Another infiltration mission. This time, we had more information available, so we made better progress.

We ended up infiltrating this school for a few days, trying to determine what ninjas were there and why (as well as protect a particular taget from kidnapping).

We had our usual bevvy of wanton destruction but managed to escape capture or identification twice before we were ready to assail the kidnappers. They turned out to be our nemeses from Konoha - just as I had feared. However, with a hard won battle, we escaped with the target and the enemy team as hostages - ex-nin proctors hot on our tails. (we did eventually give them the slip).

I doubt Konoha was too pleased with its own semi-missing nin operatives defeating its actual team and taking them hostage... but hey. While we're here, we may as well be in our benefactors' employ.

I feel our secondary goals were not sufficiently met - though we know that there were ninjas other than our two groups on the site, we weren't able to determine their affiliation or exact number.

FFFLLLFS

Fun: Tonight brought the lols. Everyone was having a good time, I like to think - we had good character interactions for the most part - people know instictively how their character should react. To top it all off there was a good OOC mood and the jokes were flying.

Fight: These are seasoned foes of ours, and we're fairly confident in our abilities to fight them. That said, we each knew our roles fairly well. Having the battlefield such as it was, we had lots of opportunities to get in bonus hits with our area attacks. Secondly, Extra actions really helps to keep us in the action, very nice.

Fail: Josh and his cocky spectre were totally able to turn things around whenever they went south. Though he instigated a bit of fail of his own in being unclear to nick about his expectations ("Say something" rather than "Give them a witty escape line"), he gave a good way to return to status quo soon after.

Loot: 10 EP - I feel this is an excellent and deserved reward this time around. Good stuff will come of it (I'm going to improve my weapons I think)

Luck: The dice were a bit dodgy from time to time, but perseverance made up for it. It seemed like julian would roll badly just as often as we. As for situational luck, jubes was pretty forgiving when we had a plan in mind - like my whole gambit of hoodwinking the instructor and my neighbor by copying answers and then handing in my origional wrong answers in the other student's handwriting.

Looking Forward to the next Session: Fo' Sho. Best session I've played in since back in the day with besm d20 :P

This session was conceptually a giant brawl to test the party's resources.

Adided by a few NPCs (which I gave the party control of), they had to fend off 3 waves of ever-increasing difficulty.

There were a lot of enemies, so the session time dragged on across two sessions to a total of nine hours or so.

Pros:
Party was pleased enough with squad combat that they (or at least the most vocal players) want me to base the next campaign on it

Figured out why player x isn't enjoying campaign as much as he could: It takes too long until he could do something, and, double whammy: His character, though conceptually cool, is, in practice, weakest in the party. At least I can work on these - I'll rebuild him again.

Cons:
Once a few allies had died, it turned out they were all belonging to one player - so he was down to one action a round. I don't know if there was a real solution to that - prolly should have built the allies better so they'd be more balanced with one another, or realized I was about to drop the last ally of that player, or not allowed the most active player in the campaign to take control of both NPCs I cared about whether they lived or died.

loooong x.x Don't let me have so many combatants, brain! But what about the final battle? Hmm.

Outcome: Long session, rewarded a level (it'd be torturous to do that long with no reward, and even an inflated party like that should gain a level from 31 agressors.

To do for next time:
TJ wants an update on the npcs the party rescued earlier in the campaign.
Party is dead set on rampaging and killing a "good" npc just because he happens to have sold his soul.
I should buy some Gaming Paper - then the A-Frame can be a real infiltration mission again.
Speeding up combat is key: need to get players to roll all their attacks at once to speed stuff up.

All I have to say is that it sucks to be a missing-nin.
Everyone you've ever met decides its prime time to whoop your ass.

Even when they know you're coming and are on their side.

Ugh. I'm back up to speed again at least, but I'm still achey from that battle.

