Profile for Student of Trinity
| Field | Value |
|---|---|
| Displayed name | Student of Trinity |
| Member number | 3431 |
| Title | Electric Sheep One |
| Postcount | 3335 |
| Homepage | |
| Registered | Thursday, September 4 2003 07:00 |
Recent posts
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| Author | Recent posts |
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| Character builds in Geneforge Series | |
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Electric Sheep One
Member # 3431
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written Tuesday, May 23 2006 11:03
Profile
Part of the trouble may be that I always go for Unlock, but then leave dozens of living tools in caches. Maybe indeed I should totally abandon magic with Guardians, pick a creation type, and really try hard to keep the suckers alive. In order for this to be fun, and not just like playing a combination of lousy Shaper and wimpy Guardian, I think I would have to keep my own offense strong, and keep a few creations alive until they levelled up high -- which my Shapers never do, because they are constantly upgrading. This would make for a different enough game that it could be fun, I think. Maybe my next project should be a squad leader Guardian in G2. -------------------- We're not doing cool. We're doing pretty. Posts: 3335 | Registered: Thursday, September 4 2003 07:00 |
| Character builds in Geneforge Series | |
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Electric Sheep One
Member # 3431
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written Tuesday, May 23 2006 09:22
Profile
I would like to see it clarified whether the 'squad-leader Guardian' is really a different build, since as I said, all my Guardians have quickly become singletons. (Don't get me started on Alwan.) Or do other people have melee or missile Guardians who successfully and effectively bring along a few creations? If so, what am I missing? If not, what would it take to make a squad leader? -------------------- We're not doing cool. We're doing pretty. Posts: 3335 | Registered: Thursday, September 4 2003 07:00 |
| Xylgham udwlnit skretcko!1!! in General | |
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Electric Sheep One
Member # 3431
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written Tuesday, May 23 2006 01:02
Profile
Hooray, I'm revived. That wasn't so hard after all. Now to find some rocks. -------------------- We're not doing cool. We're doing pretty. Posts: 3335 | Registered: Thursday, September 4 2003 07:00 |
| My God can beat up your God! in General | |
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Electric Sheep One
Member # 3431
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written Tuesday, May 23 2006 00:54
Profile
Stating that Julius Caesar never said "The die is cast!" would be an awkward way to observe that we have inadequate evidence for any details in the life of Caesar. If that was the point, it's a standard observation that can be simply put. Let's leave revelation by shocking indirections to the Zen masters. -------------------- We're not doing cool. We're doing pretty. Posts: 3335 | Registered: Thursday, September 4 2003 07:00 |
| Character builds in Geneforge Series | |
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Electric Sheep One
Member # 3431
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written Tuesday, May 23 2006 00:15
Profile
Interesting try. I have just never been able to keep any creations alive for very long, except as a Shaper. I've never tried to make them as an Agent, and as a Guardian, they just always die at some disappointingly early stage, and I do okay without them, so I give up the struggle. And if you can't keep them alive early, you certainly can't do it later: a levelled-up Fyora or a brand-new Drayk, may be fine in the middle game, but a brand-new Fyora is just floor polish walking. I'd like to see a squad-leader Guardian. The idea seems to make sense to me. Guardians are supposed to be decent at shaping, and their personal support in battle ought to be able to turn the tide. It has just never worked for me, despite a couple of tries. My guys always die before they learn enough to survive. But a shaping Agent, that seems perverse. It's not supposed to be a good idea. What it should do is make a weak character, with too few creations to be good, and too little spare Essence to cast enough spells. If it does work, that will be dismaying, but interesting. -------------------- We're not doing cool. We're doing pretty. Posts: 3335 | Registered: Thursday, September 4 2003 07:00 |
| The Bullseye Shaper in Geneforge Series | |
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Electric Sheep One
Member # 3431
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written Tuesday, May 23 2006 00:02
Profile
Welcome to the boards. Things do change on the higher levels in that monsters are tougher and hit harder. This means that the low-level missile weapons don't help enough to be worthwhile, unless you invest quite a few skill points in the relevant abilities. An almost-dead enemy can still kill you, especially on Torment, so you don't survive throwing Icy Crystals unless you have pumped Missile Weapons high enough for the crystal to kill for you consistently. And so on. This means that on the higher difficulties you have to decide to focus your character heavily on using missiles, and stick with it for a long time, resisting the temptations to develop sidelines in melee or magic or monsters. Eventually you may be able to broaden out some, but if you don't keep up your core missile-launching ability as the game goes on, you'll either find yourself dying, or abandoning missiles because they stop working for you. Proving a missile build right through a game, on Torment, is a time investment that DV seems to have made first now a couple of times. It's a service to the community. His results motivated me to try a Missile Guardian in G1, which I would never otherwise have attempted because missiles always seemed ineffective to me before, and which was a lot of fun. [ Tuesday, May 23, 2006 00:03: Message edited by: Student of Trinity ] -------------------- We're not doing cool. We're doing pretty. Posts: 3335 | Registered: Thursday, September 4 2003 07:00 |
