From episode 4 of this season's RWBY, which seems to have really hit its stride. This episode's fight was still not up to the spectacular choreography that Oum was known for, but the pacing was superb and the tension was as intense as anything we've seen.
The last 9 of the 14 and a half minutes was spent with people sitting and talking while either drinking tea or playing video games. Those 9 minutes however, were very well paced and developed characters, moved the plot along, clarified plot points and answered questions.
The mechs from episodes 4 and 10 of season two were indeed stolen and both Ironwood and Winter Schnee are aware of team RWBY's involvement in destroying one. Additionally the lot stolen was prototypes being sent for range testing that were not fully equipped.
The Schnee family are unusual in having a set of powers consistently passed down by heredity as opposed to most other gifted people who get completely random abilities. This raises some questions about how Punnett squares work in relation to superpowers. Perhaps superpowers involve Punnett dodecahedrons. How that would result in there being no such variability in the Schnee family tree is unclear unless said tree is a straight line....Eww. In other news we learn that in addition to all their other charming characteristics, the Schnees have a second ability...a form of necromancy. They can call forth the spirits of defeated enemies to act as slaves. Weiss is the first of her family in some generations to not be able to do this at all. Until, perhaps, today.
Winter, Weiss's sister, is imperious, authoritarian and intensely regimental. She also seems to be about as decent a person as can realistically be expected from someone who grew up in (and never got away from) her family.
Yang, for all her bravado, is quite broken in some ways. She sort of shuts down when shown a picture of her Mom...
The capture of Torchwick by the girls last season has not, as Ruby believed, caused a mere reduction in crime. Crime in the city has stopped...totally...in the weeks since the breach. Their elation is short lived due to the implication that that the underworld is tightly controlled, by a much bigger figure.
Mercury and Emerald are absolute monsters.
While no explicit reference was made, we now probably have a very good idea of just what was going on in the "White" trailer and yes, it looks like that incongruously expressionist installment of the original 4 teasers is indeed canon. Even more surprisingly, it likely happened pretty much as presented (though some of it is a flashback).
Also: From this point forward, the heiress is on a budget.
One observation. One of the things the success of this series has made possible besides increasing the crew by 50% is that they have been able to hire additional professional voice actors (some with impressive resumes) to supplement the shows writers and animators, cosplayers and internet personalities that has made up most of the main cast. Interestingly this has resulted in the relative novices in the main cast being backed up by serious pros playing bit parts. The original cast has actually held their own pretty well and even those who started out a bit awkward have grown into their roles nicely. The additional money, however, is still well spent. Elizabeth Maxwell has hit it out of the park as Winter Schnee who, it turns out, is absolutely vital to understanding Weiss.
When one observes one's plamos start doing this....
...it does not actually mean that one has been blessed with a Lilliputian moe' waifu, but is, instead, a rather strong indication that one really needs to get out more.
2
The base of the animation seems to be accomplished by about one second of pedestal and tilt movement; changing the POV of the camera while focusing on the same point. In fact, I think the animation of the skirt is the same motion done with a larger movement, and then applied as a separate layer. You can see a squeeze or stretch morph on the head, so I would guess most of the animation of the individual parts is done that way. *If* I'm right, the truly impressive skill was in isolating the parts to be animated so beautifully.
Posted by: Ben at Sun Nov 29 12:46:31 2015 (S4UJw)
Some Quick Links
While there is considerable concern being expressed about the Syrian refugee situation, Dustbury finds someone raising the alarm about a less appreciated invasion. He also helpfully points out that all of my problems stem from a parking fee. In retrospect, it's probably a decent trade-off.
I linked to the unfinished version of this before, but the animator finished it yesterday and thoroughly succeeded in producing a cute and technically interesting little skit.
I was expecting something like that one which was based on a Tom&Jerry cartoon, not something sweet. But it is sweet and they did a really good job on it. Very nice.
I read somewhere that KanColle had eclipsed Touhou as the fan meme of choice. I'm glad to see that it isn't totally true.
Posted by: Mauser at Fri Nov 27 22:21:23 2015 (5Ktpu)
4
Vicks VapoRub makes an excellent cheap liniment, but it sounds like you may need to break out the BenGay and/or heating pads instead. I also foresee that you may have to take morning and evening showers/baths, just for the muscle relief.
