Irrational is a wonderful prefix isn't it?

It gets you away from any explanation or reasoning that there ever could be. However, it doesn't really get away from the embarrassment that ensues, like what happened to me last night.

Now I have a couple of irrational fears. One of which is heights, and I'm mostly getting used to it now. I can get on top of a building and look over the edge and see everyone down the way. I don't know how I'd go on the roof of a skyscraper, but I don't see it being very good (he says as the warms trickles down his leg). Stupid Acrophobia. I don't know where it came from, because I've always had it since I was little, but I've slowly grown out of it, though occasionally the fight/flight will kick in and I'll just refuse to go any higher.

Mum even tried to help me get over my fear by sending me to awkward places that were much too high, or sending me out with family friends to go out to places of elevation. One time we went out rockclimbing and I just refused to climb. Wouldn't do it. Couldn't do it. He went through all the safety instructions and everything, and assured me over and over that it was perfectly safe. I even watched my sister do it, climb up and take her time and everything, but NOPE. Not budging. I at least did something at an Indoor Rockclimbing centre. But I got little more than halfway and I got stuck until I was told I could come down.



Another time we went out to the glass house mountains for a bushwalk up the mountain. There was a part with a fairly steep climb up a smooth rock. I got halfway, but I couldn't get a grip on my shoes. So I got stuck and decided to go back down and waited there for the others to go all the way to the top and back down again. I sat there for a few hours feeling a bit embarrassed, but adamant that I couldn't do it. When I got home, mum was pissed that I didn't get anywhere with it, but I never asked for her help with my fear of heights. She should've discussed it with me instead of sending me off without even asking whether i wanted to go.

I think that was my angst period too, where I just didn't have any choice of what I wanted to do, I just got told "You're doing this, that's final" regardless of whether I had a massive problem with it or not.

Anyway, I have a case of Acrophobia and occasionally my legs will turn to cement and I'll get stuck.

My other irrational fear is Glass Elevators. And I just mean Glass Elevators, where the walls have windows out into open areas, or you can see the floors going up in front of you in the door. Elevators with Windows. Display cases on a wire. This is another one from my childhood. Mum and dad had me at the Myer Centre and we were about to take the escalators going up, and I started bawling my eyes out and carrying on getting upset at the escalators to the point that Mum said "Alright, lets try the elevators." No good. I got in there and I was worse. Just stepping in there and I just went off like someone was trying to kill me.

And that one has really stuck through to today. I've taken glass elevators only a few times after that, using the small part of metallic wall as a set of blinders while feeling the rock in my stomach sink down into my feet as the buttons highlighted the floor we were on. They move so quickly those elevators, so the inertia really just makes me sink.



When I have the chance now, I just take the escalators. It's much easier for me to peel the bandaid than rip it off.

Last night however wasn't one of my bravest days. I got offered to go see Immortals for free because a friend got given 20 free double passes at the Myer Centre. I was offered to join in and I said yes, because a free movie is the best kind of movie.

We all met up at Hungry Jacks and had some dinner before taking a very long way around to the Cinema, going up Queen Street rather than going down Albert Street, but eventually we got to the right set of lifts, and that's where everyone got on the lift and I just kept on walking away and down the stairs and up Albert street to King George Square Bus Station and Jumped on a Bus and let it take me home. Didn't tell anyone. Just bolted. Like the Massive Pussy I am.



See, what had happened, is that I completely forgot that the Myer Centre has Glass Elevators. And tou know that fight or flight mechanism? That self explanatory thing in your brain? Yeah, for some reason it just had a big red sign that said "FLIGHT FLIGHT FLIGHT FLIGHT FLIGHT FLIGHT FLIGHT FLIGHT FLIGHT FLIGHT." Even the idea of escalators didn't turn me back. Scotty suggested "Look straight ahead"
Nope: "I don't have tunnel vision Scott, I can still see the way down and I have a fear of heights." Scotty even called me later after the movie to see if I was alright and I just explained that to him, that for some reason I just flipped out and had to go.

The only thing now is that when I see my friend again, I'm going to get ridiculed. Probably quite a lot.

*Shrug* It's the price you pay, I guess.

A different sort of Tron

Back in the day, when I were a wee lad, probably about 5 or 6 years of age, I was given some Lego sets as presents and, over time, I have lost the various pieces until it has pretty much completely disappeared. Whether it's a few pieces dropped off at a friends place, or just disappeared into the ether, I don't have a single piece of it now. Though I still have a memory of it.

What I really remembered of it was that it was Red, and it had these massive wheels for bush bashing across a barren planet like Mars. That was all. And I'm sure I had an absolute ball with it while I was young, and with the little Pirate Set I have at work, I want to expand it out to more. Something bigger, but not big enough to cover my desk.



