Patrick’s Realm

I’ve always hated online memberships.  There is something about easily signing up for a service online that makes it feel cheap, unreliable and useless.  Additionally, I know there are places where I’ve signed up to download a file or view a post and have never returned; there is little value to what they are providing for my 3 minutes spent on providing a username and checking my e-mail.

Facebook has been a time sink of a service that offers little reward.  This is compounded by the fact that my wife is on Facebook and is friends with everyone I would care to contact.  If something important is going on, all I have to do is put up with the “If you where on Facebook, you would know that…” nag (similar to watching the “buy the product” nag on a demo) and I get the information I need w/o having to spend a one time time fee signing up and pay a daily time tax to check and update it.  (Side note – my wife genuinely enjoys Facebook, and while that puzzles me I don’t feel bad about getting information through her since she isn’t miserable doing it)

While having a quick re-connect with old acquaintances is neat, trading buttons, flair and simple virtual world goods with them doesn’t excite me (although I can see why it’s addicting).  I don’t even like the idea of being able to catch up on people’s lives of whom I’m too busy to visit in the real world.  Staying current with my family scattered across the US, is awesome, but paint me arrogant for trying to stay current with an old friend who lives 30min away online because I feel like my time is too important to go have a cup of coffee with them.

I’ve recently considered getting a Facebook account and simply feeding it my tweets (which would include my blog posts), but I would be participating on one-way communication w/o checking Facebook, too.  If I had another reason to log in and check the status of my Facebook account, something of value, then I would do it.

Curse Sid Meier for creating that value.  From the Sid Meier’s Civilization Network Facebook page:
I wanted to let you know we’ll soon be looking for beta testers to help us develop a unique new way to play Civilization. Ever since we finished Civilization® Revolution™ last year, I’ve been looking at ways of expanding the Civ gameplay experience to include solo, competitive and cooperative play to take advantage of the uniqueness of social networks. We’re calling this project Civilization® Network™ and the full game will be available next year on Facebook. Civilization Network will allow you to join together with your friends to create the world’s most powerful, richest, smartest, or just plain coolest civilization. You can coordinate your strategy to win great battles, share your technology to jump ahead of your rivals, lobby your family and friends to form your own government and win vital elections, manage and grow your cities to maximize production and happiness, spy on your enemies, and work with your friends to create the great Wonders of the World. The game will offer everything you enjoy in Civ in a fully persistent environment – you can play as much as you like, whenever you like, and it’ll be free to play.

The Civilization series (fun fact: first link in Google for “civilization”) is a fantastic turn-based strategy game where you assume the role of leader of a simple tribe in charge of developing them through civilization to the heights of human accomplishment.  In addition to providing food and shelter to your followers, you protect them, educate them, entertain them, and architect the great wonders of the world.  In the stand-alone game, you aim to be the first civilization to launch a spaceship and reach the distant solar system Alpha Centauri (note there is no real space exploration – your success stems directly from how many resources your civilization can generate to build the spaceship).

If that was all I wanted, I could install my copy of Civilization III or download Freeciv and get to it.  But Civilization Network’s human interaction via Facebook is what has me excited.  I see great value in being able to coordinate with others to create something larger and exchange ideas about an area of interest.  If I can do that with friends I don’t share a compatible real-world skill-set with, even better.  All communication and idea exchanges facilitate real world growth, and that’s something I can get behind.

Now lets hope Civ Network lives up to this lofty dream I have for it.

Just a quick note: the comments on my site seem to have gotten a mind of their own and either won’t appear where they should or don’t claim to appear where they should.  There are comments under my post about PodCamp, and I intend to get back to everyone soon.  I have a family emergency to participate in, then I will get to replying and finding out why my comments are misbehaving…

October 11th and 12th witnessed over 300 Pittsburgh geeks inhabit the Art Institute of Pittsburgh for the 4th annual PodCamp Pittsburgh. (Browse for #pcpgh4 on Twitter if you are interested to see the conversations that occurred during the event)  All-told, the event was awesome to the max. I’ve had time to digest my notes on the speakers I listened to, and wanted to pass my insights to those who did not attend this FREE event.

