Alex

I'm torn. On the one hand, Ebola shows how poverty is a problem even for the rich. On the other hand, as a short-term fix, a quarantine might slow the spread to the developed world.

Um, that was the way Islam started, actually. It took centuries for Christianity to become more than a hippie cult. Look, I understand that from a Jewish perspective, Islam might seem like the lesser evil compared to Christianity, but for those nations who have been at the receiving end of Muslim peace and tolerance for centuries, things appear in a different light. It took over a thousand years of armed resistance before Islam was pushed back in earnest. Unfortunately, that resistance might be futile now.

Meet the new caliphate, same as all the previous ones. IS is what is says on the tin - a traditional Islamic state. Fortunately, most of the rest of the world has moved on in the past centuries. They seem to be popular in France. Presumably, not among those who are French in a more traditional sense. Oh, and the vile Islamist regime in Saudi Arabia should be toppled, too, they're not much better than IS. With friends like them, who needs enemies?

Self-hate is hate, too. The small oligarchal elite is delighted that you guys want to be fake rebels against large and diverse groups of people that have a vague privilege ascribed to them.

I would like to see a remake of Averforge 3.5 (Avernum 4), with proper outdoor maps this time around.

I got Exile to work in Wine inside a Linux VM on Windows.

The Dark Wyrm attack the nearest character, so I normally cast Arcane Shield L3 on a fighter and send him/her in to take them on in melee. If you have good archers, that will help you to take them out sooner. The Abyssal Slimes are more annoying, I think - they can swarm you in some places.

This is indeed something that could plausibly be a problem. It's a bit like open-source software versus commercial software by professionals who work full-time on it, with the additional twist of millions of enthusiasts versus hundreds of professionals. Then again, what did people know about the long-term consequences of the abolition of slavery, just to take an example?

If you replace "voters" by "legislators", you would have the same problem. Of course, a budget is not made that way. The US government shutdown shows that politicians are not necessarily responsible either.

There are already many issues on which the politicians and the majority of their voters have different opinions, that's a fact we do not need to speculate about. Is that just because the bad guys can't be bothered to make enough propaganda? If an ad tells you to vote for one stranger rather than another stranger, you might not care all that much. Maybe the politicians are not all terrible people, but the system corrupts them. Let me turn the question around: What advantages does handing over legislative power to someone else have? If someone offered you to become a minor and have a legal guardian, would you accept if you could elect a new guardian after four years?

The bad guys can afford to bribe the captain, but they can hardly afford to bribe all the passengers. Also, the system has inertia - few people would vote for an unknown single-issue protest party even if they agreed with it on that single issue. And those who benefit from the current system are those who finance and report on electoral campaigns.

Depends on the technical implementation, I suppose. Millions of people have a keen interest in politics. Also, much of current politics is such that it wouldn't be missed. Corporations are not citizens, why should they be allowed to spew political propaganda? On a related note, the City of London still allows corporations to vote in their local elections: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/City_of_London#Elections The "free" news corporations are owned by the same elite that owns the politicians. That includes both the left-hand sock puppet, who screams that straight white protestants are the problem, as well the right-hand sock puppet, who screams that [insert scapegoat here] is the problem. It's all a smokescreen - divide and conquer.

The so-called "financial crisis" and Snowdengate have convinced me that while representative democracy is still better than outright tyranny, albeit more hypocritical, the time has come for the people to have more of the good stuff, namely democracy. Why is the will of the people somehow not democratic enough, whereas the opinion of a few hundred bankster-sponsored kleptocrats under the surveillance of NSA Pinkerton "security" contractors is law?

Wait, you killed the Servant Mind in the same zone that Phipps is in? That would explain a lot.

Hm, my canister rush char is at level 42...not that bad.

The pros and cons of doing a "canister rush": Pros: -You'll get access to some powerful creations roughly 10 levels earlier. Killing worms and Fyoras in the Pacification Fields with a Gazer is fun! -You can get high-tier creations to level 61, and even some mid-tier creations to pretty high levels. Plated Clawbugs in the mid-50s with 1000HP? Why not? Cons: -You'll have someting like half the essence when you do get access to the powerful creations. -You will probably be around 5 levels lower even by endgame, even if you do bother to backtrack to the newbie areas. You might just miss out on that 7-Trall party or that level 64 Eyebeast or Rotdhizon! If you care about PC strength and overall party strength by the endgame, get as few creations as late as possible, and complete all optional areas. Branching savegames can cut down on the tedium (e.g. do the Whitespires thoroughly ONCE with a mech/leadership solo character, then keep that savegame).

