Best posts made by Killer Klown

Cranberry Apple Compote

Ingredients
2 cups apple cider
6 tablespoons light corn syrup
½ cup plus 2 tablespoons panela
(*- I'm a sugar snob. See below)
8 tablespoons (1 stick) unsalted butter
3 Granny Smith apples, peeled, cored, cut into 1/2-inch pieces
2 cups cranberries (fresh or frozen)
3 teaspoons ground cinnamon
3 teaspoons ground nutmeg
¾ teaspoon ground clove
¾ teaspoon ground allspice

*- Panela is an unrefined sugar you can usually find in Caribbean or Latin American markets. It's generally sold in 'cones', but you can get it ground as well (sometimes sold as 'evaporated cane juice'). If you can't find it, turbinado or Demerara works almost as well. It's different than 'brown' sugar in that, in brown sugar, the molasses is refined out then added back in - in the raw sugars, it's never removed in the first place. If you can't find any of these, 1/2 cup of white + 2 tbsp of dark brown will work, but the syrup won't be as rich or flavorful.

I also tend to grind the whole spices rather than buy pre-ground. They pack more of a punch and last longer on the shelf.

Preparation
Whisk apple cider, corn syrup, cinnamon, nutmeg, clove, allspice and 2 tablespoons (brown, if you're using it) sugar in heavy large saucepan. (I use a cast iron Dutch oven)
Boil over high heat until reduced to 1 cup, about 15 minutes.
Add butter; whisk until melted.
Add apple pieces to the reduced syrup, cook for 2-3 min.
Add cranberries and ½ cup (white) sugar. Stir until cranberries begin to pop, about 2 minutes.
Boil until reduced to syrup consistency, about 6 minutes.
Stir in more sugar, if desired. (Can be made 1 day ahead. Cover and refrigerate. Stir over medium heat until heated through.)
Transfer compote to bowl and serve warm.

I've got three generations of engineer in me (Structural, mechanical, and electrical). My dad <electrical> was going for his masters when I was a kid in the late 70s'/early 80s; so I always had breadboards, vacuum tubes, relays and copper-etched circuit boards lying around the house. I just remember thinking the relays and tubes were really cool looking - like little cities or buildings under glass. I remember he once pulled a cathode ray tube out of an old TV (Which involved, I shit you not, shooting the screen with a bb gun until it shattered - did I mention my family are basically South American rednecks?) and let me play with it. Plus he got me watching re-runs of Star Trek.

Heh. I think we ended up deciding, on Fallcoast, that our characters would get along famously if we ever met - except we never actually got around to meeting. I was Jericho.

@Derp But I don't want any of that. I'd rather... I'd rather ... just ... sing.

@Lotherio And hobos. We really can't dismiss the 'hobo' part of our murderhobo genealogy

Wow. Elendor. That's a name I've not heard in a long time.
A long time.

Ahem. But yes, hello; we were kind of married on TR <.<

I suppose the only thing I have to interject into this list is, when it comes to favorite squadmates, for me the list is less about which game had the best as it goes something like
#1> The Krogan
#2> The Turian

It really didn't matter which game they were in, whichever squadmate was one of those races was, inevitably, awesome. Though that being said, my favorite squadmate of the entire series in terms of personality and personal story still has got to be Legion. Legion was freaking awesome.

@Ghost said in Cyberrun:

@Admiral CP2077 might reinvigorate the genre on film and prompt Shadowrun to up their A-game.

Or put Shadowrun in a coffin. Who knows. You're right, though. CP2077 will boom and draw interest to the genre.

I used to like Shadowrun more than CP, hands down - up until about SR3rd edition. 4th was ok, but it really went downhill after FASA went under. At this point, I'd be just as happy to see it buried.

Holy crap CrystalMUSH. I was Elrick there once upon a long time ago <psycho sadistic medic>; though I don't remember if we ever tripped over one another.

Modification of an old beef stew recipe. It works best in a cast iron Dutch oven; but if you don't have one do all your cooking in a cast iron skillet, then transfer the bits into a stew pot after deglazing the pan with the beer. You can substitute beef or chicken chunks if you don't feel like eating Bambi.

