Anyone who’s played the classic 1995 Super Nintendo RPG Chrono Trigger will recognize the image above. (Anyone who hasn’t played that particular game… shame on you. So much shame. The original is hard to find, but there’s a Nintendo DS port (yes, port, not remake) available and you should play it, as it is ranked by many, myself included, as one of the best games ever made).

Anyway. The picture. The picture is of the Free Lancer, an enemy found midway through the game. In theory, it’s a mercenary, doing whatever comes to hand to pay the bills.

I, myself, am sharing that occupation- in addition to my paid part-time work, I’ve started my own business selling baked goods and I’m freelancing, doing some image-processing work. I have no idea where either track will go… but, for the moment, it’s bringing in some currency and keeping me on my toes. Unfortunately, it’s cutting into my blogging time to no small degree.

Available topics that I should probably finish writing posts on are:

• Bunnybraü
• Shave Safe (and how to get started)
• Nostalgia Advance
• Steampunk Mechwarriors Ahoy

And various and sundry others. The problem I’m having, alas, is that I can never nail down enough time to write the posts. I’ll get there eventually.

And, as the title says, life’s still an adventure.

Yes, still alive. I’m working on some exciting business ventures (I’ll get further into those another time), not doing much in terms of video games at the moment.

Mostly, I’m waiting (with a truly desperate impatience) for my Cygnar battlebox to arrive at the local comic shop and gaming store. I have begun playing Privateer Press’ tabletop combat game Warmachine. Really enjoying it. I’ll have to throw pictures of my army up when it gets here…

/wanders off, muttering impatiently

So, as I’ve blogged about previously, I shave with a double-edged safety razor. Yes, it’s old-school. Learning about it was no small chore, since I could only find one site (the Art of Manliness) that had anything on the subject.

Then I found Badger & Blade. B&B is the forum community for this sort of thing. They have every piece of information you could ever want- and if the information you want isn’t already up, a quick question will probably bring it. From how to build a lather with shaving soap, to a wiki, to their own custom shaving brushes, you can find everything there.

And friendly. The people are unfailingly and unwaveringly polite, courteous, and helpful. (Actually, after some of the online communities I’ve been in *warcraft forums cough hack cough*, it’s incredibly refreshing.)

So, yes, if you’re interested in double-edged razors, check out http://www.badgerandblade.com/ for more (even if you don’t have a DE razor, and are just interested, it’s a worthwhile link to check out).

Any PC gamer should know (and love) the above link. It takes you to the homepage of Steam.

What is Steam, I hear you asking? It’s a content-delivery, collection-management and social network for games. Let me back up and come at that again- it combines the best features of an instant messenger and blogs- it even includes an overlay that lets you use instant messaging while in-game, even full-screen games. It provides a central repository from which you can launch your games (and, if your friends have the same multiplayer games you do, it provides a shortcut to joining them in-game). Finally, it provides a store.

There’s a great variety of games on Steam (and, once you buy them, they lock to your Steam account- if you set up a new computer, you can simply install the Steam client, log in, and download all your purchased games to that computer).

When I say a great variety, I mean specifically “Hey, you can get old games here that are impossible to find!” King’s Quest, as an example. You can also get new games (Bioshock 2, as an additional example). Finally, you can gift games to friends (which is how I got Bioshock 2, from a friend).

Basically, it’s a great piece of software (it runs on Linux, too, with Wine), and I highly recommend it. (Also: They periodically have sales; Bioshock 1 cost me all of $5 this past New Year’s)

If you’re on Steam already, please, drop in and say hello (my Steam profile is linked to on my sidebar). If you’re not… drop in! Try a game or two! Say hi!

Be sure to stop in on Monday for “Tiny Knives and Angry Forest Creatures: The Best Internet Community Ever”

That said, however, there’s one point where the game can fall down, and that’s in its AI. Your computerized teammates are, by default, on average slightly less intelligent than the surrounding scenery, with what seems to be a budding suicide urge, as the archers put their bow away, pull out their daggers, and charge into melee, while the casters break out of their very effective and expensive shapeshifted form to cast Feeble Poke of Mild Annoyance at the giant boss monster.

Fortunately, there’s a way to avoid this scenario, and all its attendant frustrations: Tactics.

The game makes a big point of tutorializing your first brush with the tactics screen, and it is constantly clamoring for your attention with the loading-screen tips, but for all that I found it fairly dry reading. Then I started my second run through the game- with a mage instead of a melee rogue- and it suddenly became much more important to coordinate my party members (particularly the tank, as I could no longer afford to draw attention to myself and rely on stuns to escape).

So, let me draw your attention to Fig. 1a: The Tank’s Tactics Screen.

First: Shale (my party’s tank) has Self: Any; Activate: Stoneheart. Then, Self: Any; Activate: Threaten.

Next, he has Enemy: Attacking Main Character; Attack.

Self: Surrounded by at least three enemies; Bellow.