How come everyone else is freakishly strong? We'd have been mincemeat even in a battle where we're not fighting for our lives per se, but luckily the stupid ghost does wonders with a bandage or two. I kind of wish he could help out more - our battle strength is capped along with our chakra reserves. Oh well. In-battle healing is a definite plus.

Now, I just wonder if the crow scroll is really going to be all that great? I mean, there's definite clan affinity there, but still...

FFFLLLFS

Fun: Ehh, it was alright. All combat no plot. Well, it's not like I've never been guilty of that (or basing a campaign on it.. heheh)...

Fight: That's all there was! But that's OK too. The assailants were set up in a way deletrious to our debuffs, and powered by airy math.

Fail: The robot's back, but got pwnt. I think TJ failed a bit, but that's probably since we thought like the anime and did one-on-one fights whereas we could have easily teamed up as a team (bad wordology! Bad! No punctuation for you!) and been more effective. I'm tempted to put the ghost in here, but he was and is a definite support character, and acts mostly as a font of sarcasm.

Loot: 10 points this time. I know I was complaining about 5 last time around, but it's the amount of work put in that we want to see rewarded. This session was concepually and actually easier than the last. In my mind I'm just pretending this week was the 5er and everything seems alright :P

Luck: Didn't run an exhaustive tally, but it seemed like I did quite well whereas TJ (and particularly his lolibot) were having the short end of the stick.

Looking Forward to the next Session: Sure. The potential of raven minions has me intriuged. I wonder if it's like the toads though? Should I say ravens or crows?

We're supposed to be ninjas, I thiought.

Yet here we are, having a comedy of errors on a grander scale than our exploits prior.

First, one of the monks was killed in a very attention getting fashion.
Then one of us was captured pretending to be the dead man.

The rest of the group went on faulty information while our comerade was tortured.

After climbing from the roof down, we had to fight a bear in a subterranean cavern. That's about all about this mission that went according to plan.

Our battle was joined when the torturer dragged our comrade along so we could all get public whuppings. We managed to escape with our target scroll after an injury caused the leader monk to flip out and blow up the temple (shortly after we got away, thank goodness).

To top it all off? All the while, we were being harassed by some shinobi - he seems to be on our side, if sarcastically so. He had interesting attacks and the power of invisibility - sensei might be interested, but I don't think he's a member of Sensei's clan - he just appeared to be visible whenever it dang well suited him.

And now he's following us, I can tell. He won't carry anything either, I'm sure. What is with those two and adopting people? Next mission we're going to have that girl again, I think... Probably Emi will show her face soon, too. I can't lose to her - she'd destroy us if she found our missing-nin selves.



FFFLLLFS

Fun: Josh showed! He's good at making fun of us. Many lols were had as we systemically tripped every dang trap, killed way more than nessesary, and fought someone we were explicityly ordered to avoid at all cost.

Fight: Was good, but Jubes needs to remember that we are super fighting ninja who inevitably end up super fighting the dudes that are way above our level. It's our way of the ninja: stupid bravery!

Fail: On our side: lots. Tonnes, really. The good kind of fail where lols were had, but still. On jubes' side: a little. He prolly should have statted out sora, but he did fine winging it too. Also a fail for a pittance for our suffering(see loot).

Loot: A kick in the pants after the suffering we went through! >.> <.< But seriously, 5 points is so small that nobody knows what to do with it. I'm torn between adding 1 or 2 points here or there and saving it - I mean, if I get a decent reward down the line anyhow then spending it now is no problem (I can get 5 through defect wrangling easily), but what can I spend 5 points on anyhow? Weapon variables?

Luck: I did analysis - my luck was statistically average, and I did fine on the fight. TJ was complaining about his rolls a little but I'm not sure if it was just bad timing for when he got particular rolls or what.

Looking Forward to the next Session: Absolutely.

Zones produce mana based on day. Mana is also produced by players crafting.

A successful craft produces items, unsuccessful crafting "curses" the player - if the curse level gets too high, special mobs will spawn near them when they're relatively alone. If you defeat the mob (or die), the curse on that element or keyword is broken, and a high-quality version of one of the items you were creating is its drop (as well as a few materials).