Ingredients
4 slices bacon, cut into small pieces
2 1/2 pounds boneless venison, cut into 1 to 2-inch pieces
1 teaspoon salt, or more to taste
freshly ground black pepper to taste
2 onions, coarsely chopped
1/2 teaspoon salt
4 cloves garlic, minced
1 (14.9 ounce) can dark beer (such as Guinness)
1/4 cup tomato paste
4 sprigs fresh thyme
3 carrots, cut into 1-inch pieces
2 stalks celery, cut into 1-inch pieces
1/2 teaspoon freshly ground black pepper, or to taste
2 1/2 cups chicken stock, or as needed to cover
4 cups mashed potatoes (optional)

Directions
Cook and stir bacon in a heavy Dutch oven over medium-high heat until bacon is browned and crisp, 3 to 4 minutes. Turn off heat and transfer bacon to layered paper towels, reserving bacon fat in the pot.

Season venison cubes generously with 1 teaspoon salt and black pepper to taste. Turn heat to high under Dutch oven and sear beef pieces in the hot fat on both sides until browned, about 5 minutes. Remove meat and place in large bowl with bacon. Turn heat down to medium; cook and stir onions in the retained fat until lightly browned, 5 to 8 minutes; season with a large pinch of salt.

Cook garlic with onions until soft, about 1 minute; pour beer into pot and stir with a wooden spoon, scraping up and dissolving any browned bits of food into the liquid. Add meat/bacon mixture (or transfer everything to a stew pot if you're not cooking in a Dutch oven). Stir in tomato paste, thyme sprigs, carrots, celery, sugar, 1/2 teaspoon black pepper, and enough chicken broth to cover.

Bring stew to a gentle simmer, stirring to combine; reduce heat to low and cover pot. Simmer stew until meat is fork-tender, about 2 hours. Stir stew occasionally and skim fat or foam if desired.

Remove cover and raise heat to medium-high. Bring stew to a low boil and cook until stew has slightly thickened, 15 to 20 minutes. Remove and discard thyme sprigs and adjust salt and pepper to taste.

Arrange mashed potatoes in a ring in a serving bowl; ladle stew into the center of the potatoes.

@Ghost I would too, truth be told; but I think SR is being hobbled by the business <or lack thereof> behind the scenes. It was bad before, but Catalyst labs is a shitshow in the best of circumstances; and they got it after it had already gone through the wringer from Wizkids to Fanpro to freaking Topps.

@Auspice Yeah, it's actually not on menu here either; but they have Moscow Mules out the wazoo cause we also have a lot of things called 'gastropubs'. So I'm usually just like "So, you have some really kinda dark rum, right? Make me a mule with that instead of vodka."
And they look at me like I'm the Claw from Toy Story or something.

Now, now. Don't get all Crabby...
Ahem. But seriously, Battletech was my first gaming system - like, I started with a couple of the books still bearing the 'Battledroids' name in the early/mid-80s. I always loved how unique the mythos and technology was; for example, jumpship travel is actually instantaneous; but jumps can only cover so much distance, and it takes weeks to recharge between jumps. Or the fact that the mech reactors run on water as part of hydrogen fission - which makes it one of the most valuable resources in the galaxy. Or the fact that as far out as humanity has explored it's never come across another sentient race.

Yeah. I remember even before the deaths she had put in a call for people to help out with administrative stuff in Werewolf. I like the game and like Wendigo enough that it was, for the first time in close to fifteen years, I was tempted to break my rule of never staffing ever again just to help her out. Things have been going rough for the staffers in general, and the game is much larger than they probably expected it to be given how dead Reno 1 got in the last few months.

@Auspice said in Shadows Over Reno:

The only mistake I really think has been made? They should have waited longer to allow alt applications. I think a week was too short a window: it should've been more like a month, what with the RL issues.

I agree, but I thought it was just my personal views on it coloring my perception - I'm notoriously low on the alt-importance idea; usually only play one character per game, and the most I've had anywhere active has been three. It's not because I have anything against them so much as I don't usually have time to devote to more than one.

Also, definitely yes. People do tend to forget that people on games - players and staffers - do tend to have outside lives. The game and their responsibility to it tends to take a back seat to RL, as it should; so sometimes stuff gets pushed to the back of the line. So long as staff keeps people updated as to why things are going slow <which, to my observations, they have been> it's all good.