Some do (there are three, IIRC), but one of them needs only Mechanics 13. Also, you can get another Infiltrator's Cloak early, without fighting, from a nest in the Mountain Crossroads (NE corner, near the Alpha). 8 in Mech/Leadership + Tinker's Bauble + Tinker Gloves + Infiltrator Shield + Infiltrator Cloak = 10 Leadership, 13 Mechanics, enough to get through Travald's Crypt without fighting. You will need to fight some clawbugs for Dhonal's Band. Then you can get The Infiltrator's Tunic easily. Now you have 12 Leadership, 14 Mechanics.

(Split into two posts due to quoting limitations, will continue later.) A lot of reloading to get those moderately useful items is not everyone's cup of tea. The leader in Penta will unlock the door if you aid them and have not found the other entrance yet. Slightly counter-intuitive; check the scripts to see if I remember correctly

A great concise walkthrough! Well, perhaps not playing on Torment is a choice to consider. This also makes a lot more builds viable, not just "rush to the nearest war trall canister and pump out war tralls as quickly as possible". Rushing to get the powerful creations and shaping-boosting items early is definitely one possibility. However, it's probably sub-optimal if you care more about boosting your main character's level than leveling up your creations; a "deadweight shaper" is not the only option. Some creations will probably hit the level cap anyway - why the rush? If you just play "normally", you'll have a lot more essence when you do get acces to the powerful creations. Also, if you do care more about creation strength, getting the Girdle of Victory is probably best. Agreed, mostly. In the long run, you can accumulate enough gold for a lot of training, but saving your pennies can make a big difference early on. Not if you play a melee character, which is quite playable on Normal. Also, items that boost creation stats can get these above 30. Useful if you level those tralls up to level 61. If you have a lot of tralls, I'd wager you're better off casting spells than shooting thorns most of the time. You're the only party member that can buff, heal and use most mental attacks. Having fun? I think you can skip the Promenade. Leadership 5 is enough. Mechanics 8 is enough for the entire game if you don't mind some equipment swapping. IIRC, the servant mind is immune to poison and resistant to fire. Wrack (or Wand of Weakness) can help at least with the latter, though. 8 in Mechanics and Leadership (without equipment) is enough for the entire game; a little bit more can improve the pacing of the game, though (and reduce equipment swapping during combat). You can just sneak past Koski without paying, and come back with 7 vlish or plated bugs.

Colchis changes earlier than that - between day 1 and 2, although it's probably a glitch (the helpful shade and most of the slimes are absent on day 1). Around day 10, Kriszan gets slightly damaged: The boat repair shop gets destroyed, and there is also some minor damage to some other walls, IIRC. Some time later, the unicorn horn questgiver and some shopkeepers get killed. However, you can beat the slime plague long before day 10. Bolton does get affected, at least if you don't solve the slime plague. Shayder is hit hard by the roach plague and Sara the mage disappears. Hectar is destroyed.

It's Hardiness in Avernum 3, too - the encumberance and AP penalty are displayed in the lower left part of the character sheet, and you can see how encumberance decreases as you increase Hardiness.

Ring Wars: Episode I (a.k.a. The Hobbit) - 7/10 I disliked the clumsy attempt to make it "family friendly"; decapitations are OK as long as you add in potty jokes, it seems. Radagast was disgraceful. The action scenes were too many and too cartoonish. The White Council meeting was OK, but I got the impression that Gandalf was somehow romantically involved with Galadriel, which was...weird. I liked the tough-as-nails dragon, though.

Leadership and Mechanics are especially helpful for a solo character, and Agents are supposed to be a bit sneaky. In the later games, Speed gets nerfed but you gain daze spells to help you with crowd control.

Paolo in Pergies only has low-level priest spells (up to Summon Shade). Zacharias in Gale is the only seller of these spells I know about. The fourth stone circle teaches Divine Fire at level 3 to all characters who have 10 or more in Priest Spells, even if they don't know the spell at level 1. If they have less than 10 in Priest Spells, they still get Divine Fire at level 2.

A Sholai mage in G1: "I shoot *garbled* from my *garbled* and cover my enemies with *garbled*!" The loyalist ending in G1, when the fate of the Taker leader is described. Does that make me a terrible person? Thahd dialogue tends to be good for a chuckle. For example, in G4, there's a guard thahd can be persuaded to think that you might be an expected visitor, after which it is too filled with "self-doubt" to respond if you try to speak with it again. You can also simply beg for mercy: "Please don't hurt me. I beg you!" "Beg? What beg? Don't understand beg." You spend a minute trying to explain the concept of begging for mercy to the creature. Eventually, with care and patience, you get the concept across. The thahd isn't buying it. "No. Nothing in orders about beg. Kill. That what I do. Kill." Astoria's taunt in G5: