This one's locked, move on to the next

Finished and posted my Savage Lands review (original transcript below) so that I can start on The Witcher 3 next. I'm also starting to think about doing more experimental format stuff, but I've gotta draft that up before I say any more.

Please ignore the errors, what you are seeing is my script and being dyslexic having spelling errors in it actually helps me to read/speak it.

RMR6 – Savage Lands

Intro

Special thanks to: Randomise User for his tutorials and letsplays on tnhis game

Hello and welcome back, I am redmage and this is my review of Savage Lands, an indie action adventure survival multiplayer game currently in early access on steam.

 The game starts with you waking up on the beach of a deserted island with virtually nothing, and it is up to you as to how to progress, as you fight against biting cold, wild creatures, starvation, skeletons, and giants while the everpresent threat of a dragon circles you overhead.

As you progress thorugh the game you collect raw materials, these are mined from rocks, picked from the landscape, or taken off defeated animals or foes. These materials are used for the crafting of various tools, weapons, armors, and even structures to help turn your basic survival into total thrival as by the end you are the master of the island. Odly one of the greatest ways you progress is by building bigger and better backpacks to carry goods in as high end items require lots of components.

At present there isn’t much story in the game except what can be gleaned by looking through the beastiary. But more is being added with every patch. And devs plan to add additional story through the use of a journal system or perhaps notes found at various locations.

Speaking of the devs, the game is being built by Signal Studeos, the group best known for the XBLA “Toy Soldiers” series of games. Their attempt at building a game in Unity is admirable, but only time will tell if they can tame the system into doing the tricks they want it to perform. 

I have to give them props for jumping head first into the mainstream PC gaming masterrace’s kiddie pool that is the early access environment; a place as equally filled with bullies, trolls, and pee as you may expect.

 At present they are doing a good job of listening to the community, taking community suggestions and prioritizing community requests, also they post regular updates, patches, and vlogs showcasing the game’s development. Currently they have plans for more enemies, more items, in game magic, improved story, and eventually the ability to fight that dang dragon.

As far as survival games go, this one is fairly unique in that it is attempting to blend itself not with some form of post-apocalyptic state, or zombies, but rather with a fantasy setting.

It should be noted that this game is in deep early access (v.0.6.0) and there is still lots of planned content that has yet to be introduced into the game. I bring this up because my current experience is somewhat lacking, the game plays well, but doesn’t feel quite complete.

Don’t get me wrong, in comparison to all the other early access survival games, this one stands out as a gem amongst its buggy incomplete rivals, but It doesn’t really hold my interest. I don’t feel like the story is complete enough for me to even get a basic picture of who I am and what I am doing other than trying to not die.

I suppose the goal is to fight the dragon at the end but what is my motivation to do so other than to kill him before he kills me, the game progress feels slow, and the game is difficult in single player due to enemies sometimes spawning in reasonable numbers and sometimes not. Gathering resources ends up feeling grindy, there is really nothing special about the sound, and high end content currently only consists of walking for hours, lost in the woods to find hard-to-find place X to maybe kill a rare spawn Y who may drop a rare item Z.

What I want from this game:

1. More story, tell me who I am, give me a reason to be, a reason to fight, a goal to strive for; what is the conflict, the threat, the tension of the story that hangs over me? Right now just surviving gets old.

2. more fantasy aspects, I hear magic is planned which is good, if your going to call yourself a fantasy game you need fantasy elements. Having a dragon and undead is good, if a bit cliché, but that;s what fantasy is today, so grab your wizard hat, pick up your dwarven axe, and add some goblins, caves, and dungeons to the game that have valuable treasure horded away in their depths.

3. more customization, I mean this in items, in structuers, in character creation, in everything. This is a multiplayer game, I don’t want to look the same as another guy, hold the same weapons, and live in the same house.

4. a map, this island is huge and hard to navigate. I get that this may be part of the allure but think about giving me a map that I can optionally build and must fill in as I explore, that way I can find my way back to the cool places and not wander for hours looking for them again (like the monolith, found the blasted thing once and then couldn’t ever find it again). If you make it a buildable and an option then the hardcore players won’t feel forced to use it, and the casuals will not feel like they are always lost when you have so many sights to see, Win win right?

Now on to the scores:

Now its time for the totals.  (two score catagories, general and in genera)

Story/Characters/Dialogue: D / B

Not much story, no characters to interact with in the non-violent talking way other than other players, who you may often interact with in the violent non-talking way. But there is more here than other survival games have as they didn’t just tell you the story was “… zombies…”

Gameplay/Interface – C / B

The game is simple enough to understand, the interface works, and there are no real falaws or bugs, and it doesn’t feel too sticky or too awkward. Yes it could have more, but it really doesn’t need it. Impressively (for an early access indie game) most collisions, items, and movements work just fine.

Graphics/textures/animations/visuals/art = C / B

This game looks decent. It’s not a triple A title with a huge team working on it, and frankly for an indie game it looks good.

