Profile for Drakefyre
| Field | Value |
|---|---|
| Displayed name | Drakefyre |
| Member number | 7 |
| Title | Triad Mage |
| Postcount | 9436 |
| Homepage | http://www.sitemouse.com/users/drakefyre/index.html |
| Registered | Wednesday, September 19 2001 07:00 |
Recent posts
Pages
| Author | Recent posts |
|---|---|
| Article - Tips for Creating Challenging Monsters in Blades of Avernum Editor | |
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Triad Mage
Member # 7
|
written Monday, March 22 2004 02:37
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Homepage
Article - Tips for Creating Challenging Monsters At some point, you'll get tired of the general types of monsters and want to create something more interesting, more challenging, and more innovative. These are some general tips to make your monsters more difficult without making them boring or repetitive. Depending on the degree to which they're used, they can make any level scenario more challenging and interesting. 1) The basic thing you can do is increase a monster's level, which will greatly increase a monster's damage, health, spell points, and general effectiveness. However, it doesn't do a lot to make them new and interesting. 2) Experiment with melee attacks. Increase the melee stat and strength of a monster and decrease the monster's HP or even the number of sides on the dice for innate melee attacks. A 20d5 attack is much better than a 5d20 attack, and a 20d5 attack is more likely to pierce armor and do damage at higher levels. 3) Increase the effectiveness of spellcaster AI by adjusting spell levels. Using the call 'change_spell_level' you can adjust spell levels to 0, 1, or 3 (two is the default). Setting the spell level to '0' will mean that the monster will never cast that spell, meaning that you can effectively choose which spells a mage or priest will cast, reducing (or eliminating) the amount of castings of woefully ineffective spells. 4) Use disabling special abilities. Disabling special abilities are ones that limit the mobility and effectiveness of the party, like slowing, cursing, webs, paralysis, confusion, et cetera. Paralysis should only be used sparingly, since it will doom a singleton (one-PC party), which many people play with. Still, webs, sleep, and slowing will allow your monster to get extra attacks in, while slowing down the movement of the party, forcing the player to use different tactics. 5) Target a certain type of PC. Using the dumbfounding ray special ability will remove spellcasters from the battle, making the party use melee to beat you. Using an antimagic field will also do it, as will adjusting immunities. Likewise, giving a monster high armor and low immunities will necessitate using spells to attack it. 6) Play around with monster behavior scripts. Stareye wrote a behavior script called 'magekiller', which will make the monster attack the PC with the highest amount of mage or priest skill. Other behavior scripts involve regenerating, hasting, blessing, and other things that monsters shouldn't be able to do but can. Be careful with some of them, though - making a behavior script too powerful will seriously annoy the player. 7) Use the ray special abilities. Rays only take one AP to fire, and they're a good way to put medium-level parties on the defensive. 8) Don't ignore the eight item slots you have! One of the most powerful tools that designers have is the capability to equip our monsters with weapons, armor, potions, scrolls, and more. Giant Chiefs in Avernum 3 quaffed an invulnerability potion before every battle. Giving an invulnerability elixir to a warrior-priest will allow him to cast defense priest spells without having to worry about dying for a few turns. Giving a goblin a scroll with Lightning Spray will shock a low-level party. Tweaking items and testing various combinations will ensure that you've got the right balance for your scenario. Still, all of these are only useful if they're used in the right setting. Having an outdoor combat full of heat ray-firing ruby skeletons in a beginner scenario will make anyone but the best players give up in frustration. A more appropriate combat would be a few ghouls (disablers) along with a ruby skeleton or two - slowing the party so that they can't respond to the barrage of fire unless they quickly cast Repel Spirit. As a player, I'd rather face a few interesting monsters used in combination than slogging through tons of the same monster. -- Drakefyre -------------------- "At times discretion should be thrown aside, and with the foolish we should play the fool." - Menander ==== Drakefyre's Demesne - Happy Happy Joy Joy Encyclopedia Ermariana - Trapped in the Closet ==== You can take my Mac when you pry my cold, dead fingers off the mouse! Posts: 9436 | Registered: Wednesday, September 19 2001 07:00 |
| Article - Tips for Creating Challenging Monsters in Blades of Avernum | |
|
Triad Mage
Member # 7
|
written Monday, March 22 2004 02:37
Profile
Homepage