Posted by: Suburbanbanshee at Sat Nov 28 13:58:14 2015 (ZJVQ5)
5
I'm sure you know that you don't want to combine VaporRub, BenGay, ice, or heating pads at the same time, in any combination. In succession with some space between them - that is the way to go. (But this is the Internet, and who knows who may read this stuff. So I clarify myself.)
Posted by: Suburbanbanshee at Sat Nov 28 14:00:48 2015 (ZJVQ5)
Oh Dear
It looks like Turkey has shot down a Russian fighter. There are, naturally, conflicting reports as to where the Russian plane was, the Russians say it was over Syrian airspace, the Turks insist it was over Turkey.
Reports differ if the Turkomen rebels have one or both Russian aviators from the SU-24. Regardless, watch how they are treated. If they are smart, they will turn them over, but being that Russia has been pounding them from the air, unlikely.
So, the fellows being backed by the Turks and who are allied with our proxies in Syria have just shot two Russian pilots dangling from their parachutes. They likely did so with our bullets, since they are working with the FSA.
1
Wait, it gets better!* The Syrians the Russians have been attacking shot down a Russian rescue helicopter, too! Wanna bet they blame that on the Turks, too? "If you hadn't shot down our plane..."
*...in some subset of the word "better" that I'm not altogether familiar with.
Posted by: Wonderduck at Tue Nov 24 20:49:16 2015 (zAcee)
2
This is where my lack of naval expertise hurts. Russians moved their prized asset, "Moskva", into the area and tasked it to help covering the approaches to the Khmeinim airbase, when and where jets are most vulnerable. Turks may send their submarines and do a General Belgrano on it. So 3 days ago Russians attached an ASW destroyer "V.Adm Kulakov" and a small ASW fregate "Smetlivyi" to form an approximation of a combat group around "Moskva". Compared to how it was done in WWII, clearly it's nowhere near enough. I expected 6 or so frigates, each with a helicopter, to surround "Moskva" and elbow Turkish assets both above and below the surface. But I don't know how it's done nowadays. Clearly it's not done however Argentinians were going at it, we know that much.
Posted by: Pete Zaitcev at Wed Nov 25 16:11:38 2015 (XOPVE)
At best this is a revenge move. I can't see the Russians actively hunting and sinking a Turkish submarine, even if they were capable of doing so, unless the sub had fired first.
And these days, when a sub shoots, it hits.
So I guess this is intended as a deterrent. "Yeah, go ahead and shoot a torpedo if you want to lose your sub afterwards."
It then becomes a couple of questions: what kind of provocation would it take for the Turks to decide to shoot, and would the Russians actually have the ability to find and sink the sub afterwards?
A different question: what happens if Turkey closes the Dardanelles to any and all Russian warships? And then Russia decides to send a group of ships through anyway? And Turkey uses shore-based artillery and airstrikes?
6
The combined British, French and Russian navies could not force the Dardanelles in WW1. If Turkey decides to close the Bosporus it is closed.
Russia would almost certainly consider this an act of war.
NATO would probably not back Turkey if they did that unless bullets were already flying.
Turkey has one of the largest armies on earth and in that regard are an extremely vital NATO ally. Turkey has as many ground troops as France, Italy, Germany and the UK combined.
Posted by: The Brickmuppet at Thu Nov 26 01:21:42 2015 (1zM3A)
7
The combined British, French, and Russian navies couldn't force them in WW1 because back then the three armies combined had less computing power than my cell phone. Ground-based defenses had two major advantages over sea-based gunnery - a much more stable firing platform (i.e. more accuracy) and a much smaller target profile (you had to hit the gun more or less directly to dismount it, whereas any hit on the ship can do damage enough to sink her eventually.)
The big disadvantage is that the ground defenses have limited target footprints - if you're outside their range, they can't come get you. The Union navy attacked several Confederate fortifications using this method, firing really large mortars from outside the range of the forts' defenses.
In the modern era, of course, fixed fortifications aren't worth that much at all - we can knock them out with missiles smart enough to fly right into the embrasures. Of course, that's the US... just how good are Russia's missiles? I doubt we really know.
