Duckman

I am not, by nature, a comic-book geek so I don't know the canon for the stories beyond the most popular characters (e.g. Spidey, Supes, Wonder Woman, etc.). I know maybe 50% of their characters by name and for most "second-stringers" could not tell you whether they are Marvel or DC. That said, I have *really* enjoyed the product that Marvel has been bringing to the big screen and of course Joss's work is just phenomenal. The boy really knows how to write and direct for ensemble cast. They've done well with their teasers in the past not giving away the story for those of us who don't know the comics and this trailer is no different. Cinematography in what they're showing looks great, the effects look great... Looking forward to next spring. (Would not hurt my feelings if DC could take a lesson as well because I would love to see Batman vs. Supes try and step up to this level.)

Ok, perhaps not enough dissonance to make my point (and yours)...

I'd add more but this is enough dissonance.

I'll be honest. Steam has spoiled me. I am waiting for the 75% off sale.

That's applicable if I am buying something for my PC. Pax is trying to buy something for his PS4. The only benefit that exists to him is the simplicity of single login. The subject of security is one where everyone is going to come up with their own answer and it's going to be based on personal opinion and experience. It'd be the same thing if we were talking personal security and guns (although it would be in a different forum). I work with too many white hats to be as cavalier about electronic security as most of you guys are. Arguing that you have not seen evidence that you are hacked yet is kinda meaningless as the people who hack things on the internet are generally smart enough not to use every resource that they've gotten from a hack and they're amazingly patient. Take http://www.businessinsider.com/snapchat-hacked-the-snappening-2014-10 which is a hack that was in place for *years*. And on top of all that, no matter how little you are concerned about whether or not this is a risk, free e-mail is so prevalent that it is literally easier to get a new e-mail address and set up a new account that it is to rescue the old one.

If you don't allow auto-updates (which is, I assume, how you would get to this state overnight) then another possibility is a short somewhere critical. I'd be surprised to see that develop from nothing to "every couple of minutes" overnight though. And the bad news is that I have no good suggestions for troubleshooting a short. It's ugly, tedious and can be expensive.

I'll add that I work in IT in a hospital. While I am not in the security team, I work closely with them. I know very well how unprotected most data is both in transmission (which *is* what I do for a living) and on "secure" systems. There's a reason people use air-gap security and any system that is going to receive the copy of my e-mail is not going to be air-gap. Yep, paranoid. Not for a made-up reason though. And given the ease of getting a new e-mail address, why bother taking any risk at all?

And this would be why I created a new gmail account for Hearthstone instead of trying to link to my old one. I ain't giving Blizzard a copy of any valid federal ID and it is not worth arm-wrestling with them to keep an e-mail address when I could just as easily create a new free one.

Daniel Suarez has four books out now, I believe. I just finished his first pair, Daemon and Freedom. Contemporary fiction as social commentary. YMMV depending on your view on black helicopters and corporate attitudes/schenanigans. Reasonably well researched but not perfect. An interesting speculative take on what is possible and while I had quibbles with some of it it was paced well and entertaining enough that I could go along for the ride.

Technically I am not in the metropolis. I am in the boonies about as far as possible from Seattle and still in King county (poor planning). Send me a PM a bit ahead and we can see about working something out.

Pretre found some beautiful images there but I think my favorite has to be Thanks to fluger (I think it was) for the "search Google" option which lead to the source pages... http://news.distractify.com/culture/arts/the-most-spectacular-abandoned-places-in-the-world/ and http://news.distractify.com/dark/science/abandon-places/

Lemme know when you come up to Seattle.

Ok, so I am going to be bad and there is no picture, but Wargame: Red Dragon is on sale this weekend on Steam for anyone interested. And while it would be appropriate to link a Steam icon here I already feel dirty for marketing for them so I am going to go bathe (and no, no pictures of that either).

It's not so much about setting a timer and more about pacing. I have a copy of CK II and what I find (although this may be as much about my playstyle as about the game itself) is that I get through 2-3 generations in an evening of play. Sometimes as much as 100 years if I am lucky. Assuming that you are not derailed by an ambitious daughter who (in spite of only have 6 Intrigue) manages to kill off all your male heirs so she can inherit (and then die in childbirth while you're trying to get a valid heir of your dynasty... No, no bitterness there at all...) that's only about 25% of a game. As I said above, it's an excellent example of what I asked for and I *do* play it when I expect to have multiple nights (or a weekend) to throw at it to complete a game. I was just thinking of something smaller (maybe lighter and faster is a better description) that I could play when I have less free time for a given week or two (happening all too often these days). In answer to dvang, I have a copy of Tropico 3 (used to have a physical copy and recently picked it up free on Steam from a Humble Bundle) and I quickly recalled why I found it frustrating. The negative feedback loop of unhappy populous is so strong and so demanding that there is very little time spent exploring different means of investment and income generation and a lot of time spent building the same schools, clinics, housing and other infrastructure to keep the populous at bay. More whack-a-mole than building (although I will admit that I love the flavor text and the local radio newscaster and stuff). I have a copy of EU III as well. Didn't really connect with it and so I didn't pick up EU IV. I find that CK II fills that particular niche in a way I am just much happier with. I'm not sure I can put a finger on why I feel so differently about them given that they are all built on the same game engine (Clausewitz). I've taken a look at Game Dev Tycoon and it may actually be more like what I am looking for to fill slack time these days.