Article - Tips for Creating Challenging Monsters At some point, you'll get tired of the general types of monsters and want to create something more interesting, more challenging, and more innovative. These are some general tips to make your monsters more difficult without making them boring or repetitive. Depending on the degree to which they're used, they can make any level scenario more challenging and interesting. 1) The basic thing you can do is increase a monster's level, which will greatly increase a monster's damage, health, spell points, and general effectiveness. However, it doesn't do a lot to make them new and interesting. 2) Experiment with melee attacks. Increase the melee stat and strength of a monster and decrease the monster's HP or even the number of sides on the dice for innate melee attacks. A 20d5 attack is much better than a 5d20 attack, and a 20d5 attack is more likely to pierce armor and do damage at higher levels. 3) Increase the effectiveness of spellcaster AI by adjusting spell levels. Using the call 'change_spell_level' you can adjust spell levels to 0, 1, or 3 (two is the default). Setting the spell level to '0' will mean that the monster will never cast that spell, meaning that you can effectively choose which spells a mage or priest will cast, reducing (or eliminating) the amount of castings of woefully ineffective spells. 4) Use disabling special abilities. Disabling special abilities are ones that limit the mobility and effectiveness of the party, like slowing, cursing, webs, paralysis, confusion, et cetera. Paralysis should only be used sparingly, since it will doom a singleton (one-PC party), which many people play with. Still, webs, sleep, and slowing will allow your monster to get extra attacks in, while slowing down the movement of the party, forcing the player to use different tactics. 5) Target a certain type of PC. Using the dumbfounding ray special ability will remove spellcasters from the battle, making the party use melee to beat you. Using an antimagic field will also do it, as will adjusting immunities. Likewise, giving a monster high armor and low immunities will necessitate using spells to attack it. 6) Play around with monster behavior scripts. Stareye wrote a behavior script called 'magekiller', which will make the monster attack the PC with the highest amount of mage or priest skill. Other behavior scripts involve regenerating, hasting, blessing, and other things that monsters shouldn't be able to do but can. Be careful with some of them, though - making a behavior script too powerful will seriously annoy the player. 7) Use the ray special abilities. Rays only take one AP to fire, and they're a good way to put medium-level parties on the defensive. 8) Don't ignore the eight item slots you have! One of the most powerful tools that designers have is the capability to equip our monsters with weapons, armor, potions, scrolls, and more. Giant Chiefs in Avernum 3 quaffed an invulnerability potion before every battle. Giving an invulnerability elixir to a warrior-priest will allow him to cast defense priest spells without having to worry about dying for a few turns. Giving a goblin a scroll with Lightning Spray will shock a low-level party. Tweaking items and testing various combinations will ensure that you've got the right balance for your scenario. Still, all of these are only useful if they're used in the right setting. Having an outdoor combat full of heat ray-firing ruby skeletons in a beginner scenario will make anyone but the best players give up in frustration. A more appropriate combat would be a few ghouls (disablers) along with a ruby skeleton or two - slowing the party so that they can't respond to the barrage of fire unless they quickly cast Repel Spirit. As a player, I'd rather face a few interesting monsters used in combination than slogging through tons of the same monster. -- Drakefyre -------------------- "At times discretion should be thrown aside, and with the foolish we should play the fool." - Menander ==== Drakefyre's Demesne - Happy Happy Joy Joy Encyclopedia Ermariana - Trapped in the Closet ==== You can take my Mac when you pry my cold, dead fingers off the mouse! Posts: 9436 | Registered: Wednesday, September 19 2001 07:00 |
| Scenario suggestions in Blades of Avernum Editor | |
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Triad Mage
Member # 7
|
written Monday, March 22 2004 01:35
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I'm going to excuse you because you haven't been in the community for a while, but group scenarios are ... a horrible idea. -------------------- "At times discretion should be thrown aside, and with the foolish we should play the fool." - Menander ==== Drakefyre's Demesne - Happy Happy Joy Joy Encyclopedia Ermariana - Trapped in the Closet ==== You can take my Mac when you pry my cold, dead fingers off the mouse! Posts: 9436 | Registered: Wednesday, September 19 2001 07:00 |
| Scenario suggestions in Blades of Avernum | |
|
Triad Mage
Member # 7
|
written Monday, March 22 2004 01:35
Profile
Homepage
