Assorted Miscellany July 2013

As I seem to be doing every month these days, here's a summary of life:

• I've been playing TF2 a lot, just because it's easy to spend either a lot or a little time on it after work.  That's kind of in its nature, but I need to focus on other games.  Among them:  
• Bioshock:  I should finish it.  
• Damnation:  Now that I have a computer that can actually handle games, I want to try this for reals.  
• Thaumcraft:  I really want to get going on this one.  I'm working on building a giant pyramid.  
• Minecraft beta 1.7.3: I've been away from this one for way too long.  
• Space Chem:  I only recently got it (on sale during the Steam summer sale), but it's really good.  I haven't played such a good puzzle game in ages, outside of kongregate.  
• Pokemon:  I still need to finish White & go through Black 2, in anticipation of X & Y this fall.  Come to think of it, I need to make sure to pre-order those.  
• Board games are about as usual.  
• Sentinels of the Multiverse:  I really need to find people that already know how to play.  You'd think that, as often as I teach it, I'd bump into somebody again who knows it, if only from me.  There are some super-duper hard villains that I have yet to even try.  
• Ascension:  I recently got a chance to crack Rise of Vigil, which adds the Energy and Treasure mechanics.  The one time that I played it, though, Energy seemed to relentlessly accelerate the game, to the point that it seemed that going for anything that didn't either increase Energy or have an Energize effect wasn't worth it in the early game.  
• Video watching:  
• I've been going through much of SF Debris's archives.  I'm skipping shows that I haven't watched, but, all in all, he's a good reviewer of all things science fictiony.  
• I think that I'll go through my "watch later" list soon since, y'know, that's why it's there.  
• Work:  I'm still employed, which is more than a lot of people can say in this economy.  Work's good!  
• Music:  I recently made a point of actually tuning in to www.di.fm's vocal trance channel.  It's been a long time since I actually did.  
• Sleep:  What's that?  

So, there's the round-up.  

Initial Thoughts on Greek Mythology

I have come to the conclusion that ancient Greek poets had a personal vendetta against me. 
not really
However, my attempts to research ancient Greek mythology have been met with a certain degree of frustration.  I didn't expect quite as much variation as what I got.  In fact, early on, it seemed like it might not be so bad:  For instance, it seemed like the Orphics just tacked on Chronos and Ananke at the front end.  Of course, they also had to change all the begetting after Chaos and so on, so it's not quite so smooth. 
To make hide or hair of this, I'm at the point where I'm just taking each tradition one at a time and diagramming it on its own, before I get into the comparative stuff. 

As a side note:  How lame is it that the Hekatonkheires and Cyclopes seem to be little more than plot devices, to be pulled out whenever is convenient? 

I feel like I should mention why I'm researching this, if only to say that it's for a personal creative project that you might never see.  I'll try to post any insights that I might have here, though, that they might be useful to others. 

TF2: The Polynerf Update

On July 10th, 2013, Valve finally managed to release an objectively bad update for Team Fortress 2.  They completely and utterly nerfed the so-called Polycount Sets, as well as several other, minor sets.  There was no attempt at compensation made for this:  Each polycount set had its benefit replaced with a cosmetic effect:  leaving a "calling card" on one's victims, except for the Saharan Spy, who got a rather odd-looking sand whirlwind effect with his taunts. 
I am particularly disappointed with the removal of the headshot immunity from the Croc-O-Style Kit, especially since the ability to perform headshots was not granted to the Sydney Sleeper.  The set was completely fair as it stood:  A sniper wearing Ol' Snaggletooth could be immune to headshots, but only if he also bore the Sydney Sleeper as his rifle, removing his own ability to perform them.  (Darwin's Danger Shield and the Bushwacka were also required, which only lends more credence to the notion that they were balanced.) 
I suppose that I'm particularly miffed about this because I spent ages accumulating what my calculations show was the equivalent of 73 weapons to craft the damn hat, only to have its benefit completely removed shortly after I got it. 

