AWells

quote: Speaking of NBC, when they issued our gas masks in boot-camp, they ordered us into this room with tear gas. I elected not to follow the order. Some may think this unusual, but... This sergeant comes up to me and yells, "What do you think you're doing, general?!?" "Get your [edited] into that room, now!" I said, "No, Sergeant, I can't do that." He looks at me, then hollers for my Drill Sergeant, who comes up, and badgers me about following orders. "Not a lawful order, Drill Sergeant!" I said. "It will damage property of the United States Army! Namely, me!" He looks at me funny, then I explain. "I've been trying to get this piece to fit inside this piece here, but it just won't seal." (I've slept since the last time I dealt with the nomenclature....) He looks at it, his eyes get real big, and exclaims, "It doesn't have the @$&* filter!" It was fun, it was real... I've never used NBC gear in a live exercise.... Talk about fun... Using NBC gear in the gas chamber is the easy part... the hard part is when the drill sergeant rips your pro-mask off your face so you can breath in the lovely fumes of riot gas while reciting the answers to his questions in between dry heaves (luckily they serve lunch after you get out). Really, the most useless part of NBC training is when they toss flashbangs to simulate a nuclear attack and have everybody 'duck and cover'... like it's really going to help... lol [ 10-25-2002, 03:44 AM: Message edited by: Litvyak ]

My fondest Army memories are of sneaking out of the reception area at Benning to buy cigarettes at the PX around the corner and smoking said cigarettes in the back stairwell of the barracks. It was so easy, actually, because they give you camouflage uniforms which are perfect for sneaking through the woods and if you rolled your sleeves up nobody at the PX questioned whether you should be there or not. A warning to any future 11 series enlistees who might try that, though... there's barbed wire in the woods around the reception area, don't trip on it. Anyways, as you can probably guess from the above display of rebelliousness, I made it to week three of training before they decided to send me home instead of to Pensacola Federal Prison (One drill sergeant in another platoon actually made up a wonderful cadence about me going to prison and had his platoon recite while I waiting to be yelled at by the company CO one time, though).

Oh... you're supposed to arrest people in SWAT 3?? That kind of defeats the fun of being able to shoot through walls to kill people... there's nothing like clearing out a house without even setting foot inside (The M-14 with FMJ ammo from the Elite Edition worked wonders for that).

Does getting kicked out count??

quote:having been in the military i have dealt with women from both sides of the fence. those that believe they could do the soldiers job and those that couldnt. with the basic infantry system, most women can not handle the physical requirements. in my own job military intelligence (waiting for oxymoron comments) we had several that thought they could handle the job and could but could not handle the pack that came with it. women are not incapable of the duty but they are not built for it. not to say all men are though, quite a few men had problems with the packs we had to carry.Well, it's really hard to avoid those oxymoron comments when you state that women aren't built for military service because some can't handle the pack and then go on to defeat your own arguement by saying that some men can't handle the pack, either.

quote:Yes, actually, it was supposed to be (and is now) soldiering, my bad.Well, I do some girls that are good at soldering, too quote:I'm not saying that women are incapable of being soldiers, that's not the case, but I it does seem that most women are poorly adapted both physically and psychologically to the rigors involved in such a career. I may be biased though, in fact I probably am.I think that's more an effect of society than gender differences. Soldiering in modern times requires more in the way of physical and mental endurance than physical strength. Most women, assuming they keep in shape, are more than capable of exhibiting physical endurance just as well as man, and many women show themselves quite capable of dealing with mental stress... after all, how many women snap and shoot up thier school or place of employment? If wars were still fought with axes and swords there might be an arguement that women might not be able to cut it (no pun intended), but since the gun is the modern tool of warfare and many professional firearms instructors will swear that women appear to be naturally better shots than men, I think the female soldier is just as capable as a male if not more so. Society however, teaches girls that they are less capable in that role and that it's unwoman like to take a liking to violence. After all, boys are the ones raised on G.I. Joe... girls have Barbie... [ 10-24-2002, 03:35 AM: Message edited by: Litvyak ]

