TRPG General Chat

Ben

12:02 AM

Well... I just had a blank...

I forgot how to create a collapsible region in Visual Studio C#

BESW

Use soufflé as a supporting material?

Ben

@BESW Is that not counter-intuitive? Since the idea of a soufflé is to not collapse?

BESW

No, the challenge of a soufflé is to not collapse.

Ben

So in adding a successful soufflé, it won't collapse.

BESW

Not until someone slams a door, anyway.

Ben

12:08 AM

#region

Duh. (-1 coder points for me)

The Oracle

12:19 AM

1

Q: Migration rejected - and now what?

How to create a logical system to run a divination engine based on d&d magic? How do I help OP to get this question clarified and possibly reopened (on Worldbuilding on here, depending what he really wants)? I can't comment or edit on Worldbuilding because it was migrated and site redirects me h...

Ben

Would you agree that a Programmer with no Coding experience is as good as a Coder with no Programming experience?

Though perhaps a Coder with no Programming experience might be a little superior?

doppelgreener

12:39 AM

they mean the same thing though 😦

Ben

@doppelgreener Not necessarily. Coding is writing the code. All the if | else and such.

Programming is the way the program is laid out. Separation of classes, methods of calling things where appropriate, making the program more diverse. Recursion, Inheritance and the like.

doppelgreener

@Ben programmer/developer/coder get used fairly interchangeably, with the exception being things like 'code monkey' or 'computer scientist'

my job title is software engineer, and i am a developer and programmer and coder

and people would refer to me doing any of those things interchangeably

Ben

@doppelgreener Same. I am self-taught, so there are things I am unaware of (until I become aware of them), however my boss is a "Programmer" (did the degree in University) but has since forgotten the language.

So for example, he has told me to "create a Plugin". Simple enough, sure. But having never done anything like that myself, it's a bit of a challenge. I can tell the program what to do, but constructing it appropriately, i.e. using the correct classes and calls etc., is something I don't know (yet).

Miniman

I'd argue that's more of a distinction between "software engineer" and "programmer/coder" than between "programmer" and "coder".

Ben

From his perspective however, If I told him to write it, not only would I receive a reprimand (or something similar) for bossing him around, he'd also sit there, with no knowledge of how to do it, even though he knows what he wants to achieve

nitsua60

12:47 AM

@Ben Interesting. I would have said--and I'll apologize in advance to all the people I'm probably going to offend here--that a "programmer" is what you called a coder + what you called a programmer, while a "coder" is someone who hacks together examples they found online and keeps trying to compile until they've got a plate of spaghetti that compiles and (seems to) do what they want.

(Btw, I have been both of those ^^ at various times in my professional career.)

Ben

@nitsua60 Umm, that's basically me in a nutshell. Lol

nitsua60

Former trending to latter, this last decade =)

Ben

Like I said, I'm self-taught, which relies heavily on google, SO, and other internet sources, and "hacking things together" is pretty much how I make things work.

doppelgreener

@Ben what you describe there as programmer are just words for "knows software architecture" which is a quality for people who write and design software to know. But it's not specifically attached to programmer and not coder.

Ben

No doubt someone with actual experience could make a much better program than I could.

doppelgreener

12:49 AM

Some companies or circles may draw lines but it's subjective.

@nitsua60 I call that thing you call a "coder" a "script kiddie"

Ben

Well, anyway, I suppose I'm just frustrated at my current position. That's effectively my job. "Do this" which ends up with me searching for hours on end to try and figure out what "this" is, then figuring out how "this" works, then trying to figure out how to re-create "this" to do "that"

nitsua60

@Ben Remind me what your job is? Aside from creating "this" to "that" converters =)

Ben

@nitsua60 Umm... I suppose my job title roughly converts to "IT, so you know computers, right?"

I was hired to write a program, but over the years that has developed to "IT Support", to "Network Administrator", to "Database Administrator".

BESW

@doppelgreener And in my mother's day, that's what people meant by "hacker."

Ben

Now I'm back writing plugins for a DMS that we have become a re-seller for, and I am the only one in the Southern hemisphere that classifies as "Support"

All self-taught.

So it's been a bit of a stressful ride

doppelgreener

12:58 AM

That sounds like a heck of a ride

And a significant bus factor 😋

Ben

@doppelgreener That cannot go below 44 mph.

