Tuesday, January 25, 2011

Graham Swiss Beer Cake

125g butter
125g sugar
mix through
2 eggs
mix through
200g SR flour
2tps jam
bake for 15min

Rogan Josh

dice 2 small onions, place into crok pot
4 cloves of garlic, mushed
6 spoons of oil (the recipie is titled Hot oil)
1 kg if diced caserol meat
4 diced roma tomatos
1 small handull of sliced mushrooms, because they were in the fridge. (not normal)
1 cup of yogurt
½ cup of coconut (fine dessicated)
2 tsp cumin
4 tsp paprika
1 tsp corriander
2 tsp cinnimon (should be 2 sticks)
2 tsp cardamon
1 tsp salt
1 tsp pepper

Stir a little bit making certain that the bottom of the pot has fluis in it. Probably did not need the water

3 hours of cooking on high, served with rice.

Croissant

2 cups sugar
1/8 cup sugar
pinch of salt
mix together with stick
make divit in the center of the bowl and add 1 cup of milk (room temp)
disolve 1pkt of yeast into the milk.
Wait 10 min for yeast to properly disolve
Mix through with spatula to make certain nothing is stuck on the bowl.
When one sticky even lump place it onto gladwrap and cover in 2 layers. This is to stop the outside from drying out.

Irish Stew

The night before thow all ingredients into croc pot and leave in fridge with lid on.

1 sliced onion
1 potato peeled and sliced. this should dissapear on boiling, thickens the stew
2 potatoes, peeled and quartered.
½ teaspoon of worcestershire sause
4 carrots. Peeled and cut diagonally into 10mm slices.
Salt and pepper
3 tsp pearl barly
half of a ¼ cup or thickened cream. 30ml
¼ avacado (should be 2tsp vegetable oil or butter)
1kg diced beef

place on Low heat before work, when returned home make certain house has not burnt down and stirr crock pot.

Tuskan bread tomato soup

Ingredients:
Oil
1 red onion
salt & pepper
Turkish bread
1/2 cup mint and garlic
4 Tomatos
Basil (spice jar)
Curry powder
Garlic

Method:
Oil, covering base of croc pot
warm oil
add to pot a coursly sliced red onion, seasoned with salt and pepper
Cook turkush bread in oven, then dry out some slices. These will be added at the end.
Finly chop up half a cup of mint and garlic. (asked for Basil leaves)
add to pot, mix a bit.
Wait for a bit and prepare the tomatoes (4), these make the base of the soup.
Dry the tomatoes in the oven with the bread to be able to peal them.
Deseed the tomatos. (this means to peal the skin of them)
Chop tomatoes and add to pot
add teaspoon of dry basil and curry powder.
Cut another clove of garlic and rub on each side of the turkish tost.
Clean up mess
Wait till cooked, pour soup over tost and eat.

Serves 4, turned out pretty good. Looks more like a stew than a soup though. Mint was fine. Need a decent ammount of soup to get the tost soggy, but dont fill the bowl.

Pumpkin Soup

Ingredients:
Lump of pumpkin from bottom of fridge (roughly diced after cutting of moldy bits and seeds)
1 large carrot (cut into disks)
1 large onion (roughly diced)
3 chicken stock cubes
3 cloves of garlic
3 teaspoons of Bonox
1 teaspoon nutmeg
1 teaspoon of sesame seed oil
salt & pepper
water from tap
½ cup sour cream (optional at the end)
Parsley, for garnish (optional at the end)


Method:
Put a thumbs worth of water in the bottom of a saucepan and turn the stove on medium to get things started.
Prepare ingredients as indicated, tossing them in the pot as you go.
Add water as required to keep a thumbs worth of veggies out of the soup.
When all the ingredients are added put the lid on the pot.
Wait for it to boil (preferably without boiling over)
Dial back the heat and wait some more. While waiting stir occasionally with a potato masher, mashing occasionally.
When there are not many lumpy bits left the soup is done.

Note: be careful of steam when mashing the soup, steam is hot.
Note: when making in crock pot veggies should mash themselves.

Quiche

Ingredients (serves 6)

2 sheets ready rolled shortcrust pastry
1 tablespoon olive oil
1 brown onion, finely chopped
4 rashers bacon, rind removed, finely chopped
1 cup grated tasty cheese
6 eggs
1 teaspoon plain flour
300ml cream
1/2 cup milk


Method:
Preheat oven to 200°C. Lightly grease a fluted 3cm deep, 23cm (base), loose-base flan pan.

Line base and sides of flan with pastry. Trim excess. Line pastry with baking paper. Half-fill with dried beans or rice. Bake for 10 minutes. Remove paper and beans. Bake a further 10 minutes or until golden.

Heat oil in a frying pan over medium-high heat. Add onion and bacon. Cook for 3 minutes. Drain on paper towels. Cool. Sprinkle over pastry. Top with cheese.

Reduce oven temperature to 180°C. Whisk remaining ingredients and salt and pepper in a jug. Pour over bacon. Place onto tray. Bake for 30 to 35 minutes or until set. Stand for 5 minutes. Serve.

Mango Curry Recipe

Ingredients
Green mango - 1 no
(sliced) (my mangos were half green half overripe- hense the curry)
Shallots(Kunjulli) - 2 nos
or
Onion(big) - 1/4 of one
(thinly sliced)
Green chillies - 2 nos
Mustard seeds - 1 tsp
Currry leaves - A few (i still dont have any)
Grated coconut - 1/4 cup
or
Coconut milk - 1/4 cup
Red chilly powder - 1/2 tsp
Turmeric powder - 1/4 tsp
Coriander powder - 1/4 tsp
Salt - As required
Oil - 1 tbsp


Preparation Method
Slice up the mango like you would potato's in an Irish stew, some chunky bits and some skinny bits.
Marinate the sliced mango with little bit of salt, turmeric, red chilly powder and coriander powder for 10 mins. Ratio = pinch : 2 : 1.5 : 2
Dice onion
Heat 1 tbsp of impure sesame oil in your saucepan (I could only find pure)
Add 2 teaspoons mustard seeds. (avoid using wholegrain seeds, the water in the jar with them made them leave the saucepan like popcorn. Actually that worked so badly I started again and put the mustard on the mango instead.)
Add curry.
Add red pepper that was in the fridge drying (cut it up first)
Add a dozen Jalapeno slices
Add diced Ginger
Add onion and jalapenos and fry, till onion turns golden brown.
Await browning of the onions, enjoy smell.

Add the mango slices and mix well.
Add a little bit of water and cook for a few mins.
Add 250ml of coconut milk

To add coconut milk that does not curdle:
Put coconut along with little water in the blender.
Strain out the milk and keep aside the first milk.
Repeat the above process with coconut and extract the second milk.
Add the second milk into the pan and allow it to boil.
Add the first milk and remove from flame.
OR:
Simmer keeping it on a low heat i.e. do not boil.

After a while it will be cooked, maybe an hour?


[Courtesy of Riverbank... well sort of]

Sunday, January 23, 2011

scalar skills

Rather than using levels and experience gains I would rather use proficiencies like in Romancing Saga or Morrowind. So the more often you use a longsword the better you use a longsword. then if you do not use a longsword for a very long time your skill at it will eventually reach zero again.
so there needs to be two sets of scales, one for mutually exclusive skills and one for independent skills.

_mutually exclusive scales
Cold > fire
science > magic
ranged > melee
fast > slow
healthy > frail
handsome > ugly
murderous > kind
weak > strong
quiet > noisy
chaos > order
Sane > Fluffy bunny
aggressive > Cautious
friendly > shy
smart > stupid
Lucky > calculated
empathic > cold
.. find Nicole's personality test thing and add that.
physical > ethereal

When the epitomy of a skill is reached you become resistant to its opposite rather than weak against it.
as you become more skilled you can unlock special abilities along the way.


_Life scales:
Dead > Healthy
    being nearly dead effects all stats, most of the time players would be nearly full health
Starving > Satiated
    for food, too full moves slow, hungry causes fainting. energy used by completing actions
Parched > Bloated
    for water, effects regeneration rates of health/magic, dissipates over time
Sleepy > Rested
    to reflect play time for the player, the longer a play session goes the more special events occur, making the game more confusing. But simpler when they first start off.
Expert > Novice
    Makes more complex things when you have been playing for weeks.