Monsters spawn to meet requisite population levels(same with high-quality resources). Additionaly, specialty mobs will spawn when the mana levels are over a certain point (alternatively, some notorious monsters spawn, absorbing the mana of their type - or, some monsters simply spawn on a faster cycle when mana levels are higher).

Spells work in a similar fashion (kind of).

A failed spell will still go off, but at reduced power. It will also add to your curse level.

Spells also have the propery of converting mana from some types to another - for instance a fireball will increase local fire mana but reduce plant mana somewhat (everything adds mana total unless it's special mobs).

Spell potency is affected by local mana values as well - same or similar being powerful increases success rate, while opposed types increase the chance of failure.

Curses may also be converted into pledges - slips of mana-infused paper, ore, or whatever. However, the pledges produced by one class(or maybe individual?) have no use to the same - they are a bartering item for other people's alchemy (if you use one of your own curse slips the whole curse comes back and the residue from the other ingredientrs only makes it worse).


The economy runs through aution houses and stores - NPCs sell whatever they're sold, plus whatever they produce themselves. If an item is popular, they pay more for it (up to, say, 85% of its value, minimum 40%). If an item, however, is unpopular, they'll trade it to the most interested merchant in the region (70% chance?) or the most interested merchant in the nation.

Based on relationship values with the creators faction, duration the item's remained unsold, and popularity of the item, merchants eventually remove sold items from the game.



AAnyhow, just thought I'd jot that down. I do want a project afterall, maybe a simple-ish game would be fun to make?

My ratings:
0/5 I couldn't finish it. I'll mention why. Feel free to tell me that it gets better but I won't care.
1/5 I really hope you don't like it, because then I'd have to hate you out of principle.
2/5 It was tolerable, but I wouldn't recommend it to people.
3/5 I'd not say bad things about it, but I wouldn't watch it a second time.
4/5 I'd be willing to watch this a second time to show it to someone.
5/5 I will watch this more than once, and keep it somewhere safe so future generations can look at it and say "Wow, grandpa sure was obsessed with japan!"

Azumanga Daioh - Charming, but fairly shallow development of the characters. 3/5

Bleach - Wow. Can I say you have to watch this slowly to properly enjoy it? The opening has nearly nothing to do with the anime as it is now... But it's still good. It just has less 'ha-ha' moments and more 'ooh, pretty's. 5/5

Naruto - As soon as you get past the first story arc, it gets good. I'm waiting for the filler to end, because the manga looks like it's going to be awesome after the filler. Maybe I should read it instead... 4/5, but the filler arc is teh crap.

Card Captor Sakura - One of my all time favorites, this is the epitome of what magical girl should be, to me. 5/5. Ya gotta watch the second movie, too.

Sailor Moon - I forget the letter. The first one. I got it again from nostalgia. What can I say, amy's teh win. 3/5

Gundam Seed - I quite like this specific gundam spinoff - although it's implausible that they'd use humanoid robots for fighting, the characters themselves are quite believable and it's good fun (and good writing) to not be able to identify the real bad guys. 4/5 Heck, the dub voices are even tolerable!

The Melancholy of Haruhi Suzumiyah - A modern masterpiece, a compelling story, and just bizarre enough to match the medium. The inflexablitiy of the main character is a particularly pleasant characterization. 5/5

Ouran High School Host Club - A fun series, with a good development of relations. Somewhat reverse-harem, but she's not interested anyway. Worth a watch, for sure. 4/5

Ranma 1/2 - Took me like 2 years to finish this. It gets.... repetitive, shall we say. 3/5

Dragonball Z - Up until Frieza, 4/5. Beyond that - (1/n)/5 where n is equal to the number of episodes beyond that point. Or you can just say 1/5 to get a description...