Metaphorically accurate

doppelgreener

I'll allow it.gif

Ben

50* mph. Apologies

The main issue I have is that I really have trouble understanding things until I see a working example. I can read and re-read, and get an understanding, but until I see it work, it's still vague

doppelgreener

@Ben rest assured that's not just you

nitsua60

@doppelgreener (1) read (2) watch (3) do, eh?

doppelgreener

1:13 AM

@nitsua60 mmhmm. All the useful development tutorials I've ever read come with examples I can study to really understand.

BESW

@nitsua60 (4) teach.

doppelgreener

Even if that's just a 5 line code snippet to demonstrate something from a paragraph

nitsua60

@BESW absolutely!

doppelgreener

@BESW 😎👍

BESW

(6) transcend mortal limitations and become a being of pure praxis

Ben

1:17 AM

@nitsua60 With one exception... (incoming programmer joke)

> (0) read (1) watch (2) do, eh?

nitsua60

@Ben Religion's no joking matter, man.

Karelzarath

1:56 AM

Nothing throws me off like 1-based indexing. Gets me every time.

nitsua60

(Makes me realize: you know I was joking, right @Ben?)

(The joke being that 0-indexing vs. 1-indexing is the sort of religious conflict that could start wars?)

Ben

@nitsua60 Oh, yes. I did...

nitsua60

@Ben Uh-oh... did the Zero-Pope not like my joke?

=)

@Ben Or like the least-appealing synthpop group in history.

Speaking of non-sequiturs, @BESW: assuming my understanding of Pacific culture is now more than half-informed by Moana, what should I know is accurate/inaccurate in there, and what should be my next step in broadening my understanding?

Shalvenay

3:25 AM

hey there @nitsua60

Joel Harmon

I don't think I've ever been so tempted to answer a question that I know is off topic for the site.

Shalvenay

hey there @JoelHarmon

Joel Harmon

hey @Shalv

anything cool?

Miniman

@JoelHarmon Wait...is he just asking for someone to tell him about predicate logic?

Joel Harmon

@Miniman I really want to throw checksums and bayseian logic at him, but it's the wrong stack

so I tried to nudge him in the right direction

then I come to chat and find there's a meta about it, that I haven't read yet

1

Q: Migration rejected - and now what?

How to create a logical system to run a divination engine based on d&d magic? How do I help OP to get this question clarified and possibly reopened (on Worldbuilding on here, depending what he really wants)? I can't comment or edit on Worldbuilding because it was migrated and site redirects me h...

support specific-question migration

well that was a quick read

Shalvenay

3:35 AM

@JoelHarmon got to see Spearfish Canyon for the first time (and also the insides of mountain obscuration conditions -- driving into clouds is a bit of an experience)

Joel Harmon

@Shalvenay it's pretty surreal

Shalvenay

@JoelHarmon no doubt. it's a lot more surreal than simple fog, even

Joel Harmon

@Shalvenay in my experience, the abrupt elevation-based change made it surreal, while the somewhat dangerous roads with varied visibility made it scary

Shalvenay

@JoelHarmon it's actually thicker than most fogs too

Joel Harmon

@Miniman I'm not so sure he needs the predicates to construct complex questions from booleans. I think he needs TCP-style validation and reconstruction for highly unstable (as these things go) data sources

Miniman

3:48 AM

@JoelHarmon Is that actually possible, given that the source is unreliable while the message is reliable?

(Interesting reversal of the norm there.)

Joel Harmon

@Miniman absolutely

"hey, machine, were your answers to any of the last 5 questions wrong" is very similar to " what's the parity of the last 5 bits"

Miniman

Ah, that's clever. I was thinking we don't have two-way communication, but that's a really neat idea.

Joel Harmon

It's totally my original idea, not stolen or parodied from any other sources, so no stealing it.

you can also ask about "were any of my last 5 meta-questions answered incorrectly" to check those, too

BESW

@nitsua60 Moana is portraying a mashup of Polynesian cultures, which is a distinct group of Pacific cultural "families" alongside Micronesian and Melanesian, each of which is again subdivided into specific cultures. So a lot of what it's depicting isn't necessarily completely inaccurate, just grossly broad strokes treating a dozen different cultures as one unit.

Joel Harmon

you go from "these 20 questions have a 35% chance of all being correct, so there's an error and I have no idea where" to "there's a 35% chance of being entirely consistent, but enough cleverly subdivided dependency that I have a good idea of what's incorrect"

from there, you can just ask for verification more and more times until you get some desired level of confidence in your data

BESW

3:57 AM

The visuals are mostly right, though not always treated with appropriate respect (eg Moana's grandmother would probably not have chosen her manta ray malu; in most cultures it would have been bestowed on her by an elder after years of forming a relationship). Also I don't care how nasty your coconut is, only someone like Māui or Gadao could crack it open so casually.

(Being able to casually open a coconut with your bare hands is the Pacific lore equivalent of beating up Worf.)

2

Miniman

@JoelHarmon Yep, I'm familiar with the idea, I just wasn't seeing a way to apply it in this situation.

Joel Harmon

@Miniman sorry, I'm hung up on the idea that one internet stranger is incorrect about accumulating errors, so others must be as well, and I'm in a wrong-on-the-internet situation

Miniman

@JoelHarmon Nothing to apologize for, I can easily see how I was coming across as clueless. (And, in all honesty, I am pretty clueless about this sort of thing. Just slightly less clueless than I might have appeared.)

BESW

The themes of Moana are largely Disney and NOT Polynesian or Pasifika. Moana's personal journey is very Disney Princess; the depiction of a volcano as evil or bad or corrupted is downright offensive; Māui's portrayal is... well, Māui can be found in the stories and faiths of many different cultures and he's always a bit different, but it's hard to see the film's version in any of them. He's usually physically unimpressive but extremely clever, almost a trickster character.

Miniman

@BESW In fairness, although I haven't seen the movie, it's really difficult to depict a trickster character in movies.

BESW

4:03 AM

The story takes place in a historical gap called the Long Pause, during which seafaring Polynesian cultures... stopped seafaring... and then started up again.

There are some good links to scholarship in this article.

BESW

4:17 AM

I will say, I've never before seen an animated film where I felt like I knew the environment. Those scenes on the beaches of Moana's home island? The terrain was shockingly familiar.

Miniman

@BESW That's pretty cool.

BESW

...There was an unfortunate obesession with coconuts though. That's kind of a stereotype; coconut is important in the Pacific, but taro would realistically be the crop they were most worried about losing.

(And there was taro! I saw it! But nope, it's all coconut songs and coconut plagues and just one little field of taro that's probably too dry to grow properly.)

Shalvenay

@BESW believe it or not, I have had taro before (local Chinese place did a pork+taro dish once as a special-sort-of-thing)

BESW

@Shalvenay That seems reasonable.

Taro is to many Pacific (and Asian!) cultures what Westerners think coconut is to them.

Like, more than one culture has an origin story where humans are literally related to taro.

Miniman

Hmmm...animated movies where I'm familiar with the location they were set in. Ferngully and Finding Nemo. 0/2 for resemblance to actual location :(

BESW

4:28 AM

Oh, and that thing with the ocean. I don't even know where to start with that. Let's just say it's at least both lazy and dumb, and potentially one of the most racist things in the whole film.

(I'm not going to question where they found shale on island that's exclusively volcanic and limestone, but don't think I didn't notice that Disney.)

Ben

@Miniman I had a friend argue with me that the reef where Marlin lived was in America somewhere.

Explain why an Australian Dentist would travel all the way to America in a Tinny

BESW

@Miniman Rescuers 2?

This is taro, the low-growing enormous leaves on the slender stalks:

Miniman

@BESW Haven't seen it. Ferngully 2 would count if I remembered anything about it, I guess.

BESW

Given the soil she's walking on, there's no way that taro is wet enough. Taro needs, like, practically rice-paddy-like conditions.

But that's small potatoes (hah!) compared to the problems with Māui, Tūtū Pele, Mahuika, etc.

Ben

@BESW She's a didney princess. She can't be walking around in shin-deep mud

Miniman

4:41 AM

Side note: the live-action remake of Ferngully also doesn't resemble the location Ferngully was set in.

Ben

That would be unappealing

BESW

Yet another fundamental problem with forcing a Pasifika heroine into the Disney Princess mold.

Shalvenay

hey there @Ben

Ben

oo/

I am apparently now a 2-headed troll-beast

Shalvenay

how're things going?

@Ben an ettin you mean?

Ben

4:45 AM

Stressing about plugins and teething babies

Miniman

@BESW Sorry, like I said, I haven't seen the movie, and I also know nothing about Pasifika culture - is Moana an existing Pasifika heroine, or one created by Disney for the movie?

Shalvenay

ah. OK here

BESW

@Miniman She's invented by Disney out of whole cloth.

Miniman

@BESW Ok, that's what I thought. Just, the phrasing you used there sort of suggested to me that I had gotten it wrong.

BESW

Ah, no. Just that any heroine who is Pasifika is going to have some fundamental epistemological problems fitting into the standard Disney Princess narrative.

Miniman

4:54 AM

@BESW Yep, gotcha.

Adeptus

@Delioth HR staff: "10 years Python experience required. Recent graduates encouraged."

Shalvenay

@Adeptus sounds like they want someone who got their start early ;)

Miniman

@Adeptus Yeah, that seems to be every ad atm. I'm not sure when "junior" was changed to mean "2 years experience in this exact role", but it seems pretty universal.

Shalvenay

@Miniman yeah -- I think it's a function of keyword driven hiring, at least from the IT side

Adeptus

Even better is "10 years experience required in this 2 year old technology". Those are the ads that you can tell were written 99% by HR and 1% by IT

Shalvenay

5:07 AM

@Adeptus yah. you can't write a job ad for a job you don't at all understand

Miniman

@Shalvenay Well, clearly you can, because most of them are.

Ben

Can someone suggest a good source for learning how to write a plugin? My issue is that most of my sources require some understanding of how a plugin works, but there is nothing I have found that is basically a "For Dummies" tut.

Shalvenay

@Miniman I mean, most people understand most jobs at some level, but that falls down for IT

@Ben plugin for what?

or is the plugin concept your problem?

Ben

Synergis Adept

Shalvenay

@Ben ah, can't help you there man

Ben

5:09 AM

@Shalvenay I have been tasked with "writing a plugin".

Miniman

@Ben Never even heard of that one, sorry.

Ben

I have struggled with trying to understand how a plugin is structured, but so far I've only managed to confuse myself

Shalvenay

@Ben you know how an API works right? i.e. "here are some functions you can call to have task X done for you"

Ben

The program isn't all that important. I have an SDK for it, but my issue is that I am trying to write this in c#, and the sources they have provided are all in VB.NET, even though that isn't supported anymore.

I just want to start over, start fresh, with a tutorial that is basically saying "this is how we write a plugin in C#"

What the plugin does isn't important at this stage.

Miniman

Ah, right.

Ben

5:13 AM

How it works is what I need to understand

Shalvenay

basically, a plugin-type thing is basically "they're calling the API, and you need to provide it"

do they provide actual API documentation for the plugin API?

or do they expect you to work it out on your own from the code examples?

Ben

@Shalvenay Yes, which covers nothing more that "These are our method names", and these are the ones that are new, and these are the ones that are old"

Their documentation is lacking in most areas.

Shalvenay

@Ben ... sigh

Ben

They expect me to already know what I'm doing.

Tbf, that isn't necessarily a bad thing.

Shalvenay

@Ben do the parameter names in the VB.NET code offer any advice as to what the parameters do?

Ben

5:16 AM

They just don't allow for the new guys

Adeptus

Look at the VB.Net sample, see what API calls it's making, ~~replicate~~ approximate in C#

Ben

@Shalvenay They don't support VB.NET anymore

Shalvenay

basically, all you need to know are which things in your code get called when with what parameters

and what the stuff they provide for you to call does and what parameters it takes

also, don't be afraid to write an experimental plugin to throw away

that's one of the nice things about code -- it's really easy to set up experiments on a local test system

Ben

Yeah, this is where I'm getting confused. I know nothing about Interfaces, Plugins, COM or anything relevant to plugins.

Shalvenay

(unless you're off in developmestruction land that is)

@Ben COM, IDL, all that are completely orthogonal to this plugin business

don't worry about any COM bits right now

just focus on who calls what functions for how many cookies

Ben

5:21 AM

Ok, first off: I'm not sure this is the place to be doing a tutorial on how to write a plugin. Secondly, while I'm sure your advice is going to be helpful, and I really do appreciate the help, I need something I can follow, step by step, preferably with examples.

Shalvenay

is there a reason you can't reverse-engineer what the VB.NET is doing?

Ben

The last time I did anything with VB.NET was over 15 years ago

Miniman

@Ben I've been looking, but I'm not sure you're going to find anything really helpful.

Ben

@Shalvenay The language is foreign to me, and while yes, I can understand what it's doing, I can't understand how it's doing it, mainly due to the difference in structure

Miniman

Most plugin-related tutorials are about how to write an application that uses plugins, not vice versa.

Ben

5:24 AM

@Miniman Yeah.

Shalvenay

@Ben I mean -- try to pick out where the sample plugin is making calls back into the program.

as well as what procedures/functions the sample plugin provides

Ben

@Shalvenay That part is easy enough.

Chemus

Heya @Shalvenay

<<<is a swordsage.

Shalvenay

@Ben those are the keys if you will -- you can experiment from there, testing one call at a time

hey there @Chemus

Ben

My issue is that, for example, the class they use in the example is a "COM Class". No such thing exists in C#

Shalvenay

5:26 AM

how're things going?

Miniman

@Ben You could try this one - it's not exactly what you're after, but it looks relatively close.

Shalvenay

@Ben I suspect your problem isn't "plugins" -- its "COM Objects". that sadly I cannot help you with. I suck at COM

Ben

The equivalent might be a class library, as that can be compiled into a .dll, but when I import the appropriate references into the project, it creates a series of methods within the code, that are not in the example, because the project "does not have the calls to the reference project"

Shalvenay

you'll probably want to start by creating a generic COM object in C# and then hooking that up to whatever interface they want you to provide

and then implementing whatever calls are in that interface

Ben

@Miniman I did see that one. The issue is that this is only about adding GUI into a pre-existing plugin :/

Shalvenay

5:28 AM

you may want to skip the wizards here @Ben

@Chemus -- so, how're things going?

Chemus

Dangit! I should've known I'd forget something. :)

Alright, how's things here?

Miniman

@Ben This one also looks like it might be helpful for you.

Chemus

Minor sorta collaboratin on a plugin thing... I'm not likely to be any help there... but why not look/ask on another stack?

Ben

@Chemus Asking "How do I write a Plugin" isn't really going to work very well.

Miniman

@Chemus Because Stack Overflow murders people who ask things like this, chops their bodies into small pieces, and makes them eat themselves.

Shalvenay

5:32 AM

@Chemus OK here.

Chemus

@Ben Asking "What's a Good Plugin Tut, or where can I find one?' Is...

Miniman

@Chemus A recommendation question, and therefore off-topic :(

Shalvenay

@Ben did you catch my drift about starting by getting a COM object in C# working and then having it implement whatever IBlahPlugin they provide?

Chemus

@Miniman That's... huh. OK.

Shalvenay

@Chemus its the same reason [game-rec] got chopped into small pieces and thrown in a river to be eaten by 100lb catfish

Miniman

5:34 AM

That said, SO chat might be a better bet than our chat.

Ben

@Shalvenay As I mentioned, there is no "COM Object" in C#, and the closest I could find was the Class Library. Having played around with it, I have been unable to replicate an environment that I recognise from the examples I have been provided with

@Miniman true

Shalvenay

@Ben you're looking at the wizards and thinking that that's all that exists

I said "skip the wizards" for a reason...

Miniman

@Ben I mean, I have no idea what their chat is like. Just guessing that they might know some better resources.

Shalvenay

@Miniman chats, plural

Ben

@Shalvenay And again, my problem is that I know next to nothing about this kind of project. I don't know, what I don't know

Shalvenay

5:37 AM

I'd start with the C# one -- the "how do I implement a COM object in C#?" question is the first and foremost problem @Ben here has to solve

Ben

@Shalvenay Asked that. That's what pointed me to the Interface/Class Library

Shalvenay

@Ben oh, hmm...

I'd work on that project/reference project issue, then, I suppose

(you can probably tell I'm way out of my element here -- I'm a native code type who stinks hardcore at COM things and prefers to rely on IDE wizardry as little as possible)

(I'm also of the school of thought that says "if the automation is doing things that you don't understand -- turn it off and make it do what you want by hand")

Ben

@Shalvenay For a scope - all I want to do is create a Plugin that is simple a "Hello World" project. Just something that I can click a button, and it does something. That doesn't even need to reference the host program at all - simply load the plugin. Once I get that working, then I can move onto trying to integrate it.

Chemus

@Ben Wait, what are you lookin to plug synergis adept into? It looks like they sell that, so it might be hard to rev-engineer.

Ben

I have also found the appropriate chat on SO; however from experience, they are usually absent when I poke my head in.

@Chemus Uhh, I'm writing the plugin for Adept... as in, adding another feature to it, rather than the other way around

Shalvenay

5:47 AM

@Ben I'd see what happens if you try to make it load the thing with the extra methods in it

Miniman

@Ben Ok, I think I've found a better one.

Chemus

SO has all of goose-egg ("0") posts regarding synergis adept...

Ben

@Chemus I'm not looking for how to write a plugin for Adept, I'm trying to learn how to write a plugin.

Shalvenay

@Ben or more precisely -- how to write a COM object in C# that something else can load

Ben

@Miniman This is looking promising! Thankyou!

Shalvenay

5:49 AM

because plugins don't have to use COM :P

(generally speaking, that is. Adept's plugin system is apparently COM-based, but plenty of programs have plugin systems without having the faintest clue about COM or CORBA)

Ben

@Miniman "Start with a Blank Solution". This is already 10x better than anything else I've found haha

Miniman

@Ben In case you're wondering, I found it by including "-system" in my search, since everything that was coming up was about that.