Sound/music = D / C

The sound is decent, its properly timed and located, and there doesn’t appear to be any music. This may be an artistic choice as the game does try to make you feel alone and isolated as you hear the waves crash against the nearby shore while the wind wistles past and wolves howl in the distance, but its been done before and this game adds nothing new.

Panache: Meh

Clearly the devs do care about this game and are working hard on it. Though it doesn’t yet feel like its all come together. Frankly it feels a bit like just aobut every other survival game I’ve played, and this game has the chance to do more with its inclusion of the “fantasy” genera.

Learning Curve: Mid/high –

Not really a game you can just pick up to play and have a good time in 10 min; this game takes lots of work, a bit of grinding, hiding indoors at night, slowly gearing up, and eventually heading out just to get helplessly murdered by furys (my first bear encounter… and there were four…) . But the recent updates have made the game more forgiving and atleast now you can find your corpse and collect all your lost goodies after your terrible death at the hands of an entire sleuth of bears.

Overall: general score: D+/C- / Contextual score: B

Not a bad game in its current state, it just needs more, and with the team doing what they are it should become a decent game in short order.

Definitely

So… Should you buy this game?

If you like survival games then you likely should

If you like fantasy games you should consider this

If you download the hardcore and realistic survival mods for your games then you should

This game is decent, even in its current state. I am excited to hear that the Devs are working to implement many of the things I want fixed the things I had problems with. Should they accomplish this, then Savage Lands will be a good all around game. Even at present it is much more polished and playable than many of the survival games out there.

I’ve been your host RedMage, never stop gaming.

If you enjoyed this video please give it a like, if you want to see more videos and reviews from me in the future please subscribe, and if you think others could benefit from what I’ve said please share. I have a growing library of video reviews, gameplay, and lets plays, so feel free to check those out, and if you have any questions or comments please leave them for me in the comments section below. You guys take care.

Don't Let The Dog Bite You on Your Way Out

Hello people who still read.

The past few days have been spent slowly collecting parts to rebuild my bicycle. I have a 1980 CCM Corsa 10 which I refurbished about ten years ago and recently just gave it another working overhaul. Nearly everything except the frame got replaced this time. And without proper tools (not a good idea) this took several days.

So after a few days of working with screwdrivers to take the tires off and pry out the old rotted rubber and put the new stuff on I decided to take it for a victory lap around the neighborhood.

My first thought - "wow, this is a lot faster than walking"

My second thought - "hey look a dog"

My third thought - "What the heck!"

As a dog came sprinting out of someone's side yard alongside the bike. It soon ran directly in front of me and I slammed on the new breaks trying to avoid the dog. I managed to not hit it, but the dog decided to take my sudden stop as an opportunity to sink its teeth into my right calf, drawing blood in three places and leaving seven other deep bruise impressions.

I was unable to find the owners nearby and didn't want to call animal control who would likely put the animal down. So I hopped off the bike and used it as a barrier between me and the dog. Together we walked for a quarter mile, with the dog being held at bay by my bike which I was using as a shield. Eventually the dog got bored and left me to hobble home. I asked several nearby neighbors if they knew the owners of the dog but no one did.

Now this brings me to the point of my whole story, modern law regarding animals makes sense but is also grosely unfair. Should I have called the proper authorities, the dog would likely be put down, a fate it did not deserve. But then again, a dog cant just go around biting people as that is a public hazard. Furthermore it would not be fair to hold the owners fully responsible as who can ever be fully responsible for the actions of another being (even though if they knew it was capable of biting random strangers for no reason they should either train this out of it or keep it in a place where it cant do so).

So in the end nothing is resolved. I cleaned the wound and crossed my fingers that the dog didn't infect me with anything. I don't have the money to throw away on a "could have had rabies" doctors visit as I am still quite unemployed. And I spent the day hobbling around as my leg throbbed its way along. I never found the owners, and likely never will. I could have checked the dog's collar, but I wasn't gonna put my hands near it after already being bitten hard. But most of all I'm confused and mildly annoyed. I have been physically hurt, possibly requiring medical treatment if this gets infected, and who is to blame? What can be done? And why would a dog just run up and bite someone in the first place?

Early Success AKA Seis de Mayo

Hello, I'm back.

I apologize for the delay. I spent most of last week helping a friend move which ate up all my time and energy. This week has mostly been spent building short animations for videos. I am getting noticeably better at audio and video editing, as well as animation building.

One thing that I'm struggling with is my early and not resounding success. The KSP video went up and got a real number of watches on the YouTubes. I am happy for the hits, the likes, and the positive feedback, but almost no one who watched it saw any of the other videos (and I don't have enough of those yet to boot).

This early success got me excited before I realized that I won't likely have success like that again soon. And to make matters worse, for all the hits I did get 3/4 were using a form of Addblock (which is a fantastic plugin that I also use) so I got very little money for it on top of those adds being worth nothing for the days I had traction.