I'm going to excuse you because you haven't been in the community for a while, but group scenarios are ... a horrible idea. -------------------- "At times discretion should be thrown aside, and with the foolish we should play the fool." - Menander ==== Drakefyre's Demesne - Happy Happy Joy Joy Encyclopedia Ermariana - Trapped in the Closet ==== You can take my Mac when you pry my cold, dead fingers off the mouse! Posts: 9436 | Registered: Wednesday, September 19 2001 07:00 |
| Floor posion/disease special property in Blades of Avernum Editor | |
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Triad Mage
Member # 7
|
written Monday, March 22 2004 01:33
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Homepage
It's not in damage - it's in layers of poison. -------------------- "At times discretion should be thrown aside, and with the foolish we should play the fool." - Menander ==== Drakefyre's Demesne - Happy Happy Joy Joy Encyclopedia Ermariana - Trapped in the Closet ==== You can take my Mac when you pry my cold, dead fingers off the mouse! Posts: 9436 | Registered: Wednesday, September 19 2001 07:00 |
| Floor posion/disease special property in Blades of Avernum | |
|
Triad Mage
Member # 7
|
written Monday, March 22 2004 01:33
Profile
Homepage
It's not in damage - it's in layers of poison. -------------------- "At times discretion should be thrown aside, and with the foolish we should play the fool." - Menander ==== Drakefyre's Demesne - Happy Happy Joy Joy Encyclopedia Ermariana - Trapped in the Closet ==== You can take my Mac when you pry my cold, dead fingers off the mouse! Posts: 9436 | Registered: Wednesday, September 19 2001 07:00 |
| The Don't Fix The Shark Competition! in Blades of Avernum | |
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Triad Mage
Member # 7
|
written Monday, March 22 2004 01:29
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Homepage
Classic loads very quickly for me, and it's really not that much of a problem. -------------------- "At times discretion should be thrown aside, and with the foolish we should play the fool." - Menander ==== Drakefyre's Demesne - Happy Happy Joy Joy Encyclopedia Ermariana - Trapped in the Closet ==== You can take my Mac when you pry my cold, dead fingers off the mouse! Posts: 9436 | Registered: Wednesday, September 19 2001 07:00 |
| The economy in VoDT in Blades of Avernum | |
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Triad Mage
Member # 7
|
written Monday, March 22 2004 01:27
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Money helps in future scenarios. It does make sense, though, that these poor people in the ravaged land wouldn't be able to spend that much on your items. -------------------- "At times discretion should be thrown aside, and with the foolish we should play the fool." - Menander ==== Drakefyre's Demesne - Happy Happy Joy Joy Encyclopedia Ermariana - Trapped in the Closet ==== You can take my Mac when you pry my cold, dead fingers off the mouse! Posts: 9436 | Registered: Wednesday, September 19 2001 07:00 |
| Bosses in VotDT? in Blades of Avernum | |
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Triad Mage
Member # 7
|
written Monday, March 22 2004 01:21
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The ensuing scenarios treat combat differently. And who uses parties, anyway? Still, the BoA Arena will come around and teach people how to make challenging monsters. And I might make an article on it too. -------------------- "At times discretion should be thrown aside, and with the foolish we should play the fool." - Menander ==== Drakefyre's Demesne - Happy Happy Joy Joy Encyclopedia Ermariana - Trapped in the Closet ==== You can take my Mac when you pry my cold, dead fingers off the mouse! Posts: 9436 | Registered: Wednesday, September 19 2001 07:00 |
| horses in Blades of Avernum | |
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Triad Mage
Member # 7
|
written Monday, March 22 2004 01:15
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No and no. -------------------- "At times discretion should be thrown aside, and with the foolish we should play the fool." - Menander ==== Drakefyre's Demesne - Happy Happy Joy Joy Encyclopedia Ermariana - Trapped in the Closet ==== You can take my Mac when you pry my cold, dead fingers off the mouse! Posts: 9436 | Registered: Wednesday, September 19 2001 07:00 |
| Spiderweb Newbie Looking to Find a Good RPG to Begin With in General | |
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Triad Mage
Member # 7
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written Monday, March 22 2004 01:12
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Well, in terms of the scenario editor, BoE's is more user-friendly. -------------------- "At times discretion should be thrown aside, and with the foolish we should play the fool." - Menander ==== Drakefyre's Demesne - Vahnatai Did Do It desperance.net - We're Everywhere The Arena - God Will Sort The Dead ==== You can take my Mac when you pry my cold, dead fingers off the mouse! Posts: 9436 | Registered: Wednesday, September 19 2001 07:00 |