On the other hand, the only reason that Erdogan is still in power is because he gutted the Turkish military's leadership and replaced them with his own people. You don't purge your staff like that without tons of damage to the effectiveness of your fighting force; ask the Russians about that! So even if Russia's capabilities aren't that great these days, neither are the Turks.
Personally, I'm of the opinion that we ought to have wound down NATO well before now. Soviet Russia's expansion needed to be stopped; Putin's Russia isn't nice, but it's simply not a threat to the US. We don't need to put ourselves on the line for a military alliance to prevent tanks coming through the Fulda Gap anymore. Nor am I fond of being lectured about not putting enough into social spending by countries who shamelessly free-ride on our military expenditures.
And the idea that we could get sucked into a conflict by the Erdogan government is positively grotesque. I wouldn't just leave him hanging, I'd root for the Russians.
Posted by: Avatar_exADV at Thu Nov 26 06:44:41 2015 (v29Tn)
8
The littorals are still the most dangerous place to be a warship. Clutter, interference and well camouflaged batteries of missiles and artillery that can have their guidance radars on mountains to make use of their maximum range make any sort of inshore operation very dangerous. Both the Bosporus and the Hellespont are exceedingly narrow. The sea of Marmara is big enough to allow submarines to maneuver in and that brings us to the other thing the Turks pay a lot of attention to...mines. Mines sank Allied battleships with alarming regularity and Turkey is still highly adept at mine warfare.. If the Turks want to close those straits they will likely remain closed until foreign boots tread the full length of both the Asian and European shores.
The big question is how badly Ergodans Stalineque purges have affected the army's fighting ability. The Turkish troops are generally pretty good but given the army's previous hostility to islamists, and officers with islamist sympathies had to be dug up from under rocks. They are not likely to be experienced. I tend to agree that this is likely to have a seriously deleterious effect on their effectiveness.
Personally, I'm of the opinion that we ought to have wound down NATO well before now.
Yes, but sadly we didn't and the treaties have us kind of stuck.
And the idea that we could get sucked into a conflict by the Erdogan government is positively grotesque.
Unfortunately thats how the treaty works. Of course article 5 doesn't necessarily apply if a NATO member shoots first and pokes at the bear.
I wouldn't just leave him hanging, I'd root for the Russians.
Yep. Russia certainly seems to be the more reasonable player here.
Posted by: The Brickmuppet at Thu Nov 26 09:28:49 2015 (AaBUm)
Article V of the NATO treaty ultimately only requires each member to do what they think is best. We found that out in 2001 when Article V was invoked for the first time and the response from some European countries was underwhelming.
Everyone is supposed to treat it as if it was their own country that was attacked, but that's not binding. (As we found out in 2001.)
At this point the NATO charter is pretty much a dead letter. Obama won't do anything except deploy strategic hash tags and expressions of deep concern. Until a new president takes office, no one in Europe had better be depending on American military power. And if it's Hillary, they still better not depend on it.
The whole list is interesting as well as disturbing, but the last on the list is quite the doozy.
Already synonymous with misery for unrelated reasons, the worlds bloodiest porkchop may one day bring suffering and death to many far from its bleak shores.
This is incredible. Bethesda has invented time travel!
This game really is 'all that and a bowl of grits'.
Most surprisingly, despite the grim premise and post-apocalyptic setting, Fallout 4 gives off a remarkably optimistic vibe.
I find it really interesting how they integrated a first-person shooter quest game with a 'rebuild civilization' game. What's interesting is the freedom one has. The player can pursue the main quest like a regular adventure game, wander around and interact with the incredibly detailed world (usually via high powered weaponry) or focus on the second life aspect of building a settlement. The player can also build a series of settlements and thus rebuild civilization. I'm nowhere NEAR close to finishing the main quest...there's just so much interesting stuff to do.
Re-playability looks to be really high.
On the down side:
Mirelurks. Those things are tough.
Also: It's like clicking on a TV Tropes link that delivers crack intravenously...I predict the collapse of society by the end of the year.
1
This morning I was checking out an insane asylum guarded by a team of mercenaries (real pros; they told me I was trespassing and ordered me to leave, without shooting), when I happened to look up and notice a windmill on top of a nearby overpass, made from an airplane prop. Well, I had no reason to bother those mercs (didn't have the quest item to get into the asylum...), so I decided to explore.