Finally, he has Ally: Being attacked by a melee attack; Taunt.

His behaviour (top righthand corner) is set to Default.

So what does this mean? In combat, what will Shale do? Well, tactics process from top to bottom. So, first, always, if Threaten or Stoneheart (his ‘tanking’ abilities) are down, he activates them. After that, he fights as normal, picking his targets based on (as a rule) either who is attacking him or who is closest. This all stops if some vile thug dares to attack my main character- that person then becomes the priority for all Shale’s attacks.

If there are at least three enemies near Shale (this tends to happen fairly often, as he charges in ahead of the others), he will Bellow. Finally, if someone is attacking one of my other characters in melee (not ranged- this is important), he taunts the attacker.

So that’s Shale. What about my other characters?

On this save file, I had my main character as my healer (which is why Shale is so fanatically dedicated to stomping flat anything that dared touch him in any way). Although healer tactics are settable, my RPG experiences leave me twitchy at the idea of leaving all the healing up to someone else, be it another player or AI, so that was always my controlled character. This was important in the tactics for the others, as seen below:

This is Alistair’s tactics screen (my third character, Leliana, had an identical screen, with the addition of Self: Any; Song of Courage).

Alistair’s tactics are incredibly simple: Whenever there’s an enemy, switch to your ranged weapon; always have Aim activated; and select, as his target, whoever the main character has targetted. Between the offensive magic of my main character and the two archers, the focus-fire was intense (and deadly).

Notice that Alistair’s behaviour is set to Ranged; in combat, he will always prefer to remain away from enemies where possible. This is devoutly to be wished of archers and most mages.

I have little doubt I’m going to get poked and told to give examples of tactics for melee fighters but, for the moment, I have none; my playstyle involves keeping people away from the enemies.

Be sure to tune in on Thursday for “Not Really Retro: Steam-Powered Gaming”!

See, any creative work fixed in any tangible medium- my blog posts, the soundtrack to Star Wars, a photograph of a rose- is given, immediately upon its creation, something called a copyright. The copyright is usually (not always, but usually) owned by the creator, and basically states that, by international law and treaty, the creator has certain rights regarding the work- the right to reproduce it, to translate it, to move the work from one medium to another (for example: I have the copyright on any blog post I write for this blog. That means that, barring certain exceptions like short quotes, I am the sole and final authority on where these posts can appear. If someone were to make Mad Cow Chronicles: The Book, they’d have to go through me).

So that’s copyright.* Public domain is a little bit different. If either a work has been around for so long (usually, years after the death of the last person to hold the copyright), or because the creator expressly requested it, a work can be made to be ‘public domain’. In essence, this means that the work is no longer copyrighted, and can no longer be copyrighted in its original form. Derivative works, reproductions, translations, transpositions to other media- it’s all fair game. As an example, the works of Jules Verne are no longer copyrighted. If I wanted to print an anthology of Jules Verne, and sell it- there is absolutely nothing to stop me doing so (legally, anyway).

LibriVox is a collection of volunteers who take books that have lapsed or been declared into the public domain, and create recordings- themselves declared public domain- of the books, read aloud. Jules Verne is in there. Gulliver’s Travels is in there. I’m pretty sure you can find Tom Sawyer, too. They’re a great source of free audiobooks, and well worth checking out if you need something to listen to. While the reading quality can vary from volunteer to volunteer- Librivox maintains no quality controls, as they’re more interested in mass volunteer work rather than strict vocal quality- the majority of recordings are excellent.

Librivox can be found at http://www.librivox.org.

Be sure to come back next Monday for “Dragon-Slaying Tactics: Why Wynne Keeps Running Into Melee”!

*Vastly simplified, of course.

So here I am, back in the as-it-were saddle of the internet, once again loading my digital cannonry to fire bytes upon bytes of pure chaos in your general direction.

So here we go: First post back, and, as I am gravely indebted to Lady Jess, I took a request: “Blog about pretzels!”

Here, then, I am: Blogging about pretzels.

First, so we can establish what’s going on, an illustrative picture.

Ladies and gentlemen, yours truly in kitchen battle garb:

Let’s begin. You will need (assuming you actually want to make pretzels here) the following:

1 tablespoon yeast;

1 tablespoon maple syrup*

3 cups all-purpose flour*

2 tablespoons margarine or butter, softened*

1/2 teaspoon salt

1 cup very warm water (but not boiling)

You will also need:

Two cookie sheets, a small or medium saucepan or pot partly full of water, and roughly a tablespoon of baking soda.

Toppings (coarse salt, black pepper, oregano, Montreal Steak Spice, dried crushed chilies, parmesan cheese, etc)*

*All these ingredients can be substituted for an equal amount of a similar ingredient; maple syrup can be replaced with honey, white sugar, brown sugar, or even Pepsi; flour can be replaced with hard whole wheat flour if you prefer it; I tend to use olive or vegetable oils instead of margarine or butter and, of course, toppings are completely at your own discretion.

