A less presumptuous name.

Originally Posted By: Lilith for some reason economists complain a lot more about deadweight loss caused by taxes than other kinds of deadweight loss, such as the ones caused by IP laws I WONDER WHY 2 reasons. Many prominent economists are conservative, and the intro econ textbooks often focus on things like taxes rather than IP.

Originally Posted By: I am Lord Grimm. Something where the lines between brackets can be blurred, and the system of distribution more transparent, and inefficiencies and inequalities identified an eliminated? Am I making any sense? (This isn't theoretical. I don't know enough about economics and taxation, and the the only rationale I can think of is that it is always unreasonably hard to change an established system) If this is aimed at my assessment of the loss generated by by taxes, I need to make a distinction. The deadweight loss is generated by the tax, not the bureaucracy. When a tax is applied to a good, it raises the price of the good, thus decreasing the amount of said good that consumers will buy. Thus, we are paying more and getting less. Likewise, the producers of the goods are paying some of the tax, so they make less money per unit and sell fewer units. Certainly there is also bureaucratic loss, which you seem to be thinking of. Yes, we could do something about that to make it better, but think of all those poor government lackeys who would be out of jobs!

Warning: I took a step back away from healthcare in the following post, as there were a few points I wanted to make on taxes and government policies. Also, this is perhaps my longest post on these boards. I've tried to make is easy to follow. Originally Posted By: Harehunter Originally Posted By: Dantius How, exactly, does the government use taxation to "dictate" what people should buy, eat, and drive? If you're referring to tax incentives, it's pretty difficult to claim that because I (the government) am offering you a $4000 tax break if you buy a Volt, that I'm somehow "dictating" that you buy a Volt. How does your buying a Volt benefit me, and why should I pay for it? This is what economics calls an externality. Dantius alluded to the idea in his reply, and I'd like to expand on it a bit more. When we look at costs and benefits, it's easiest to look at them privately. For example, the Volt will cost me x initially and y per year, while saving me z per year in decreased gas consumption. This does neglect other factors, though, as well as the externality, or public affect. As Dantius mentioned, there are benefits that affect everyone. When the government uses tax incentives to support products like the Volt, what it really is doing is looking at the total benefit of the car. With the decreased pollution, everyone gets a tiny bit of benefit, so the government steps in and uses taxes to essentially make everyone pay a tiny bit for them. In doing so, the government increases the amount of people buying advantageous products, all together moving the market to a more socially optimum point. Correcting externalities is one of the greatest arguments for tax programs, and it works really well on paper. The trick is that taxes deal in dollars whereas pollution is not easily measured that way. So how much benefit is there really, and is it truly distributed over the whole population? We can't really get a perfect answer to this, so the government is left with a bit of guesswork. Really, I think that a comprehensive course in economics, both micro and macro, should be a required part of a public education. It has made me far more aware of what is actually going on the the world, and has really made me think about what is best. Just rehashing some theory in this thread has made me think about taxes. By definition, simple taxes are inefficient. But since we all want government services, they're a necessary evil. Also, there are corrective taxes, such as those mentioned higher up in this post, that benefit society as a whole.

Originally Posted By: Dantius Originally Posted By: Dikiyoba What happens when it's in the USA's national interest to be in another country but it's not in that countries national interest to be there? Are we obligated to stay there then? Dikiyoba. ... Since he's the dictator, it's certainly not in the Syrian government's interest for the US to intervene and stop them massacring their own people. Just a quick note - Dikiyoba mentioned the "countries [sic] national interest, not the governments. The two don't always go hand-in-hand. Taxation brings up a whole bag of issues. Looking at it economically, most taxation sucks more out of the total benefits of a market economy than the tax revenue can create, something called dead weight loss. Naturally, that's something that we wish to avoid. Also, consider the extreme case where the top income bracket is taxed at 100%. What incentive would people have to work for such wages? Absolutely none. Fewer people would take jobs putting them into such brackets because they receive no benefit. Thus, the tax revenue would decrease! I'm not proposing that taxes are all bad or that they should be eliminated. Clearly the government plays many important roles in our nation, and tax revenue allows that to be the case. How much the government should tax and spend, though, is a much more complicated issue that I don't wish to delve into at this time, mostly because I really don't have a solid idea or anywhere near enough evidence to make a solid argument.

Originally Posted By: Tyranicus Originally Posted By: Dintiradan Snow. So the Great White North actually managed to remain white this winter? Here in Pennsylvania, our biggest snowstorm was was a few inches in October. Really? In Maryland, we got a few snow showers that managed to last a full hour or two! One Saturday it snowed and lasted until the following Monday! Considering our last two winters broke records, it's been a let down. That said, this week has been rather chilly. We all broke our shorts out over the last week or two, but we've had to go back to pants this week. My calculus teacher lived in Alaska for a time, and she likes to check the weather there on warm days and go all googly-eyed over the single-digit numbers.