So I did some Google searches. "Mars Lego Vehicle" was the first through Image searches and it came up with nothing except random lego sets from something else entirely. I looked at the wheels and just found everything wrong, wrong and wrong. None of them matched.

I looked up Wikipedia to see where that would take me, and what I found was that there are various different Themes of Lego. Now I already knew this, since I could still see Medieval and space and modern and etc etc etc all around the Lego Aisles in the shops. But series of a theme would only last for a few years at a time, so I figured that the set I was looking for would probably be best found on Fleabay.

Eventually I found it. The M-Tron Series Celestial Forager/Astro Wrecker.



I searched more on it too and I found out that it is also part of a super set called the "Secret Space Voyager", which has me curious and I want to build it. Too bad I don't have any money.

What's Black, White and Red all over? Two Destroyers and an Ivan

Every Sunday I head to Spring Hill to play games at the LGS there. At least I try to. Yesterday I made it there and had a couple of really enjoyable games with Kommander Brian Blessed. I mean, Kommander Izak Harkevich.

Now, I originally thought he was an awkward caster. He has a heap of spells that are really interesting, but he's just hard to really get off the ground. But this yesterday was different. They were significantly better than the last couple of games I had using him, where he'd be overloaded with Warjacks (I had a Behemoth and two destroyers I think) and I would hope for the best out of their ranged attacks.

This time, I got a fantastic result out of the two games i had with him. The first game was 50pts against Kara Sloan. I technically lost, but got a wonderful moral victory out of it.

The lists were as follows.

• Kommander Izak Harkevich
• - Black Ivan
• - White Destroyer
• - Red Destroyer
• - War Dog
• Great Bears of Gallowswood
• Greylord Ternion
• Widowmakers
• Winterguard Infantry (Max)
• - Officer and Standard
• - Rocketeer (1)
• Koldun Lord
• Kovnik Jozef Grigorivich

• Captain Kara Sloan (*6pts)
• - Cyclone (9pts)
• - Defender (9pts)
• - Stormclad (10pts)
• - Squire (2pts)
• Black 13th Gun Mage Strike Team (4pts)
• Storm Tower (2pts)
• Stormblade Infantry (Leader and 5 Grunts) (5pts)
• - Stormblade Infantry Officer & Standard (3pts)
• Sword Knights (Leader and 5 Grunts) (4pts)
• Trencher Infantry (Leader and 5 Grunts) (6pts)
• Captain Arlan Strangewayes (2pts)

He started off with a list of things he hadn't used, and some reliable fellas. I pulled out mostly reliable stuff, and designed Harkevich's battlegroup to include three warjacks. So Black Ivan, and two Destroyers. I love Destroyers and I only wish they were P+S 18 still, rather than 17.

One thing I was happy about was using the Koldun Lord. I've rarely used him, but he came into great use. My second turn, everyone was in range to shoot, so the Koldun Lord gave a point of Focus to Black Ivan to Boost Damage since Ivan's affinity offers automatically boosted attack rolls. Then the other two Destroyers would boost to hit using focus from Harkevich.

With Harkevich's four focus, he upkeeps Escort from last turn and put the remaining three to use for Broadsides. Out of the 6 AOEs thrown out there and and slightly beyond the Stormclad I caught a couple of Stormblades and one AOE caught Kara who she copped a boosted damage roll for either 4 or 7 damage.

Next turn, I got my chance to charge into his Stormclad and Cyclone. With the Escort up and his Feat popped, Black Ivan and Red Destroyer charged in and tore a good chunk off the buggers. Harkevich gave them two focus each as well, I think, and White Destroyer was left guarding Harkevich's Flank from a Defender that was creeping around.

Russ's turn was spent either missing half the attacks on Black Ivan, or slowly Grinding at the Red Destroyer. That +3 armour to my Khador Warjacks? Holy **** biscuits on a **** platter does it make a difference. I sat there and took so little damage. It helped that I crippled the Stormblade's Sword Arm, but CRIMENY.

Oh and it was rather funny when the Cyclone who couldn't shoot any more and hold up my Winterguard from Advancing, sat there and tried to double handed throw Black Ivan. Twice he tried this turn and the next, and with both Strength Test Rolls we equalled on the dice. Which means I win since I have 1 more Strength than he does. I had to laugh because the chances of rolling higher than 2d6 with only 1d6 is very improbable.

Fourth turn, the last before I was shot to oblivion, I surprised him with some Winterguard Fun. Grape Shot plus "For The Motherland" makes for an infantry killing turn. Which I did to his trenchers and the better part of his remaining Stormblades. I think there were two left, including the officer who had taken about 3 points of damage, one after the other, through the game.

