Duckman

You, sir, need the help of a professional.

I picked up XCOM on sale a while back with all the expansions. Beyond Earth and Starships are the two that tempt me here. I believe that I already have everything else on this list.

I also have lots of Jyhad cards if you are interested. Have some NetRunner as well. PM me if you are interested in numbers or sets.

Excellent find!

It's only a necro thread if that's what most of your painted minis are. I was never a 40k player so I have no idea if it is even possible to build a nercon horde but I recall that the WHFB Undead have problems building hordes reliably because they need the expensive heavy-hitters that prevent them from affording hordes as backing. (I should add that I have not posted here because I have been downsizing and getting rid of minis and such, not growing my armies lately so I am definitely not the largest painted collection and probably never was...)

Normally I come down to GameStorm and stay at the hotel but my wife has not had as much work this year as normal and so I am looking to do GameStorm on the cheap this year. I am looking for crash space including power for a CPAP that is cat-free (I'm allergic). Ideally this would be close to downtown Vancouver so that I'm not driving for an hour to get the the venue or anything. I've put out feelers to some other folks as well but if you have space and don't mind a house guest (especially if you are planning on going to GameStorm) please drop me a PM and I will get in touch with you for details.

"This was a book about the Starks until I decided they were unbearably boring and I replotted it mid-novel." The series was better than the books but not enough to make it worth watching.

You know, most of my resolutions don't have anything to do with gaming but have a lot to do with the aspects of life that are getting in the way of gaming... For gaming-specific resolutions I guess they would be: 1. Attend one convention/event this year - the way it is looking I may not manage this although I would like to make it to GameStorm down in Vancouver in March. 2. Clean out the last of my Warhammer and Warmachine models - neither game is doing anything for me these days and I need to admit that, make a clean break and move on. 3. Find a new miniatures game that I *can* enjoy and get into small (maybe an escalation) so I can do some modeling and painting and get in a game every two weeks (or maybe just take up modeling without the gaming as a hobby)...

Hrmmmm... I wonder where that falls in the Bag Full Of Guns heirarchy for Feng Shui 2. I might need a character with a gun caddy.

I've sworn off nVidia cards until they publish a promise that they have found and squashed the kernel bug. I have really liked nVidia cards over the last 10 years but the last three I have simply refuse to play some games because nVidia has a known kernel bug that they cannot or will not fix. I happen to have been bitten by it multiple times in a row. Same hardware, no change but the video card. I now run Amored Warfare, ARK, Warmachine Tactics, Skyforge, Wasteland 1 and 2 and a number of others that used to crash within 3 minutes of starting... nVidia can byte me until they fix their problems. Thanks for the offer though, Sav. Rant is not directed at you at all.

Happy Festivus!

This ship made the Kessel run in 12 parsecs. o.0 Star Wars has never been about the science. Ships flying in vacuum like they have air. Ships flying in air like drag is fiction. None of this is why we *care* about Star Wars. Plasma passing through an atmosphere? The mass of a star vanishing into a planet with no repercussions? Ask me if I care. If you have not turned that part of your brain off at the door you're doing it wrong. (And I'll point out that Mekhet mentions it in an aside, not as a con so I think he's ok with that.) I think Kehmet voiced it well when he commented on the parallels to A New Hope. *That's* what made this fit so well into the Star Wars universe for me. Heck, I didn't even mind Rei going all fangrl on the Falcon. I took that as more of the "jedi as mechnical prodigy" which they made clear without beating to death (I mean, there was no pod race or anything!). In short, I glossed over a bunch of things that people seem hung up on because I accept that jedi react differently to things because they can feel the force (e.g. the hug between Leia and Rei at the end).

And clearly the thread is not locked in the hope that we can continue a solid discussion on the original topic which actually merits it. As for putting The Force Awakens above the original trilogy, I just can't do it. I'm not going to evaluate the original trilogy on writing or acting and just admit that it probably has a lot to do with nostalgia but the whole point of The Force Awakens was to return to the camp / style / fanboi past and reestablish the franchise in that vein and to get past the baggage of the past 20 years. I'll even go so far as to agree with Gail and say that the writing is pretty sub-par (although I would pick different nits) but the point is that it has some shining moment aimed straight at the fanboi (i.e. me) and that it has some really solid moments like Han's death which is foreshadowed, emotional, consistent and well-acted by both parties. I can only hope that our shiny, silver Stormtrooper comes back later after having escaped from the trash compactor so that we can actually enjoy her as a villain. Otherwise this is another case of Darth Maul... A really cool concept who is so badly used as to become so forgettable that I HAD TO LOOK UP HIS NAME TO POST IT RIGHT NOW. Talk about terrible writing... Was she supposed to be a major antagonist?