With both ends of the overpass collapsed, I had to hunt around for a bit to find a way up there and see what was going on. Scrambling over the junk, I spotted a Gunner logo spray-painted on the side of a bus, and knew I was going to have a fight on my hands. Sure enough, but I wasn't expecting the combat droid; that made it a lot tougher.
It wasn't a quest or a marked location on the map, just a little something thrown in to fill out the world. If you noticed it, cool; if not, maybe next time you play through.
Favorite characters so far: Nick Valentine and Dr. Brian Virgil.
-j
Posted by: J Greely at Sat Nov 21 23:51:15 2015 (ZlYZd)
2
The old Fallout games had skills, which were a big factor in determining your weapon damage - if you had low skills with guns, they did low damage, but as you got more skilled with guns they increased more and more in damage.
F4 gets rid of skills, and your progression is in your basic stats and in perks you add at every level. And it's a big improvement! Under the old system, if something was good at low skill levels, it was ludicrous at high skill levels; by contrast, if it was pretty balanced at high skill levels, it was terrible at low skill levels. Guns got balanced at high skill levels, which meant that for most of the game, guns were -crap-.
In F4, you don't have to worry about having sunk several levels of skill advancement into a particular class of weapons in order to make them non-crap - they're mostly all right to start with, and certain modified examples are quite a bit better than "all right". Add in the perks on top of them, and the ones you choose to specialize in (and by this I mean broad categories, like "rifles", "all heavy weapons", "all automatic guns", etc.) can feel quite powerful.
I also really like the new power armor system. It's not the endgame armor anymore; instead it's something you leave at home for normal adventuring and then trot out when you expect heavy combat, in which case it makes you far more resilient than normal. (Or you can get the right perks, in which case it becomes your "normal" gear; I basically don't get out of mine except to craft and sleep.)
VERY happy with it overall.
The settlement building is nice but not nearly feature-complete yet; I expect they'll do like Skyrim and drop in a little DLC expansion that adds a lot more options.
Posted by: Avatar_exADV at Sun Nov 22 00:36:13 2015 (v29Tn)
3
Rutskarn made a good point in his Elder Scrolls retrospective: it's incredibly frustrating to make an attack that clearly connects in the 3D UI, but then be told you missed the hidden die roll. If the game shows you shooting someone in the back of the head with a .44 magnum, then by golly it had better hurt. I'm still carrying the first 10mm pistol I found, upgraded with mods and perks, and I just cleaned out a building full of super mutants with it, including a suicider. Very satisfying.
I've been making heavy use of the power armor, but thanks to Tinker Tom, I have some very resilient clothing now. As a bonus, my character no longer looks like an extra from Mad Max.
Between patches, DLC, and third-party mods, I expect to see the settlement feature improving a lot. Actually, the mod I'm most looking forward to is an adaptation of the Skyrim "reduced NPC speech distance" fix; I had to move the weapon-crafting station in Sanctuary so that settlers wouldn't stand in the doorway and spam me.
-j
Posted by: J Greely at Sun Nov 22 02:28:32 2015 (ZlYZd)
4
Let's get to the important part: what do the girls look like? And how many of them are there?
5
Post-apocalypse Boston has a surprising number of attractive, friendly, competent women, some of whom can be romanced. They put a lot of effort into the face-design system that's used for both the PC and the NPCs. And there are a lot of NPCs, with a wide range of skin and hair colors, as well as a variety of ethnic features.
You can also replace the clothing of friendly NPCs. I recommend the "summer shorts" outfit for women, which not only shows off their figures, but can be retrofitted with ballistic weave for some of the best armor in the game. It's the only moddable clothing I've found so far that leaves the arms and legs bare for additional armor pieces, and it looks pretty good with the trilby hat that also accepts ballistic weave.
-j
Posted by: J Greely at Sun Nov 22 13:30:15 2015 (ZlYZd)
The Russian's Strategic Situation Room is Much More Bright and Cheery Than Ours
We cannot tolerate this lily gap!