To put things in perspective: my Delver video with around 40 hits made me about $2.50 because the adds on those days were worth good money. But the KSP vid with around 700 hits has only made me about $.05 due to the adds being worth very little. In addition I nearly made the mistake of asking people to turn off addblock to help support the vids, which along with asking people to click on adds turns out to be against the terms of service for Google AdSense.

This makes it quite hard to actually make money via videos. Much harder than I had expected, as that eliminates around 3/4 of the potential profit, which is then split between you and Google, further reducing the content creator's cut.

Well, I still have several more months to continue this experiment. And I'm in the process of becoming a Steam Curator as well so that should help. Maybe things will turn up in that time.

New attempt at a slogan: Never stop gaming

...Not because it is easy...

The Youtube experiment is going. So far only friends have subscribed, but the hits suggest that others have started seeing the videos. I realize that posting game reviews of indie early access games is something that will only hit a small audience, but it is important that these games also get treated seriously as many have an innovative spirit to their design that bigger companies could learn from.

The next video, which I am already stressing over, will be a grand test of skill. I picked up KSP back when it came out in early access. I gave it a shot, killed many kerbins, lost a few to the blackness of space, put a few in orbit of the sun, and think I sent one beyond the reaches of the solarsystem. But that was many months ago and one thing I never accomplished was landing a kerbin on the mun then returning him safely to planet Kerbin.

As my first commenter has asked, I shall make it my goal, before this week is out, to review KSP, and to finish my video before the game leaves its Early Access Beta stage on this coming Tuesday. Beyond that, it is my goal to reach the mun and return.

A Face for Radio

After an entire day of mishaps, I am no closer to video 2. First I had a file error which required me to re-record all of my video captures. Then I had a conversion error when rendering the videos in HD. Then I found that my camera is just not going to cut it. All in all just bad. However as an early-subscriber bonus I'll post the upcoming video's script* below.

Cheers!

* script subject to change before video is completed.

One down...

So video 1 was a success. I have more hits than just my friends, almost all feedback has been overwhelmingly positive, and I think I could continue this on a weekly-ish pace and keep up. As a heads up I'll likely be reviewing "Delver" by Priority Interrupt next week. It's a retro-indie dungeon crawl adventure (seeing a pattern yet?). I'm also gearing up for my first vlog (generating questions to answer, deciding on introduction and format etc.).

Also, and I've tried to keep them as tame as possible, I've applied to connect advertising to this and the video page. I've opted that only adds that do not pop-up and are skip-able apply, so hopefully this wont get in the way of the purpose of the blog and videos.

Otherwise I'm gonna take a small break and watch the meaningless numbers slowly tick up. I am proud of it. I still hate the way my voice sounds, and there are still parts about the video I can figure out how to do better, but I think it was a good first attempt. I set out to do something, I tried hard, and I did it. And I can have pride in that.

17 hours in

And the first video is DONE.

The sound of her voice

Welcome welcome, one and all.

To continue the series on my woes and troubles with producing even a single Youtube video I have a new complaint: the sound of my own voice.

Let me back up a bit.

My process:

1. play the games I plan to review, and record hours of gameplay, covering various locations, levels, characters, game mechanics, builds, etc. to give people a wide scope of the experience and to be an informed reviewer.

2. review the collected visuals and audio clips, identifying portions of what I do and do not want to use as to save myself time later. This also gives me a chance to QC my work.

3. write a script covering all the things I would want someone else to cover, as well as everything that is expected of a proper review.

4. record said script, editing it until it says what i want it to say, in an order that works, and in a way that is informative, entertaining, and efficient.

5. cut film sections to be relevant to pre-recorded script.

6. ???

7. profit.

Where I'm currently stuck is 4. The more I record and listen to myself, the more I hate the sound of my own voice. I'll record something and either sound stupid, or my speech will sound unnatural, or something will be wrong with the mic. How do people do this? Is there a point at which they just accept what they have? Do they ever like what they have done?

Regardless, I should have everything done in the next two days and will shoot you guys a link once its posted. Soon the now will be the past and no matter what I sound like it will not be something I can change. There is a certain inevitability surrounding the feeling of setting a goal and approaching a milestone. In this case its a milestone which will start a new attempt at using my creativity, talents, and interests to be useful.

Thanks for all the support and views, and as always please feel free to comment, question, or complain, just don't feel entitled to an answer from me.

Before you Sell the Drama...

...You must build it first.

Hello there!

Sorry for the posting delay. I've been video editing. The process has been going well except that I ran into a snag which required me to re-shoot all my sample footage, putting me behind by a few days. I expect to have a first review up within the next week.

In the meantime I've also been setting up the appropriate peripherals. I now have the RedMage google+ page and associated Youtube channel so everything can work together as a well greased pig (well-oiled wrestler? world-dominating machine? something like that anyways). The past week has been spent capturing video, and still images, creating .gif files, mixing music, video splicing, and sequential animation composing. All in all a whole new world of cool stuff to learn.

