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00:00 - 18:0018:00 - 00:00

12:07 AM
 
erm... erm... erm...
 
@badp Oy, were you responsible for that? :|
 
Sometimes I drop jokes in that area
 
>_<
 
as a very lightweight way of communication
 
12:08 AM
punches @badp
 
I didn't figure you were so interested in erm-erm-erm, sorry
 
@badp Oy.
 
goes add oy to your favourite tags
 
@badp OY!
 
(you can stop refreshing, I'm not doing that)
 
12:26 AM
Site offline...
@badp what did you break
 
@LessPop_MoreFizz Rebecca went 'oy' one time too many.
 
1:04 AM
@badp Mod abuse! (Can I get you fired now?)
 
1:19 AM
@ArdaXi Nope, I'm not employed.
 
2:15 AM
I'm not sure what to think of every SCII patch adding yet another league at the top of the bracket.
(Newest PTR adds a Grandmaster bracket for the top 200 (fixed) players in the region)
> Leagues will now be locked during the final weeks of the season. As a result players will not accumulate additional bonus points and will not be promoted or demoted out of their current division during this period.
> This will allow players to focus on moving up in their current league without being promoted during the final weeks of a season, and having to fight their way up from the bottom ranks of their new higher league.
That's really really good though.
 
I've always been wary of playing online due to my great fear of just being completely demolished. I suppose I should give it a try at some point, though, heh.
 
> Charging Zealots will now hit fleeing targets at least once.
 
2:51 AM
@Tim If you're talking about Starcraft, the Blizzard matchmaking system matches you up with people around your skill level, so you're not going to get completely obliterated
 
@Mana I know, I just have to convince myself of that. :P
 
Bob
3:22 AM
0
Q: Please include info about spoiler sections on the "formatting help" page

Lord TorgamusAs described on this MSO post, it's now possible to create spoiler blocks/hidden text with the syntax >! Spoiler text Can a blurb about this be added to the "formatting help" page that's linked to in the "How to format" box on the right of posting pages and by the little ? block above post en...

0
Q: What's the point of titles in Tales of Vesperia?

Lord TorgamusI'm a few hours into playing Tales of Vesperia, and I noticed that each of my characters has a few titles to choose from in the Status screen. Does the active title affect gameplay/stats? Does it make cosmetic differences? Or is the only purpose of titles to be fun to collect? By titles, I mean ...

 
I think it's still a bit cluttered.
Harumph.
 
 
3 hours later…
Bob
6:08 AM
0
Q: Does giving rations count towards your "rations used" in Metal Gear Solid 4

gotgenesIn Metal Gear Solid 4, you can walk up to militia or PMC troops and give them items, including rations. Does doing so count towards your "rations used" or not?

 
Bob
7:08 AM
0
Q: What are the upgrade paths for the academy?

OakThe academy only shows what unit type it upgrades to for existing units already in the army, and only if you've already unlocked the correct race and level upgrades. Can anyone provide or link to a diagram or table (or the data in other other form, really) showing what upgrades to what?

 
 
2 hours later…
9:23 AM
Mornin'
2
Q: Keypress Limit - Anomalous Problem!

Flummoxed BenI have read many an answer about the keypress limit (i.e. "Help! I can only press 2 keys at a time") and it seems that in most cases it is the need for a new keyboard that is the issue. Well here is a doozy for you then: Me and my girlfriend both have identical motherboards. I have more RAM than...

If anybody wonders.
 
9:43 AM
uh, I opened TF2 and suddenly the game decided I had new items
 
Bob
10:38 AM
0
Q: How to hack a turret in Bioshock?

Alex AngasI've found that most cameras can be hacked by sneaking another them and hacking from below. Also the flying helicopters can be hacked if they are protecting an enemy which is killed. What I can't work out is how to directly hack a turret. It's difficult to get close to them without suffering sev...

 
10:57 AM
TF2 is very excited by my finding of the Tribalman's Shiv.
Oh, man, the TF2 beta is a 9 GB download. WTF?
 
11:16 AM
@badp How was the Game On btw?
 
@ArdaXi A failure, not enough people
Basically only I, Powerlord, Tom and Ivo showed up (and I think Oracle Certified Professional too)
but most of the time we were 3 people
...and Ivo could only join us because I sent him a guest pass.
room topic changed to The Bridge: of Gaming's StackExchange™ AlienOverlord AskQuestion™ mothership, wherein we take loving care of our recharging lazers. No mentions of Arda are yet made in this topic as scientific studies prove that continued attention can be unhealthy for tsundere mermaids.
 
