The Ratt

Nothing super special. I don't think there are any radical statements in the Q&A. I think this is Jeff drawing attention to his game. Look here . On another note, who has tried Onlive or Steam, and what do you think of it? Do you agree with Jeff about them?

Eh, maybe not Harvey Mudd, but he definitely looks like a 90's college geek to me.

If you are playing on a lower difficulty level, I would suggest trying as a warrior. It is possible to be good at melee while still having four creations to back you up, and it's still possible to get low to medium level spells.

Hey! Don't get rid of childrens' obedience, I'm going to need that some day. I think the only problem with grounding is that sending the child to his/her room, where, most likely, there are a lot of toys, doesn't really punish the child in any way.

It also doesn't give you experience like using living tools to unlock stuff does.

So... Can any beta tester tell us what scarabs do?

Wait, what's a ninja?

Well, pirates have guns, which, in a game universe that has swords and stuff, would to lots of damage.

Congratulations Ephesos

Another useful note, last time I checked the +10 to Undead/Constructs actually made no difference in damage dealt to the Undead/Constructs. It generally is a skill that is considered worthless. Someone can correct me if new evidence has arisen.

What DRM?

nitpikas nit; –noun 1. the egg of a parasitic insect, esp. of a louse, often attached to a hair or a fiber of clothing. 2. the young of such an insect. pi·ka; –noun any of several small, brown to gray tailless mammals of the genus Ochotona, resembling rabbits with short ears and legs and inhabiting western mountains of North America and parts of eastern Europe and Asia. From these definitions we can deduce that a nitpika is the egg of a pika, and also that pikas are both mammals, insects, and parasitic. Hooray for math!

I'm not too familiar with building a PC, but don't you also need a power source? Specifically a power source with the same voltage as your motherboard?

Originally Posted By: cfgauss This wouldn't work so well for math or science used literally, but when I give people advice on how, e.g., to write talks, I do always tell them that their talk should tell a story. It should have all the classical components of a story, just suitably adapted! Your characters get to be equations or laws instead of people . When I see most talks (or read most chapters in books) I come away thinking: what was the point of that? What was the 'moral' of this story? What important things should I take away from that? How can I use that to do something? What did it do by itself? Often the answers to these question, based on the talk/book are "I dunno." I think writing things like you're writing a very abstract story answers these kinds of questions automatically and leads to much better material. I think this also has to do how you write the story. Admittedly it would probably be hard to express the concepts of higher math, physics, chem, and maybe bio, but I could see it potentially working for calculus and beginning physics (basically talking through derivations), and working very well for biology. I base this on my experience reading "The Goal" by Eliyahu Goldratt, which teaches lean manufacturing through story. If you actually ask questions about what you should take away, you benefit tremendously.

Originally Posted By: CRISIS on INFINITE SLARTIES Ratt: Hmm. A good question. I think the difference is as follows: anyone learning a foreign language has already picked up at least one language. However unconsciously, they already have the structures to mentally grasp what a word is, ways that words can be combined, how different speech sounds can be combined, etc. The specifics are all different, of course, but except for radically different pieces of grammar, the structures all exist and don't have to be built from the ground up. However, I doubt that most people have any pre-existing structures to slide negative numbers, logarithms, or derivatives into, when they first learn about those topics. I meant more of the fact that basic to intermediate math is, for lack of a better expression, universal. There is the same amount of debate about what is or isn't worthy of inclusion as in language, maybe even less. But since you took the time to respond... Well I would argue that people already have a semi-grasp of language but only in so much as they understand the concept of words (nouns, adjectives, verbs, etc.). Grammar structure however can be as alien as negative numbers etc. I'm sure you've heard a spanish-speaking person say something similar to "Where we can sit?" in stead of "Where can we sit" or, I believe, Russians leaving out "a" or "the" because that idea doesn't exist in their language. When you get down to it I believe that language and math are both ways to express abstract ideas. Once you have a grasp of basic concepts (words and addition) you can apply it to other concepts (grammar structure and algebra).

Originally Posted By: CRISIS on INFINITE SLARTIES The one major exception I can think of is foreign language textbooks: while there is plenty of fluff out there whose curriculum is dictated by a café menu, there are also a lot of good language texts. I think this is because the content of languages isn't up for debate. Some books will present infinitives right away and others will save them for later, but an infinitive is an infinitive, a noun is a noun, and how you say it is how you say it. There is nothing to interpret and there are no value judgments to make. Compare this to, say, history textbooks. For secondary school books, what gets included is either totally arbitrary and unscholarly (ancient history) or rigidly politically determined and unscholarly (national history) -- and in neither case is anything interesitng said. It's harder to overlay a clear-cut structure like "vocabulary here, grammar there" onto other subjects. I think I'm going to stop here before I rant any further. Wouldn't/Couldn't this apply to math too? And if not, Why?

Does god love World of Warcraft?

Have you tried the Geneforge Series, Nethergate, or Blades of Avernum?

Originally Posted By: The Mystic Originally Posted By: The Ratt Meth is much worse than video games. Please tell me you're not talking from experience. No I'm not, I'm talking from what I've heard. Stuff like, "one use of meth kills 10% of your brain cells", and "it's super-addictive to the point of almost guaranteed". As far as I know, there is video game that has similar effects from one average use. However, after a quick examination those rumors appear to be exaggerated, but accompanied by other nasty side-effects as well.

Originally Posted By: Flower Child meth... addicted to WoW Well there's your solution. I jest. Meth is much worse than video games.

A new conspiracy. Your boss is sexist.

I wanted to do a 1024 post celebration but that would mean missing the 1000 celebration which is, by some standard, the first "real" milestone.

I'm a freshman in college and my first class will be CH 107 General Chemistry I. My second class will be CH 100 Studies in Chemistry: Materials of Life. The title of this second class makes me think it will be BioChem for dummies. No idea what Classes 3-8 will be.

On a bicycle or playing saxophone? Of course if you were doing both I could understand the miserable failure.

I've been playing saxophone for almost 8 years, and have gone to band camp 6 or 7 of those years, so I'm decent at that. I also can kinda sing; I can hit notes but I'm not great and I don't have great tone. I can also tell you what the notes are on the piano, play bass drum, and I wrote a song for one of my music classes. Does this count for anything?