Ben

That makes sense

Miniman

Well, ish. I'm sure it eliminated plenty of good results, too, since "system" is a word that's pretty much guaranteed to appear on a page that's talking about this sort of thing. But it worked, I guess, so yay!

RollingFeles

6:07 AM

@Shalvenay I really really hoped that I don't encounter COM here.

and there you go

hello, by the way :)

Ben

My b

RollingFeles

@Ben hello! So, you want to write a plugin, don't you?

Miniman

@RollingFeles If it helps, COM was really really hoping not to encounter you here.

Ben

I would also like to extend an apology to everybody, necessary or not. I realise that my requests may have been a bit forceful or demanding, or that my explanations may have come across as a bit harsh or abrupt, but I have really appreciated the help that everyone has provided. It has really helped me to calm down.

RollingFeles

@Miniman yeah, we both thought that my vacation should separate us for a while. We're pretty exhausted by each others company.

Ben

6:10 AM

@RollingFeles I don't exactly want to.. but...

RollingFeles

@Ben listen, it was already said, but I want to put more ephasis on this

53 mins ago, by Shalvenay

@Ben COM, IDL, all that are completely orthogonal to this plugin business

If you still have to use COM, for one: just sort out what interfaces is and how plugins work generally.

Ben

@RollingFeles that has been my stumbling point

RollingFeles

Only after that you should venture into COMdom

Miniman

@Ben Well, you didn't sound forceful, demanding, harsh, or abrupt to me, at least.

RollingFeles

@Ben Let's work some things out: first and foremost: do not touch COM because it' will add a LOT of pain for you. COM is not easy peasy. Well, it is sometimes, but also it like to stab you in the back with it subtle issues. So, based on that you don't know what interface is, COM should be out of reach.

Then let's work out basics that you mentioned before: plugins and interfaces

Ben

6:17 AM

@RollingFeles Do you mind if we go to another room for this?

RollingFeles

null sweat. Lead the way and I'll go and grab some tea.

Ben

Jus to avoid any distractions, and I don't want to force others to focus on this if they don't want to

RollingFeles

I agree

Miniman

@RollingFeles (So as not to distract from the C# talk) Felpurr are the catfolk race from Wizardry 8. They make very good ninjas.

~~They're also known for their C# skills and ability to teach others.~~

Well, no. But they do tend to wear hoods.

RollingFeles

Actually, cat on my avatar is mine. He's name is Pascal :)

Not after language, but after the smart man ;)

Miniman

6:32 AM

@RollingFeles Hmmm. Is he a ninja? :P

@RollingFeles But it's such a great language!

RollingFeles

@Miniman he likes to hide under the blankets. And climb at high places. I think he could be a ninja, but he is too emotional and loveable and fat, so I think he wouldn't like to be a ninja.

Oh, well, although he is fat, he is still very graceful.

Miniman

I mean, he sort of sounds like a ninja. Hiding, climbing, graceful...you just need to teach him to hit a bullseye with a shuriken at 100 paces!

trogdor

@BESW lol, burns all around today

Miniman

@trogdor Volcanic burn!

trogdor

lolololololol

Miniman

6:43 AM

(Technically, geological burn, but I couldn't resist that one.)

trogdor

well it is geological, but it is heavily related specifically to volcanoes

BESW

7:05 AM

@trogdor I'm going to assume they had some mossy shale left over from Brave and Up, and needed to use it.

trogdor

lol

I still have not seen Moana

I was semi interested, but not extremely interested

RollingFeles

@trogdor just what I thought :)

trogdor

@RollingFeles you were thinking that I had not seen Moana and that it was because I was just slightly not interested enough?

RollingFeles

No =) It just same for me.

semi interested is a pretty accurate description.

Ah, I need to gather myself and go to Guardians of the Galaxy 2 while I still can. Also, I'd like to see King Arthur(it's OST is pretty good. I took a few scores for DW bg music )

trogdor

ah I see

@RollingFeles also yeah, go see Guardians of the Galaxy 2

all I will say is, if you liked the first one, you will most likely like this one even more

RollingFeles

7:10 AM

nice to hear!

Erik

Heh... I think that settles GoG2 for me, I don't think I'm going to see it then xD

RollingFeles

What about King Arthur? Have anyone seen it?