Well, I wanted to come, but I had... other things to attend to.
@badp [citation needed]
 
You said you were stranded on a netbook?
 
@badp That was early in the evening.
 
@ArdaXi Continued attention caused excessive amount of whining from all 1 tsundere mermaids on chat.
 
11:27 AM
@badp Also, that's very weird causality.
What does the effect on tsundere mermaids have to do with me?
 
scribbles 'on denial' on the character sheet
 
11:48 AM
@badp It's in denial, unless you're referring to some kind of drug.
If you are, hook me up.
 
@badp would you think having embedded youtube video's be useful for gaming? you'd still need meta information to describe the contents and have it be findable on Google, but wouldn't it be way more explanatory?
 
12:16 PM
What's up guuuuys O:
 
aloha @Mana
 
Yo Ivo! How's it going?
 
Hey @Mana
 
Hey Arda. What cool things are happening?
 
well you can go and answer my question for badp too :P
 
12:22 PM
@Mana I'm waiting for my "I'm gonna make a terrible mod" t-shirt.
I need it before we do a meet-up, y'know.
 
@Arda fiiiine, I'll have the design for next week
 
There's really a lot of t-shirts I want to buy but haven't because shipping to Europe is outrageous.
 
@Ivo I don't see any problem with it; the idea of embedding videos has been brought up several times on meta.SO and I don't think it's been met with great amounts of opposition
The general consensus is "Yeah, this would be a cool thing to have."
 
18
Q: Add chat-like YouTube support to Stack Exchange

badpSome Stack Exchange sites, like Super User and Gaming, would derive large benefits from having some sort of YouTube integration. I'm not suggesting having embedded players in pages. Rather, I'm thinking of the kind of support chat has: a static video snapshot, with a play symbol overlay. The su...

well I want the team to simply make it auto-embed if I add a link or make it such as images
 
Hrm, I just realised something. The word I was looking for some time ago might as well have been a malamanteau.
 
12:45 PM
@IvoFlipse embedded is probably overkill; some chat-like youtube "oneboxing" would be great however
with that awesome overlayed triangle
 
I just wonder if it's a good idea to sent users of our page to watch it
 
@badp You can do that alread- oh.
 
yes, the play 'button' is great
 
@ArdaXi Yeah, otherwise it just looks like a picture.
 
@badp It already looks like a picture
 
12:47 PM
(see Yi's reply to my request)
 
though turning it around: if we have dozens of video's on YouTube, new users will be able to stumble upon our network
 
I need an example, taking a random video from @badp's favourites.
 
they will if the videos link back :)
 
they should if they want to get upvotes from it
 
12:50 PM
Hrm, it's just some clever CSS.
 
awesome music @ArdaXi, makes me feel 10 again
I guess we can't have everyone use a stackexchange account on Youtube though @badp :\
 
@IvoFlipse that's unnecessary
 
well it would help for brand recognition
 
though perhaps using 'standardized' banners or something in the video could help
yeah, putting it in the information part works too
though that isn't show when it's embedded elsewhere :\
 
12:53 PM
Anyway, an image link to i2.ytimg.com/vi/<id>/hqdefault.jpg is better than nothing.
 
though I guess the network effect is more important: have more users make video's in a semi-organized fashion will draw people anyway
 
well I'd rather not have to put banners before/after the video
it raises the bar unnecessarily
 
can't you use the overlay things? :P
 
recording, encoding and uploading a video is enough of a time sink :P
 
true, though it would probably be useful to point to the question as a reference
hehe, I think handbrake can handle it :P
but true nonetheless
 
12:55 PM
I'd like to mention that gtk-recordmydesktop is awesome for making videos of games
however, Youtube doesn't like what that tool produces in the slightest
 
You could even have an automatic set-up that uploads videos to a Gaming.SE account and adds the overlay.
After you garner some amount of rep, that is.
When is Google merging my account? :|
 
one of the mods from Guitars asked me what other sites have tried to promote themselves
and I told him he should hold a small competition: who can play this solo the best? and have everyone upload a video to youtube and use it as an answer on Meta
just to get people to use their guitar to answer a question, not just words. It's a music website for christ sake!
 
So you're saying we should use controllers to answer questions?
Wait... that could be awesome. Answering questions with Kinect.
 
the keyboard comes in handy, yes.
 