I've also been putting together intro and outro portions of the video to make myself stand out as a proper brand. In the end I hope to provide reviews, vlogs, and even podcasts related to mostly game and game-industry topics. This is an ambitious set of goals for an utter n00b at videocasting but I'll give it a shot.

Originally I had spliced images and sounds from about 8 different games into just the intro sequence, but this ended up being exceptionally complicated to mess with every time I had to make a small adjustment to it. Also at first I planned to rip the NES Megaman robot master intro sequences in order per-season of broadcast. But sadly the first Megaman was quite boring to look at so I made the creative choice to skip ahead to using Megaman 2 as the starter background.

For your viewing pleasure, below is a sample of the intro sequence for the upcoming review. Enjoy:

Please feel free to subscribe as there is much content in the works that will soon be out. Also feel free to comment or visit the "Ask RedMage" tab. I look forward to hearing from you!
...And never stop playing the game.

Project: Broadcast

The past few weeks I've been working on a secondary project which may soon come to fruition. I am preparing to take my game reviews and hints and move them largely to Youtube. I will still be writing here (though the page URL also may change) so don't you worry about me changing too much all at once.

Its all cats, cats from the bottom to the top.

At present I'm not sure how I'll compete with the standard fare, but that's what this is all about, forging a name for myself out in the wild blue yonder. I'm currently working with Camtasia, which I have found to be a solid platform, to teach myself about video editing. 

My exact plan is to break videos down into: reviews, top pics, hints/tricks, and suggestions.

To continue with my theme I think I'll do the reviews from the magetower and call the reviews RMR's (red mage reviews) and the hints/tricks TBF's (trial by fireball). I don't yet have clever names for others (considering something about level 9 spells, or white/black magic rundowns for best/worst), but please feel free to add suggestions should any come up. 

In the mean time I'll be cutting and dubbing video, so you guys stay classy!

Savage Lands: review and hints/tips/tricks

No, not that one, lets try again.

There we go.

Elite Dangerous Review

Elite Dangerous, or ED is a game which seems to share many characteristics with it's acronym's original namesake. Both are embarrassing, affect males, eventually when word gets out about it you are subjected to pity and bullying, and can be quite frustrating at times. But luckily one of them you can choose to stop subjecting yourself to... with a little blue pill. (Hey, they chose the title. And come on, two adjectives, I am offended as a teacher of this fine and apparently terminally ill language.)

Click below to see the full review.

The pitfalls of vacuuming and game design

Today I was productive. Today I broke out the vacuum and went to town. Now I have discovered that when your lazy like I am, simple tasks end up becoming more difficult and dangerous than they should be.

Since I am exceptionally lazy and just felt like vacuuming because I hadn't in a while, I didn't really pick anything up off the floor first. Now I'm lazy, but not that messy. The only things I had on the floor were a pair of shoes and the leg of some pajama pants that were hanging off the bed (yes I wear pajama pants... they're warm).

I started out, everything was going fine, and then the vacuum became a ravenous creature and ate up the pajama pants leg. Before I could stop it, the beast had swallowed half the leg and was starting to choke (serves it right). But in my panic I hurled myself at the on/off button. Normally I have excellent memory and accuracy, but this vacuum is not mine and in my haste I was only guessing at where this button was. All I managed to do was knock the darn thing over and push it further from me.

The pants were almost gone at this point and so I saw only one option left. I started a tug-of-war with the evil beast, and it was surprisingly strong. After several long seconds of pulling back and forth I freed my pantleg... or most of it.

The evil creature had melted a large hole in the nylon. Fed up with myself (and this round being won by my new nemesis Senior Sucko) I decided I was done with that for the day... And those were my best pajama pants...

Seeing in Four Dimensions

This was origonally a lecture I gave to highschoolers.

Most people limit themselves to one-dimensional sight. And doing so generally causes problems in relationships and communication with others. What I mean by this is that we judge too quickly and on a far too shallow basis.

Don't get me wrong, being able to judge is an importnat skill. Forming judgements on incomplete sets of data is something we do well as humans and it often helps save our lives. We draw simple snap conclusions (which are often incorrect or at the least limited in scope) which simplify our days, save us time, and even help protect us from harm.

But such oversimplification does not fit us well in the modern complex fast-paced world. Here everybody is multifaceted, everything is complex, and nothing that exists, exists in vacuo.

So back to the original point, although forming snap judgments on people, things, and scenarios is natural, it is not necessarily good. Normally when we first meet someone what we understand is simply the text of the situation. We judge only based on what we see and hear, nothing more. But we must learn to see past the text, as it is only one-dimensional. Only seeing the text is like only believing stereotypes about types of people. Yes often stereotypes start somewhere in reality, but they are oversimplified, distorted, and almost never fit the facts of the situation or people involved.

