-=SKArface=-

CPU: P4 3.4 (w/ HT active) MEM: 2G (Dual DDR2) DRIVES: 300 G Seagate (main drive) 250 G Maxtor (misc) VIDEO: Radeon X850 (XT) SOUND: onboard AC97 HD (soundblaster didn't work for me) DISPLAY: 2 x Sceptre 20" LCDs (1680x1050 on both, dvi on primary, vga on secondary) Currently running the Omega 3.8.273 drivers on the video card My current best 3dmark05 score 3Dmark05 Profile I also have an old 1.??? AMD box that I dork around with linux on. It's currently running Dapper Drake (ubuntu) But it had been running Gentoo for a long time before that. (wanted to play with a new distro) I'm probabbly going to re-install gentoo on it at some point. I'm not a huge ubuntu fan, solid distro, but I like more control.

Thanks! I was looking for something to use my audible credits on. - andrew

Yah. Some books I've loved that I consider s/f (I lump horror into here as well) Song of Ice and Fire series (George RR Martin) Ender's Game/Speaker for the Dead (Orson Scott Card) I've heard most of the books in the Ender/Bean world are pretty good Hyperion/The Fall Of Hyperion/Endymion/The Rise of Endymion (Dan Simmons) I haven't read these in a while but I remember really liking them Dark Tower series (Steven King) I'm really not a huge king fan, but I really liked the series (book 1 was a little weak though) Swan Song (Robert R McCammon) I really remember enjoying many of his books, again, I haven't read him in ages The Diamond Age (Neal Stephenson) Also, Snow Crash, and Cryptonomicon (sp?) I REALLY liked all of these books. I haven't been able to get much traction into the quicksilver books though American Gods (Neil Gaiman) This book and the related book "The Anansi Boys" were both really neat. A very interesting take on legend, myth, and modern society. I've read the first few books out of the Robert Jordan series. It's OK. They just feel needlessly long and lacking focus Sadly, I don't really have the time to read as much as I once did. I spend a ton of time reading for work and when I get home I'm generally pretty braindead. However, I do listen to books driving to and from work (unabridged only) . If any of you like audiobooks and have an iPod I HIGHLY reccomend audible. For around 20 bucks a month you get 2 audio books per month. They have a very good selection of sf/f

Thanks for the update. I really appreciate it.

Ice, are any of the other maps we've been playing yours? - andrew

First off. . . /me loves teh NOFX, I listen to punk in drublic almost weekly. I always thought woot was a corruption of the noises that the grunts made in warcraft II. It always sounded like they were saying woort woort woort. . . . The wow loot thing make sense too. . . .

There were some questionable sprays and some language, seemed to be increasing at the time I posted but settled down shortly afterwards. Go figure. - andrew

Nothing in particular but things are "drifting" a little.

As I do every so often I go and try new games (been playing planetside, good game, worth checking out). I finally needed some good old scopeless. Good to be playing again. - andrew

I've had my "fun ruined" by getting owned by people who are far better than I am. It gets frustrating. I log off, do something else, and come back to get my butt kicked later. Is this e-thuggery? or is it just being out played? Both CS and DoD are objective based games. In DoD the goal is to take all of the flags. As M2 pointed out, taking the opposing spawn is a very effective way of meeting this goal (if you have no resistance the flags can be grabbed in seconds). If the lock was not being used to achieve this goal (like Ts camping on a defuse map) then I think there is an issue. I have been in more than my share of spawn/die/spawn/die cycles on DoD, 1942, and DC. It is not particularly fun, about as fun as going 0-19 in CS. In both cases I (or my team) were vastly out-played. All that said, I am more than happy to play by whatever policy is set for the GC DoD server. - andrew

By boosting I'm assuming you are talking about someone jumping on someone else to get to a high point not normally acessible. If this is something else ignore the rest of this post. I played DoD on BFE for about a year. A very effective tactic to win the map was to keep the opposing team from spawning. Most teams defended against this. If someone got into our spawn the first thing that we did was pull back and clean them out. The BFE rounds would be scored by the total number of points scored during a 24 hour run on a map. I.E. we would never take the last flag if we had a lock. We would let points accumulate. My feeling on spawn camping has always been, if you don't want it to happen to you stop the opposing team from doing it. If there is an exploit being used to accomplish the lock then that is a different issue (i.e. tank sitting in a hanger in pre-patch bf 1942) If they had to boost to get the lock they were sitting ducks for a bit. Someone should have shot one or both of them. my .02 -andrew

11FE is 4606 Anyway, 4631

You probabbly need to add ram. I would go at least 1G.

