Morning Radio

I was flipping through the channels this morning on my way to workout at the Y and I stopped on 102.5. On the radio was this guy that was a real douchbag with an annoying voice. Turns out it was Tim Eyman.

Ever heard of a face for radio? Timmy has a voice for newspapers.

Time to space out the DC continuity

The DC comics news out of San Diego Comicon is that they are bringing back the Archie Comics heroes (like the Fly and the Shield) and the Milestone heroes (Icon, Static) into the DC universe.

Nice to see those characters again, but how crowded is that universe? The way their continuity is set up there were tons of heroes in the 1940s-50s, then almost nothing, then everything from the first appearance of the Silver Age flash to now (almost 50 years) has taken place over the last 10 or so years.

Why not spread the heroics out a bit? There must be some good 1960s-1980s DC universe in continuity stories. Let the characters age well so that their stories will do the same.

Minis Display

Step-Brothers

Freaking hilarious.

I'm starting to think that Judd Apatow could produce 90 minutes or Will Ferrell and John C. Reilly sitting across from each other in metal chairs in front of a white back drop and it would still be funnier that most of the "comedies" that are out there.

My Against the Giants Review

Let me start of this review by stating that the WOTC gallery pictures don’t do the actual figures justice. The actual minis have more definition and shading. Also, I think there is a kind of quality associated with the inconsistencies that are a result of the minis being hand painted that isn’t present in the demonstration figures.

Also, the RPG stats are wrong. For figures that come from the monster manual it is a minor nuisance. However, a lot of figures aren’t from the monster manual and not having functional stats is a major headache.

The gallery (for what is it worth) can be found here

Shocktroop Devil: This is a great looking soldier figure.

Voracious Ice Devil: A resculpt shouldn’t look worse than the figure it is based on. It shouldn’t have a worse weapon, pose, and paint job. It shouldn’t be from a set that was released two years ago and is still on the shelves of hobby shops. Especially when that set was the gold standard of D&D Miniatures sets. It only makes Against the Giants look bad in comparison.

Deathpriest of Orcus: Kalilama! Kalilama! Kalilama! Prepare to die Meester Jones!

Degenerate Cultist of Orcus: This goofy figure doesn’t look like a threatening cultist of a Demon Lord of the Abyss, more like a drunken dude leaving a Danzig show. He should get in touch with the Skullcleave Warrior for tips on how to channel howling rage.

Gnaw Demon: Funny figure but in a goofy, scary way. Like a Gremlin. The repaint in red looks much, much better though.

Efreeti Flamestrider: A big improvement over the old Efreeti.

Visceral Devourer: This undead is worthy of facing Bruce Campell, Simon Pegg, and Van Helsing (the real one, not Hugh Jackman).

Doresain, The Ghoul King: There can never be to many well painted, well sculpted miniatures of undead tyrants.

Thunderblast Cyclone: It is nice to have a Huge Air Elemental, no matter what WOTC calls it. The pair of eyes is too silly though. These are little sculptures of fantasy creatures that adults push around kitchen tables in between Monty Python and the Holy Grail references, not toys.

Yuan-Ti Anathema: This figure won me over when I realized that the backward tilt pose was to make it appear that the Anathema was getting ready to strike like a viper. I love those little details.

Elder Red Dragon: How do you fuck up a dragon mini? Especially when there is already a great Huge Red Dragon? It is almost as if the designers sat around with the express goal of making something as inherently awesome as a dragon into a bland, flat, static figure. Like it was this really difficult challenge that needed to be met.

Fire Titan: Excellent figure. Inexplicably sticky. Since others have reported it I am going to assume that it is made or painted with a new material.

Armored Guulvorg: Poor huge worg, someone went to all the trouble of making you a really bitchin sculpt and WOTC went and hide it under blue paint. In a perfect world you all look like this one:

Bugbear Lancebreaker: Nice sculpt and nice paint job. Maybe more intended for people just starting to collect DDM. I’m all set for bugbears with maces, thank you.

Dragonborn Defender: The paint job would make this figure a good uncommon but it really is a letdown for a rare. His weapon looks like the designers hadn’t settled on what it was before sending the set to production. Looking at the stat card I’m not sure I am far off. The DDM side says it is a longsword and the RPG side says it is a battle axe.

Dragonborn Myrmidon: I imagine this really great figure is pointing specifically at the Dragonborn Defender. As if to say “You’re the reason people are mad that gnomes were cut from the PHB.”