Yu-Gi-Oh - I actually like the first season of this. Haven't watched since, but that first part is not bad... 3/5

Beyblades - Holy geez wtf is the story of this? Maybe I'm just not the target market for this anymore? 0/5 (For even an episode!)

Hamtaro - Aww adorable cute hampsters. Same age restricvtion thing though (I'm not a 7-year-old girl). 0/5

Metabots - Same deal I guess. For what I did watch it was decent 2/5, but I'd probably hate it now. Too collection-y. On that note,

Pokemon - Screw you, the first run was good. Again age made me not watch the rest... 3/5 (I'd be embarassed if I actually recommended or got it)

Digimon - This series is again a series where first season or two is great and then the rest are too... something... for me to enjoy. Although I do like the season with takato somewhat. 4/5 for first, 3/5 for takato's season & second season. The rest gets a 2.

Hellsing(OVA) - Freaking sweet. You should watch it and see what I mean. 5/5, that's all I need to say.

FLCL - One of my favorites, and man is it pretty! Look at the colours! 5/5

Kirby of the stars - A bit childish, but I like it. 3/5

Samurai Shamploo - This is good. I likes it a whole bunch. 4/5

Magic User's Club(OVA) - It's good! A bit fast, but there's a series that follows that I haven't had a chance to watch yet. 4/5

Love Hina - It's pretty good for harem - however, the ending is bad. They ran out of money before manga, it seems. 2/5 because it's a little too zany in parts.

Inuyasha - I need to get more of this before I can understand whats going on. From what I can see it's pretty good, but it suffers from the repetitiveness that Ranma suffers from as well. 3/5

Neon Genisis Evangelion - Man, this show is depressing, and the ending makes no sense, and the ending from the movie makes no sense and waaah. However, there is really good characterization. Wow, even. Plus the variety in the monsters is interesting. 4/5.

Trigun - There's a little bit of superfluous activity in this one, but the story holds up nonetheless. 4/5

Cowboy Bebop - Seeing a name like that I wasn't sure what to expect. The series was really good though - has something for everyone and an inevitable but nonetheless poignant ending. 5/5

Elfin Leid - Man, this is bloody. I've only seen two or three episodes - it's hard to get a hold of... In any case I wonder what's going to happen to the poor guy when her memories come back proper? Anyhow, 4/5 for eps 1-3... :)

Eureka 7 - 0/5 I don't know quite what made me stop short of episode 2 - It just seemed a rehash of stuff I'd seen before, the events were too railroady - railroading in roleplaying being where anything you do still results in the same outcome. It seemed like I could already see the ending...

That's all I can think of for now. Maybe more later :)

<+reality|> i love jesus but i couldn't eat a whole one

http://www.eweek.com/article2/0,1895,2034680,00.asp

This might have something to do with it - the volume of spam with interesting hash busters and oddly shaped stock advertising gifs has increased - and, while I thought this was interesting, fairly sophisticated spam, I'm interested that it may attack the other malware on the drive to get more control.

Hmm, wonder if I could find it on my computer? Easiest way to get my e-mail is to be on my computer :)

http://bitchun.org/

I really want to join, but I don't know if I'd be able to help or not...