I would actually not format your entire drive as one big partition. IMO it makes a little more sense to format a partition for your documents and settings seperately. That way you can re-install the OS without blowing away your documents etc. Makes the whole re-install process a little less painful. On non windows boxes you can even leave your programs in a seperate partition so you don't have to re-install all your programs. However, with the registry that just doesn't work. *sigh* Another thing to consider is one you have a base install with all of your apps and drivers etc. (basically, once you have your machine configured the way you like it) Take a ghost image of your drive (or use some bare metal backup software) so you can return to a decent baseline quickly. - andrew

11FE

How come no one ever accuses me of cheating? Some nights I'll rack up 4 or 5 kills in a few hours. - andrew

goot points. I may setup some local stuff for practice.

I try to do that as much as I can. However, when I'm playing I really want to try to help the team. (often as just a meatshield) If I'm working on, say shotguns, on a map or in a position that really doesn't lend itself to the shotgun I don't feel like I'm helping. A good example is on de_italy on the T side. Defending long hall with a shotgun is not going to help out nearly as much as with a weapon that can work better at range. Would anyone be interested in setting up a "training" night? I'd love feedback on what I do well, what I suck at, and how to get better. - andrew

I ran into this problem with the old non source CS. And I'm starting to see it again in souce. I really dig the game, and I've been having a ton of fun playing with you all. However, I feel like I've hit a wall as far as getting better at the game. Have any of you run into this, and what did you do to get past it? When I played DoD in the battle for europe league we would have practices to work on shots, grenade placement etc. This really helped me get better. Playing actual matches don't seem to do that for me. Any thoughts? - andrew

Map making guides? Could you point me in the direction of a good map making tutorial? Thanks. - andrew

What resolution do you want to run? I have an X850 and I get 100-125 indoors at 16x12 everything full. Outside (esp in pirinese) it drops to 70 or so at times. I've never run into a situation where I've noticed any lag though. I've read that the x800 is also a solid card but I don't know what they are selling for at this point. Newegg has the x800 for 189. http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.asp?...N82E16814102529 If you're running at a lower res than 16x12 you probabbly have many more options. I have a few friends that have the 9800pro and have had good luck with it. (none of them have hl2 so I can't say how it runs) - andrew

I agree. I had stopped playing CS years ago. I couldn't deal with the legions of 10 year olds that seemed to infect most of the servers. I'm not particularly good at the game, I just play because I enjoy it. I got sick of the AHAHAHAHA I PWN3D JOO attitudes on most of the servers. I got HL2 because I'm a graphics junky and decided to give CS:S a try. Fortunately I found your servers pretty quickly. Fatty and a few others made me feel very welcome when I joined up. So I added the servers to my favorites list. I'm now a happy new member. Thanks for all the hard work guys. - andrew

3dmark05 score 5637 Operating System Microsoft Windows XP DirectX Version 9.0c Mobo Manufacturer Mobo Model AGP Rates (Current/Available) N/A / N/A CPU Intel Pentium 4 3464 MHz FSB 0 MHz Memory 2048 MB Display Information Graphics Chipset ATI RADEON X850 XT Driver Name RADEON X850 XT Driver Version 6.14.10.6490 Driver Status WHQL - FM Approved Video Memory 256 MB Core Clock 519 MHz Memory Clock 540 MHz http://service.futuremark.com/servlet/Inde...rojectId=920501

www.addictinggames.com They have a ton of free flash/shockwave/java games. - andrew

I'd love to. It would have to use a free service though. I'm already in a pretty expensive leauge and my wife would kill me to be in another pay league. (I could swing a few bucks if needed, but not a ton) I had pretty good luck with the free yahoo ff leagues.