I say: put your game skills where your mouth is :P
 
1:04 PM
oh, but I suck at videogames.
 
@IvoFlipse I would have, yesterday, but I figured it would be better to go out and drink beer than to stay in and play videogames. WHAT IS WRONG WITH ME???
 
that you're barely legally allowed to do so?
 
I am allowed. Well, okay, I wasn't. But still.
I was referring to the fact that I preferred that over playing videogames.
 
@ArdaXi The error was to drink dutch beer ;-)
 
where are you from again @Fabian?
 
1:07 PM
@IvoFlipse Germany
 
@Fabian Err... oh, yeah, it was Dutch.
 
Bob
1:35 PM
0
Q: L4D2 - Conditions for the Confederacy of Crunches achievement

Drew NoakesSteam describes this achievement as: Finish a campaign using only melee weapons. Ok, so that obviously excludes any primary weapon, but what about throwables (pipe bombs, molotovs, bile jars) and the pistol that mysteriously appears in your hands when you're incapacitated? Furthermore, if ...

 
2:32 PM
I kinda need a Gravatar that works in sizes like 64x64
 
3:14 PM
Oh, man.
The medals are for dominations right?
Because I think they were all dominating me :|
 
@badp Kills: 3 Deaths: 93? o_o
 
Blu had complete domination of middle; I tried to help our team regain control...
 
@YiJiang He's playing Medic. I would hope he'd be healing his teammates and not concentrating on killing enemies.
 
@Powerlord Well yeah, but 93 deaths?
 
@Powerlord Even so, 93 deaths?
 
3:17 PM
You can see the 36k hitpoints
 
@badp You can tell who is dominating you because they'll have fist icons next to them.
 
Okay, so it wasn't as bad as I imagined, but still pretty bad.
 
The medals are for any kind of domination.
So, any enemy. The fists are you.
 
Also in team FPSes I don't care about death, I care about the objective; I think it's fine for support and offense people to die a lot.
 
@ArdaXi badp has had the game for like... 1 day.
 
3:19 PM
but it's just me.
obviously the objective is pointless when there's no score limit or time limit
 
@Powerlord Seriously? Oh. Never mind then.
@badp No score limit on a CTF map? Really?
 
I do find it humerous that you're playing on a 24/7 server.
 
@Powerlord I just followed @Ivo
 
Meaning that they're running the same map all the time.
 
I don't think he knows any better :)
 
3:21 PM
@badp Ah, I see.
Yeah, playing one map constantly can make you really good... at that one map.
 
I recall playing TF2 on 24/7 surf to 1. Practice surfing properly and 2. Get weapons.
 
or at that map type in generally, I suppose, although ctf maps tend to vary wildly.
 
And yes, @Powerlord, I changed my mind about TF2, now that I've figured out you can easily get any weapon you want.
 
meh, I just wanted to play with Ivo, given that his guest pass ends tomorrow.
 
Can you see what guest passes you have without launching Steam?
 
3:24 PM
I don't think so
 
@ArdaXi By... trading or crafting? :P
 
@ArdaXi Who is Zero?
The Zero in your friends list, I mean.
 
@Powerlord Crafting, mostly.
@Powerlord Crafting, mostly.
@badp Er?
 
Dunno, he requested my friendship. I figured, since you accepted him, that you'd know him.
 
3:26 PM
I see. adds
 
Oh, guzhno is ivo
VNCs into his desktop in order to check if he has any guestpasses
 
I still think we should find someone with a server in Europe we can steal for the Game On! thing... most of the people who play are in Europe, but I'm hosting from my Dallas, TX, USA server.
 
I say next game on we just pick a server and join it with other random people
 
@Powerlord Pick me, pick me!
 
TF2 requires ~12 people apparently, we'll never get that much
 
3:28 PM
I'll have to install SRCDS
384/768 MB RAM should be enough to host a small game.
 
heh, how many times that does your laptop have :)
sure, your laptop's not a server, but virtualization is funny that way
 
@ArdaXi The standalone server can be installed without requiring Steam. Valve has some directions.
 
@Powerlord I'm not new to this.
 
@ArdaXi Oh, OK.
 
@badp 2.67 / 1.3
But my laptop doesn't have burst RAM
 
3:31 PM
hmm... barbecue RAM...
 