_independent
Blades
    sword
    axe
Piercing
    spear
    arrow
blunt
    club
    bullets
harvesting
planting
General dodge
constructing / repairing
    woodwork
        handles
        furniture
    Leather work
        grips
        armor
        clothing
        Bags
    cloth
        rope/string
        clothing
        blankets
        bags
    metalwork
        blades
        tools
    stonework
        ovens
    gems
        jewelry
Observation
    listening
    smelling
    touching (physical)
    tasting
    looking
    feeling (emotions)
    knowing (intellect)
    believing (spiritual)
social
    intimidate
    haggle
    conversation
    taunt
    seduce

For independent skills you always recall the max proficiency that you have reached. when relearning a forgotten skill there is a bonus to learn until the max proficiency has been reached.
Gaining points in these skills would increase the skew of the damage calculation of that skill type. Also the skew of the attacker is negated, this is then the evasion ability. So when you are really good at attacking with a mace you will also be really good at dodging mace attacks.

Some reasons behind TGTIWLTP

background and reason for the game.


*Disclaimer* No editing was done on this page! If it is well written it is an essay If it is not the case then it is a Ramble**

for my game I want to have no elves, I liked the tolkin elves byt it seems every fantasy setting has slaghtly fifferent elves/ vampires / orks. I want my game to have as few preconceptions as possible. I have played too many games where you get to chose between 4 different races.
Humans
Humans with pointy ears.
Short humans
fat humans

But why do games use this format? It is easy to identify with and understand we have a lot of preconceptions that fill in the gaps so a lot less effort is required to explain what they are and how they work.
The other purpose for a human base class is to use it to point out the differences in the stats. for example.
Humans +0 to all stats
Humans with pointy ears. +1 inteligence
Short humans +1 dexterity
fat humans +1 constitution

Then to balance the game the vanilla humans require less experience to advance or learn skills faster of have one extra miscellanious perk.

After I played WAR for a while my ideal game became a MMO, I like the comradery and the teemwork required to complete tasks. It was also a lot easyer to compare yourself with others and to learn from their play style. What I dont like about MMO's are the anoying people and the spam and the flippancy with which death is treated.
Then if it was a MMO could it still use top down rogelice graphics? or would it need to look "Pretty"
I like the idea ofthe massively single player online game, if all the other players interact in a simmilar world but you cannot directly inteact with them then is would still be a single player enviroment but with some rather erratic NPC's. Possibly they can be used to develope the AI for the real NPCs.

Another thing that has started to annoy me about games is their destructiveness. It kind of made sence when I was a nobody who was searching a dungeon for the amulet of yendor but what is left to do once the great evil has been vanquished?
And what aboutthe colony of ogres that you slew on the way. I am sure if there were woman and childeren ogres too the protaganist would surely be required to kill them too.

How better to breed empathy for these monsters than to roll one? This would also allow me to have a miltitude of non human playable races.

What about classes? I really like playing as a theif but I was never interested in the actual theiving skills. Of the typical class archtypes the healer is the only one that would be remotely usefull in a civilised peacefull socioty.

and thats what I really wanted, a civilised peacefull socioty that the adventurers can return to an retire in once they have cleared out the dungeon that was threateningthe town. Anybody from this socioty may be driven to protect it or leave on an adventure. and the adventurers may happen upon one of these small communities for trade. Then I though if I want to play as the evil minion, why not also ans the blacksmith who never wants to go on an adventure. But is happy to meet all the adventures that come to buy his stock. In this way players can be given a sandbox minigame with the only goal to produce amazing artifacts that are the envy of kings, or brigands.

The next step then would be to allow players to give quests to eachother, hopefully this would create a selfsustaining world. For example the blackmith may run out of saphires to complete the nifty sword and give an adventurer a quest to obtain saphires. then when the sword is finished it might be stolen and deposited at the bottom of the local mine that has been overun by monsters. then there will be a quest to retreive it.

So I want origional races in an origional world. the world needs to be full or seperate communities that can interact with eachother. both to compeate and coexist with.

to start with there would be a severly limited selection of races and the rest can only be played after they have been unlocked within the game by interacting with them.

TOME

VRBones inspired me to have a look atthe new TOME, it has been a while since I realy enjoyed this varient.

Also playing this TOME:
Raskalnickoff
Riverbank
VRBones
Deo

Sunday, January 16, 2011

Darker Than Black - Gemini of the Meteor: Eps 7-12

Well, I enjoyed the firs series, I liked it being a mystery. the middle one was OK. This one was good. set itself up for a sequel but I doubt there will be one. has lost the charm of the first series.

