisis. _________________________ The Silent Assassin reminds you that while roses may be red and violets blue, both fresh air and vacuums are transparent. Always bring spare oxygen.

The true one-world government took control by conspiring to make us waste our time by coming up with ridiculous conspiracies. They just stepped into the power void after that. I know: I reverse-hacked my lawn gnome. _________________________ The Silent Assassin is the lead figure in a conspiracy to ensure that every person on earth gets pied at least once in their lifetime. The other members of this conspiracy, that I have observed, are the cat, our mailman, and a shady character from down the street who calls himself JoJo the Clown.

Most of the dungeon levels that I have encountered are easily Large, though it appears from my playthroughs that 64*64 is the limit. The Automap stretches to fit the dungeon's dimensions to the current window. That said, I'm not really interested in copying maps straight out the the random dungeons, but instead the key elements from them: various room arrangements, types, and sizes, specific rooms scripted to specific levels, the occasional door at a dead end for humor and authenticity, etc. As Niemand has pointed out, things like secret passages and height add a new dimension to the gameplay element. It's been a slow process, particularly in having to use the debug tool to regenerate each level several times to determine if certain rooms are random, or designed specifically for the level.

While randomly generated levels would be very true to the original, I believe that it conflicts with the nature and motivation of this port: the point is in fleshing out the world of CotW, not simply copying it from one engine to another. If someone wants CotW, then they can go play it: it is, after all, freeware. That said, you're right, a good deal of the original game's allure rests on the fact that it's impossible to play the same game twice. In order to emulate that factor while maintaining carefully-designed and -purposed dungeon design, I'm taking an approach that blends Ishad Nha's suggested choices. Players will be exposed to "standard dungeons", as he put it; however, I am creating a number of such towns, specifically tailored to the purpose of each dungeon level when applicable (and given an essentially random purpose when not); so the player will be exposed to randomly selected dungeon levels, as opposed to randomly generated dungeon levels. Right now, I'm working on the premise that three different versions of each of the 38-39 originally randomly generated dungeon levels results in something like 1.35*10^18 unique play-throughs. Obviously, that overly large number does not consider the obscene amount of overlap, but realistically, how many times will someone play a port? It does create more work for me in that I have to design (and test. and beta test.) over a hundred essentially unique towns, but it maintains the random play element without having to plagiarize BoR. _________________________ The Silent Assassin points out that anyone simply wanting a randomly generated hack-and-slash with relatively prettier graphics should give up BoA and go play Vulture's Eye. He also points out stars, errors and typos in my posts, candles, and occasionally, accidentally, the glass eyes in mounted animal heads.

Mistborn, it looks awesome. May need to check the bottom edges to ensure that it fits in the tile constraints. I'll see if I can give you an in-game demo of what it looks like in action, but that probably won't happen for a day or three. And yes, I'm attempting a port of Castle of the Winds. Pertinent info can be found at Shadow Vale and The Blades Forge. I am interested in any suggestions from fans of the original, in order to help the success of porting the core of this classic. _________________________ The Silent Assassin likes to favor a male human archae... no wait, wrong rogue-style.

Looking for a rather distinct monster graphic for my port-in-progress. To quote the help file of the original: Quote: Manticore: monstrous guardian, originally created by sorcery. The manticore has the body and claws of a great lion, feathered vulture-like wings, the face of a cruel, bearded man, but with tusks in the wide mouth, and a long, rather insectile tail behind. The many-jointed tail is tipped with a pinecone of barbed quills, which it can fling with the accuracy and effect of a company of crossbowmen; with this, a manticore will try to slay lesser opponents at a distance, or cripple stronger opponents before closing with claws and jaws. Too, as a crossbowman can empty a case of quarrels, so can a manticore exhaust the spines on its tail, though it will usually cease fire before such exhaustion and so hazard a few quills against emergency. While manticores are intelligent, their bestial, angry nature overrides most subtlety. They talk, and will mock their prey during combat. Will take either small or large template. Would really like to have the attack pose include the quoted tail flinging, for proper in-game effect. Bonus points if the graphic is flying, and the death animation invoves the creature falling to the ground. Thank you.

More like, One team showed up wanting to win, the other thinks they deserve it by default. And never stick Lidge in without a ten-run lead. But oh well. Philly hasn't given up hope yet... which is to say, the fans haven't. Jeez... so many freaking t-shirts out while shopping today....

It is difficult to come after these well-thought and detailed deconstructions, and then state that I liked Canopy. But here it is: Canopy is fairly normal for TM, in that it involves a good deal of ten-dollar philoso- and psycho-babblings, takes control of "our" characters, generates some excessive and oftentimes sensless items, and comes to a very unsatisfying conclusion; I'm not going to contest that, it's what makes TM, TM. What draws me to this scenario is its execution and its departure from standard convention. In terms of execution, you have essentially this: a linear plot, as described in posts above, that is essentially a series of extended battles that carry you from cutscene to cutscene. These battles are challenging, and, when combined with the custom item and spell set, force the player to all but abandon the tactics that the party has relied on to level up to the 35-50 range. Fair? No. But that's what you get by putting yourself at the mercy of any designer. I would suggest that you stop pouting and play along. Because once you do start to play along, you slowly learn that the designer is providing you with all of the tools that you need to survive his intentionally perverted world. You play by his rules, you get to move on; which is a rather effective embodiment of Bishop and all that Canopy represents. I don't know if TM planned it that way, but that's what we get. True, the ending is an anticlimax: by TM's own confession, he simply didn't feel like writing more. But I find it completely in-line with the rest of the scenario: this is not the Player's game. It doesn't have to pay off. Canopy forces the player to think unconventionally, with its unusual bosses and battles. They will be forced to reload many times to learn from their mistakes, and adapt their strategy to play TM's game. And yes, inevitably lose. But that's what you get for playing in the first place. Canopy's scripting has its technical highs and its annoyingly specifically-demanding lows; its' items are not effective (or overpowered) outside of its own world; the combat balance really lies on the upper end of the levels 35-50; and the "custom spells" are cumbersome and at times useless. But. As long as you're willing to play by the ever-changing rules, Canopy is a ride into the potential of BoA's engine that no player, designer or no, should forget. Because of its alternative gameplay, its custom-fitted and internally-balanced scripting, its cutscenes, and applied ideas, I would say that it is among the best that early BoA has to offer, but... I believe that the ideal BoA scenario must respect the fact that it exists inside the continuum of BoA and therefore other scenarios, so due to its unbalanced items, disrespect for the players' own RPing, and the fact that much of Canopy's technical and visual flash has become mainstream, I can only rate it as: [rating]Good[/rating]. Personally, I believe that much of the above-posted resentment could have been avoided if TM had supplied a prefab (granted, the idea was far from common at the time), thus concretely placing Canopy in its own world, and not draging players' beloved parties into it.