I've actually home-hosted a TF2 server where almost everyone had about 30ms ping.
About 1 MB/s up
Of course that doesn't beat my VPS' 112 Gbit/s
 
So, out of curiosity
 
I'll never have 30ms ping since I'm in North America, but eh. :D
 
What is it that the server sends when HL2-based stuff "receives server information"?
because that step takes ages
 
@badp TF2's various server connecting stages confuses me. I assume it's also doing some map loading stuff when it's receiving data.
Particularly since certain maps take longer to load than others, and it always seems to be during the last few steps.
 
3:35 PM
That'd make sense
 
"Source-based stuff" please.
Also, what it does is negotiate at least a while of server info
 
This is amusing... one of Reddit's Europe TF2 servers says it's "TF2 Midwest Chicago/Ireland"
 
You need to download more data than was generated in the time while you were downloading it.
That's probably really unclear.
Basically, a server doesn't send everything that happens in real-time, right?
Because that means it has to send n-1 packets for every packet it receives, where n is the amount of players connected.
Instead it works with ticks, every tick it basically calculates what the world looks like, takes a snapshot, and sends that to every client.
On the client-side, it seamlessly interpolates between ticks.
In order for that interpolation to happen, when you're receiving server info, it's not just initializing all the data (it does that too) but it also downloads as much ticks as it can, until you're synced to the current world and it can provide a reasonable game world.
 
0
Q: Universal User Recent Activity Page

ircmaxellRight now, each Stack Exchange site has its own Recent Activity page (http://stackoverflow.com/users/recent/userid). I find these pages immensely useful, as it's nice to see recent changes in rep and favorites. (I track it daily to find downvoted posts that I can improve upon). I would suggest...

 
@badp tl;dr: It's doing stuff. Be patient.
 
3:46 PM
@ArdaXi I'm aware of that, but other games don't need as much :)
you only interpolate on two? three? ticks?
 
You gotta realise that Source is 10 years old.
 
@ArdaXi cough Quake 3 cough
rather I see the limiting factor being the amount of bandwidth each client has, which is kinda small when you have to accomodate 24/32 clients... except on @Powerlord's server yesterday connection times weren't really better.
 
4:14 PM
I gave up @badp, I ended up in a team that kept getting owned
 
@IvoFlipse Did you mean the one I was on? :)
 
I got switched a couple of times
 
1 hour ago, by badp
user image
 
but in the end we just got spawn killed
 
Yeah, me too.
At the time of this screenshot (and at the time I'd left) you had complete domination of the map
 
4:16 PM
they had 2 engineers on our roof
portals
 
It irks me that you can't shoot at sticky bombs to make them explode, btw
 
heavy's dropping in for spawn kills
I think you should be able to :S
the sniping reminds me of scout knives or awp maps :P
 
(at least that's the way it works in Quake 3 Team Arena, although those are trip mines)
 
@badp No, but you can shoot at enemy sticky bombs to make them go away.
 
@Powerlord er, that's what I meant.
 
4:18 PM
who else has TF2?
 
Although... I think it has to be a weapon that shoots bullets or a melee weapon.
 
it did waste my whole afternoon, which I had planned to spend reading :P
 
so if a demoman camps the spawn doors with sticky mines you either are a class with a pistol, or you are screwed
 
Lets just say... there's a reason we have a rule against sticky camping spawn doors on OCR TF2.
Although, if you were playing Doublecross, your spawn DOES have three exits... upper floor, lower floor, sewer.
 
upper floor being the one that matters :)
 
4:22 PM
who wants to have another go?
 
This is amazing.
 
@IvoFlipse maybe in 30 mins
unless you need to have another go now or never.
I need to recharge my wireless headphones :/
 
user30
We playing TF2?
 
yeah but just a random server
 
user30
Sure
 
4:26 PM
well my GF wants to start making dinner in 30
 
maybe not a 24/7 server
 
perhaps not no
I had no idea what I picked though
 
user30
Okay, join me?
 
joins @ThomasMcDonald
 
@badp If you like your wireless headphones, I need you to tell me what they are, because I'm looking to buy some. :P
 
user30
4:31 PM
fails
 
@TimStone Wireless headphones are like wired headphones, but with thrice as much wires.
 
Ah, well that clears things up.
 
Wired headphone: computer ←→ headphone
Wireless headphone: computer ←→ transmitter ... headphone
the transmitter needs a plug and the headphone batteries need recharging with a third wire
Hm, when I finally connected to the server and got through the intro video @ThomasMcDonald has changed server :)
 
user30
@badp No I haven't.
 
oh okay.
 
user30
4:37 PM
I'm just not doing very well.
 