@SG In that case, it needs to also use the GMC Overly Specific Condition "Don’t Have Any Clues but the Plot Needs to Move Forward"

Honestly, I never saw a point in restricting the merit; for supernaturals, there are some professions that just don't work; but there are others where they should be better than the average human simply because of what they are (I have yet to hear a justificaiton as to why a Werewolf would not be a better, say, hunter or survivalist than a human would in terms of skills).
That said, though, I think CoD did it the absolutely right way in that they didn't restrict it - but they made it less attractive for supernaturals to have.
For my money, I was never really interested in the Rote action bit; it requires a WP Spend flat out, and is difficult to use in combat <I agree with preventing it's use in that case - combat is far too chaotic a scenario to rely on 'rote' ability by skill alone. Supernatural influence, sure; but not through training> The contacts were throwaway, the skill/spec bonuses were nice but nothing over the top - and less so in COD where they are only 1 or 2 xp points each regardless of what level they actually boost the stat to. Given you're paying a point for that dot of merit anyway, the gain is minimal.
Also, Supers tend to have ways to get the 8 or 9 again on their own. Any starting Rahu has the ability to get 8-again on their brawl or weaponry rolls, werewolves have a merit that will give them 9-again on one of their Auspice favored skills, etc. I don't know Vampire as well, but I'm sure they have similiar things. I know Mage still has Fate - which means they have all sorts of dice hacking abilities.

All told, PT in CofD isn't necessarily restricted from Supernaturals to take -there's simply far less reason for them to take it if they're just trying to buff dice.

Edit: Just in case people weren't aware, CofD changed a few things about PT - in addition to things being a flat cost by level. Most importantly, where it does reduce cost, it's significantly less of a reduction than the original.

• Networking Contacts •• relating to profession.
•• Continuing Education Choose two Asset Skills relating to profession. Take 9-Again to roll Asset Skills.
••• Breadth of Knowledge Choose a third Asset Skill. Distribute two new Specialties among your Asset Skills.
•••• On the Job Training Raise one Asset Skill by one dot. Take a beat when you buy dots in Asset Skills.
••••• The Routine Spend one Willpower to apply the rote quality to an Asset Skill roll.

Yeah, so one thing I've been noticing as CofD gets more and more mature... they're moving away from specific mechanics in pretty obvious ways. What I mean by this is that the dice are truely becoming secondary to the system; you use them to cover cinematic accomplishments or dramatic events, but not for any nitty-gritty, granular activities. As mentioned, much of this is covered in how vague the skills are (Crafts, Academics and Athletics are some of the worst) but it's seeping into other things as well - have a look at the Hurt Locker writeup on firearms if you haven't already. They don't even have ammo counts anymore; it basically boils down to a handwaggle and a 'yeah, you can keep firing until either you screw up, or go all cheerleader in a zombie movie and spray your load all at once' If all you're doing is plinking off one shot from your sidearm every round? You can keep doing it until the proverbial cows come home and kick the pigs into orbit. Range is handled in much the same loosey-goosey kind of way; it's based on positioning rather than the gun itself, and 'movement' is a relative calculation that more factors in how many rounds it would take a person of x speed to cover a range band, rather than any specific numbers.

Bottom line? I think all the vaguery is by design. There's a definite sense, at least in my mind, that someone got it into their head that they're never going to make a realistic system with the mechanics provided, so they just went with something easy and more or less minimalist. Broad skill categories? Cut down on sheet bloat. Vague weapons? It's CofD, not Cyberpunk. 8-again, 9-again, etc? Some things are just easier to use or luckier than others - and it offsets the standardized difficulty number. As was mentioned, neither of these things makes it more likely that you will succeed or less likely that you will fail in a simple roll - it just makes it more likely that you'll succeed well, or win at a contested roll because you have an edge.
Rote and, less used, Advanced Action are a slightly stickier point - but both of those basically are to reflect that you're probably going to succeed on whatever it is you're doing, but still leaves at least a little room for the dice hating you and having you fail.

Same. I also liked the proposed way they were going to handle generation - in that it provides a bonus to the mechanic of how often you can safely Rouse the Blood, but a penalty to the amount of blood you 'regain' through feeding. Having your Clan Weaknesses play in to your psychology the way they do, as opposed to just being an outside mechanic, was also pretty cool.

In truth, the Hunger mechanic feels like what they kept trying (and failing) to do with Paradox in Mage. It's an over-arching thing that affects everything you do, and becomes more threatening the more often you use your supernatural abilities. It's not a sliding scale or a meter, given that the hunger dice replace dice in your pool rather than being rolled separately or being added/subtracted from pool numbers. It's something that's always in the background, always a threat, and grows more intense the more often you call on your supernatural nature while,at the same time, not being limited to affecting just supernatural things.