| The Bullseye Shaper in Geneforge Series | |
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Electric Sheep One
Member # 3431
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written Sunday, May 21 2006 04:04
Profile
My Guardian did fine with his missiles on Torment in G1. He put maybe one point in Dexterity, but pumped Missile to 20 as quickly as he could. Swarm Crystals gave him a very effective multi-target attack; he saved them for when he needed them, and they never failed him. And the occasional Icy Crystal was still useful even very late in the game, to save AP when finishing things off. -------------------- We're not doing cool. We're doing pretty. Posts: 3335 | Registered: Thursday, September 4 2003 07:00 |
| The Big Club Theory in General | |
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Electric Sheep One
Member # 3431
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written Sunday, May 21 2006 02:56
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As I mentioned, I'm bored with young Earth discussions. So how about the flat Earth? I read a really great defense of the flat Earth, whose essence was this: "People always say that you can directly see the curvature of the Earth, by looking out to sea and watching how ships gradually disappear over the horizon. Well, we sailed out there one day, until we were almost out of sight of land, and looked around. The sea was just as flat out there as it is near the shore. So much for the horizon theory!" A thing of beauty is a joy forever. -------------------- We're not doing cool. We're doing pretty. Posts: 3335 | Registered: Thursday, September 4 2003 07:00 |
| The Big Club Theory in General | |
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Electric Sheep One
Member # 3431
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written Saturday, May 20 2006 11:22
Profile
I'm not so extremely confident that anyone knows the correct age of the universe. People seem to have converged somewhere around 14 billion years , and I consider it highly probable that this is right; but for years there were conflicting theories favoring a figure closer to 10 billion, or closer to 20 billion. The current figure has been stable for a few years now, but it's not out of the question that we might revise it again. 15,000 years, however, is right out. I used to be interested enough in the various meta-issues in this debate that I would patiently discuss it. I've lost that interest since coming reluctantly to the conclusion that young earthers are usually not at all interested in the universe. I think they actually wish it would go away and stop posing obnoxious problems for their view of Scripture (a view which to me is itself very unscriptural). As far as I am concerned, I'm afraid, the relevant verse on this topic is now Matthew 7:6. [ Saturday, May 20, 2006 11:25: Message edited by: Student of Trinity ] -------------------- We're not doing cool. We're doing pretty. Posts: 3335 | Registered: Thursday, September 4 2003 07:00 |
| The Bullseye Shaper in Geneforge Series | |
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Electric Sheep One
Member # 3431
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written Saturday, May 20 2006 10:50
Profile
Huh. Very interesting. Through several replayings of every Geneforge game I never used to pay any attention to missiles, after the early game dependence on crystals to get second attacks. But last time I redid G1 as a Missile Guardian, and was pleasantly surprised at how well everything worked. I'm a bit disturbed, though, that a Shaper can do well to finish the game with nothing above Vlish. That seems like a flaw; building up to Gazers should surely be the right thing for a Shaper. The NPCs all use batons a lot in G2, so maybe I should have twigged at that point. -------------------- We're not doing cool. We're doing pretty. Posts: 3335 | Registered: Thursday, September 4 2003 07:00 |
| The Ultimate Survey in General | |
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Electric Sheep One
Member # 3431
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written Friday, May 19 2006 13:09
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quote:Furthest from where? -------------------- We're not doing cool. We're doing pretty. Posts: 3335 | Registered: Thursday, September 4 2003 07:00 |
| Native Americans in General | |
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Electric Sheep One
Member # 3431
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written Friday, May 19 2006 12:45
Profile