This is all in Russian, but allegedly they are making a big show of the pounding of ISIS positions earlier in the week which saw the first combat use of the Tu-160 (Blackjack). Tu-22m(Backfire) as well as the ubiquitous 'Bears' were used as well. Additionally, according to RSNF, Putin orders the CO of the task force built around the big cruiser Moskva to co-ordinate with French forces.
1
That setting looks all sorts of wrong. One would expect it from China, but not Russia. But then the official ideology of Russia under Putin is "Eurasianism", so perhaps it fits.
Posted by: Pete Zaitcev at Thu Nov 19 13:30:24 2015 (XOPVE)
Despite, (or perhaps because of) the fact that the economy has been so-so and is looking uncertain moving forward, online orders are surging, with the result that a full week before Thanksgiving we are already getting the kind of hours we got in early December last year.
From this season's third episode of RWBY which thickens the plot a bit by whisking some ambiguity into the vagueness and spicing it with a pointless fight made with apparently unseasoned ingredients that only serve to remind us how good things were when it was possible to get them made with genuine Monty Oum.
The fight choreography is not actually bad, and pretty decent in comparison to many other shows. However, despite increasing the size of the staff from around 15 to nearly 30 that particular aspect is not up to the standard set by the show's much mourned creator. Oum appears to have been a singular talent.
The story is proceeding apace though the shadowy council opposed to something bad talks in sufficient circuitousness that we still don't know exactly is going on. There is a big reveal, but I suspect that it is probably not at all what it seems to be.
On the other hand the character animation is really well done and the voice work is excellent. Lindsay Jones (Ruby) in particular does a really good job in this episode.
Also there is a drunken martial artist, so they've got that going for them, and in any event, I'm still enjoying the show.
The foreshadowing for next week seems strangely ominous.
I Suppose One Could, in Good Faith, Quibble Over Whether
...the following embedded video is THE sign of the end times or simply one of many. However, Steven's query has, as I type this, generated 7 responses, none of which definitively answer his question.
I Now Know What....
...the "Planet Eater Building" is.
I have no idea WHY the Asahi Beer Building has a planet eater on top of it, but I can now at least explain what so perplexed me that day I walked from Skytree to Ueno, and I can do so without alarming people.
Regarding the specific linked post, which you should read in full and which so edified me, the answer to the question it poses, is, I'm afraid, yes.
This is not simply because some buildings with character are to be razed because a certain jet setting demographic finds them tacky. It's because people are being robbed of their property as punishment for not having connections, power or influence sufficient to forestal a most egregious utilization of eminent domain.
Lots of places pass asinine historical preservation laws that hinder people from improving their properties and destroy its resale value, but the same sort of people that pass those ordinances think nothing of razing a historic and character heavy area that is actually thriving.
It's not just the corrupt construction cartels. It's also well meaning Bureaucrats, who muddle though life with delusions of grand vision but have no concept of how a real city lives in the vast expanse of humanity and architecture that exist in nearly invisible symbiosis with its grandest and most recognized edifices.
1
It was supposed to be a flame on a torch. I've heard it described as the Golden turd building, among other things.
Posted by: Jccarlton at Sat Nov 14 20:57:45 2015 (jqaLb)
2
A repost of my comment on The Arts Mechanical: Something that has been bugging me about "trendy architecture" and design.
The trendy mega-edifices that are built in place of these once
thriving areas that are actually lived in tend to have a certain
characteristic to them: There are no niches, no easily contained spaces,
no natural microcosms within them where people can actually set
something up.
One thing about all the trendiest buildings on campus that I find
absolutely maddening is that there is nowhere you can go to get privacy,
or to get away from other people. It is all, 100%, 270 degree public
space (and overcrowded on top of that). Set up a booth or a display?
Forget about it. All you can do is pass through at high speed and try
not to let it wear on you. Find a corner (as I used to be able to do in
my undergrad university) in the periodical stack to set up and study all
night? There’s nowhere like that here.
It almost seems of a piece with all the uber-trendy "open-plan
office†designs. (I have an open desk in an open office that I never
spend any time at, because I can’t *think* in that setting. (Nevermind
the noise – I have no control over my space.) Better the corner of a
cluttered bench in a lab, where my back is to a wall.)