1. Giants Standing on the Backs of Giants
My wife and I agreed that if you where a novice to the social media world, you didn’t have much of a place here. I’ve had a blog since before I knew they where called blogs, and I still felt a little on the outside. My wife has only gotten a blog this past week (no, she has no posts), and while they did have courses labeled Blogging 101, she couldn’t relate to much that was going on.

2. Software Engineers Are a Rare Breed
I didn’t meet all 300ish attendees, but I didn’t find a single programmer there in conversation. I’m sure there where one or two, but most fancied themselves as designers, professional bloggers, or entertainers of some sort. Makes me feel special to know that I could possibly have talent that is in such high demand!

3. Facebook Isn’t Useless
Save LinkedIn, I’ve ignored social networking sites. If I don’t have time to check in with most of my friends or acquaintances, why would I bother to cyber-stalk them? But applications like Facebook still have what marketers want most – consumers. Mearly having a fan group in Facebook (or the equivalent in other sites) gains you access to many people via posting entries on the wall.

4. No One Knows Clicks Are Useless
A popular topic among bloggers is monetization. Everyone seems to think that you can just grab Ad Sense, learn the secret spots to put the ads, then sit back and retire. The half-smart people realize this is crap; they think you can’t make money with a blog. While I realize this is a case of “teaching because I can’t do”, I’m telling you that to make money on a blog, you need to promote products and sell them for the company. I’ll leave the explanations to others, but just as impressions gave way to clicks, clicks are giving way to leads. If you want to make money, follow suit.

5. Make The In-Crowd You Want
To truely have a following, you have to offer more than your blog or social media item of choice. Once you get an audience going, let them in on little secrets: in-jokes, ‘private’ videos, alternate posts, whatever you can think of. Make these extras “hard” to get to. “Hard”, as in not promoted through your primary media choice. Have a Twitter account you rarely talk about in your blog, and post links to embarrassing/beautiful/artsy/personal photos from your flickr account. Go nuts, and make your fans feel like they are in on it.

6. Don’t Be a Downer
A lot of people had negative opinions of one particular presentation, and I fit into that category. I don’t know what these 3 people did, but they turned what could have been a great topic into a stinker. The main culprit? They where telling people in social media to censor themselves. More specifically, they where telling people to not look desperate and to simply censor what they type. I’m willing to bet that while you read that, you either go “Well, duh” or “Don’t tell ME what to do!” Either reaction is right in my book. I think the closing note by Justin Kownacki addressed this better when he said something to the effect: If you want to be an ass online, that’s fine! Realize that people will think you are an ass.

7. Give!
Give back to the community. This applies to you even if you arn’t interested in blogs, Twitter, and social networking. Join an organization or volunteer your time in a way that means something to you and make your world better. I’m not eligent enough with words to convince you that this is the key to happiness, so if you are glossing over this, thanks for being a drain on society, douche.

The videos and other material of the sessions will be posted online within the week, and I will share them with you when they are available.

One of my biggest gripes about social media and Web 2.0 is the massive amount of registrations you are forced to go through.  I understand that each service has it’s own database that needs fed, but you couldn’t drink as many glasses of water in a day as the number of forms I’ve filled out (one reason being, that much water would kill you).  OpenID tried to fix this, but no one seems to know what that is, much less implement it on their registration forms.

That is where you need to piggy-back off of the work of a social media and semantic web nut, like Glenn Jones, and make your registration forms seek out your potential user’s information using the new toolkit, Ident Engine.  Glenn has taken advantage of Digg, Twitter and 70+ other social sites’ markup and created a tool that will scour the net for publicly available information, given a link to an individual’s profile page.

Since re-inventing the wheel is discouraged among programmers, I direct you to an article on A List Apart that explains what is going on.