If you have an ATI video card that you're not using and you might be interested in selling it, get in touch with me. I've got an nVidia card that has been struck with their self-admitted kernal bug we ain't gonna fix. This is not the first time I have had this problem and so it is time to switch teams. I'm looking for a PCIE 3.0 x16 card in the 2GB memory range and don't want to pay new prices.

The most important part to me was the "redemption" of Han Solo. Shipping deadly animals who'd eaten his crew. Screwing his backers. "When was the second time?" This is the guy who shot first, thank gawd. When it comes to the fate of the universe he'll step up and be a hero (or to saving the girl) but he's a scoundrel. That and just the flavor of the writing. In spite of all the commercials, there was not a 5 minute scene with them driving Fiats or wearing Covergirl makeup. Nothing here felt like a commercial.

TOO SOON!

Don't get me wrong. I *like* the dark knight concept and the character and the way he's written. That's the whole point of the dark knight. It was a huge step away from the Golden Age icons of the DC-verse. The problem is that they have never successfully done it with Supes and I am not sure that I want them too. Supes (and Wonder Woman) have always been (and therefore in my mindset are supposed to be) idealists who don't question the choice to "do the right thing". As a result they don't work in a gritty movie like the trailers portray so far here. By contrast, look at the Marvel-verse. They have Stark who is angsty start to finish plus Banner and Black Widow. They still manage to have Cap and Thor and now Vision who are largely 2-D ideals writ large. Think of the scene in Winter Soldier where Cap declares that he's shutting it all down, SHIELD as well because SHIELD is what made the expansion of HYDRA possible. No angst, no whining, no moroseness. Just an idealist decision. Sure there are holes in the writing. There always will be when writing about gods and demigods like this. The difference is that Marvel still *has* different characters. The DC movies are all trying to recast the icons as the Dark Knight which is not being done well and is not what I want from those characters.

To be honest, I would rather see this kind of trailer than the teaser for Man of Steel. "You, too, will believe a man can fish!" I mean, what the heck? It's not like there was a whole lot of illusion about how they were going to handle this one. The only news in this trailer is that they included Doomsday. I have to second the comment about DC taking their universe very seriously in stark contrast to... well... Stark in particular, but the rest of the Marvel universe as well. In general, I have to say that I am just tired of the DC movie-verse and their writers' struggles. They had a shot at grabbing Joss before he did Avengers and they let him go because they didn't like his work. They've got iconic heroes from the Golden Age of comics when things were not gritty and their characters are inherently 2-dimensional ideals from that era, the exception being, of course, Batman as rewritten by Moore Miller. Unfortunately, the Dark Knight films rescued a failing DC movie-verse and now they think everything should be dark and gritty but the big, blue boy scout is not good at gritty and Wonder Woman is supposed to be a naive idealist from Themyscira who came to America because of our pure and noble ideals (anyone seen those in the DC-verse lately?). I'd like to be wrong about this, by the way. I'd love to see Clark Kent make an impassioned speech to Bruce Wayne about noble ideals and how Gotham is dark and gritty specifically because of Batman (not just a speech about how bad Batman is for causing fear and uncertainty) but I don't think DC has the guts to write that speech these days (nor do I think I could pull it off from the corner I think they have written themselves into). Just makes it hard for me to be very hopeful. edit: Fixed my error in attribution.

For those who didn't play New Vegas (like me), it is available on Steam's Black Friday sale in the "Ultimate Edition" bundle for $7.

For what it is worth, my wife's Subaru has over 200k miles on it and is still running fine. We do oil and regular maintenance and have had to do almost nothing else. She drives it cross-country once every 5 years or so. On one of those she had a concrete form come off a truck in front of her and land on her windshield and roof. The car protected her. The windshield and roof had to be replaced. Hers is old enough that it is not a PZEV. Cannot speak to those engine systems nor can I speak to the Forester models. We buy new off the lot, get exactly what we want and then drive it for 15-20 years. It's more expensive up front but then we save a lot of money in the 10-15 years with no car payment and I explicitly set that aside for the next car. When you buy the next car for cash anything left in the account is an instant windfall. Good deal.

Ok, so I am probably silly posting here since anyone who is playing won't be reading but... Who's home playing Fallout 4 today? As I posted in another thread, Fallout with the current mechanics is not my cup of team (although I love the setting and universe). I was just wondering how people were finding it.

Run! The 'nids are here! It's that or arm the Skaven...

I hate to see any marriage end, but I have supported friends through separation and divorce in the past because it's the right step for them. It sounds like you guys are making an informed choice and handling it well which makes a huge difference. Doesn't keep it from sucking for you guys but I applaud you for the way you're handling the kids and everything. At this point, all I can do is wish you the best and tell you to come vent here when you need to so it does not happen elsewhere when it shouldn't.