Dwarf Warsword: Finally a passable dwarf rogue or ranger. Frankly, I’m happy whenever they put out a dwarf that isn’t wielding a battle axe.

Feybound Halfling: Fine enough, but why exactly?

Fire Giant Raider: WOTC is 5/5 when it comes to making great Fire Giants.

Fist of Moradin: Very well made and painted figure. Dwarves with maces are starting to reach Dwarves with Great Axes status though. I also imagine this dwarf dropping the mace as a challenge a la “Drumline”. This amuses me more than it has any right to.

Goblin Runner: This is the obligatory common goblin of the set.

Hobgoblin Guard: Better than expected paint job for a common

Mighty Blademaster: Average. The sword looks a little off though. Like the blade is too thick.

Skullcleave Warrior: Very cool figure. He looks like he is angry and will indeed take his agression out on someone’s cranium.

Tiefling Gladiator: A good sculpt and paint job but really is more in the realm of an uncommon figure, not rare. The rarity of a figure isn’t as important to me since I started getting complete sets, it has to be frustrating for someone to open a booster and find this when they could have just as easily pulled a Fire Giant Raider, Shocktroop Devil, or a Cloaktrick Rogue.

Fire Bat: OK for what it is but WOTC really needs to cut back on minis that are just a sculpt made of clear plastic. Clear plastic works best on figures like the Large Water Elemental and the Huge Ice Elemental which have paint jobs that add detail to the figures.

Orc Zombie: Not bad but we already had a common one in War Drums. There are lots of living things in the D&D universe that we haven’t seen a shambling, undead, brain starved version of yet. No need to try and reinvent the Orc Zombie.

Plaguechanged Ghoul: What’s with the blue goop in the abdomen?

Shadow Hulk: The only think better than an Umber Hulk is an uncommon (edit: rare actually), huge, dark blue Umber Hulk.

Xorn Ravager: This is what a resculpt should do. It takes the essence of the old Xorn and magnifies them in a way that better defines the creature.

Cave Bear: See Xorn Ravager. This is a much better medium bear than the Celestial Black Bear.

Cockatrice: Nice to see the cockatrice make its debut in the DDM line with such a good sculpt and paint job. Too bad it didn’t make the 4th Edition Monster Manual.

Earth Titan: You say Earth Titan, I say really well done (esp. for an uncommon) Huge Earth Elemental. I will probably end up say Earth Titan at some point too.

Flamescorched Kobold: This is the obligatory common kobold of the set.

Furious Owlbear: Kind of has a 1st Edition D&D feel. Really, I’m not that enamored with any of the Owlbears that have been released so far.

Galeb Duhr: Look like the Monster Manual art so I really can’t fault DDM. I do get the impression though that the Galeb Duhr’s day job is “Make holes in teeth!”

Lizardfolk Raider: Normally the line produces some really nice Lizardfolk. This one looks like it should be, at best, a common. When a figure doesn’t look better than the Harbinger version, it is time for the design team to go back to the drawing board.

Shifter Claw Adept: Apparently the Adept defeats foes by convincing them to pull his fingers.

Storm Giant Thunderer: Remember what I wrote earlier about gallery figures not doing the actual figures justice? Not so in this case. It is just as bland in person as it is in the gallery. The paint really has no detailing. Everything is one tone. The back of the warhammer is messed up. It is Large, not Huge. It is blue, not green. One of, if not the, worst figures in the set.

Angel of Retribution: The new angel concept in 4E isn’t hugely popular according to conventional wisdom, but I am a fan.

Captain of the Watch: A nice, colorful PC mini.

Chain Golem: Much better than the gallery picture. Very nice but I really liked the rusted look of the repaint better.

Cloaktrick Rogue: Very, very cool figure.

Half-Elf Assassin: Nice sculpt, but it is tough to judge the paint jobs on figures that would be wearing a lot of black clothing.

Eladrin Pyromancer: This fireball on this one looks kind of funny. It makes the pose look even more awkward.

Golden Wyvern Initiate: A nice addition to the lines PC figures. The color on it really pops.

Tomebound Arcanist: This is the kind of paint job that should be expected on a rare, medium figure. It has a lot of detail that even a lot of hobbyists would have difficultly recreating. One of the draws of DDM is that I just don’t have that much time to paint that many figures. With the Arcanist, I can say I don’t have time to paint them that well.

