4e

if you are a classic nerd like me, hell if you even know me you probably have at one point in your life leafed through a Dungeons and Dragons book. Though most of you reading this have even participated in such an event as a campaign, there are those of you out there who have not been touched by its greatness.

Last week the much anticipated 4th edition of the classic paper and pencil roleplaying game was released with a rousing cheer in the nerd community, and a whisper elsewhere. I started playing the game towards the tail end of 3rd edition with the Spaniard and some other friends from Connecticut days and we got pretty into it. When 3.5 came out it didn't seem like a lot was changing so the transition wasn't too bad. Granted by this point I had moved to North Carolina and our 3.0 campaign was on indefinite hold. Once when I came back up to the CT we played a bit after converting to the new rules. In college I got involved in some pretty lengthy 3.5 campaigns that were tonnes of fun with Nate and that crew and we pulled a bunch of people into the lifestyle with us.


After graduation, getting a job, and moving down here I found I was hurting for some DnD so after a few trips to my local games store I landed myself in a campaign with some kids who work down in the Depot where I do my contract work. These cats showed me how to really do the "game" aspect of 3.5. Twinking out your character, min maxing, all that fun stuff, it was a totally different game experience than with "its the gnome" or "whatever Nate called his campaigns"

Anyway on to 4e. They changed everything. No joke, no exaggeration. Combat system, class system, magic items, character creation, there is very little left from 3.5 that went unchanged. Its going to be a totally different experience for a lot of people, and there will be some that will reject the change. Personally I'd be excited to play either version, since they both have their merits, but I can see where Wizards was going with 4e. They wanted to make it more accessible to the general public in a world dominated by World of Warcraft and I don't really blame them, they are trying to run a business. I just hope they don't completely abandon support for the 3.5 ruleset, since I know some people who will still play it.

Alias

The internet is a funny place. To me now I feel comfortable pretty much anywhere on the nettertubes but this didn't used to be the case. Do you remember when the interwebs was a scary place? I do. I remember stumbling upon sites in my youth with flashy banners and sounds and freaking out closing browsers and such thinking somebody was haxxoring my box. I remember getting stupid email viruses and keyloggers and spyware shit all out the ass and then going through the tedious process of cleaning it all out.

Then came web2.0 and as I grew older and wiser the internet began to feel like a second home. A place to re-invent oneself if one chooses to do so. A place to be anonymous in a sea of other anonymous people. I wonder sometimes whether the internet is still dangerous, and I've just become more immune to its dangers...

I was right!

I was just reviewing my post history and came upon an entry regarding the future of American television where I predicted the Discovery venture "Smash Lab" would not see past its pilot run. Well I'm fairly certain I was right. I haven't heard word one about that show in at least 6 weeks.

Uncle Niko Says....

Since getting my Xbox360 my other systems have fallen to the unfortunate wayside. I had the distinct advantage of grabbing games I knew were good, as was the case with Mass Effect, Assassins Creed and Bioshock, and then this month with GTAIV and the Penny Arcade game (which is FANTASTIC for a non full length game). Another pickup for me this month was the latest burnout incarnation, paradise. The open world is pretty inventive and the new crash system is fun, but I miss the individuality of the races in previous games. Its great that you can fuck around whenever you want but you have to hunt out when you want to do a new race if you don't want to repeat the same tracks over and over again.

My PC is currently fascinated with World Of Warcraft still...this is probably because I have nothing else to do during the week and parts of the weekend, and its a pretty good time sink for me. Im the Rogue officer in a guild on Greymane US in a raiding guild 4/5 5/9 in T6 content if that means anything to any of you. I'm probably going to give Age of Conan a try once a buddy of mine comes through with a guest pass primarily for the reason that I hate the WoW PVP system and am yearning to try something new. And the fact that MMO's have been my heroin since Asheron's Call.

In non-gaming news, my boss recently informed our group that we have no future work outside of 1 year so I have once again taken up the mantle of jobseeker in my spare time to solidify my future.