So we must use our brains to see the other dimensions. When learning how to read (something many people think they can do) you started in kindergarten with letters. Later you got words, and eventually sentences and paragraphs. Then suddenly it was stories and books. But this is only the first step of reading, the school systems take about twelve years to teach you the rest. Just knowing how to read is just looking at the text, but to understand a character, dialogue, or work, you must look at it more fully.

One must start with the the text, but must also consider the context, subtext, and intertextuality to really read to the depth that many things are written. The same is true for dealing with people.

People present text through how they look and act, but they also provide context based on the situations and locations they are currently in, they provide subtext in their mood, intonation, and gestures, and the observer must also be aware of the intertextuality of people, who they react differently to different stimuli, around different people, in different moods, and even that the observer is also subject to being affected by these things.

This is how people are understood better, this is how conflicts are more easily resolved, how misunderstandings are easily cleared up, and how modern wars are prevented and peace is preserved. There will never be perfect contentment for all people, but understanding the world in more than one dimension can only help people to better work together in it.

Interview Questions

So as some of you may know I recently gave up my prestigious position teaching in a public school, for the fun chance to get a job that payed in money instead of in grey hairs. This means spending lots and lots of time applying for jobs that I'm totally qualified for, yet never hear back from. But on that odd occurrence when I do hear back, the hilarity of the so-called "modern" interview process ensues.

Don't look now but he's reaching for your crotch.

See, it all starts much the way it should, with a phone interview. This is the way it's been for a while. Except now this part is outsourced. So someone who really has no idea about the job, company, or what those word looking things on your resume mean is in charge of holding the keys to gate one.

Gate two is some form of internal HR who does sort of understand what is going on, and this is where the fun really begins. So, most HR people I've dealt with are nice. However most are also out of the loop. in One interview I had the HR person gave me the wrong address to the next meeting. In another they asked me to give a presentation on a software function, and gave me the wrong version of the software to work with. And in a third they somehow forgot to email me to tell me that I didn't get the job. In some cases they help to prep you for the next stage, and this too can go horribly wrong.

Going in circles and ultimately doing nothing since 1925.

In the prepping stage I had one HR person directly tell me to doctor my resume and lie to the next person about experience I don't have. And in another they decided that even though I met and exceeded all the qualifications that were listed for the job, I was unqualified for the job. But if everything goes well you get lazily handed off to the next stage and that is where the fun really begins.

If you get past step two and three (which isn't that hard) you may find yourself facing a real person (Oooooooo). What they don't tell you is that these people generally also have virtually no experience in the hiring process somehow. They don't know what to ask or even what the answers mean. And being an introvert who hates dumb people, and stupid questions, and having my time wasted, you can imagine that I don't do too well. But the fun lies in the questions they ask. Check out some of these gems of modern interviews.

What does the fox say?

1. "If you were an animal, what animal would you be?"

2. "What is your favorite Color?"

3. "What is your greatest weakness?"

4. "What is your astrological sign?"

5. "Why should I hire you?"

6. "What makes you different from the other applicants?"

7. "What makes you qualified for this job?"

8. (without giving you a figure to start with) "What is the least amount of money you would accept for doing this job?"

And the cream of the cream (that's right, it sounds stupid in our language but suffocated in theirs):

9. "Are you comfortable doing things well outside the job description if asked?"

Now let's get down to why these are dumb questions, because I can't even begin to answer why people ask them or what they think the answer will tell them about the interviewee.

My mantra.

1. "If you were an animal, what animal would you be?"
- What the heck does this have to do with doing a job? Are we in elementary school? Is there a right or wrong answer? Do you want me to explain? Are extinct or imaginary animals off the list? My thoughts on this is that people may think they are either being funny (trying to diffuse the tension by wasting both of your times) or that perhaps the type of animal will say something about your personality, say for instance whether you are aggressive, or will crap on the floor of your office unprovoked. Otherwise though, it's just a waste of time.


2. "What is your favorite color?"
- Oh good, another kindergarten question. Would you also like to know my favorite shape? Or what my mom packed me for lunch today? What does this have to do with the job? Oh wait, I can answer that, nothing.


3. "What is your greatest weakness?"
- I personally take offense to this question. Every time I hear it I think "Who the hell are you to ask me that?" See it comes down to one of a few conclusions that make me want to punch the interviewer in the dick (or vagina... but somehow it just isn't the same) just for asking this. Either the person asking is using the interview to lord over you in a personal power trip, taking in something to hold over your head if in the future you work together (i.e. Douchebag), Or they think its an "intriguing" question because you are supposed to demonstrate growth or find a weakness that's secretly a strength or be creative. What they don't seem to get is how much of a dick question this is, interviewees are under pressure to answer AND are in an environment which they are not supposed to lie. This puts the interviewee in a position to compromise themselves morally for no damn good reason, essentially not only giving the interviewer a reason to not hire them, but also giving them information which is quite personal and could be hurtful, if people were really honest at least. .


4. "What is your astrological sign?"
- ??? Uh, what century is this? Do you also want to know which of my humors is out of balance, or how much money I gave to the church this year to ward off demons? I could also tell you what level my Paladin is if it'll help.