In Calhoun’s rat overcrowding experiments, the rats that stayed sane
the longest were the ones that took over and controlled the niches. The
ones that had space that was *theirs*. The others had to scramble for
spots in poorly defensible public open areas.
Posted by: MadRocketSci at Sun Nov 15 14:35:34 2015 (GtPd7)
Je Sui Paris
The fog of war is slowly lifting from the city of light and it appears that last nights atrocity was every bit as bad as what happened in Mumbai 7 years ago.
A tremendous amount of carnage has just been wrought by what appears to have been a very small group. Reports are that there were as few as 8 gunmen, though whether this includes the suicide bombers is not entirely clear.
Some idea of how confused early reports were, can be gleaned by reading those who were live-blogging it here, here and here.
The facts are still a bit sketchy, but as horrific as this massacre is, it it not terribly surprising, and it is only a matter of time before similarly well coordinated attacks take place here.
In the meantime, if France invokes the NATO charter over this (as is to be expected) things in the Mideast may get really interesting....in the Chinese sense.
Hobby Space News of the commercial space industry A Babe In The Universe Rather Eclectic Cosmology Encyclopedia Astronautica Superb spacecraft resource The Unwanted Blog Scott Lowther blogs about forgotten aerospace projects and sells amazingly informative articles on the same. Also, there are cats. Transterrestrial Musings Commentary on Infinity...and beyond! Colony WorldsSpace colonization news! The Alternate Energy Blog It's a blog about alternate energy (DUH!) Next Big Future Brian Wang: Tracking our progress to the FUTURE. Nuclear Green Charles Barton, who seems to be either a cool curmudgeon, or a rational hippy, talks about energy policy and the terrible environmental consequences of not going nuclear Energy From Thorium Focuses on the merits of thorium cycle nuclear reactors WizBang Current events commentary...with a wiz and a bang The Gates of Vienna Tenaciously studying a very old war The Anchoress insightful blogging, presumably from the catacombs Murdoc Online"Howling Mad Murdoc" has a millblog...golly! EaglespeakMaritime security matters Commander Salamander Fullbore blackshoe blogging! Belmont Club Richard Fernandez blogs on current events BaldilocksUnderstated and interesting blog on current events The Dissident Frogman French bi-lingual current events blog The "Moderate" VoiceI don't think that word means what they think it does....but this lefty blog is a worthy read nonetheless. Meryl Yourish News, Jews and Meryls' Views Classical Values Eric Scheie blogs about the culture war and its incompatibility with our republic. Jerry Pournell: Chaos ManorOne of Science fictions greats blogs on futurism, current events, technology and wisdom A Distant Soil The website of Colleen Dorans' superb fantasy comic, includes a blog focused on the comic industry, creator issues and human rights. John C. Wright The Sci-Fi/ Fantasy writer muses on a wide range of topics. Now Read This! The founder of the UK Comics Creators Guild blogs on comics past and present. The Rambling Rebuilder Charity, relief work, roleplaying games Rats NestThe Art and rantings of Vince Riley Gorilla Daze Allan Harvey, UK based cartoonist and comics historian has a comicophillic blog! Pulpjunkie Tim Driscoll reviews old movies, silents and talkies, classics and clunkers. Suburban Banshee Just like a suburban Leprechaun....but taller, more dangerous and a certified genius. Satharn's Musings Through TimeThe Crazy Catlady of The Barony of Tir Ysgithr アニ・ノート(Ani-Nouto) Thoughtful, curmudgeonly, otakuism that pulls no punches and suffers no fools. Chizumatic Stephen Den Beste analyzes anime...with a microscope, a slide rule and a tricorder. Wonderduck Anime, Formula One Racing, Sad Girls in Snow...Duck Triumphalism Beta Waffle What will likely be the most thoroughly tested waffle evah! Zoopraxiscope Too In this thrilling sequel to Zoopraxiscope, Don, Middle American Man of Mystery, keeps tabs on anime, orchids, and absurdities. Mahou Meido MeganekkoUbu blogs on Anime, computer games and other non-vital interests Twentysided More geekery than you can shake a stick at Shoplifting in the Marketplace of Ideas Sounds like Plaigarism...but isn't Ambient IronyAll Meenuvians Praise the lathe of the maker! Hail Pixy!!
