Posts made by Derp

@auspice said in Good or New Movies Review:

(Though I'm mad at Netflix 'cause how y'all gonna cancel Marco Polo?!)

I'm still salty about Sense8.

@faraday said in World of Darkness -- Alternative Settings:

What I was responding to was @Derp's assertion that in general people would be pissed if you turned up to a game without knowing the system.

Notice, however, two things about my original assertion:

1. There is a difference between theme and game system/mechanics. People don't get pissed as much about theme as they do mechanics.

2. This only tends to fly on WoD or games with an original RPG system in place.

Games using established systems are where this comes into play, and theme / source fiction material is different than mechanics.

@surreality said in World of Darkness -- Alternative Settings:

The really depressing thing? Most of the people playing it still don't know it. I mean, how many times is everything slowed up because somebody has to look something up...

So, this is just my experience, and others may have different takes, but:

That 'tee hee learn it as I go' stuff only really flies with original systems and World of Darkness.

Themes? Sure, there is wiggle room. But basic mechanics? If someone joined a DnD game and didn't have at least a basic grasp of how it works, people would be pissed. Expert level mastery not needed, but a goodly many folks at least know the general gist, even if they have to look stuff up occasionally. That is the expectation.

In WoD games, we get a lot of excuses. "I'm busy and don't have time to read this big book so just teach me!"

No.

Sorry, but I don't think this should fly. This isn't Fate/stay night. You cannot come in wildly unprepared and just have everyone carry your ass until you suddenly become the master through sheer dumb luck. You have to work for that shit man.

This stuff doesn't fly in other systems. Why do we let it fly with this one? Even if the game has a 'know your shit' policy, it's never enforced.

That’s why we get bogged down with it, I think. We treat it like it can be learned through immersion in a day, when it just can't be. We should change that.

But aren't reality levels normally wizard only? Cool idea, but how does that help a player who just wants to ignore one other player in a specific room? Which is what I assume is being asked?

David and I watched Bright as well. I thought it was great, and critics are maybe being a little jaded about it.

I lost my temper at a nurse today. On the one hand, I feel bad. On the other, it's something that I've been wanting to say for a long fucking time now.

This probably doesn't mean much to most of you, but I'm going to vent anyway, and it's going to be a bit long. Sorry.

RANT STARTS HERE:

Every time David goes into the hospital, his doctors put him on contact isolation. Which:

1. Is a huge pain in the ass.

and

2. is ridiculous and utterly unnecessary.

They want people in his room to wear a full isolation gown, gloves, mask, the whole shebang. This sounds like reasonable precautions, until you start to take into account, you know. Reality. Like, for instance, the fact that if he and I were going to share something with each other, we would have already done so before he ever got here.

The mask I can understand. The gloves I can even understand. But the gowns? Ridiculous. I don't fit into them. (My arms are literally too big to get into the sleeves. I can't get them past my elbows.) They adamantly refuse to order a bigger size so that I can get my arms into them. And then they bitch at me for not wearing them.

Uh, ok. Except that I can cite at least ten studies that show that isolation gowns have no benefit when it comes to the reduction of nosocomial respiratory infections, because they're just a ritual part of hygiene control. They don't, by themselves, have any significant association with virus reduction. Hemorrhagic fevers, like ebola? Yes. Not things like coronavirus. The studies which do show some benefit show mixed results at best, and are usually done on infants and toddlers to reduce RSV infection rates (though even those tend to show that cohort nursing tends to be better at prevention). Also understandable.

But gowns for adults? I know they don't work. The nurses know they don't work. His own doctors know they don't work, because one of them published a study last year showing next to no efficacy when gowns are added in addition to masks and gloves.

If you're going to come at me for some bullshit because you won't order the correct sizes of things, after I've shown you for almost a decade that I can't get my arms into them, at least have the decency to acknowledge that it's not the kind of crisis you're pretending it is.

I don't go into the rooms of other patients.
Not that it matters, since I have to take all this shit off before leaving the room, so it literally only applies in here.
And I am in this room long enough that these precautions as a whole are laughably ineffective at keeping me from becoming a carrier, anyway, so if I was gonna mask and gown up, I should be doing that when I leave.

Fuck, man.

Ok, rant over. I'm gonna call the doctors again and ask, again, about getting the bigger gowns. Even though it never happens.

@auspice said in Real World Peeves, Disgruntlement, and Irks.:

I'm doing a tech screening for a possible job.

One of the questions:
'Describe to a non-technical friend how SSL works.'