5. "Why should I hire you?"
- You tell me, you have my resume, you presumably read it, you know the job requirements, are you dumb and illiterate, or just dumb?


6. "What makes you different from the other applicants?"
- Again a question that the interviewer should know. How are you supposed to know about the other applicants? Presumably this is just to make you brag about yourself, but frankly its poorly worded for that answer. Just like many of these questions, the answer they are looking for does not directly correlate with the question they ask, thus making it a bad question. A good answer may be, "well I spoke with all the other candidates and they all agreed unanimously that I was the best choice."

7. "What makes you qualified for this job?"
- Much like question 5, this question makes me question the intelligence of the person asking the question. To ask this they A: don't trust HR and the contractors HR hired to get you this far (which is a great sign that so much money is going toward saving no time), B: have no idea what the job requires, C: have no idea what your resume says, or D: don't trust what you wrote about yourself. All in all a great way to start a job.


8. (often without giving you a figure to start with) "What is the least amount of money you would accept for doing this job?"
- This question is insulting, stupid, and inappropriate. Negotiation of the job's salary should be in one of two places. It is either upfront and unchanging (this job pays x and only x), or it is when you get the offer letter but before you are hired where you talk to the people who have the power to make this change. Asking this in any interview stage is an insulting weaselly way for them to underpay you. And nothing says happy worker like an under-payed worker.


9. "Are you comfortable doing things well outside the job description if asked?"
- Oh yes. Time to assume the position, and prepare to get your lawyer on speed dial. I have only heard this question once, but I'm not sure how on earth it got asked. Even more shocking is what it implies. Either they totally forgot to write down what you will do in the job, thus anything would be outside the description, or they want you to tell people you are an editor while you secretly smuggle drugs, immigrants, and Chihuahuas from Mexico on your business trips. If ever there were a shady question what makes you search the national sex-offenders database for your boss, this is it.


How did we fall so far? Why does one or more of these questions come up in every interview I have had in the past year? Since when did HR outsource their own jobs to someone even more useless than they are? Who is paying for all this wasted time?

See, if you really want to get to know a candidate, you need to see them doing something related to what they will be doing, interacting with the people they will be interacting with, and maybe assure them that their boss will not be an ignorant dick and/or sexual predator.

Working "Over-Tim" tonight?... Overtime I meant Overtime!

Other good ways to test people:

- drive somewhere with them in the passenger seat, and take your hands off the wheel and cover your eyes while careening towards a cliff and see if they manage to get out alive.

- tell them that the interview begins when you drop them in a field and that they must evade both bears and a person hunting them for sport for 24 hours.

- Fake an office terror attack and see who the would-be employee uses as a human shield.

- Lock them in the conference room and tell them that an odorless deadly toxin is being pumped in and ask them what they want told to their loved ones.

- Hand them an unloaded gun just to see what they do with it.

or the ever-popular:

- tell them that you will be bugging their house to observe them over the next week and see how long it takes before they change their daily routine.

The sky is the limit when it comes to both good questions and good tests for people. Feel free to hire me if you need a new HR department and are open to unusual ways of testing people. I may charge as much as an entire department, but you can rest assured that I will produce results that will tell you something true about your candidates and how they work under pressure.

StarCrawlers: Hints / Tips / Tricks and Review

A lot of my new-found spare time has been going to the Early Access section of Steam. And of particular note is the game "StarCrawlers" an initiative round based action scifi dungeon delver. I have found the game quite decent, with multiple select-able characters each with different combat skills, a Diablo-esque item generation system, adventure mechanics like "Legend of Grimrock" but set in space, and music reminiscent of "FTL." After I started playing I noticed that no guides seemed to exist at all, so why not create one and share my experiences.

At the time of writing the game build is: Beta 2 - BoisterousBobcat

Click "Read More" to access the Hints/Tips/Tricks/Review

Ode to Winter

I think depression is like winter. Some days the skies are clear and it is warm. These are the days I think I feel like everybody else, mainly because I feel. Some days are cloudy and grey, where something looms in the distance. Some days it snows, and the cold air bites and freezes. These are the days of depression. People see the snow and do not understand how it feels. They see it and wonder at how it looks, guessing that one may find it difficult to drive in such conditions. Some venture out, others play in it, but some of us live in it. Those who see it and stay inside think they understand. They think that it could make life difficult. But that is never the true problem. The snow makes everything harder, and when you stay out in it it makes you cold and numb. First comes the cold, a subtle biting feeling, sometimes set off by something and sometimes just a product of existence. Emotions disappear, as do motivations and passions, all that one can feel is numb. It is almost comical, feeling nothing. Then often when the feeling starts to come back, like with the cold, it begins with the painful pins and needles, the aches and fears un-felt come rushing back. The returning of emotion is not pleasant either as it is almost easier to continue on like a snowman, unable to understand the emotions you see around you, nearly feeling anger and frustration at how others feel. To fit in I fake smiles and interest, I fake interest and social graces, but I do not feel them. And this year, winter is long and the snow is deep.