BESW

trogdor

@BESW wat

BESW

@RollingFeles I'm always skeptical of King Arthur remakes, so haven't paid much attention, but what little I've heard is not great.

trogdor

7:14 AM

@Erik fair enough, if you didn't like the first one skipping the second one is not a stretch

BESW

@trogdor Granted, they're stacked that way on purpose by the locals.

But.... that doesn't look igneous to me.

trogdor

@BESW oh I see, see without context you basically just showed me rocks XD

Erik

I've been hearing lots of good comments about GoG2 and I usually just watch movies when I'm bored and tired, so I was keeping it in mind. But I didn't really enjoy the first one so I guess I'll skip this one yeah :)

BESW

GoG2 is... good. It's got more jokes, faster and harder, but that's necessary to balance some heavier character-driven stories. However, the primary plot depends entirely on whether you care about Quill's daddy issues.

trogdor

which you probably don't if you didn't even like the first movie

BESW

7:19 AM

I would've been happier if Quill's daddy issues had been the B plot, while the A had been split between the changing relationships of Gamora and Nebula, and Rocket and spoiler.

Would've made it all the funnier when Quill's daddy problems suddenly escalated to threaten the galaxy, if he'd just been the background drama until then.

trogdor

yeah but that would have been a huge risk if they didn't do the relationship stuff just right

BESW

Nebula needs more screen time anyway, if they're going to do anything like the comics conclusion of the Infinity Gauntlet arc.

trogdor

I think that is fair, I just also think they were afraid to go too big with something that looks like a B plot on the surface and tone down something that they know is going to look like an A plot later

Adeptus

7:44 AM

@BESW Sounds like it's worth watching once it's free (on cable/netflix... I don't do torrents)

Ben

8:42 AM

Hey guys and gals. Anyone know what @RollingFeles is up to?

RollingFeles

I think I'm the only one who could tell :P

doppelgreener

He's at least up to level twenty three

RollingFeles

9:02 AM

@doppelgreener I'm really curious. Have you casted Detect Level ? Or are you a fighter - Battle Master and used "Know your enemy" ?

doppelgreener

@RollingFeles Judgement call + I've been listening out for the level up noise

RollingFeles

@doppelgreener close call. It's exactly 2 month of exp till 25th level.

doppelgreener

@RollingFeles Wow! Cool. 😁 Let us know when the big level up day comes.

RollingFeles

@doppelgreener it would be cool, if I had more achievements before reaching halfway through this decade :)

doppelgreener

Lots of people feel pressure to have done that because there's a small number of people who have done that, but it's all OK however it shakes out. 👍

RollingFeles

9:11 AM

@doppelgreener also, I had a glimpse about your and @BESW recent level ups. So, I wish you both to be happy! (I really think that's the most important thing and so I wish it everytime to everyone).

doppelgreener

I'd like to have gotten investment started by that point but I've had other things I've needed to handle which have also been important.

@RollingFeles thank you very much!! :'D

BESW

Thank you, and many happy pre-emptive returns of the day to you.

RollingFeles

@doppelgreener thanks! Actually, I like to pressure myself. Judging by what fruits hard work brought to me, it's good :) I expanded my comfort zone and need to move on. It's always a bit hard to push yourself out even when you'd done it in the past.

@BESW thank you very much!

doppelgreener

@RollingFeles Fantastic! That sounds like a good attitude. I'm just saying what I'm saying because it's also a thing for people to fall into "ugh I'm such a FAILURE" for not meeting certain goals while not noticing how much they did achieve.

BESW

I'm definitely not where I thought I'd be (except in broad geographic terms) ten years ago, but it's surprising how much the unexpected bits eventually started lining up.

RollingFeles

9:23 AM

@doppelgreener and I appreciate that. It's really important to highlight this to people in such situations.

@Miniman here is my glorious not-a-ninja cat.

RollingFeles

11:35 AM

> News Digest: Vampires Masquerade as New Warhammer 40K Space Marines with Magic Commanders for Mike Mearls's AMA

I've just imagined new WH40K Space Marine chapter which consists of Vampires from VM and Mike Mearls is their Primarch.

doppelgreener

11:48 AM

I just learned that roll20 no longer supports Google Hangouts as of January 10 this year. :(

There's other VOIP options available, but I thought that was a great feature for it to have.

ShadowKras

@doppelgreener roll20 is looking even less appealing to me

Adeptus

12:19 PM

I have a question for chat, which may or may not be main-site-worthy. I have an underwater encounter coming up soon in my D&D 3.5e game (flooded room). Rules say PCs can walk on the bottom, at half normal speed. Can they run?

(can't find it in SRD/DMG, can't find any Q's onsite or elsewhere on net)

BESW

That's an excellent mainsite question.

