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"Now rezzing %t... stand back, this could get ugly."
Some people say "Liiiiiive agaiiiin!" Some people make jokes. Some people, as they're rezzing me, just say "Rezzing %t in 10 seconds" (useful, but boring). Invidiously over on LJ is looking around for a rezzing text macro. It's a little /say that you stick on the casting of a rez spell to let other people know they're about to come back to life.There's an art to writing stuff like that, really. A few mods do it automatically (I believe Castparty will send a /party chat for you, and Serenity is mentioned in the threat), but the best ones are homegrown and customized. Invidiously has some good answers to choose from: "%t, your subscription to Life has expired. Would you like to renew?", "Warriors now have a Feign death. It just requires a Priest reagent, right %t?", and "Now ressing %t. Please don't anyone else try because we could end up with half each, and that would just be awfully messy" (for the noobs, the "%t" in a macro just substitutes the target of your spell; in this case, the person you're rezzing).But some of the best text macros aren't even for rezzing-- tonight I had a mage in the party that cast Polymorph: Pig with the simple "Water into wine, enemies into swine." And warlocks go crazy whenever they summon people-- I've seen paragraphs of text coming from them, everything about who to call if this summon goes bad (a lawyer, obviously) to "Click on this portal to summon someone to do your job for you!" (that one comes from a mod, I believe, but not one I've used). Some warriors (I used to do this, in a previous MMORPG) even shout out a macro when they're pulling something, just to make sure the party is ready.For my characters, a normal "Sheeping %t..." or "Rezzing %t..." seems to work just fine-- it's quick, utilitarian, and to the point. But some people go all out, and I do chuckle when I see the good ones. What do you think-- waste of screen space or fun way to keep other players informed? And of course, what are the best ones you've seen?
How HD gets from your tuner to monitor
]Yah ever wonder how the 'tv stuff'' gets from your tuner, could be built-in or set-top box flavor, to your screen. HD1080i has a rather nice explanation of the process, although, we would still like to see a magic school bus episode with that crazy teacher flying through the inside of a DLP cabinet. By understanding what is actually going on, a person therefore can track down and fix issues with the picture a lot easier. Digital signals travel on a sort of transport stream made up of Mpeg signals. It is also this practice that can create those 'blocks' on the screen everyone loves to hate. Those 'blocks' are caused by lack of bandwidth and the hardware trying to produce something for the area affected. Like stated in the hd1080i article, if you see LOTS of block, call your cable company as they might not know there is a problem in your area, but unfortunately, some of these blocks are considered normal. This article might bring to light what is actually going on in that colossal HDTV of yours but we still think a ride in the magic school bus would be better.
Multi-level gameplay
Gamasutra has a Designer's Notebook piece by Ernest Adams centring around the concept of 'multi-level gameplay' -- that is, games with multiple 'levels' of interaction, or different modes of play. An example is the interrelated tactical and strategy modes found in war-games: you can make decisions that affect the entire world, but also fight individual battles on the ground.Multi-level games are more complex, but allow you to enjoy different aspects of the game -- knowing that you'll have to fight personally if you move an army to a particular spot makes you feel more involved than if the computer simulates a battle. They are hard to design, however, and balance between the different game modes is key.