Blazing Skeleton: At first I merely thought this figure was mediocre. Then I saw the Origins repaint and I really started to detest the original. Here’s an idea: Make the flames on the original Blazing Skeleton orange and yellow and save the freaky purple flames for the repaint. I'm not sure I like this trend in the repaints vs originals. I prefer the "This one's belt is red instead of yellow" style of repaints to "This one is awesome, the one from the boosters sucks" style.

Boneclaw Impaler: Were there really that many people clamoring for a second run of the mill Boneclaw?

Death Titan: This is a figure where clear plastic works with the rest of the figure. This mini really is a good ambassador for the 4E Monster Manual.

Lurking Wraith: It is ok. The really redeeming quality of this figure is that the repaint doesn’t outshine the basic figure.

Young Adamantine Dragon: One of the new metallic dragons that hasn’t been seen in the new edition yet. It looks good, as dragons ought to, but would have benefited from having a more silvery sheen on the wings. Accurate RPG stats would have been real handy while waiting for a Monster Manual write up.

Blackroot Treant: I’m not sure what this is exactly, but it is a good one of them.

Enormous Carrion Crawler: Just kind of goofy looking.

Hellwasp: It looks like a giant wasp would. Maybe a little brighter, but not much more. Can’t really find fault with that.

Ochre Jelly: The mini does look like a Goethite colored amorphous blob. I still can’t help but feel that idea was formed around 4:45 pm on a Friday before a three day weekend just to meet a deadline.

Ravenous Dire Rat: Best dire rat so far.

Roper: Has a better pose than the original. It would look better with the original’s paint color.

Elder White Dragon: This is how you make a Huge Dragon! If only we could have seen a different Huge Dragon than the Red. A huge Blue Dragon would have had a lot of potential. It at least wouldn't suffer from comparisions to an earlier Huge version.

Elf-Arcane Archer: Shouldn’t an archer be wielding a bow and not a gnarly, sun bleached piece of driftwood?

Overall I think this is a middle of the bell curve set. It hits more than it misses and adds to the depth of the DDM line. Some things that are hurting it is that a) cannon fodder monsters such as goblins and orcs have much less generic value for me now than when the first three or four sets hit the street. b) enough sets have come out that new sets are seeing more versions of older minis, if the older one is already pretty good the new version will either look worse or maybe be just as good, which makes it kind of pointless for those that have the old version.

If WOTC really needs some inspiration for resulpts they should look at the Harbinger Hellhound and the Archfiends Clay Golem. That is some pretty low hanging fruit for designers looking to make an improved version.

No Charms in the Humvee!

Generation Kill is amazingly accurate. David Simon and Ed Burns need to always be working on a TV program. Just shine a light on every aspect of life that other people don't always get to see.

Generation Kill just has these amazing little details, like the vanilla pound cake and Charms in MRE's. The weird rush of being awake for 48 hours by nothing more than sugar and caffeine. The cadence of radio traffic.

I also like how they don't awkwardly try to insert exposition for the various acronyms and terms the military uses.

One of my favorite aspects of "Dark Knight"

First off, Dark Knight is a masterpiece of film making, not just of the superhero genre.

One of my favorite scenes of the movie was were Christopher Nolan set up a kind of "Prisoner's Dilema" scenario.

The "Prisoner's Dilema" is a Game Theory scenario where two suspects are brought in for questioning. A confession by at least one of them is needed to bring a conviction otherwise they are both released. Each prisoner is offered a lesser sentence is they testify against the the other. If they both confess their sentence isn't reduced as much but will still be less than if they stay quiet and thier accomplice doesn't. Neither suspect knows the other suspects decision. In theory the police will get both suspects to confess because the risk associated with not confessing is to high.

In Dark Knight this scenario is played out in the scene with the ferry full of law abiding citizens and the ferry of convicts. The purely rational outcome would have been both detonators being pressed almost immediately. The actual outcome laid out in the movie is actually the more realistic in my opinion. Our ability to trust others to be good actors, even when incentives exist for them to not be, is the key to civilization. Our trust isn't always rational, but it is what allows us to relax enough to progress. The ferry scene is a good metaphor for a world where people with nuclear weapons don't actually use them against others.

Of course in my mind, the Joker rigged the trigger to detonate the boat it was on and not the other ferry.