quote:So give me an example of something that disproves that everything needs some sort of cause.Dragon Lady answered that point quite nicely, I think. quote: quote: What is it? Having a group manipulate people into not murdering, stealing, etc is a BAD thing? Other than being a minority opinion, i'm asking you to explain how causing people to follow Christian morality is BAD for society. Yes, I know you never said "Christian morality is bad for society", but you've implied it time and time again by your position that the Church controlling people is "bad". Defend it.Easy now darling, I havenÔÇÖt clamed that Christian morality is bad for society because, in the strictest sense, it isnÔÇÖt. ItÔÇÖs bad for a lot of people, homosexuals being a prime example, and inconveniencing for most, but not bad per say. The church, however, is another story. It has been burning witches, murdering heretics, spieling all sorts of nonsense, and disrupting science for hundreds of years. ItÔÇÖs teeth are pretty much pulled in the modern age, so it doesnÔÇÖt do much harm, but in the past the church has been a viable option for those who want to control others. Exactly. Though I still think Christian morality is a major hinderence to scientific progress, even in modern times. Or maybe it would be better put as organized religion is a hinderance. An example off the top of my head is protests about cloning and research on aborted fetises, both of which are valuable areas for scientific study. quote:Darling, I canÔÇÖt believe were having this discussion. Soldering happens to require certain physiological characteristics (size and strength) that men have in greater abundance then women. The same cannot be said for most modern jobs. Besides, there is absolutely no ground to argue that men are being treated unfairly when women still make considerably less on average.I assume that's supposed to be soldiering, in which case I have to disagree. Women, when they've been allowed to soldier, have proven themselves exceptionally capable of the task. After all, the first Soviet citizen to be recieved at the White House was a female sniper from WWII with over 300 kills to her credit... more than any US sniper ever that I'm aware of... it just goes to prove that guns don't kill people, PMS kills people. Not to mention many other countries employ women as combat soldiers successfully, including Israel, and there's women serving in the U.S. Army's elite Delta Force counter terrorism unit. [ 10-24-2002, 02:12 AM: Message edited by: Litvyak ]

quote: 2. Is there any way to form marine teams and give them orders short of individually in TacOps? As far as I know there's way to put your Marines into teams. quote: 3. How do I effectively use SM's? Good question... I use them as shuttle pilots personally, but you can deploy them into space, I believe. Read the VCF for instructions on how to do so. quote: 4. Is there an option similar to fleet C&C for marines and pilots in order to form squads/wings? No. [ 10-23-2002, 05:59 PM: Message edited by: Litvyak ]

Went out to dinner with a couple people from school last night. I was a little late and showed up after everybody else had ordered. Well, the waitress comes over after about 15 minutes and apologizes for not seeing me come in... she hands me a menu and askes if I want anything to drink, so I go to open the menu to take a glance at what they have, and she says, "I don't have time for this," and takes off. I had to laugh... I don't think I've ever seen a waitress do that before. We just chaulked it up to my natural talent for making friends.

Any non-human entity doesn't need the same level of detail in AI programming as a human based character to create a suspension of disbelief. Players are critical of human ai entities because they are familiar with humans... since after all most of us are human, and they expect them to act like humans. However since most non-schizofrenics don't deal with demons on a regular basis, it's easier to be more forgiving about how they act. After all, I don't think most people would think it's odd if the spawn of hell doesn't dive for cover when somebody fires a pistol at it. It doesn't mean the AI is dumb, either, just that there's certain corners that can be cut when dealing with monsters instead of humans. And also, from what I've heard there won't be any "hordes" of monsters in Doom III... they're more likely to be encountered one or two at a time. Of course that's just impressions of reviewers based on the E3 exhibit.

All right, SC, I think I burst both my lungs laughing as I read those links... that's just too much.

I think it might have been gamespot that mentioned that there's plans for a PC release, but I've seen nothing about it on the Rockstar Games site, and I until I do I consider it just a rumor. [ 10-22-2002, 11:03 PM: Message edited by: Litvyak ]

Well, really for a Zombie or something it doesn't need much complex except for pathfinding. Ok, so it needs a bit more than that but nothing compared to what a typical FPS with human looking opponents that should take cover and work as a team with some sort of appearance of logic.

Well, anyways, for anybody who hasn't seen them Raven Shield is the third Rainbow Six installment and SWAT: Urban Justice is the Sierra's next SWAT title. To put it mildly, Raven Shield looks fantastic... using the Unreal engine and blowing away any of the previous titles from Red Storm Entertainment in eye candy. I have to say, though, that I'm very disappointed that they made a choice not to model bullet penetration through walls... really I think that was one of the best features of SWAT 3 or at least the most fun. Other than that, it features more weapons and will use the Rainbow Six style of equipping operatives rather than the Kit system introduced in Ghost Recon. SWAT: Urban Justice on the other hand looks... well, corny, to put it mildly at least next to the super realistic graphics of Raven Shield. Something about the feel of the graphics reminds me of the Resident Evil games and I can't help but wonder if the SWAT team will get call ups to battle zombies when I look at the screen shots. Sierra also dropped the LAPD name from what I understand, in order to incorporate a variety of other features they wanted to include such as female officers and riot shields... none of which are used by the LAPD SWAT. On the plus side, weapons and ballistics modeling is supposed to be some of the most detailed ever... with richochets, over penetration, and the ability to customize weapons quite extensively. Anyways, both games are due out in the early 2003. [ 10-22-2002, 05:50 AM: Message edited by: Litvyak ]