I planned to develop a little tutorial to show you, but the darn thing is to easy to use.  For the most part, you call the global object’s search() function, passing in the URL of the profile page, and then you wait.  You have to use JQuery (which I’m not happy about… gotta fix that), as the object continually throws update events as it pulls in more data from other sites.  From that point on, you simply pull the most commonly found data from the object, and presto!  A completed registration form!

Note: only issue I found was the search function won’t execute correctly if you have it run automatically at the bottom of the page; put the request in an event handler.  If you are using JQuery, that shouldn’t be an issue.

This isn’t the only use for the toolkit, of course.  You can use it as a generic identity checker, as filler for NPC information in some new age Web 2.0 game, to pull information about people you find on various Google Maps applications, assist in screening job applicants…  What other uses can you think of?

I’m very excited to get more familiar with Ident Engine.  I’m planning on using it to make my registration forms more friendly for people who visit the net often, and I encourage you to do the same.

A new demo is up for my web game in development, BrightLance.  The demo itself is a lite version of combat.  Go check it out.  I’ll be adding to it soon.

Recently a little known (but accomplished) game critic going by “Reverend” Anthony Burch released his most recent rant concerning art in video games.  If you haven’t followed the topic, art in games has been an issue comes around “every 2 months” that’s primary stances are “we need games to touch the heart of the human experience” and “games need to be fun, period.”  If you don’t want to visit Destructoid and see the HD YouTube of the show, look below:

For those of you who didn’t watch it, Anthony goes on to mention that developers need to branch out and add more art and human condition to their games.  Anthony implies that companies don’t do it because all they care about is money, but if they want the medium to be worth anything later they have to do it.

David Jaffe, mostly known for Twisted Metal and God of War, felt the need to fire back at Anthony:

The one-liner to his video?  Screw you; we can’t do it yet, so shut up.
Anthony replies to his video.  While the part I want to nit-pick about isn’t a direct reply to Jaffe, I want to talk about this specific quote:

…nobody could turn something like Passage into a longer, $60, “real” game?

I don’t buy it.

If five-minute artgames can speak to the human condition through gameplay alone — and I’d argue that they can — then a hefty amount of the theoretical work is already done. Games like Today I Die and Passage prove that interactivity on its basest levels can evoke an emotional or intellectual reaction unlike any found in other, established artforms. If you can get a button press to make players cry in five minutes, you can make it do the same thing over a period of hours — it’s just much, much harder.

Let me do my comparison between art in other mediums and art in games…  While there are plays that last hours and many movements to some musical pieces, some art is more compact.  Such as the first movement to Mozart’s 40th, or a poem by impresionist William Carlos Williams, of a painting by Vincent van Gogh.  These unquestionably artistic pieces of media have the potential to last minutes – it depends on how long you wish to take it in.  While music has a definate length, or a poem a specific amount of words, so does a current-age artgame.  If you wish for the feeling to stick with you long all you have to do is think about the piece. You can always go back and take the piece in again by listening, reading or looking at it as appropriate.

Artgames are in exactly the same state.  Go ahead and play one of the games linked in the quote (Today I Die can be played in-browser).  If it struck a cord with you, I’d bet you kept the feeling with you for a few minutes.  If you wanted, you can go back and experience the game again.  Your degree of knowledge of the game would hinder it only as far as it would in any other art form available to you today.

My point is simply this: we don’t need to make artgames longer – they are all ready here and are beging you to expirience them rather than bicker about them.

But perhaps the authors of these games need to die first… *shrug*

I watched an intriguing talk on TED by Peter Donnelly, a statistician with a specialty in genes, that spawned some thinking about deck building.  The talk it about 20min and I highly encourage you to watch it – but if you arn’t in the mood, let me spoil a little of it for you.

