dognapot

let's say when you page someone it opens a dialogue window where you chat with that person. it would have the standard options and functions. it would have an "X", and all that, and a "buffer" to put your words into before hitting "enter" and "sending" the "message" to the person you're talking to. also, why not give out invites? for example typing "/invite chat some_name" would invite some_name into a silly room where needn't toggle or create new colors to understand what's going on. i just thought since there's a (albeit) small demand for a specific chat for everything, why not have one chat for everything outside the current supported chats. that, and just to make some things easier, less wordyness to clutter up the main window, and better ease of use than the current paging system.

alot of my friends can't live without a slew of cds to compliment thier every mood. so when i ask them what's thier favorite, the answer depends on the weather pretty much. so i made a hypothetical situation to pinpoint thier musical tastes. it's three questions, with three answers.

after an unsuccessfull military campaign you're stripped of the title of emperor and exiled to a tropical island. you're given preserves enough to last a life-time and a cd player powered by rechargable solar cells. you are only allowed to bring one album though, so you go through your collection and get the one cd you know will keep you happy through your exile. what album did you choose?

i chose soup, by blind melon. only thing i can listen to in any mood.

after a freak collision with an iceberg your fishing boat begins to sink. you see an island off in the distance and realize you can probably just barely make it if you change course right away. now you don't have flares but you do have a loud PA system. in hopes that the coast guard might hear you, you begin playing the album you think ought to attract attention to the island. what's the album?

this one never changes for me. 'number ones' michael jackson. it would work. i know it.

last one: during a luxurious cruise your boat gets hit by an airplane and you are the only survivor. while stranded on a desert isle you realize you're not alone and the natives are very scary and probably want to cook and eat you. luckily your cd collection survived the catastrophe along with another loud PA system. since these are your only possessions right now you decide to turn them against the natives and scare them from your side of the island. what cd do you play?

i'd put in the aphex twin come to daddy EP. i think it would work. can't think of anything else i own really.

so what'd you guys choose?

so the riaa recently sued a few hundred more people. so i thought this might be a good intro to some riaa/file-sharing discussion. i've never had any sympathy for the riaa. to me, they're spoiled rich kids using thier influence to extort money and change the rules so they can ignore changing markets. that was just my first impression ages ago, but as time goes on it becomes apparent i struck on something.

i read this article about the riaa's claimed losses and it pretty much validates my suspicions. as aversed to several years ago, record stores (like most stores, period) keep less backstock and order primarily what they'll need until next order, on top of odds and ends needed for variety. basically they try and keep the backrooms as empty as possible, and it's a good method to try and ensure better revenue. this has nothing to do with file-sharing, it's simply more efficient. then there's riaa, who records all units shipped as 'sales'. so they ship less, and claim a loss. despite the fact that on top of a more streamlined ethic in record stores, there's an increase in actual sales (not shipped items), the riaa claims a loss (which borders on lies) and then cites file-sharing as major factor of thier 'losses' (a bigger lie). i have to work hard to imagine an actual motivation for the riaa's tenacity in confronting file-sharers. the fools looked right at a medium that distributes music with no costs and litigated at it for years until realizing that maybe the absence of shipping, and mass production costs might make it a venue worth cultivating. they shot themselves in the foot. they ignored a changing market, thier own market, and blamed the consumer, thier consumer, and still made money. they're too damn lucky to be so poor at thier job.

then there's mpaa. they're less litigious. however, they've been known, on occasion to harrass alledged file sharers rather consistantly. they're another organization that has little motivation to extort money out of thier target market. it's true you can get movies online for free, however you can't get full featured dvd's so easily and that leaves them relatively secure. in addition to that, they seem to be making fabulous amounts of money from the box office anyways, which piss-poor telesync videos can't compare with. at least they're not so aggressive, maybe that organization will get over this fad of abusing entertainment markets.

lastly, there's software piracy. oddly enough there's little litigation here and it's the only industry i can think of that might be in the right to start. but don't get me wrong, the biggest problem with software piracy isn't with games, it's with OS's and business applications. it's not kids either, it's businesses and schools. although it's less wide-spread now, i used to be able find entire buildings using the same copy of office, 98, me, and 2000, in addition to various other insanely expensive software being mass pirated. this, at least, was largely curbed by online activation and whatnot, but where there isn't a process like that there's an open invitation to piracy. like with games, although i don't have much sympathy for gaming companies who complain about piracy, a lot of it comes from the fact that very few games have protection past cd-check. that's pretty weak. couple that with the fact only a few games are released each year that are actually worth 50 dollars and you have me on p2p networks downloading a different game each week and passing it as fast as the food i ate before installing.

now discuss!

Ralph appeared some ages ago. he just wandered in from the forest looking lost and was taken in by a humble family of equally lost and newly arrived rock musicians who encouraged ralph spread his gift to the new world he found himself in. thus, "Ralph" was born. the next day, an automotive repair shop appeared in nightmist and had absolutely no business whatsoever. ralph's automotive shop did not fail though, it was eventually discovered that ralph had a knack for fixing things, even magical items, and what's more, creating them. soon after, ralph closed his automotive repair shop, and took his newfound gifts (and some old ones) onto his new career: adventurer.

Ralph's abilities...

plumber's crack
the plumbers crack ability causes a small amount of damage to the enemies health, but also forces them to look away and make rude comments to thier buddies, leaving them vulnerable to attack (lowers enemies dexterity temporarily).

sloth
the sloth ability allows ralph to out wait anyone who is expecting something to happen around ralph. whether it be rotating tires or leaving town. (basically it shakes off people trying to track you out of the town)

robot companion
since ralph's arrival, he has created some companions that remind him of home. these are his robot companions. normally their purpose is to bring him his home brewed ale but they also serve combative purposes. when called in battle they'll deflect damage meant for ralph and attack an enemy. when called on outside of battle they bring you ale, which makes ralph miss beer.

exploit
ralph is the only man in the world that truely knows when you need car repair. he's the only one who can diagnose mechanical problems. so it's only natural that ralph isn't always going to be honest with mechanical problems you may be facing and what's a reasonable estimate for repair. his success rate (and gold) is dependant on his charisma and the other person's intelligence. if ralph is successfull, ralph is payed for nonexistant repairs.

just a rough idea here folks, i figure he'd work best with armors along the lines of over-alls, jumpsuit, greasy clothes, and finally, irregular pants (which have got to be cheap, i mean they're irregular). man those'll be sweet. his weapons would range from robots, to simple sears tool sets. there's really only one other thing that the ralph class really needs and that's just a button on the client that says "Ralph", that when pushed makes a random ralph noise such as a fart, burp, or vulgarity. otherwise this is all ralph needs.

i was thinking, maybe solo classes are unneccessary, and it could be possible to encourage players to use existing classes solo by creating items that could only be used when no other alts are online. potions would be the easiest to come up with ideas for but i suppose it's entirely possible that armors and weapons could be included too. discuss.