I'm not dead, i'm just lazy. I will get back to writing up blogs once the house move goes ahead, right now i'm to stressed for words.

 

Bring on the new house, or bring on the weaponry. The people will know which to choose.

Ok, NTL man came, saw, and fixed. Easy. Well, easy once i'd shouted at the customer service people for changing the time and insisted they get the engineer to me immediately. After a few choice words, they did so ;)

 

And from one probem solved, another is born. My scooter (which i use to get to work every morning) is playing up again. It just won't start in bad weather. This has been a very occasional thing (often enough to be put down to a "fault" rather than just bad luck) since the repairs were done on it following its theft in late 2004. The garage i use keep taking it in, as they have done for the past year and more, and giving it back with assurances they've done everythign they can to make sure it's in working order. But sure enough, the problem resurfaces, and i'm left stranded up shite creek without even a proverbial paddle. It has to stop!

 

So my investigations proceed thusly:

Contacted Citizen's Advice, they say to pursue the insurance company i'm with first off, to see if there's anything they can do. After that, it's basically down to the garage, and eventually maybe a claim against them.

Tried to contact the insurance company, they say they can't find the case quickly since it's over a year old (fair enough i guess) so i need to wait on them. Should chase them today. The sound they are making goes along the lines of "you didn't choose a garage that is on our books, so poo to you" and therefore i am not hopeful they will be any help.

So it looks like i will have to tell the garage that they can either provide me with a new scooter at their cost, or i will take them to small claims court and claim that and more, taking into account the fact that this scooter going wrong lost me my job last year. Scarey prospect, but what else am i to do?

 

Answers on a postcard...

Sixth Level of Hell - The City of Dis

---

You approach Satan's wretched city where you behold a wide plain surrounded by iron walls. Before you are fields full of distress and torment terrible. Burning tombs are littered about the landscape. Inside these flaming sepulchers suffer the heretics, failing to believe in God and the afterlife, who make themselves audible by doleful sighs. You will join the wicked that lie here, and will be offered no respite. The three infernal Furies stained with blood, with limbs of women and hair of serpents, dwell in this circle of Hell.

 

 

Oh my...

Ok... The time has come for me to smell the PSU, the CPU, the GPU, the SATA, IDE, and right on down to the BIOS. If you know what most of those stand for, you're right here with me.

 

Yes, i am going to build my own PC! And what a PC it shall be. The Components i have settled on are as follows:

 

MoBo: Asus A8N32-SLI Deluxe - £134.97

Case: Coolermaster Cavalier 3 Silver Chrome Finish - £47.93

PSU: 600W Enermax Noisetaker SLi EG701AX-VE(W)-SFMA (20+4) SLi PCI-E READY aPFC Quiet - £91.05

CPU: AMD Athlon 64 3800+ "Venice" - £196.67

RAM: 1Gb (2 x 512 Mb) Corsair TwinX, DDR, PC3200C2PT, Cas 2 - £73.90

HDD: 74Gb Western Digital Raptor Enterprise - £114.95

DVD-ROM: Sony Silver 16x DVD-ROM + 48x CD-ROM IDE - £13.97

GPU: XFX nVidia Geforce 7800 GT - £244.39

 

TOTAL: £917.83

 

ORDERED!

 

Bring it the hell on...

On February 2nd, 2006, my life changed.

 

Ok, so it may not mean alot to the public at large, but being accepted into the beta testing for DDO is a massive deal for me. I get to test the greatest addition to MMORPGs to date. D&D, welcome to the Massively Multiplayer world!

 

Let's start with first impressions.

My machine isn't quite up to advised spec, but it handles the game quite nicely. Seemingly the programmers have taken a bit more care making sure that underspec machines will react in the right way.

Longer loading times? Yes.

Delays in highly populated or graphically intense areas? Yes.

Lag-teleporting? No.