Peter talks about a simple coin-flipping exercise.  One side of the room is interested in getting a combination of HTT (heads, tailss, tails), while the other half of the room is interested in getting the combination HTH.  Statistically speaking, everyone believed that after a large enough data set, both combinations would have an equal chance of appearing.  Additionally, Peter asked the question of which combination will appear first?  Nearly everyone thought (as I did) that they would occur, on the average, at the same time in every test.  This was wrong: HTT appeared first because of it’s pattern vs HTH.  However, if you where looking for HTT and you have your first H and first T and then are delt a H you are effecitvly starting over; if you where looking for HTH and have HT a second T would be devastating, but a second H would not only complete your pattern but give you opporunity to start a new one.

Peter talked more about this and how it relates to his specialty, but for our purposes the point is made: when you stand back and look at the entire deck, one set of card choices may very well be equally powerful as another, but that doesn’t mean that it will produce results for you as fast or as concentrated as you might expect.  This is profound.  This explains why Kitchen Finks are better than, say, Nyxathid in a Death Cloud deck.

Kitchen Finks

Before Death Cloud: 3/2 creature and +2 Life vs X/X creature OR no creature

After Death Cloud: 2/1 creatue and +2 Life vs no creature OR Y/Y creature

Do you see how Kitchen Finks provides card advantage over Nyxathid?  It pratically plays itself a 2nd time after the cloud goes off.  Additionally, it is covering up two of cloud’s weaknesses (you loosing creatures and you loosing life).  A 7/7 monster after a board wipe is scary, but at the cost of a Thoughtsieze/Distress followed by a Deathcloud THEN to draw Nyxathid… you are making things complicated for the sake of a big stompy that can be removed or mitigated easily (Path to Exile, Bitterblossom).  Do you see the HTH vs HHT pattern?

The obvious pattern of choice with a card like Death Cloud is HTH.  So, what else goes good with Deathcloud other than the obvious Tarmagoyf?  Lets look at Deathgreeter first.  Pretty mediocre when you first play it.  You wouldn’t want to use it to block: basically this guy stops you from loosing most if not all of the life to cloud.  But now we’re thinking.

Toshiro Umezawa is an interesting pick.  At 3/3 while blocking, he can beat back smaller opponents.  And if your deck is set up correctly, you will be slinging spells at the opponent (including instants that where in your hand just a second ago – read the order of the card).  Getting warmer, but this guy requires a specially tooled Death Cloud deck compared to what we’re use to.

Dusk Urchins

Dusk Urchins has to be my favorite.  You want to use him to block, and you can use him for a swing or two.  This guy is good for one to two cards after Death Cloud.  How much better does it get?  That is a HTH if I’ve ever seen one.

Lastly, cards like Deadly Grub, Dregscape Zombie, Golgari Thug and Nether Traitor need to be mentioned.  While not the biggest bang for your buck, all provide decent answers to the lack of creatures after the cloud goes off while providing potential beforehand.

Take this knowledge and grow, my young friend!  When you start winning cash prizes, e-mail me and I’ll give you my address so I can collect my fair share.

I’ve been facing an onslaught of people demanding I join a social networking site.  I all ready have a LinkedIn account that I give no attention to, so I see no reason to make a Facebook account that I would never use.  I am of a dying breed, however.

While I have not caved into the requests for a REAL social networking account, I have joined the relatively useless but addictive community of Twitter.  The account is seven hours old and all ready I have 13 tweets.

Follow me at http://twitter.com/deltran!

Rip-Clan Crasher

I played a few hands with my RB Deathcloud deck today.  It was not a good time.

RG Aggro

The first deck I played against used Rip-clan Crashers and cards like Lightning Talons and Giant Growth to overrun an opponent quickly.  It came out the gate swinging, but fell apart late-game.

Game 1

I have 12 cards dedicated to creature control ON TOP OF Deathcloud – should be a scince, right?  WRONG.  The deck fell apart.  I thew down an early deathcloud, but he recovered before I could even draw one Infest.  Night-night.

Game 2

My opponent had nothing useful during game 2.  It was a cake walk.  I walk way from the 2nd round the winner.  It is as this point we bid farewell to the matchup and I move on to the next deck.