| Graphic Copyright (GFX is being used somewhere else) in General | |
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Triad Mage
Member # 7
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written Monday, March 22 2004 01:09
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Alec is temporarily banned for the Techgforge topic. -------------------- "At times discretion should be thrown aside, and with the foolish we should play the fool." - Menander ==== Drakefyre's Demesne - Vahnatai Did Do It desperance.net - We're Everywhere The Arena - God Will Sort The Dead ==== You can take my Mac when you pry my cold, dead fingers off the mouse! Posts: 9436 | Registered: Wednesday, September 19 2001 07:00 |
| Floor Types in Blades of Avernum Editor | |
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Triad Mage
Member # 7
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written Sunday, March 21 2004 02:30
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You can have a dirt floor, can't you? You could make a swamp that's water and ground so that people can boat through it and walk on it. -------------------- "At times discretion should be thrown aside, and with the foolish we should play the fool." - Menander ==== Drakefyre's Demesne - Happy Happy Joy Joy Encyclopedia Ermariana - Trapped in the Closet ==== You can take my Mac when you pry my cold, dead fingers off the mouse! Posts: 9436 | Registered: Wednesday, September 19 2001 07:00 |
| Floor Types in Blades of Avernum | |
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Triad Mage
Member # 7
|
written Sunday, March 21 2004 02:30
Profile
Homepage
You can have a dirt floor, can't you? You could make a swamp that's water and ground so that people can boat through it and walk on it. -------------------- "At times discretion should be thrown aside, and with the foolish we should play the fool." - Menander ==== Drakefyre's Demesne - Happy Happy Joy Joy Encyclopedia Ermariana - Trapped in the Closet ==== You can take my Mac when you pry my cold, dead fingers off the mouse! Posts: 9436 | Registered: Wednesday, September 19 2001 07:00 |
| too bad.... in Blades of Avernum | |
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Triad Mage
Member # 7
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written Sunday, March 21 2004 02:24
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quote:Also, the G5 is an incredible system. Play around with one and listen to Apple's spiel - it's 64-bit, with support for terabytes of RAM (these models are only 8 GB, though), many are dual-processor, and running Mac OS 10.3.2 on it will make it scream. Once more programs are adapted to take advantage of the new processors, you'll see a marked speed increase. [ Sunday, March 21, 2004 02:27: Message edited by: Drakefyre ] -------------------- "At times discretion should be thrown aside, and with the foolish we should play the fool." - Menander ==== Drakefyre's Demesne - Happy Happy Joy Joy Encyclopedia Ermariana - Trapped in the Closet ==== You can take my Mac when you pry my cold, dead fingers off the mouse! Posts: 9436 | Registered: Wednesday, September 19 2001 07:00 |
| too bad.... in Blades of Avernum | |
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Triad Mage
Member # 7
|
written Sunday, March 21 2004 02:20
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You need to have 8.0 to run the upgrade. Buying 8.0 or 8.1 will only set you back around $20. -------------------- "At times discretion should be thrown aside, and with the foolish we should play the fool." - Menander ==== Drakefyre's Demesne - Happy Happy Joy Joy Encyclopedia Ermariana - Trapped in the Closet ==== You can take my Mac when you pry my cold, dead fingers off the mouse! Posts: 9436 | Registered: Wednesday, September 19 2001 07:00 |
| making progress in VofDT in Blades of Avernum | |
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Triad Mage
Member # 7
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written Sunday, March 21 2004 02:17
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Homepage
Well, there should be a walkthrough in the docs. -------------------- "At times discretion should be thrown aside, and with the foolish we should play the fool." - Menander ==== Drakefyre's Demesne - Happy Happy Joy Joy Encyclopedia Ermariana - Trapped in the Closet ==== You can take my Mac when you pry my cold, dead fingers off the mouse! Posts: 9436 | Registered: Wednesday, September 19 2001 07:00 |
| Is it cool? in Blades of Avernum | |
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Triad Mage
Member # 7
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written Sunday, March 21 2004 02:15
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8.1 is an update to 8.0. You can buy 8.1 (full version) for about 20-30 dollars. -------------------- "At times discretion should be thrown aside, and with the foolish we should play the fool." - Menander ==== Drakefyre's Demesne - Happy Happy Joy Joy Encyclopedia Ermariana - Trapped in the Closet ==== You can take my Mac when you pry my cold, dead fingers off the mouse! Posts: 9436 | Registered: Wednesday, September 19 2001 07:00 |