Bob
0
Q: Do the Colosseum and Theatre need separate population for their benefits?

cs_255It is stated for both the Colosseum and the Theatre that they can only provide as much happiness as there is population. I believe they both provide +5 Happiness for a population of 5. Do they stack on the same population meaning I would get 10 Happiness with a population of 5?

 
user30
@badp Amazing.
 
yay for the hole
 
@Mana That was hilarious. :D
 
We playing TF2 now?
 
user30
4:44 PM
Yes
 
I'll join if the server lets me.
Ugh, Steam is freezing up.
Server is full. I'll join it once there's a spot.
Oh great, I have a crate. (Pun not intended) Does anyone have a lockpick I can borrow?
 
user30
Um, they're one-use items (keys)
 
user30
And they cost.
 
Yeah, I know about keys.
That's why I want a lockpick, not a key.
Downloading crap, then joining.
 
Bob
0
Q: Slimes all over my mob trap, unkillable and blocking everything

fjdumontMy mobtrap was working perfectly a few hours ago. After relogging to the server, a massive amount of slimes spawned in my trap. They seem to be unkillable and block the canal and grinder. How can I get rid of them?

 
5:03 PM
I'm actually using some of my downlink to download at the same time, but I'm pretty sure it's still much better than yours, @badp
 
user30
Okay, that's enough for now
 
user30
I have stuff to work on
 
Ah... so that's why a spot opened up.
 
Bob
0
Q: Does anyone know of a good PSX emulator for OS X that's not at EOL status?

tylermwashburnTitle pretty much explains it. In case you don't know: EOL, End of Life.

 
@ArdaXi Uh, actually I found out Steam was downloading and Minecraft was running while I played
 
5:19 PM
Steam doesn't download while you play.
 
unless you force it to, and I'd forced it while playing Minecraft in single player
(I also launched MC from Steam)
 
Ah.
I don't use the non-Steam game feature much, people start accusing me of piracy.
 
also, 80 rep to go
 
For what? You already have access to mod tools.
 
It's a nice milestone, and I need to work on my retirement plan.
also in 80 reps I'll lose the link to 'about'!
except they fixed that bug
ah well
 
5:23 PM
@badp Which link?
 
10kers, and now mods too, have it replaced with 'tools'
but you knew that
 
I thought the 'tools' link was in the top-right, not the bottom-left.
 
The about link is in both places with low enough rep.
(the 404 page doesn't check your reputation)
...I guess the about threshold got lowered even further then
 
@badp You meant the about link, I assume.
 
8 mins ago, by badp
also in 80 reps I'll lose the link to 'about'!
 
5:31 PM
5 mins ago, by Arda Xi
I thought the 'tools' link was in the top-right, not the bottom-left.
5 mins ago, by badp
It is in both places with low enough rep.
 
The 'about' link is in both places
 
I know, but you implied that the 'tools' link was.
 
Happy?
 
Never.
 
Then I'll make you unhappier.
room topic changed to The Bridge: of Gaming's StackExchange™ AlienOverlord AskQuestion™ mothership, wherein we take loving care of our recharging lazers.
Wait, is that you being happy?
 
5:35 PM
Aww.
No. Yay! would be happy. Yay. is sarcastic.
 
Why?
 
10
A: Sudden sharp drop in reputation; find out reason (recalc?)

Nick CraverWe are running a global recalc right now across all Stack Exchange sites in preparation for showing leagues on the /users page, you can see more details (and suggest things!) in this question: Redesigning the /users page Note no reputation rules have changed, we're just doing a recalc to get you...

12
A: Redesigning the /users page

Nick CraverTo expand a bit on this, the first change will be rep leagues on the main /users view, when landing on /users you'll see the top users by reputation...this week. With these options they'll be new sub-tabs (like the user activity view in the profile for example) with options the same as the stack...

 
Aw, @CRoss, I was hoping for an impersonator. I had my suspend stick ready!
 
5:47 PM
@CRoss Nope, Grace never uses a beamed pair of notes.
 
I think this is a pretty easy call, but just for doublechecking, any reason why I shouldn't merge and ?
They don't overlap at all and the questions covered seem pretty similar to me.
(cc @ArdaXi, who will complain either way)
 
No I won't.
 
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