Writers Writers Everywhere

... but not one worth a link.

As a personal struggle I have been trying to publish various pieces for the past four-ish years. Now, even though this process is new to me I didn't set about it like some new kid with his first typewriter and a fresh English degree in hand. I took over a year to write, used the time to bounce ideas off friends, and do my own research about what makes a story good. When finished I took my manuscript to friends and had them hand it out to their friends, people I didn't know, to get what I hoped would be more honest opinions. Then I spent another six months revising. After this I took it to a professional editor and had it fixed up. Then I took it through another few months of polishing, tweaking the language and style to be the best it could be. Then finally on to the agents. 

For those of you who are not writers, let me dissuade you from the pain. Trying to publish is like playing a game of chicken with the actual act of committing suicide. After you put years of your life and time into something you have studied to produce, you will get this message.

"Thank you for your submission, we are very busy, but will get back to you within two to six weeks."

And that sounds great... Until 4 months pass without word one back. 

"This must be a mistake" you will tell yourself, "did they loose my submission?"

But the sad truth is that they don't seem to care all that much. Eventually (over a year in some cases for me) they will respond with something like, "We apologize but our company does not feel like going in this direction at this time, but others may so don't stop applying to agents." That's it, a generic canned response that could be sent to any writer about any book ever written. And that is what you will receive. Tens or even hundreds of these responses.

In the end I believe that I sent out something along the line of nearly 100 quarry letters. Which are also great as there are standard quarry formats, but every agent wants something different, so each submission must be hand catered to fit the requirements of the agency, taking even more time and effort for the same level of response. 

All in all I am convinced that only around 5 people actually read the sample pages that I was sometimes graciously allowed to send with the quarry. And those were generally the responses that came back on time or early.

I'm not blaming the agents themselves, I'm sure they are busy people, I'm blaming the people, the "writers." Somehow somewhere along the line we as people decided that if we can speak the language, than we can write the language. And as much as this may be true for things like texts, and casual or simple work emails, it is not true for the masterpieces of writing. 

Great writers are often born with a gift, and then take that natural talent and hone it with lots and lots of work. In some cases an entire lifetime of writing, only to be recognized for one or two pieces. It takes time to develop voice, tone, mood, vivid word choice, natural rhythm, and those are just some of the simpler parts of good writing. Then there are the more complex things like pacing, character interactions, themes, imagery, emotional tone, and atmosphere which are even harder to convey on the page.

After teaching English for a few years I have part of the reason we think this way, which is related to a mistake that we made a long time ago. We teach English like it is a science or history, we hand out the pieces, study them, and make students write a paragraph about how "tone is a thing which writers use to convey emotion," but what we miss as teachers and students is that writing is an art. Some people are naturally artistic, some people can learn to be artistic, but most of us simply are not ever going to compete with the greats. Unless that is we resolve ourselves to become the next greats. That is the key, to write with great purpose, not just to write because we can. We writers are the guardians of the language, it is in our hands, let us do great things with it.

Sketch: Captain Internet Police 1

Fade in:

Int. Grocery Store - Checkout Line - Day

Various people stand in line holding groceries waiting to check out.

CAP'T, a mid 20's white male casually dressed holding a stack of frozen microwavable pizzas stands in the middle of the line, waiting patiently. Thirty seconds pass as one customer completes their transaction and the line steps forward one pace. Suddenly CAP'T drops all of his groceries, tears open his shirt (he has nothing but a white T-shirt on underneath), cranes his neck sideways, raises an eyebrow, and stares intensely into space (the camera).

CAP'T

Somebody somewhere just posted something erroneous 

though technically not incorrect on the internet. They must be 

made aware of their near error. To Wikipedia!

CAP'T spins around and takes out his phone, he begins typing madly, making a wide range of contorted faces and sweating profusely. The words that CAP'T is furiously typing can now be heard voiced over the sound of the store.

VOICEOVER

Technically the appropriate term is "figuratively" as using

the term "literally" implies that such an event actually

happened and I doubt that you almost died because...

The person in line in front of CAP'T moves forward and completes checking out while this voiceover is going on. The customer behind CAP'T (middle aged Asian man with his arms full of real groceries) begins to fidget and look worried. The customer behind CAP'T begins to look around nervously at other people and eventually taps him on the shoulder.

CUSTOMER

Excuse-

CAP'T

-Don't interrupt me, I'm doing something important!

Hard Cut end scene.

Pathfinder Class Numeric Breakdown

Good morning fellow adventurers. Today I have an odd and incomplete gem to share with you. Several months back my party and I sat down with an odd goal in mind. We knew that Paizo had taken the existing d&d 3.5e classes and generally improved them, but our question was how. What formula did they use to accomplish this. They must have had some form of standard measuring stick as even though all classes received a boost, some got more than others. We figured this had to be more than "it feels like" math and began grinding it out.