Keep on truckin

Genius and madness, a fine Culinary line

In the ever increasing war on food boredom I have added a few recipes to my stable. Please indulge and elaborate at your leisure

Sosage Mc. Pasta
1 package Johnsonville Sweet Basil Italian Sausage
1 jar Classico Traditional Sweet Basil sauce

Cut the sausage into small pieces ~4 per link and cook thoroughly in oil in a fry pan (I dont fuck around with pork so mine are 90% done with a decent crust before I take them off)

Simmer in the sauce with additional oregano till your satisfied in its doneness

serve over pasta of your choice

Omega's Universal Marinade
I use this on chicken, pork, beef, what have you, anything in small pieces to be fried in a pan w/oil

Teriyaki Sauce
Worcestershire
Barbecue Sauce (this is where I lose a lot of people Im sure, I only use Bone Sucking Sauce)

its pretty tasty, toss the remnants in towards the end of cooking for a good coat.

http://www.foodnetwork.com/food/recipes/recipe/0,1977,FOOD_9936_25143,00.html
this is fantastic btw I use baby portabella for the mushrooms though
ProTip, dont use a high wall pan or you end up simmering instead of thickening the sauce at the end

Nostalgia

This evening, I pulled out my trumpet (she without a name) and blew some notes for the first time in almost a year. I learned that when you spend 13 years doing something, you don't ever forget how to do it. Much like Sam did at school I came to the realization that I've spent over half of my life with the harsh mistress of the trumpet and I shouldn't be so quick to let my fingers and lips lose those hard earned callouses.

Of course playing could be hard considering I live in a relatively well populated apartment complex. Tonight I played softly with my most noise deadening mute. The walls are thick enough that nobody would have been disturbed by that much, but I think I could be a little bolder during the day, when Im usually the only person I see in my building.

Getting to another topic. Recent comments from old friends Mike, Christine, and Rebbecca have led me to believe that this thing I'm doing here is accomplishing at least one of my goals, communicating with friends far and near. That being said, I still get very little communication from people I know. I can be stubborn so feel free to bug me on this front. I leave my current contact info below to that end

Email: CRSchaller@gmail.com
AIM: TheWookie13 (unchanged note :D)
Phone # 252-288-7177 (highlight)

Next Gen

So with my generous tax refund coming in this past weekend I went out and purchased myself and Xbox 360 and some games. My first next gen console. I was debating for a while between the xbox and the PS3 but what I figured was if I were to buy both eventually I would get the xbox now since its currently tops but eventually I figur the ps3 will reclaim the glory of its predecessors before the next next gen systems come out.

Anyway the details: my gamertag is FrakTruck and the games i got were Assassins creed and lost odyssey

initial reviews to follow

AC: This game is great. I like the premise, I like the action, I like all of it. Its completely immersive and if you haven't played it, you probably will be confused by how it will end up working. If I were to complain about 1 thing its that after the first set of missions, the gameplay basically repeats itself just at a harder difficulty. The story however more than makes up for it.


EDIT: APR3 (12:30AM) LO review

This game was pretty cool for the first couple of hours. It definitely had potential in my mind till they introduced 2 new characters, young children who through some ridiculous plot twisting appear and join the party. It is from this point on that the game seemed to go downhill for me. The writing got sloppy, the characters making huge leaps in logic without really explaining anything, ambiguous character traits surface (ex, Kaims immense sentimentality vice his incredible blood lust for revenge) and seriously, everything these kid characters do makes me want to toss things at my TV and they're involved in EVERY CUT SCENE so you can imagine my rage. I don't know what it is, maybe its their terrible voice acting or the fact that other than being a decent healer they're incredibly useless (I've permanently benched mack till the game opens up and I can level him without him doing nothing every battle)

lets move on. Graphically the game is pretty good, though on my TV (not HD mind) it doesn't look any better than FFXII and the fighting system isn't really anything special except that magic is incredibly overpowered and there are entire zones where melee is just useless. Theres also not a lot of freedom yet and I'm 12 hours in and on disc 2 of 4. Im still being prodded along this path with nowhere else to go pretty much. The Challenge rating is pretty high for an RPG...the AI will target your weak characters and constantly barrage them which until you learn how to deal with each group of enemies in the zone you will have trouble, and the bosses so far have been interesting battles at least.

this looks like a terribad review, I know this but these are just my personal gripes. Im gonna keep going of course since the 360 is unfortunately RPG starved at this stage with this, eternal sonata and Mass Effect being the only high profile RPGs that I know of (though fallout3 and fable 2 are coming in 6 months)