Darker Than Black - Gemini of the Meteor: Eps 1-6

Watched the first half of the last series yesterday. now the 4 episodes in the middle make more sence, they were necicary for the plot, pity they wernt actually interesting, Same goes for episode 3&4 here. But the first and last 2 episodes that we watched were pretty good.
after the 6th episode we now know that this series is about the two Japanese founding gods, the bloke is life and the girl is death. At this rate I wouldn't be surprised if we get a dodgy confuting anticlimax of an ending.

The game that I would like to play

I have given up on making this a complete post. Initially I wanted to define what I mean and introduce where I will be going to from here. But I have not been motivated to make it a big offline post first so here goes.

I beleive every gamer is looking for the game that they would really like to play, most of the time only finding something somewhat close, then each time you play a game the ideal will be altered. there will never be a perfect game for all people.

So the only way to get this game would be to make it yourself, This I think is the nexus if the indie movement. they individually created the games that they wanted to play. Rather than the big businesses that make games in order to make money.

Just now I have found another example of this. A Games on net article about a neverwinter nights mod called Edon[1]. it seems that some people were not happy with neverwinter nights but it was nearly what they wanted to play and had the modding tools for them to change it.

What are the games that I like?
What are the essential parts of those games?
What do I want to avoid at all costs?
Can I make it?
Am I motivated enough to start?

For the bottom two the answer would be no, not yet but I have ideas that have been slowly developing ever since this concept was introduced to me.

Friday, January 14, 2011

Darker than Black

Darker Than Black - The Black Contractor - Gaiden: 4 episodes

Not entirely sure what that was about, fills in a bit of back story on the organization though.

Darker than Black

Finished this series for the second time. First I had watched it by myself, now with my brothers. Nicole also helped us watch the first half of the series.

The series ended rather tidily, we have a good idea what the dolls are and why the main character is the main character. The rest of the world now knows about contractors (although I don't know how or why). for most people it is business as usual, fair enough considering how secretive everything was. I think I can watch this yet again and so it is added to my recommendable list.

Tuesday, January 11, 2011

Why can't I play Goblins in the WOW trial?

It turns out if you have never bought wow when you sign up for the trial you can only access the "Vanilla" races. But if you buy the vanilla game (~$20) you can get a trial for either of the expansions, Burning crusade or Cataclysm.
It doesn't relate to what files are installed on your PC at all.

Sunday, January 9, 2011

Skyzer

Skyzer was first a BeyBlade[1], while watching the show I wondered what sort of super powered spinning top I would have. It would be green and have a chaos engine[2][3] at its center, so that it always wobbled unpredictably.

The monster would be a snake and it would attack unpredictably and unexpectedly, like an ambush predator[4].

I think it was also nuclear powered and could spin as fast as light, but I don't remember why. something to do with nuclear radiation also being unpredictable.

I think I started using Skyzer in Baldur's gate II, it would either use two weapons or a really big one. I focused on critical hits again. I think my main Skyzer then was a hobbit girl assassin who duel wielded katanas. So yeah I'd jump out of the shadows and slice them up like butter.

I played Skyzer a far bit in Morowind, but I think that was mostly when I was playing with the creator. I tried to create a village and a guild based on a new race. I didn't get the dialog options to show up properly though so I couldn't start any of the quests that I had created.

Skyzer is about hidden power and being unpredictable so a gnome with a warhammer fits nicely.

I think the name came from Sky Serpent, and I like to use the letter Z whenever possible becausze it dozent get out much otherwize. Pretty much I ended up with a bunch of letters that looked nifty and was also pronounceable.

All in all I have not used this avatar very much. or maybe I should say sometimes Frog acts a little like Skyzer.

Frog

Frog is one of my oldest avatars. I think I started playing her back in the days of Slash'EM / ADOM. on my Sherry386.
Back in the day the only cosmetic difference of your avatar was the color of the @. but gender had a significant effect of the game. blokes had a bonus to strength and sheilas had a bonus to dexterity. I was often a dex heavy character, thus a girl, and often that character was Frog.
In ADOM the first creature I usually tried to kill was a frog, then I wouldent kill any more frogs until I got the quest from the old gladiator, to kill more of the first monster I slew.
Frog was one of the protagonists that nearly finished ADOM, I dont think I ever actually compleeted that game. On the other hand lots of Frogs have retreived the Amulet of Yendor, and helped to destroy the one ring in TOME. I dont really remember the endgame of angband but I i sure Frog succeeded there too.