The base premise was that it seemed most classes had about 3 major mechanics working within their 20 level bounds. Things like every other level powers, every 4th level powers, and the odd quirk set which made them flavorful but also useful in their field. We began by finding classes that received similar abilities at the same level progressions and counted them as an equal numeric value. Then we broke down the value of each sub-ability based on how many appeared to fill out the set. Below is what we discovered.

MWO Commander Guide

I've been spending a decent amount of time recently on Mech Warrior Online. The game ended up surprising me. I started playing it when it released a few years ago and was not impressed. But after giving it another try recently I was almost impressed. The game has been re-vamped with interface overhauls, gameplay changes, balance fixes, and many other positive changes.

After extensive work with the new version of the game I started taking notes on competitive play and have been writing up a how-to commander guide.

That guide can be found here, please feel free to comment on this post about additions/changes to the guide.

Pathfinder RPG homebrew class (3.5e warlock inspired)

The Augur was born out of the desire for a Pathfinder RPG class that functioned like the D&D 3.5e warlock but without the paradoxically blandness and brokenness of the upcoming "Kineticist." Here is a PDF of the class, it is also available below but beware that Blogger messed up all the formatting.


The Augur
An Augur is a hybrid alternate class which seeks to mesh the abilities of the magus with those of the investigator to explore the darker arcane arts. Augurs seek to understand the connection between magic, reality and the nature of the divine in a more practical way. Either through a dark pact, long-lost red magic, or some form of arcane ritual, Augurs bind a mote of demi-arcane essence within themselves. As an Augur grows in experience she learns how to tap into this godspark, granting her greater and greater control over how she weaves magic with reality. Due to their increased focus on an alternate form of magic, Augurs are less adept at conventional combat and casting than their cousins the magi. Reguardless of the stigma that follows their kind, Augurs choose this path in the hope of one day unlocking the secret to focusing their power, and taking their rightful place among the planes as demigods.

"By Design" a children's short story, DRAFT 1

"By Design" a children's short story, DRAFT 1

Once there was a very special robot. This robot was made with hands and wheels and a network antenna. This robot went through its life happy, feeling the joys of the world around it. It felt hot things and cold things, things that were rough and things that were smooth, things that were soft and things that were hard, and things that were wet and things that were dry. And this robot loved all of the things.

But as it grew it learned to listen with his antenna and began to hear the other robots around it. They mocked it for not being built like they were, not being "complete" like they were. For they told it that they could see with their radar, a component that it did not have.

And so this robot became sad in the knowledge that it was not like the others. It became sad that It could not do what they could, and that it would never be what they were. It did not want to believe them, but it used its hands and felt its face and found no place for sight of any kind.

At this the robot became so sad that it turned off its network card and would not listen or talk to the other robots. It set its wheels to auto and drove until its motors would not carry it any further. It looked for the edge of everything so that it might find a place to hide.

But there at the edge of the world it found something it did not expect. Its wheel got stuck on something that whirred and shook and prevented it from going any further. The robot reluctantly turned on its hands and reached out to move the strange object blocking its path.

The robot soon found this unusual object to be unusually stubborn. Every time it moved the object the object moved back into its path, and it could not continue forward. While it struggled with the strange thing it started to notice how this object felt. The strange object was soft but it was also hard, it had bends and curves and wheels and bumps and divots. It was a shape unlike anything else the robot had ever experienced. And soon it found that this object had an antenna, just like the robot did. The robot turned his antenna on to find that the small thing was trying to talk to it. "Listen" it said, "please listen, there is a ravine ahead and if you are not careful you will fall into it and may break."

"That would be fitting" the robot said, "For I am flawed by design, created different, unable to be what the other robots are. I do not understand why I was made this way, but since I am not what I should be, what harm would it do if I did fall?"

"No" the small robot said, "You are not like them, but who said that you should be? You may not be the same but your designer did love you very much. You are red and blue and gold, filled with bright colors that they do not have."

"What do you mean? How do you know this?" the robot asked.

"Because I am not like them either, though I do not have hands to feel, I have light receptors that see color. And I see that you, in your difference are more beautiful than they are. You are not the same, but you were never meant to be. Turn on your antenna fully and I will turn on mine and I will share with you. I will show you the colors that you cannot see if you will show me what it means to feel, I was designed this way as well and I have never felt anything, yet I have always wished to know what water feels like and sand and sky and light."

The robot heard these words and remembered how much he loved all of the things he did have, he rediscovered his own unique talent and turned on his antenna to share it. As soon as he did and the other robot did the same, the two realized that they would never be incomplete as long as they had each other. And so they stayed together the rest of time and were happy to be different; because it meant that they would always have something beautiful to give that the other would appreciate.

the end.

Back in Action

MyFreedonia will be returning with an all new format. I have decided to re-purpose this old rambly blog in the hopes of creating a forum for stories, thoughts, and writings to blossom. In the past few years I have created much, and it is here that these things will be compiled for you to read and consider.