Well, I don't have any particular arguments against trying to do things. But my instinct is to concentrate efforts on those relatively few cases where even after really serious thought it still seems very clear what to do. So I am not often enthusiastic about doing anything. It's not that I can't pull a trigger, but that I'm more prepared to take wild shots in the dark with my eyes wide open than to pretend that we really know what we're shooting at. Probably it's a darn good thing I'm a professor and not an emperor. On the other hand, it's not like Spidweb is the US Senate. Posting stuff here, even posting exhortations to do things, isn't going to do anything, either. Sometimes we can have a shot at threshing out arguments of principle to our own satisfaction, but if message board pundits are the unacknowledged legislators of today's world then we're a consitutionally impotent legislative branch. It is perhaps interesting to observe that the frustation in our discussion has apparently stemmed from your reaction to my conclusions (detecting insufficient enthusiasm for intervention) and my reaction to your premises (lack of enthusiasm for market self-correction). Some people tend to skip to the bottom line and assume that if they don't like that, then they must be against whatever was above it. Others never get past the prefatory remarks, and if they don't like those they assume they must hate all that follows. Arguments between these two types are rarely efficient. EDIT: Maybe I can just tack on to this that I take Zeviz's points. I've had in mind new high school graduates (or drop-outs) as the recruit pool for plumbers (or whatever), so I don't think all these issues are typically relevant for them. In general though the problem of retraining mid-carrier workers seems bad to me too. I was contemplating it myself a couple of years ago, and it didn't look good. But it's not like economists can't think of these things. I'm sure that there are tons of careful articles about these kinds of problems, which I will not have time to read. [ Friday, May 19, 2006 12:52: Message edited by: Student of Trinity ] -------------------- We're not doing cool. We're doing pretty. Posts: 3335 | Registered: Thursday, September 4 2003 07:00 |
| Native Americans in General | |
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Electric Sheep One
Member # 3431
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written Friday, May 19 2006 06:32
Profile
You and *i extrapolated from current conditions to future labor shortages, which I assumed were to be severe (or else there would be no point in talking about them in purely qualitative terms). I suggested that it wouldn't actually be nearly as bad as such extrapolation might indicate, because there is a robust self-correction mechanism for such things in a free market economy. It seemed an important point to make, since without it the discussion certainly left open the possibility of some kind of economic apocalypse. I was then quite surprised when, instead of saying, "Well, of course, but we're just worried about having to pay more for getting things repaired in a few years," people started poo-pooing the idea of market self-correction, and thus apparently defending the doomsday scenario. I tried twice to straighten out whether we were only speaking about different degrees of severity of the purported problem, but no-one picked this up; from the responses I got, it seemed that people were really expecting the country to go to the dogs because money could no more buy plumbing than love. If we agree that, barring some unforeseen disaster, the free market should keep the American economy running despite current indications of technician undersupply, then I don't really have any views on how big an inconvenience the undersupply might be, or what might be done to ease it. Economics is a very messy subject. To compare with physics, I'd be willing to shoot the breeze qualitatively about the Greenhouse Effect, but if we're asking about whether shutting down some coal plants would make cooler summers in the next few years, I'm going to either lay out masses of figures and formulas, or bow right out. So if the free market versus doomsday debate wraps up, I'm going to just plead ignorance and skepticism about whatever remains. When I graduated from high school in the mid 1980s, lots of people were going into engineering because we were being told about this coming dearth of engineers. Then when we graduated from college, the news was all about the engineering glut. Either the rumors from four years before had been wrong, or my cohort had overcorrected the problem, or there had been an unforeseen fall in demand for engineers, or something. Anyway, it made for a very tough job market. So I think I understand some big and basic economic issues, but below this level I take everything with a big grain of salt. -------------------- We're not doing cool. We're doing pretty. Posts: 3335 | Registered: Thursday, September 4 2003 07:00 |
| My God can beat up your God! in General | |
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Electric Sheep One
Member # 3431
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written Thursday, May 18 2006 12:17
Profile
Wait, Betelgeuse the star? There are bigger ones. Or are there other Betelgeuses I should know about? -------------------- We're not doing cool. We're doing pretty. Posts: 3335 | Registered: Thursday, September 4 2003 07:00 |
| Native Americans in General | |
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Electric Sheep One
Member # 3431
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written Thursday, May 18 2006 12:14
Profile
