I will probably try Age of Conan, too. I have an ambiguous attitude towards Conan. While the world is cliché and highly sexist and all kinds of bad things, I love the grittiness and unforgiving style (did you know that Howard was inspired by Lovecraft in his creation of the Hyborean Age?) to a point where it actually outweighs my hesitation. Of course, in the end, it's all dependent on whether or not the actual game is any good.

127

(20 replies, posted in Sava's Garden)

Oluf wrote:

The words was tracked via the username and not the IP.

Which was a bad solution, really, but I suspect it was necessary with all the web logins and whatnot. Given that people use a real IRC client, it's much better to track via ident plus domain or somesuch.

128

(22 replies, posted in Steambaths)

...with the flow...

Rob Zombie, "Superbeast". (Been playing CoX.)

130

(52 replies, posted in Steambaths)

Platinum!
Gold is ugly.

Kiss or Kill?

I'm still going to play, though. Not giving up yet. wink

I agree with you largely, Darkhawk, but there are sides you're not taking into account in your assessment. One of these is what the game requires of players to just be able to get anywhere within the game mechanics. I found the idea of being a forager rather nice, but I quickly realised that there is no way I can avoid fighting and grinding a great deal if I'm to be an active forager. I don't need to be. I find the game mechanics rather dull at length anyway. I'm there for the RP. The problem is that until we find a place and settle down, it's going to be very tricky for me to get around and meet people, so I'm a bit turned off towards the whole thing at present.
Right now I'm just kind of taking some time off, trying to get my inspiration back.

133

(20 replies, posted in Sava's Garden)

Just checking. Cheers.

134

(20 replies, posted in Sava's Garden)

I don't want to be cheeky or anything, but if you have the server up, an URL would be nice. wink
Great work!

135

(6 replies, posted in Sava's Garden)

It's kind of against Sensible Policy(tm) to go above 800x600 for any set resolution, because of the various possible configurations.
Personally, I run 1600x1200 but I don't want the browser window to be much larger than 800 in width as I generally do several things at once.

Also, keep in mind that we're aiming for a simple website layout. With some smart fiddling (for example, a horizontal menu bar rather than a vertical one) we can fit the forum into the website without having to make the layout overly wide.

Course of Empire, "Coming of the Century".
One of my start-of-the-day songs.

137

(52 replies, posted in Steambaths)

Deekin!

Blood or Milk?
(Trick question. Darkie may know the answer? wink )

I'm hanging in SoR until I find something better. I am starting to get to the point where I realise that I really don't want to grind any more, though, so I'm going to do my best to find a point in the game where I can just play my character out without having to spend hours chopping up kitins or digging for materials. Whether this is possible or not remains to be seen.

Norah wrote:

Well, don't judge a game on that. The forums always said the same about Seed.

And they were actually right. We all know Seed was buggy and incomplete, but the game was simple enough to work anyway. RV doesn't seem to share that.

If the game does deliver what it promises, it could be very interesting, indeed. I would love to play a tavern-keeper/brewmaster or something like that. Judging from the forums, the game is incomplete and buggy, though.


Occasionally, world size has long since stopped impressing me. Usually it's better to have a small, well-working one than a large one that's buggy or too silent.

141

(6 replies, posted in Sava's Garden)

So, we come to the point where we're about to start designing a website for the community and launch it with its own domain. Seeing as I seem to have become the instigator of all this, I hereby make a thread dedicated to this project. Anyone can take part or give opinions. Just keep in mind that we're all doing this voluntarily. If you're going to criticise, try to present a viable alternative.

At present, we have four people directly involved in this project (in chronological order of volunteering):
Myself - Initiator, designer and superficial code handler.
Oluf - Designer.
skanx - Server provider.
Nuala - Mistress of the Code.

As previously stated, we'll be using the CMS (Content Management System) known as e107. Further information about it can be found at http://e107.org/.


As I'll be continuing to push this project forward, and likely be a main part in its design, I'll post some of the principles I find pertinent and necessary for the project and site to work well.

It may all seem very serious and grave, but I'm just trying to make a solid base for us to avoid confusion in a later stage. This is all good fun, but let's make it fun that leads to good design. wink



[big][death]Design Principles[/death][/big]

• K.I.S.S.
Keep It Simple, Stupid - i.e. don't complicate things unless you really, -really- (really!) have to.

• Avoid Clutter
Many websites today are chaotic jumbles of features with front pages that take forever to initiate. We should strive to keep our layout simple and functional (though, of course, aesthetically pleasing.) If you want to know what my preference is, have a look at my website (http://centralen.net/ahnion/)

• Avoid Redundancy
This is particularly important since we have a pretty powerful forum (courtesy of Nuala.) We should decide where features like calendars and news should be and stick to what we decide.

• Minimise Database Queries
The server efficiency is dependent on traffic minimisation. The fewer DB queries we have, the better. This is yet another reason to keep the design simple. For example, a calendar on the front page would cause a smattering of DB queries for each user that loads the site. This is bad.

• Large Text Bodies Should Be In Serif Fonts!
Yes, sans serif looks a lot sexier, but every single publishing guide and report on the topic says the same thing: the brain recognises and interprets serifed text much faster. The eye also recognises serif text in smaller sizes. Sans serif should be used for headers and notices - things that are there to catch attention.

• Minimise Maintenance and Upkeep.
Everything the Seed community does is based on volunteer work. As such, the people involved will work when they have the time, energy and inspiration. This means that we can't have systems that require continuous attention and daily management, and that we must strive to keep the necessary work to a minimum.

• Shared Privileges.
Being a spare time community, we will have people dropping off and coming back on an irregular basis. This poses some trouble if a person who loses touch holds exclusive privileges to one of the systems the community depends on. To some extent, this is unavoidable, but as much as we can, we should at least try to see to that one other person (that we feel we can trust) has access, so that if something happens, we can at least get to the data.



As for graphical design, my initial thoughts are along the lines of trying to keep the image size/count down to some extent, to make the impression implicative of the game we all love and miss, but not directly derived from it (except for the logo) and to try to make it as accessible and easily handled as possible. The latter is always a challenge, and I hope to bash heads with Oluf a lot over the matter.

That's all I have to say for now. Comments, ideas, rants?

142

(20 replies, posted in Sava's Garden)

skanx wrote:

As for chimbot, maybe an eggdrop?

An eggdrop would be useful for all kinds of things. I don't know how much you've looked at the available plugins but I seem to remember there being a plethora of possibilities. Also, eggdrop has been in development for ages, so it's stable and functional.

143

(78 replies, posted in Steambaths)

(That's two words.)

Defiance.

144

(78 replies, posted in Steambaths)

Buckshot.

145

(22 replies, posted in Steambaths)

...dark and grim...

Fleshquartet's cover of "I Am The Walrus".

147

(78 replies, posted in Steambaths)

Hangover!

148

(52 replies, posted in Steambaths)

Rain!

Stab or slash?

149

(78 replies, posted in Steambaths)

injury

150

(52 replies, posted in Steambaths)

Sci-Fi!

Tea or Coffee?