quote:Pretty weird, the bar for poverty continues to go up. I think that it is now $20,000 and a family lives in poverty, in africa most families are lucky to make a dollar a day.Federal Poverty Guidelines They go by the number of people in the household and range from $8,860 to $36,580 for 1 to 10 people respectively. Though I think most people would be hard pressed to get by with less than $20k and still live relatively comfortably. Though I admit when I had my own place before I started going to school I was getting by on $15k.

quote:That comment about in order for some to get richer, others have to get poorer is the biggest load of crap that I have ever heard. If everybody was to get rich, nobody would be rich... you can't be rich unless others are poor. The poorer everybody else is, the richer you become. Being rich isn't about how much money you have, but how much money you have in relation to how much everybody else has.

quote: quote:And exactly what law of science would that be?Not sure of the name of it, but i'd love for someone to prove it wrong. Actually, for a law of science to be valid it would have to be proven true. A law that states that everything has a cause is impossible to prove true because of it's vagueness. If it could be proven true we wouldn't have much of a debate There are scientific laws that deal with a cause and effect relationship in much more specific circumstances, however. And one of the methods of research when employing the scientific method is to look for a cause and effect relationship, since it's often the easiest avenue to persue if one exists. Though my understanding is that that particular method is falling out of favor with the scientific community.

quote: Whatever I do it's about time to say good bye to AOL. And whatever you choose, if it involves saying good bye to AOL it's probably a good choice

I don't know... Doom III looks good if you've seen the screenshots. I've heard that will have an entirely feel of gameplay and the game will focus mostly on single player with only rudimentary MP support... somewhat a relief these days when many FPSs are made for MP with only a cobbled together SP game or no single player game at all. It should be interesting to see what it plays like.

I don't know... I think I'll pass on this one since a PC release is still rather sketchy and GTA 3 got old really quick for me.

I think the bill through AT&T is about $120 US a month for broadband, digital cable, and digital phone service. Broadband alone is like $40-something...

quote:well when they are a "religious" group, and thier "own" god (ficticous or not) said no, its not really silly. and weapons dont make a country, ppl do. so by breaking thier own religion and having weapons (and using them in an agressive way) means they have sinned according to thier own laws and beliefs. so again i ask, do they deserve land that isnt thiers anymore? they lost it a looong time ago.Actually, Israel is a nation not a religious group. Anyone, regardless of religious convictions can become a citizen of Israel. The fact that country is dominated by a single religious group, in this case Jewish, means little, since most nations are dominated by a particular religious faith among thier people. The only thing that sets Israel apart is it's the only modern nation where the predominant faith is Jewish. To insist that a nation must make policy based on a religious concept such as sin is just plain silly. As for Israel wanting land that doesn't belong to it... the last time I checked a map the nation was called Israel and not Palestine... so, yes, the Israelis do own it. The Israelis took back thier nation from the Palestinians some 50 years ago or so... it's called survival of the fittest, and Palestine just didn't cut it.

quote:Nonviolent protests, gag me with a spoon.That sounds kind of kinky, actually... how come all the fun ones live 3000 miles away? quote:all i have to say is Israel should never get thier own land. thier "own" god cursed to forever wander cause they had ignored what he asked them todo and i hope Palestine beats the mess out Israel. serves em right tryin to force another group to become subservient and give up land they own. and before u say the Israelites own that land too, think of it this way. mexico once owned most the West Coast, theres no way the US would let them have it back. it was lost fair and squareAnd the Isrealis controlling Palestine isn't the same as the US controling... well... anywhere in the US, since we took it all fair and square over the dead bodies of the Native Americans? I have no problems with how the United States was formed, and I certainly don't see anything wrong with Israel. To say that the Israelites shouldn't have a country because some ficticous God said they couldn't have one is just plain silly. There's plenty of very real automatic weapons, tanks, attack helicopters, fighter jets and nuclear weapons that say that Israel can exist as a nation.

quote: But you can bet this will be an interesting movie.... From what I read about it... no... not really.

quote:I hadnÔÇÖt thought about government censorship though, that would be rather bad, if rather unlikely (after all, there is nothing obscene about crazed Arab suicide bombers, and if censorship includes things that are simply not PC then things are a hell of a lot worse then I thought).Heh... I don't put it past our elected officials to try and censor anything they think they can get away with.