Multicolor Enchantment Control

This deck is composed mostly of enchantments.  It uses Collective Restraignt and Honden of Cleansing Fire to hold off the opponent long enough to bring out multiple shrines – including Honden of Life’s Web for token generation – followed by a Titanic Ultimatum.  It is a very powerful deck, and I knew I didn’t have much of a chance against a deck who I couldn’t remove cards for.

Collective Restraint

Game 1

This round went well.  I won by deathclouding two demigods into my graveyard just to summon them back with a third demigod of revenge.  I used Deathcloud to get me the other 5 I needed.  I used all of my creature control cards on Chrome Mox.  The nature of this enchantment deck lends it to have a very uneventful game until later, so I tried to not give him a chance.

Game 2

Although Thought Hemmorhage and Distress removed 3 of the 4 Collective Restraints, I didn’t see one demigod until the game was his.  I was left with a hand full of creature control.  It was a long game, and I went through half a deck before he finally had enough of a lock-down between his single Collective Restraing and two Hondens for my lone demigod to matter.

Conclusion

My version of RB Deathcloud needs a second win condition.  Some opponents can play around 3 Deathclouds, and while I always had tons of mana with this deck, I only had one real way to win the game.  While potent, I obviously can’t depend on Demigod for the win.  Bituminous Blast wasn’t a factor in these games and probably needed to sit out in the second set of games.

I will attemt a few more times to make this a viable deck.  With powerhouses like Thought Hemmorhage and Demigod of Revenge, it has great bones.  I’ll keep you updated as it progresses before I move onto a different Deathcloud variant using some BIG cards from Alara Reborn.

So Arcane Power is out.  I’m a bad fanboy and haven’t bought the book yet, but I did take the liberty of updating the Character Builder.  If you haven’t noticed, I’ve been chomping at the bit to do some RPGAing with a Cosmic Sorcerer.  I’m disappointed that character builder doesn’t have the 1st level daily power the preview article had, but otherwise my crunch-tastic dragonborn cosmic sorcerer is better than I imagined him to be.

====== Created Using Wizards of the Coast D&DI Character Builder ======
Marzanix, level 1
Dragonborn, Sorcerer
Spell Source: Cosmic Magic

FINAL ABILITY SCORES
Str 18, Con 11, Dex 13, Int 8, Wis 10, Cha 18.

STARTING ABILITY SCORES
Str 16, Con 11, Dex 13, Int 8, Wis 10, Cha 16.

AC: 16 Fort: 14 Reflex: 11 Will: 16
HP: 23 Surges: 6 Surge Value: 5

TRAINED SKILLS
Arcana +4, Diplomacy +9, Intimidate +11, Athletics +9

UNTRAINED SKILLS
Acrobatics +1, Bluff +4, Dungeoneering, Endurance, Heal, History +1, Insight, Nature, Perception, Religion -1, Stealth +1, Streetwise +4, Thievery +1

FEATS
Level 1: Armor Proficiency (Leather)

POWERS
Sorcerer at-will 1: Blazing Starfall
Sorcerer at-will 1: Dragonfrost
Sorcerer encounter 1: Ray of the Moon
Sorcerer daily 1: Ice Javelins

ITEMS
Leather Armor, Implement, Staff, Adventurer’s Kit
====== Created Using Wizards of the Coast D&DI Character Builder ======

It killed me to have a 13 Dex, but I needed it for Dual Implement Spellcaster (gain bonus if carrying 2nd implement in off-hand).  Like-wise the Ice Javelins is meh, but if I’m going to use Draconic Spellcaster (+hit with powers matching breath weapon element) to good effect, it’ll have to stay.

On a tangent, what is the deal with cold getting so much of the spot light?  Fire use to be the trendy element, then suddenly Ice turned all Hot Topic and is an attention whore now.  I’ve liked cold-themed casters for years, but now I just look trendy.  I feel like people are giving me the same criticizing eye given to people who claim they liked Elmo BEFORE he was popular…