| Bosses in VotDT? in Blades of Avernum | |
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Triad Mage
Member # 7
|
written Sunday, March 21 2004 02:11
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Control Defenders were not a problem for me if I took them one at a time and closed to melee quickly. I'd hide behind an obstacle, pop out and slash it, and then sneak up on the next one. -------------------- "At times discretion should be thrown aside, and with the foolish we should play the fool." - Menander ==== Drakefyre's Demesne - Happy Happy Joy Joy Encyclopedia Ermariana - Trapped in the Closet ==== You can take my Mac when you pry my cold, dead fingers off the mouse! Posts: 9436 | Registered: Wednesday, September 19 2001 07:00 |
| Who's Lurking? in General | |
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Triad Mage
Member # 7
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written Saturday, March 20 2004 16:50
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That fact was somewhere in my subconscious. It came up before. -------------------- "At times discretion should be thrown aside, and with the foolish we should play the fool." - Menander ==== Drakefyre's Demesne - Vahnatai Did Do It desperance.net - We're Everywhere The Arena - God Will Sort The Dead ==== You can take my Mac when you pry my cold, dead fingers off the mouse! Posts: 9436 | Registered: Wednesday, September 19 2001 07:00 |
| The Don't Fix The Shark Competition! in Blades of Avernum | |
|
Triad Mage
Member # 7
|
written Saturday, March 20 2004 16:27
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You'd probably be better off emailing Jeff. [ Saturday, March 20, 2004 16:27: Message edited by: Drakefyre ] -------------------- "At times discretion should be thrown aside, and with the foolish we should play the fool." - Menander ==== Drakefyre's Demesne - Happy Happy Joy Joy Encyclopedia Ermariana - Trapped in the Closet ==== You can take my Mac when you pry my cold, dead fingers off the mouse! Posts: 9436 | Registered: Wednesday, September 19 2001 07:00 |
| When are scripts loaded? in Blades of Avernum Editor | |
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Triad Mage
Member # 7
|
written Saturday, March 20 2004 16:14
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They're loaded when the scenario is created, AFAIK. Also, the monster's behavior script will affect this too. -------------------- "At times discretion should be thrown aside, and with the foolish we should play the fool." - Menander ==== Drakefyre's Demesne - Happy Happy Joy Joy Encyclopedia Ermariana - Trapped in the Closet ==== You can take my Mac when you pry my cold, dead fingers off the mouse! Posts: 9436 | Registered: Wednesday, September 19 2001 07:00 |
| When are scripts loaded? in Blades of Avernum | |
|
Triad Mage
Member # 7
|
written Saturday, March 20 2004 16:14
Profile
Homepage
They're loaded when the scenario is created, AFAIK. Also, the monster's behavior script will affect this too. -------------------- "At times discretion should be thrown aside, and with the foolish we should play the fool." - Menander ==== Drakefyre's Demesne - Happy Happy Joy Joy Encyclopedia Ermariana - Trapped in the Closet ==== You can take my Mac when you pry my cold, dead fingers off the mouse! Posts: 9436 | Registered: Wednesday, September 19 2001 07:00 |
| Who's Lurking? in General | |
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Triad Mage
Member # 7
|
written Saturday, March 20 2004 16:11
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Homepage
Game pu has probably surfaced with the release of BoA. He's infamous for his "i-called-up-Jef-Vogell-and-I-asked-him- abut-geneforge-and-wondred-if-it-would- be-a-dancig-game-and-he-said-yes-and-i- was-like-woah" post. Line breaks are my own addition. [ Saturday, March 20, 2004 16:12: Message edited by: Drakefyre ] -------------------- "At times discretion should be thrown aside, and with the foolish we should play the fool." - Menander ==== Drakefyre's Demesne - Vahnatai Did Do It desperance.net - We're Everywhere The Arena - God Will Sort The Dead ==== You can take my Mac when you pry my cold, dead fingers off the mouse! Posts: 9436 | Registered: Wednesday, September 19 2001 07:00 |
| Mac or PC? in General | |
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Triad Mage
Member # 7
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written Saturday, March 20 2004 16:09
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Homepage
Answer to both questions: It's Mac OS 10.3.2, give or take a security update. -------------------- "At times discretion should be thrown aside, and with the foolish we should play the fool." - Menander ==== Drakefyre's Demesne - Vahnatai Did Do It desperance.net - We're Everywhere The Arena - God Will Sort The Dead ==== You can take my Mac when you pry my cold, dead fingers off the mouse! Posts: 9436 | Registered: Wednesday, September 19 2001 07:00 |