Identifying phases in this process can help to understand experience.
The people who are in close contact with customers are the unit of innovation. Es erinnert etwas an Muenchener Biergaststaette. You need a solid customer metric.
The talk was given in an overcrowded room.
In your scenario, probably the buyers are different from the users.
I agree that customers do not foresee the future.
You need a solid customer metric. Second was an ad firm, which produced probably the worst ad in history.
I wrote down the points that stood out for me. You get more points for feeding Yoshis multiple fruits. Amazon is an exception, they have trained us not to expect scent on the home page. They needed something simpler.
That idea was invented by a QA person.
The advertising was terrible. Requirements may conflict; our paper says you have to strike a balance among all.
The idea of having the government actually watch how citizens operate would be so eye-opening.
Users needed to get too much hardware.
Once you see tagging existing both on bookmarking systems, blogs, etc.
Dan decided this was a real problem we needed to work on. Some orgs are addicted to surveys, but surveys actually reflect your current mindset.
Graphics can sometimes communicate scent, too.
There was a learning from what he did.
You can download the game for any PocketPC from the website.
In your scenario, probably the buyers are different from the users.
But the paperwork was amazingly complex. Once you see tagging existing both on bookmarking systems, blogs, etc. Have you thought about introducing a predator?
Questions can kill an entrepreneurial team.
This is based on field experience, sitting down with customers. Despite my resistance, we made a version with hardware.
Players augmented existing routines and established new ones.
Use the consumer to understand the problem that you are solving. We need to celebrate failure. There is still debate over whether this would be a good thing.
In den folgenden Jahrzehnten zog es mehrmals um.
Our first ad, I wrote.
The result is the Quicken Medical Expense Manager.


Yes, I recieved this. It's purpose is to untrain spam filters, I presume. But, it's so beautiful...

Obviously I didn't take the evil of Cisco seriously enough.

For our UNIX/Linux networking course, we need to use SuSe as that's what the instructor prefers. However, we need to cover the Cisco curriculum - ie. for ugly useless Solaris that looks like it crawled out of the 3.1 era and is mostly proprietary.


Kinda hard to learn a system when it isn't available to you and the instructor won't go over it in class.

Well, I only want a c+ anyhow... :(

Sort of a self-diproving argument, but it's in paradox that potential validity may be founded. </total crap>

God created everything
God has perfection
It is not a quality of perfection to create evil
Evil exists
---------------------
God doesn't exist

g:God exists
e:Everyting exists
p:Perfection exists
v:Evil exists

g->e
g->p
~p->v
v
-----
~g

premises Conclusion
gepv|g->e|g->p|~p->v|~g
TTTT|
TTTF|
TTFT|
TTFF|
TFTT|
TFTF|
TFFT|
TFFF|
FTTT|
FTTF|
FTFT|
FTFF|
FFTT|
FFTF|
FFFT|
FFFF|

...Crap, looks bad. I'll recode as a table later :)

So, I'm in school once again.
Assuming anyone ever pops by, they might see me talk about my homework load :)

Work schedule will be posted later for seferia's convienience.

I need to:
-Read chapter 1 in Buisness
-Read chapters 1 & 2 in Database Systems
-Read chapter 1 of Object Oriented Analysis & Design with the Unified Process
-Get a copy of the assignment for math
-Burn a SuSe linux liveCD distribution
-Make the dungeon & monsters for FFRPG adventure 2

I like the newish LJ user panel.

On an unrelated note, I'll be gone this weekend.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DClkE64nFDY

I'm sure everyone has heard this quote, but john puts it all in perspective :)

http://www.nfb.ca/animation/objanim/en/films/index.php

Brilliant pieces of work.

Some of my favorites are in there- the big snit is cool, for instance

Three prisoners in the gulag get to talking about why they are there. "I am here because I always got to work five minutes late, and they charged me with sabotage," says the first. "I am here because I kept getting to work five minutes early, and they charged me with spying," says the second. "I am here because I got to work on time every day," says the third, "and they charged me with owning a western watch."


Stalin himself cracked jokes, including this one about a visit from a Georgian delegation:

They come, they talk to Stalin, and then they go, heading off down the Kremlin's corridors. Stalin starts looking for his pipe. He can't find it. He calls in Beria, the dreaded head of his secret police. "Go after the delegation, and find out which one took my pipe," he says. Beria scuttles off down the corridor. Five minutes later Stalin finds his pipe under a pile of papers. He calls Beria—"Look, I've found my pipe." "It's too late," Beria says, "half the delegation admitted they took your pipe, and the other half died during questioning."

I'm not sure whom among the gangbunch participated in this, but it's awesome.

http://www.teamspecialolympics.com/gangbunch/?t=12

Oh, and I'm working 8 hours today. Wish me luck!