Originally Posted By: hellodolly ...the other system is much more fun. That's your opinion. It's perfectly valid, but not everyone shares it. I personally enjoy how Spiderweb sets things up. If I want my high-damaging characters to get first crack and thus get an extra attack before they start taking damage, I have to invest in dexterity. Originally Posted By: hellodolly okey lets see, if i attck with caster first with aoe, is the same if attack with him last? Not sure if this is sarcasm or not. If not, then let me point out that there is a big difference. With high-damage, low-HP characters, hitting first could get you a one-hit kill, while going last could get you killed before you can attack. Originally Posted By: Earth Empires how about realtime battle but character uses main attack automatically on enemy until he/she/it dies? Alorael already mentioned this style: Originally Posted By: Lack of Dearth He could go with a Baldur's Gate-style real time with pause, or with Dragon Age's automatically attacking targets until they're dead with only special abilities to control. —Alorael, who predicts neither. Among other things, he'd have to give party member AI a serious boost. It's not worth the effort to abandon his niche.

Wow, a fascinating read. I've been here for decent number of years, although I haven't been one of the fancy "active members." With Spiderweb's recent influx of new players, first with Avadon and then the new platforms, I've felt like an old member. This really puts it all into perspective for me, since my oldest memories only go back to the beginning of Slarty's newest age.

Originally Posted By: MaximB I want to wait till I find better prices for my stuff. I may be wrong, but I think the prices are pretty consistent throughout the game. Even if I'm wrong, you'll have plenty of money by the endgame.

Given the terms of his ban, he would be kicked as soon as he was discovered. He is not allowed to interact with these boards in any manner.

Originally Posted By: ALorael Digital archaeology is already happening, and the problems run deeper than just hardware failure. Software moves on too, and it can be hard to access data in formats no longer read by anything modern. Programs may require the retention of a compatible operating system can become lost when hardware that runs the OS is no longer common. It should be mentioned that the same thing happens to print sources, although over a much larger time scale. Can you easily read a text written in ancient Egyptian?

Originally Posted By: BMA That's good to hear. I was sighing that my good old Geneforge is dead, and it being 'not avernum' would never be remade. That's why. Jeff likes for us to be able to play his games in the future, and he has already made a market for the games. Also, it is much faster and easier to remake an old game than it is to make a new one. Pretty much, Jeff can give us old games that we liked and get another round of sales in for far less work.

Originally Posted By: Actaeon I may have mentioned this in a previous thread, but I got the original Geneforge off of a multi-game CD called Ten for X. I discovered the website sometime later, and was delighted to discover that there was a Geneforge 2 out a Geneforge 3 already in the works. Pretty much this. I can't remember exactly where Jeff was with 3, but I eventually found the site and got the demo for 2, and I joined the forum some time later. Clearly Actaeon got to the forum before me even though we started around the same time with the games. Curse you, youthful ignorance!

It is also worth mentioning that the older Geneforge games have gotten a bit rusty and lag on newer machines. There is no perfect solution to this, but we hope that Jeff will remake the games before too long. The lag in 4 and 5 is most likely due to your machine, and the additional lag of 1-3 is due to age.

Originally Posted By: Nightwatcher My system is LG netbook X140 with intel atom, windows 7 starter and not for games. You've self-diagnosed the problem. Your machine isn't designed for games, and Spiderweb games enjoy eating up your computer's resources. Whenever the game has to work extra hard, your performance suffers.

Music is also very expensive. Jeff doesn't have the budget to get a full soundtrack, and there wouldn't be enough demand to justify a pay-to-download soundtrack.

The nice part about not having a soundtrack is that you can pick your own. You can very easily play your own music while playing the game, and no one else has to worry about listening to something they don't want to listen to.

There was a discussion a while back about background music, if someone would care to search for it and provide a link. The general consensus was that a less-than-excellent score will hurt more than it will help, and Jeff doesn't have the budget to do an excellent score. I suspect that video cut-scenes probably fall into the same category of value.

[alpha] = k / (cp * [rho] Wikipedia even has an article about it. It must be a real thing! It sounds like a measure of how easily a material conducts heat.

Woo, spambots!

Let me Google that for you.

Originally Posted By: HOUSE of S Also, it's technically illegal, since the game's license does not allow for this kind of modification. I think that should say enough. Plus you'd have to crack the source code, which is not exactly something developers allow.

It looks like "SDF 100 7 0" without the quotes should set your canister usage to zero. Type shift+D to bring up the box and enter the SDF code (without "").

Originally Posted By: Soul of Wit I would prefer a law which puts the judgment in the traffic cop's lap. The officer can pull you over if they believe that a distraction is interfering with your driving. I was talking with some older guys at work earlier tonight about police and their authority. While most cops are responsible and reasonable, there will always be those with inferiority/superiority issues and the like. Those cops would then be able to use "judgement crimes" like your idea to harass people they don't like, or just to let off some steam on a bad day. Excalibur, I mostly agree with what you say about when the government can regulate behaviors. It may please you to know that, at least in Maryland, seatbelt laws are only a secondary offense. You can't be pulled over for not wearing a seatbelt, so as long as you don't commit any primary offenses, you're fine without a seatbelt.

I'm pretty sure that there is a line in each item definition that says that it can stack. Look at a few stackable items and see if you can find a line of code toward the bottom that is missing on other items. Adding this line to regular items should make them stack. <insert generic warning about scripting - back up first!>

Originally Posted By: Harehunter how do you explain the strife that goes on in the world, all the atrocities that are committed in the name of one ideology or another (I do not exclude Christianity from this), the genocide or ethnic-cleansing that has happened at various times and in various places throughout our history? Cancer.