General Update June 2013

Here's a general status update for my life at present:

• Minecraft:  I still haven't been playing it much.  I'll get back into the swing of it soon enough, perhaps with the long weekend coming up.  
• Board Games:  more Sentinels of the Multiverse for me, for the most part
• Tabletop RPGs:  I now have even fewer prospects for available RPG players.  
• Reading:  I've finished The King in Yellow, and am working on A Feast for Crows during lunch breaks.  
• Webcomics:  I'm still way behind.  
• Western Print Comics:  I really should contact the local comic shop & see if they're carrying Mouse Guard yet.  If nothing else, hearing about it might get them to do so.  
• Wesnoth:  I've got a hankering to play The Battle for Wesnoth again, so I've gone and gotten it again, this time for my gaming PC.  

That's all for now.  Hopefully, more coherent updates will be coming shortly.  

Regarding Google Reader

I've been using Google Reader for my RSS feeds for a long time now.  I think that it started because I needed an RSS reader and already had a Google account, so it was a natural fit.
I've been meaning to switch for a while now, ever since Google announced that it would be shuttering Reader because it couldn't figure out where to put the ads.  Fortunately, I remembered that this morning, since tomorrow is the big day.  I've already copied everything (not just Reader subscriptions) via Google Takeout - it's a good backup to have, anyway - and I've gone ahead and switched to The Old Reader, since it was based on Google Reader ages ago and, well, my main preference would be to just keep Google Reader, so I want something as close to it as possible.
There are lots of other RSS readers out there, of course.  Have you remembered to switch?
(Also, if you feel like commenting, let me know which RSS reader you use and why.)

Spite for Spite

As I mentioned previously, I've been enjoying Sentinels of the Multiverse.
To give some context for what I'm about to describe:  The rule book actually gives difficulty ratings for the various villains.  The base game contains two difficulty-1 villains and two difficulty-3 villains.  I've beaten them all, though the difficulty-3 villains are, of course, harder.
The Rook City expansion contains two difficulty-2 villains and two difficulty-4 villains.  One of the difficulty-2 villains, Plague Rat, does seem to go into that spot, though he's closer to the 3s than to the 1s, I think.
The other difficulty-2 villain, Spite, remains unthwarted, at least in any game that I've played against him.  His Drug cards combo to make him a real pain.  The most annoying is the one drug that reduces the first damage that he takes each turn.  The way that the game normally plays, the best way to deal with that is to use a one-shot card to eat that, then use a power to do damage.  However, Spite has another card that damages a hero whenever that hero uses a power, in addition to making that player mill 5 cards.
Spite has 5 of these things.
Strangely, one of Spite's Drug cards whose name I actually remember - Demon's Kiss - is the least annoying because it merely does damage to every Hero target.  Yes, that's the good one.
In strategizing about this, I think that the best approach is actually to use a team of just 3 Heroes (the minimum), because his damage reduction card works at H-2, which would be 1.  That way, rather than trying a one-two punch, each hero could just know that their damage is -1, with a +1 on there if they happen to hit twice in one turn.
The moral of the story is that I might just have to ignore the printed difficulty ratings.  ;P

Sudden Short Story 50

"A decision has been reached," spoke the image of a woman on a lonely Earth-like planet on a remote star in the Sculptor Dwarf Galaxy.
"I expected as much," said the man helping his equipment to put itself away.  "Would I be correct in thinking that the entire Milky Way, including its satellites, is to be incorporated into humanity?"
"The satellite galaxies will indeed be included.  Technically, you have a choice in the matter:  You are permitted to leave the affected area."
"OK," he said, hoisting a smallish now-boxed machine into a hatch on his ship, "I'll do that, then."
"The resources of the entirety of the galaxy will join humanity.  This includes stars, planets, asteroids, comets, nebulae, dust, and gas.  You may be able to leech off uncaptured light energy for a time, but there will eventually be nowhere in the main galaxy or its satellites from which to derive resources, unless you rejoin humanity."
The rest of the machines had put themselves away.  The ship was now as heavily laden as it could be, save for the weight of one human body and its clothing and accoutrements.
"I know.  That's why I'm going to Andromeda.  I'm going to sling around a few stars on my way out, unless you can give me a better boost."
"The gravitational energy from this stellar neighborhood will not be needed for some time, so you may do as you wish, for now."
He walked around to the door to climb in, taking full advantage of the feeling of being in a body.
"She's not out there, you know," spoke the image.  "You will be the first human to have left the galaxy.  We know that you are an idealist, but you will not find love in another galaxy."
"I don't intend to," said he, "but, as you said, I'm an idealist."
And with that, he climbed aboard his ship, shut the door, and left, not to set foot upon a planet again for a very long time.