I agree with Thuryl's point. I assumed that Kelandon and *i were already making it. Whatever shortage exists now is not, by any standards I consider reasonable, severe: I lived in Boston until last fall, and the idea that the US might be short of technicians was news to me when I read this thread. That's no proof it wasn't short of them then, but I think it is proof it wasn't severely short. I called plumbers once or twice in Boston, and they came quickly and worked well, for a shocking fee. This is where real data is needed (which is where I came into this discussion, after all, a page or two back). But I'd say that if anyone needs to dig for data to assess the problem, it isn't severe now. As to how bad it will be for technicians' wages to rise as high as they perhaps will: I did try to acknowledge this issue a few posts back. And this is why I used the vague 'all the tea in China' phrase in my last post: there is indeed an issue in just how high plumbing wages might rise. To repeat what I said above, I write off a certain level of economic grief as inevitable, and if we're still arguing I pretty much assume we're talking about catastrophes on the scale of the Great Depression. I think that the market will protect us from that, over this issue. Yeah, it could be that life in the US will be significantly different in future, in that plumbing and other technical service costs will be something Americans worry about the way they currently worry about health care costs. I wouldn't count that a catastrophe. I'd probably count it as social progress. Until my shower needed fixing again. -------------------- We're not doing cool. We're doing pretty. Posts: 3335 | Registered: Thursday, September 4 2003 07:00 |
| a4 is the best game yet in Avernum 4 | |
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Electric Sheep One
Member # 3431
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written Thursday, May 18 2006 11:53
Profile
quote:A game in which there is both a monster called 'God' and a Dungeon Master is simply very poorly theologically informed. -------------------- We're not doing cool. We're doing pretty. Posts: 3335 | Registered: Thursday, September 4 2003 07:00 |
| "Blades of Geneforge" in Geneforge Series | |
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Electric Sheep One
Member # 3431
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written Wednesday, May 17 2006 13:59
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We had this discussion a while ago. I remember "Geneforger", but I preferred "Shades of Geneforge". -------------------- We're not doing cool. We're doing pretty. Posts: 3335 | Registered: Thursday, September 4 2003 07:00 |
| Native Americans in General | |
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Electric Sheep One
Member # 3431
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written Wednesday, May 17 2006 13:15
Profile
The utility of a discussion in which none of us are willing to dig for real data, never very great, has probably been exhausted by now. But I seem to be invested in the project of getting a certain point across. Perhaps it will help if, after trying one more time to explain my point, I give two examples of the kind of counter-argument I can see. I repeat that the assertions about present conditions, which we are accepting as data for the sake of argument, may contradict a naive straw man, but do not contradict my actual hypothesis (which I believe is the actual free market theory). The point was never that plumber income should be the only relevant factor, either now or in future, but that plumber income would be the only relevant factor that would change dramatically if we experienced a severe shortage of plumbers. Nothing anyone can say about current numbers of plumbers says anything, in itself, about how those numbers would respond to such a change. All that such numbers can establish is the balance of forces among the various factors as they now stand. No matter what these factors are or where their balance leaves us now, if the only change among them is a great rise in plumber income, we should see lots more plumbers coming along. I can see two general kinds of ways for this market correction mechanism to fail. The first is that other (negative) factors might in fact change along with plumber income, and change comparably much. No fixed level of irrationality among economic agents, for instance, would be enough; but if people in general were to increase their pigheadedness rapidly, perhaps because long waits for pipe repairs were driving them mad, then rising pigheadedness might keep pace with rising plumbing wages. That would scupper the market correction mechanism. The second is that people might be, not just influenced by other factors, but extremely insensitive to earning potential when choosing careers, at least within the time frame of acceptable response to a plumber crisis. Since we do in fact have some new plumbers at present, this would mean that the population of high school graduates fell into two sharply different groups (with a negligible population of stragglers between them): those few who are already willing to become plumbers under current conditions, and the rest who would not become plumbers within four years even for all the tea in China, other relevant conditions remaining as at present. I agree that the free market mechanism would not work in the latter scenario, either. This was what I meant by people being totally blind to the advantages of wealth. I don't find it plausible, either. I mean, if I were trying to recruit plumbers by offering licorice all-sorts, and people pointed out to me that I was already offering lifetime supplies and getting no takers, I guess I could accept that maybe I had already gotten everyone who liked licorice all-sorts, so increasing my licorice offers in future would have no effect. But with money? I don't see it; but perhaps I am missing something here. What I am not missing is the contention that people are passing up plumbing today despite current high rewards. That simply doesn't address the issue of response to dramatically increased rewards, which is what the free market correction hypothesis is about. -------------------- We're not doing cool. We're doing pretty. Posts: 3335 | Registered: Thursday, September 4 2003 07:00 |