One of my pet hates about WoW was the lag teleporting (which was essential in the game's environment) and i am glad to say it's completely absent in DDO. The way the game handles combat and various other aspects leaves no need for the server to anticipate your moves as much as in conventional MMORPGs. And TBH, IMHO and FYI, you won't care if your machine is a little under par to begin with.

 

Looks.

The game is gorgeous. My graphics settings are hung low due to my reduced spec, and i can still see the game's beauty in all its glory. I can't wait to get a monster to run this properly. The character customisation is detailed, but not finnicky. It won't take you all day, and you'll get an individual look. There are tons of possibilities, whether you want to look like a swarthy unshaven pirate or a rich clean mummy's boy, a downtrodden tomboy or a beautiful maiden, you'l find something to suit your tastes. Brilliant. The scenery is lovely, buildings are believable and everywhere you look there is something magical to behold.

 

Combat.

To start with you might be dubious about the combat system. It really is real time, and if you're not willing to be a little dextrous the monsters will give you a hard time. However, after a couple of minutes you'll find it's refreshing to move away from just the "auto-attack on, stand until mush" MMORPG standard, and move into a game which allows blocking and tumbling as well as the ability to really use position to your advantage. Players are solid, which means monsters have to go around. As a fighter, you can stand in front of the poor mage and take the beating, or hide behind that mound of muscley barbarian. Traditional "taunt" skills are replaced with intimidation for getting attention, diplomacy to lose it, and bluff to cause a monster to look the other way while you stick it in the gullet. It's very D&D, to put it as simply as possible.

 

Moving around.

Stealth is great - use the shadows to be MORE hidden, you actualy have to be thinking where the light is coming from, and how you're going to remain undiscovered. Everyone can stealth to a certain degree, and there are little eyes which appear next to you to tell you how well hidden you are - the more eyes, the more chance you're gonna get caught a-sneaking. Athletics and Acrobatics actually matter. Or at least they will later; how far or high you can jump may make the difference between reaching that lovely piece of treasure - or indeed that quest objective - or not. Running actually works too. Fleeing in terror. If you can run round enough corners, the monsters/bad guys will wonder where you've gone, seemingly. It's refreshing to be able to run off, regroup, and come back. I'm sure that will become more difficult once i meet faster enemies!

 

Grouping.

I've frankly never seen a game make it so easy to group. I've not even USED the tools they provide yet. I simply went to the start of the dungeon i wanted to do next, and before i could click the "LFG" button, someone invited me to join them on a run through it. Fantastic. And the group interface is simple, just the way it should be. As everything is instanced, you will never have to worry about sharing mobs in DDO. And of course, since the reward is given once the quest is complete, you're free to work together as little or as much as you want. I recommend you err on the "much" side! I'm sure tactics will come into the game alot more than they did in my level 1/rank 1 run through the early few quests, and there is plenty of room for them. Every class has it's role to play, adn yet you don't HAVE to take certain classes. Again, it's very refreshing at this stage.

 

Interface.

The interface isn't something i've played with alot, but it has all the basics anyone could wish for. Detachable hotbars - seemingly you can have as many as you want; i only needed 2 - main and utility type abilities - to begin with. The chat windows is small to begin with, needs a bit of resizing, and at 768x1024 the screen is a little restrictive. This could easily change with a little modification, and everythign is moveable. Pretty good, no problems, and plenty customisable.

 

Im sure i'll add to this, but i want to air what i've written so far. On with the show!

***Your Birthdate: March 3***

You are more than a big ball of energy - you are a big ball of hyper.
You are always on the go, but you don't have a type a personality.
Instead of channeling your energy into work, you instead go for fun and adventure.
Witty and verbal, you can have an interesting conversation with anyone.

Your strength: Your larger than life imagination

Your weakness: You tend to be pretty scattered

Your power color: Lime

Your power symbol: Lightening bolt

Your power month: March

What Does Your Birth Date Mean?
http://www.blogthings.com/whatdoesyourbirthdatemeanquiz/

 

So it would seem... Indeed.