My, how things have changed. I still don't enjoy flight sims at all but maybe that has to do with being poisoned by my first experiences...

Sounds like diabetes waiting to happen. I've been trying to cut back on carbs and focus on whole foods lately. I've found some simple salads to be really nice. Iceberg lettuce (wedge or chopped) chunky bleu cheese dressing black olives (sliced) thick-cut bacon (2 slices lightly crisped and chopped) fried onions (optional) cherry tomatoes halved to taste You can also add 4oz of sirloin cooked to taste if you want. I recommend steak cooking a la the fourth post in http://www.cheftalk.com/t/41684/finishing-a-steak-in-oven (boar_d_laze). For the salad I do minimal seasoning (salt and a bit of pepper). You can also do them separately, salad and steak in which case I recommend putting butter in the pan before you sear the steaks and then as soon as you turn them for the second side top them with parmesian cheese mixed with chopped (fresh) basil. The parmesian/basil mix will crust up nicely in the oven and then while you let the steak rest you can add some garlic to the butter and drippings in the pan for a few minutes and then pour the garlic butter/drippings over the steak when serving. (Unlike IK's example, this is fast to fix at about 15-20 minutes tops but is only one meal at a time. It can be frugal if you go the steak-salad route using top sirloin using 4 oz. or pricey using something like a new york an 8-12 oz. serving.)

What is the tone of the book? Is this a war movie? A propaganda film? An angsty drama focused mostly on the period after he returns from a tour? The trailer is definitely interesting but I'd like to know more so I know whether or not to try and get my wife interested, etc.

So what ya'll are saying is you never heard of Beerhammer? It's simple enough. The one-reroll rule is not modified, you may only reroll any die once regardless of how you get the reroll. You may reroll any number of dice on *any* roll using a drinking reroll. A drinking reroll is gained by drinking a 1 oz. pour of any beer or lager of your choice for each die being rerolled. This was expanded one year to include hard alcohol (I prefer scotch to beer). I was sipping instead of shooting and was *not* the first person to be blotto although I was thoroughly wrecked by the end. Warning, this has *not* been tested with 8th edition and random charges...

Looks more like a 0 to me. The good news is that it doesn't actually always miss since that rule only applies to 1's.

Good call, Pax. That fits what I described perfectly because of a slight oversight on my part. I'm also looking for something that can be finished in 6-8 hours and I find that CK II takes *much* longer than that :)

I am jonesing for some old-school financial empire-building. I'm thinking of something like Sid Meier's Railroad Tycoon. And I don't mean the shiny, new one with the fancy graphics that made it impossible to build out of San Diego without running into Los Angeles. That's not to say that I am totally down on combat or anything but I have plenty of good 4X games where combat is the focus of interaction and I am interested in something where I am developing something besides my military industrial complex. Anyone got any good recommendations from, say, the last 3 years?

My wife learned *yesterday* that you can use the boomerang in The Legend of Zelda to pick up loot and stun monsters. Granted, we had a lot of downtime on that title instead of continuous play...

There have been a couple of threads about Kings of War here over the years and I know reviews on it have been pretty positive. I just started looking at some of the details and figured out base sizes and other bits. I know that the magic item list in the free PDF is not a complete list from the actual rule book. I *believe* that the army lists which are available for download *are* complete but I am not sure about that. Can anyone confirm that? I know that WarSeer has "lists" for all the standard Warhammer armies that aren't already there including WoC, Skaven and Lizardmen (i.e. all the armies I play) and that they get good reviews and that the author who handled all of them is considered good for balanced thematic lists. I saw that as the army lists grew a number of new Special Rules have been introduced but they seem to be complete (e.g. Angelic Inspiration for the Basileans). I can't tell if I am missing something like special rules for specific units or something or if the downloadable stuff really covers almost everything. I figure I want to support the company by purchasing the rule book in the long term but is there anything I need to get early on to get a complete picture of how things play? Similarly, long term I would look to build fixed units of minatures (or build nicer diorama-style movement trays for using my Warhammer stuff) but in the short term am I better off working with the cannon lists and proxying with paper units to see how I like the game and get comfortable with the rules?

That parrot wouldn't voom if I put four thousand volts through it!