| Native Americans in General | |
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Electric Sheep One
Member # 3431
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written Tuesday, May 16 2006 14:03
Profile
Who says rising plumbing wages will only produce a few more plumbers? What mechanism limits the effect so severely? Just why won't this mechanism solve the problem by itself? Suppose current numbers in X profession are below optimal, leaving aside any doubts about the numbers or the optimal levels. Suppose further, again ignoring doubts, that this situation would be improved if everyone were ideal, intelligent agents. Not even the combination of these two assumptions invalidates the claim that the free market will bring the required numbers of professionals. People don't have to be ideal agents; they just have to be less than totally blind to the advantages of earning more money. Or so it seems to me at the moment. I'd be perfectly happy to learn otherwise. I'm just getting a bit impatient with blanket disbelief in what seems to be very robust mechanism, without any serious explanation of why the mechanism should fail. [ Tuesday, May 16, 2006 14:22: Message edited by: Student of Trinity ] -------------------- We're not doing cool. We're doing pretty. Posts: 3335 | Registered: Thursday, September 4 2003 07:00 |
| A Few More Advance Words On Geneforge 4 in Geneforge Series | |
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Electric Sheep One
Member # 3431
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written Tuesday, May 16 2006 13:06
Profile
There seems to be a sort of Catch-22 here. -------------------- We're not doing cool. We're doing pretty. Posts: 3335 | Registered: Thursday, September 4 2003 07:00 |
| Sentinel Pyrowyrms in Avernum 4 | |
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Electric Sheep One
Member # 3431
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written Tuesday, May 16 2006 13:00
Profile
And weren't ripped from NWN (or from wherever NWN stole it from, if applicable). -------------------- We're not doing cool. We're doing pretty. Posts: 3335 | Registered: Thursday, September 4 2003 07:00 |
| Native Americans in General | |
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Electric Sheep One
Member # 3431
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written Tuesday, May 16 2006 12:48
Profile
quote:Not at all. Ignorance or folly that make some people choose burger flipping instead would simply be one of the obstacles to plumbing careers. As long as the coming dearth of plumbers doesn't make people steadily more ignorant and foolish, higher income for plumbers will bring more plumbers than we are getting now. Perhaps lower ignorance and folly would also give us more plumbers, even at today's wages; this is not a contradiction. Reducing ignorance and folly would be a great idea, if we could do it. While we're working on that, rising plumber income under the free market will be helping, too. And money only has to be a significant reward component, which it is. -------------------- We're not doing cool. We're doing pretty. Posts: 3335 | Registered: Thursday, September 4 2003 07:00 |
| Native Americans in General | |
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Electric Sheep One
Member # 3431
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written Tuesday, May 16 2006 11:38
Profile
quote:Care to cite some data? But even if we accept your claim about numbers of job applicants, it is not obviously a relevant comparison. There are rewards and obstacles for any career, and the number of people seeking each career depends on both factors. Suppose that the current disproportion between plumbing and burger-flipping represents the current balance between rewards and obstacles. Crank the reward for plumbing higher than it is now, while leaving the obstacles the same, and more young people will go into plumbing than they do now (not necessarily all of them being people whose other choice would have been fast food, of course). -------------------- We're not doing cool. We're doing pretty. Posts: 3335 | Registered: Thursday, September 4 2003 07:00 |
| Alorael have finally get a Custom Title? in General | |
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Electric Sheep One
Member # 3431
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written Tuesday, May 16 2006 07:50
Profile
This is all reminiscent of that old study by that guy, about 'U' versus 'non-U' vocabulary and usage among middle and upper class British. The most telling sign of being 'non-U' was the effort to appear 'U'. (For instance, 'recall' versus 'remember': it is the seemingly more genteel 'recall' that is non-U.) Only newbies worry about whether or not they could be oldbies. -------------------- We're not doing cool. We're doing pretty. Posts: 3335 | Registered: Thursday, September 4 2003 07:00 |
| Alorael have finally get a Custom Title? in General | |
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Electric Sheep One
Member # 3431
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written Tuesday, May 16 2006 01:15
Profile
There may be room for revision of some of Zeviz's terms, but the functional form of his final equation has that ring of manifest truth which cannot be denied. -------------------- We're not doing cool. We're doing pretty. Posts: 3335 | Registered: Thursday, September 4 2003 07:00 |