Let’s Begin:

Place your yeast and your maple syrup into a medium-large bowl as shown below, adding the oil.

Add the salt

And stir it all up well. Then add the water,

one cup of the flour, and mix very well. The mixture will start to bubble; leave it alone for about five minutes.

After about five minutes, stir in the rest of the flour. The dough should be slightly sticky but not too difficult to work with; turn it out on a lightly floured board and knead.

If the dough persists in sticking to your hands or the work surface, work more flour into it as you knead. Knead for approximately five minutes, then return it to the bowl and allow it to rise in a warm place until it doubles in size (or about sixty to eighty minutes).

Remove the dough from the bowl, punch it down, knead it again for about five minutes, and divide it into twelve equal parts. Roll each of these pieces into a pipe between twelve to eighteen inches long. You now have two options:

1: Cut the pipe into three four-to-six-inch pretzel sticks, or

2: Twist each pipe into the traditional pretzel shape. As you can see below, I took this option with my latest batch.

As you’re shaping the pretzels, put the tablespoon of baking soda into your pot of water and bring it to a boil; you should also, at this time, begin pre-heating the oven to 475. You’re going to boil the pretzels for about a minute on each side, remove them from the water with a slotted spoon, allow them to drain for a moment, and put them on your cookie sheet.

You should add your seasonings to the pretzels the moment they come out of the pot; you can either have a dish of seasoning standing by to press the pretzels into gently, or sprinkle the toppings on.

The pretzels, once they are all boiled, bake at 475 for 12-15 minutes, or until they are golden brown, thus:

Enjoy!

Be sure to drop in on Thursday for “Things That Are Cool: LibriVox"!

Knights of the Old Republic- a game by BioWare, the geniuses behind Neverwinter Nights, Baldur’s Gate and Dragon Age: Origins- combines my love of Star Wars, my love of RPGs, and my love of swordfights in one glowing, fast-moving, lightning-chucking telekinetically-choking rumble.

I loved it, if you hadn’t gotten that impression.

Tonight, I was at The Heroes’ Lounge (my local comic shop) and I picked up the first couple issues of Dark Horse Comics’ treatment of Knights of the Old Republic. Will it follow the plot of the game? Will it dance around it, showing the story from secondary characters’ points of view?

I don’t know. But my inner ten-year-old is demanding I get off the internet, forget about being at work tomorrow, baking plans for the weekend, and just about everything else… curl up under the blankets, listen to the thunderstorm*, and read about the Knights of the Old Republic.

Should these comics be excellent, I will no doubt be raving about them soon. (Should they be terrible, the same raving will probably be occur, but it might be labelled more of a ‘rant’.)

*I have hooked up my iPod, with an ambient recording of a thunderstorm, on loop, to the sleep timer on my iPod alarm clock. I love thunderstorms, too.

The recipe may make its way up, with photographs, when I next prepare it and photograph the process. Or, it may not.

Okay, now this post has a second purpose: If you have ever played and enjoyed Diablo, or any of its sequels, you need to get at least the demo for Torchlight. It’s great.

There were a few notable flaws in this clock. First, the switch to turn the alarm off required you to navigate past “Radio ON”. If you turned it on and off quickly, you’d just get a loud “SQURK” as you flicked the switch through three positions to Alarm On (or from Alarm On to Off). Second, the radio was… uh… terrible. Unless you wanted to wake up to static, it was Buzzer or Go Home. Third? The buzzer had no volume control- it was always set at max. BEEK BEEK BEEK BEEK BEEK BEEK BEEK BEEK…

I swore a terrible vow this summer. “When I get a new job,” I said, “Part of my first paycheque is going into buying a clock that isn’t terrible. A clock with an iPod docking station! Yeah! I’ll have a clock that plays music to wake me up.”

Such a clock I now posess. It is a Memorex iWake Mi4004. In black. It fills several roles now:

1: It is an alarm clock. Dual alarms, in fact, which is… undeniably pleasant. One for work, one for Sundays- and to music, not strident banshee-esque wailing. I don’t need an alarm for my days off, as a rule; typically those are spent allowing my body to, in an almost sponge-like fashion, suck up as much rest as it wants by sleeping until I am awakened by some cut-off switch in my brain that thinks I have reached optimum voltage.

2: It is an iPod dock. This serves a dual purpose- it keeps the iPod charged and makes it easy to locate.

3: It is a set of speakers for the iPod! It even has a tiny little remote. Which I will, no doubt, lose within seconds.

4: It has a Sleep function. I can go to sleep to the sounds of twenty minutes’ measured ambient cricket noises, or perhaps a pre-measured samplet of an audiobook or podcast. (By setting the internal alarm on the iPod to play from a much more… energetic… playlist one minute before the clock alarm goes off, I can have the clock pick up something like the Wilhelm Tell overture instead of, say, the sound of a river running; when I’m tired, that’s not enough to force a twitch out of me, let alone consciousness).

In short: I have a new clock, and it is good.