Adeptus

OK, I shall ask it there.

BESW

@Adeptus Where's the "walk on the bottom" line in the DMG?

Adeptus

@BESW page 92, footnote to table 3-22

> Creatures have firm footing when walking along the bottom, braced against a ship’s hull, or the like. A creature can only walk along the bottom if it wears or carries enough gear to weigh itself down—at least 16 pounds for Medium creatures, twice that for each size category larger than Medium, and half that for each size category smaller than Medium.

(the table says Firm Footing - Movement half)

BESW

Excellent. Link me when you've asked the question and maybe I can answer it faster than the regulars.

Adeptus

12:36 PM

0

Q: Can you run underwater?

I have an underwater encounter coming up soon in my D&D 3.5e game. They will be entering a flooded section of dungeon. Rules say PCs can walk on the bottom, at half normal speed. (DMG, p. 92): Condition: Firm footing. Movement: Half Creatures have firm footing when walking along the b...

dnd-3.5e

BESW

There ya go.

Adeptus

1:17 PM

Thanks! 2 good answers, with opposite conclusions... looks like it'll be down to DM ruling after all. I'll think it over...

Delioth

@doppelgreener That kinda sucks, but there are tons of alternatives (I'm partial to Discord- it's got a desktop program, a mobile app, and it even runs in browsers if you want; no video, but it supports huge rooms, bunches of rooms in free servers, and even selective muting and deafening)

doppelgreener

@Delioth There definitely are. I'm in a group that's been using Roll20 plus Skype, and Discord's amazing unless webcams are necessary.

ShadowKras

@Delioth video is coming soon to discord.

doppelgreener

@ShadowKras For real!?

ShadowKras

indeed

check their news on their webpage

Added a link

Adam

1:23 PM

Discord is pretty cool. My group gave it a test shot once instead of hangouts and we really liked it. The only issue we came across was that it would chop of the first little bit of your sentence as part of its white noise reduction thing. Made it really annoying because if I did any kind of voice or in character kind of inflection, it would be chopped off and everyone besides me got super confused

At least I think that was discord we were using. That group hasn't met in over a month, so I don't remember for certain what the name was.

BESW

I've run and played games on Discord as part of working to introduce a visually impaired gamer to RPGs, and the choppiness could be customised pretty easily.

ShadowKras

iv been using it for the past 3 months

one player still groans and complains about clicking a button and rolling his skill checks

But as the GM, i always had to type all my checks, or roll a real dice and tell the results (hidden roll).

@Adam i believe i disabled the white noise reduction option.

Delioth

@Adam That can be fixed, you can drop the setting or such (I think it's part of not using push-to-talk; using PtT can usually help it, or a higher-quality mic)

HazyKingdom

Good morning all!

Adam

@HazyKingdom Hello!

HazyKingdom

1:36 PM

How ya doing today @Adam? :)

Adam

@Delioth @ShadowKras If that group ever meets again, I'll definitely be looking out for that.

@HazyKingdom Alright. Little tired. Have a Matt Colville video playing in the background as I work. How are you?

HazyKingdom

PS - Major thumbs up on discord. After you get your settings straightened out, it's some of the best light weight communication software out there imo.

@Adam Solid man, ha yeah I hear that, still on the first cup of coffee. Work work otherwise.

Adam

I limit myself to one cup of coffee in the morning, but mostly because my pre-workout supplement has something like 2 coffee's worth of caffeine in it, and I'd like to not make my heart explode.

HazyKingdom

That's the only way I can keep myself awake here, lol. I come in about three hours before everyone else on my team. eh, I used to be WAY worse, so two or three cups aren't too bad for me.

Adam

My fiancee used to basically chain drink coffee when we were in high school. Since then, she's tapered way off. Now she hardly can finish one cup.

Joshua Aslan Smith

1:52 PM

good morning

I leave this for all of you who also program/computer

BESW

3

ShadowKras

@JoshuaAslanSmith hah, someone did write that?

Joshua Aslan Smith

@ShadowKras lol it would basically be like google your problem, click the top 5 SO links that pop up, choose an answer

HazyKingdom

@Adam I used to be an energy drink fiend, at one point in college I was doing three monsters a day. NOT cool.

ShadowKras

its funny, because i usually do that on things iv already written but cant bother to wait for windows or visual studio to find the code, so google wins.

Joshua Aslan Smith

1:59 PM

yeah Ive definitely found myself re googling stuff down the road because I cant for the life of me remember what stored sql proc I implemented it in

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