'No. Just no. Don't do this to yourself or anyone else' should be a valid answer.

For my last IT job, we had a similar question:

"Describe how a modem and router work to a person who has never used a computer."

My answer was: "If they have never used a computer, then they wouldn't be a student here, and since my job would literally be to offer support to IT students, this would be working outside the authorized scope of my employment."

I got the job.

ETA: Most frequent complaint?

"I think so and so is watching porn in the computer lab."

Answer: "Thank you for your concern. However, as explicit materials are frequently assigned as required homework in a number of Kinsey Institute classes, this is an acceptable use of University equipment."

So satisfactory.

@auspice said in Real World Peeves, Disgruntlement, and Irks.:

@derp said in Real World Peeves, Disgruntlement, and Irks.:

@Auspice

This is why you need to punch things softer than walls and more resilient than kittens.

Or, you know, do what I do: makiwara set up in the basement.

What basement?

I would like to (goes back to the whole 'being poor' thing, sadly) get into some form of martial arts class tho.

I took some Aikido recently. It's a biiig change from both the Okinawan martial arts and the Wing Chun I studied previously. I recommend trying out a few, to see where your interests and strengths lie.

Why is Peace Talks not out yet? Sheesh.

@Auspice

This is why you need to punch things softer than walls and more resilient than kittens.

Or, you know, do what I do: makiwara set up in the basement.

@surreality said in World of Darkness -- Alternative Settings:

(I lucked into a crazy wonderful apartment complete with low rent due to a WTF history.)

Stooooooory!!!

@macha said in Real World Peeves, Disgruntlement, and Irks.:

Losing your job the week before Christmas - and them telling you they want you to work until NYE. Having your friend sexting the dude she knows you're building a thing with, and trying to lie to you about it. Same guy being a jerk who can't handle a phone call because he's so stressed out.. when you need someone to talk to about losing your job.

Fuck it.

That sucks majorly.

I was coming here to bitch that we'd be spending Christmas in the hospital this year, but yours sounds like it might score a bit higher on the bullshit-o-meter.

@quinn said in Quinn's Playlist:

Could I be a sentient lawnchair that made herself a person and then went around cursing people to the hell that was my life for crossing me? Is that a thing? That should be a thing.

I've seen stranger.

@surreality said in The Mush Hackathon:

I definitely do not have the brains to even guess at where or how to break things or defend them, really.

Same. This sounds like rad fun. For coders. Not so much for people who can barely get the code to move. I think your teams would be maaaybe 3 on 3, which might be your ideal.

Post the things and let us know how it goes!

@arkandel said in Hobby-related Resolutions/Goals for the coming year... ?:

@misadventure said in Hobby-related Resolutions/Goals for the coming year... ?:

Getting out of this job.

You work for Blizzard. That's the dream!

@misadventure said in Hobby-related Resolutions/Goals for the coming year... ?:

@arkandel It's in Irvine, that's the nightmare.

Both of those sound awful.

I hear Austin is nice though.

@sunny said in Real World Peeves, Disgruntlement, and Irks.:

(anybody heard the 30mph vs 80mph thing, yet? Yeah, the 30mph thing is for freight along that stretch of tracks), and there was not CONCRETE poured on the tracks by Antifa.
Ugh. Ugh ugh. There are hurt people, and 3 people are dead, and yet it is like Christmas for some of these drama llamas who are playing this whole thing up SO HARD.

They are airing a story about it right now, and my super evangelical Republican diehard grandma is -all over it- being a terror attack by <perpetrator changes every sentence>.

@auspice said in RL things I love:

@rook said in RL things I love:

I am really liking HelloFresh.

I tried that (or was it BlueApron?) once. If I could afford it on the reg, you bet I'd have a subscription. I think those services are great for people with busy schedules (or those like me who don't have a car and can't go grocery shopping regularly easily).

David and I got Blue Apron. Man, it was awesome. But alas, I am yet a poor student and cannot afford such things on the regular.

But you can bet this is now my goal.

@taika said in Hobby-related Resolutions/Goals for the coming year... ?:

lil brats wouldn't stop biting my kid >.<

I don't like kids. You handled this better than I would have.

I would have called animal control.

Hopefully they had all their shots.

Right now, I'm working more on RL resolutions. I would like to get back into fitness stuff, but I think I need a trainer, so my game stuff is on hold until I get RL to cooperate.

But I would love to find a reliable block of time to unfreeze at least one of my characters.

In NWoD, I'm pretty sure it's Life 5 + Matter 4. No Prime necessary.