Frog is always a girl, usually a thief. She has high acrobatics, jump, sneak, hide in shadows,  is just a little bit showy. Frog would be terrible at picking locks if it weren't for her high dexterity, she usually moves first in combat. Frog is also really good at dodging and scoring critical hits and this is more important than actually being good at combat.

Berzerker

I am fighter, but I normally roll a theif because they have better dexterity. Although deep down I think I am really a berzerker. Exept for the half nude bit, I do that all the time.

Friday, January 7, 2011

compendium of deep thoughts

To be forewarned is to be forearmed.
Thus if you show me a person that can tell the future I will show you a person who has four arms.
I know I have never seen one, so how can anybody claim to know the future?

High carisma lets you see invisible
Forget Dwarven infra-vision I want to be Bard with uber charisma and appearance. Then I could see through greater invisibility. Even the Beatles agree with me in Come Together, the bloke with hair down to his knees is invisible, maybe he is a bogeymen?

To understand fully what you hold is to know all its potential possibilities, everything from whence it came and what it may yet become. ~~~~Chapter 14 Tao Te Ching

from a devotion, one of those vocation things

13) What would I do without being paid for, if I could afford to?  play computer games outside while camping and I would get to different places via a catamaran in 20knott winds. cooking tea for my friends and give them enough grog that they are slightly tipsy but will not have a hangover.

After I reread it I though I would post it here.

Thursday, January 6, 2011

Recommendable Books

Aesops fables
I particularly remember the parable of the fox and the grapes, from which the term sour grapes is derived.

The Bible
note that although this translates as "the Book" there is a particular book that I am referring to. I am proud that I read it through in order, nearly cover to cover but they always have extra stuff before Genesis and after Revelation.

THHGTTG
this was the first of the series that I read, I have only read the fifth book once and was not impressed with it but all the rest are good (have not read the 6th) Also I have an audio book and have listened to that a few times. my favorite part of the audio book is when Marvin defeats the tank think in the building that is getting abducted by the frog-ships.

Wednesday, January 5, 2011

Dawn of War II: Chaos Rising

Just completed the final mission of Dawn of war 2: Chaos rising. Ran through the entire campaine with Joseph. we didnt get corrupted and used the easyer difficulty. Steam says it took me ~20 hours to finish. that took all the heros from level 19 to 30.
According to steam I played the original campaign for 80 hours, that would be a campaign and a half + some arena matches. There were only ~3 optional missions this time around and windows live has lost all of my previous achievement unlocks again.
Not a bad game in all I will probably play it again single player and maybe also try to get as corrupted as possible. Also it would be nice to run through the entire story from go to woe. I think I used the hack to give me all the exclusive items in the second mission I may do that for this one too, then spend an hour or so reading all the item descriptions.
They left the game wide open for another sequel, I'll probably get that too despite games for windows live and having lag issues between computers that are 6 meters apart (normally less than 30 seconds of lag).

compendium of deep thoughts

It seems to me that every race and culture as far back as can be seen has had religion as a significant part of life. Why is this so?

Is there really an inherent/intrinsic need in all humans to worship something that they perceive to be better than themselves? Is this a common need for all living beings?

compendium of deep thoughts

Necromamcers are not evil, they are just really friendly. They love to be surroundead by people weather they are alive or not.

Necromancers are not evil, they are just really enthusiastic obsessive compulsive healers.

Where there is great lack of Faith, there is great lack of Truth.

compendium of deep thoughts

Seems I need some more diversity in my thoughts.

Disappointment is when you are really enjoying a nice coffee then you try to drink more but none comes out. Disappointment in an unexpectedly empty coffee mug.

compendium of deep thoughts

need a new tag, plan is to despite here interesting proverbs sayings epiphanies and the like.

If you rolled a skeletal witch would you die whenever you drink a potion of healing?
Because skeletons usually get all the benefits of potions/food from attempting to ingest them regardless of the fact that it ends up in a messy pile on the floor. and when a witch gets wet they are supposed to melt and die.

compendium of deep thoughts

Don't look on the bright side when you can live on it. ~~~~Mel O'Phee

Thumbs are known to be exceedingly exceptional rulers, politicians should take note. If only out country was actually ruled by a thumb.