The Greylords, who were mostly putting clouds on the Warjacks to defend Old Mate, had charged in last turn and one tried to kill a Trencher but failed to hit. One kept back to surprise them from the side, so the other two were basically sacrificed to hold up the trenchers. At the fourth turn, the remaining Greylord was suddenly surrounded by Running Sword Knights, and luckily three of them were in a line. So off he fired the Magical Shotgun and away went two Sword Knights, the last two taken out by Harkevich's Hand Cannon and White Destroyers Executioner Axe.

That was when Kara moved up and got a bead on Harkevich with her Rifle and the Defenders Cannon. Two shots, and he was down and out. As you'd expect from a Boosted Weapon Master POW 12 and a Boosted POW 15.

Before I forget though, the Great Bears of Gallowswood made up their points value, I reckon, by stopping the Black 13th from doing anything significant. Granted, he didn't lose a single model and I lost all three Great Bears, but you know what? If the Black 13th were more in the fray than taking the long way around the flank, it would have been a very different game. I probably would've lost more Winterguard much earlier in the game.

Russ conceded the moral victory to me for BUTCHERING his army and pulling off a "Bullshit Assassination". Which wasn't quite bullshit, it's the way I would expect a dirty Cygnaran player to Assassinate me.

---

Second game was against Aiden's Karchev the Terrible. This was a massive grinding match, pitting Khador versus Khador. But it was really fun at the 35pt Level with the following lists.

• Kommander Harkevich, the Iron Wolf (*5pts)
• * Black Ivan (10pts)
• * Destroyer (9pts)
• * Destroyer (9pts)
• * War dog (1pts)
• Great Bears of Gallowswood (5pts)
• Greylord Ternion (Leader and 2 Grunts) (4pts)
• Koldun Lord (2pts)

• Karchev the Terrible (*5pts)
• * Berserker (6pts)
• * Berserker (6pts)
• * Decimator (9pts)
• * Juggernaut (7pts)
• Battle Mechaniks (Leader and 5 Grunts) (3pts)
• Man-o-war Shocktroopers (Leader and 4 Grunts) (9pts)

This game was fun, but could've worked out a bit better if he changed up one thing. We threw each others Warjacks against each other, and I mean threw them. Mine charged first during the feat turn and he had Towed most of his warjacks into the Fray. There was only one Warjack that missed out in getting into the fray which was one of his Berserkers. He fell a little way behind the rest of the Party.

The mistake that was made was that a poor Berserker had gotten ahead as well, and copped the better part of about 6 Bombard Attacks, and a Charging Black Ivan. He was quickly torn apart. Afterwards, Karchev got into the Grinding melee with his own Axe versus my Feated Warjacks.

The better option, which he agreed with, was to have Karchev move a little way out of melee and use the ranged attack to Knock down everything in front of his own Warjacks. Oh and to get his Berserker up the front a bit quicker, maybe taking the place of where Karchev was. That way, Karchev wouldn't have been punched into Oblivion by Black Ivan with Fortune cast on him.

One thing that was Frustrating? Black Ivan has Critical: Brutal Damage. Out of the 6-8 attacks I made against Karchev, do you think I made a SINGLE Critical hit? NO! Everything else in my army got Criticals Galore! But could Black Ivan do it? No, the spiteful bugger decided to extend Karchev's death.

---

So overall, I had a good weekend with some great games. I can't wait for next week!

You take away my single player, I get angry

Disclaimer: This is aimed at the whingers. Not those who actually like having more hours worth into their solo play.

You Bastards.

I'm in the same pool as the author of the above post, where I can get a better sense of accomplishment playing the single player campaign. In my case, I will admit that I'm absolute crap in Multiplayer and I don't want to hear, to quote @TheWah, "Fourteen year old american children questioning my sexuality".

So now they're going to take away from me a small part of my pleasure in a franchise I actually like? That's some super bastardery right there.

I like long campaigns. I heard in the same podcast, where the quote above is from, that console games aren't entirely worth it, which is somewhat true for someone of my standing. $90 for one game and you play for 24 hours, or $90 for 45 games on your Gadget and you play forever.

So to have my gameplay time drop by a third, I feel like I've been ripped off by the wrong people. All because of a bit of whinging about "Oh it's TOO LOOONG".

Tell you what. Have a cup of cement for breakfast. Maybe that'll harden you the fuck up.

Of Nerds and Birthdays

I think I've mentioned how much of a geek Scott is. He always has a list of Preorder Receipts as long as his arm from the local EBGames store near his work. He has a back log of games he hasn't played due to being distracted with certain other games.

So when his birthday comes around in a month time we're going to celebrate his birthday by, you guessed it, playing Video Games. We bring our own TVs/Monitors and our consoles (maybe computers) and we network up to enjoy some good old fashioned LAN Gaming.

Halo, Gears of War, etc etc etc. All good games for a good time, all for Scottys Birthday. Then we're going to play Dystopian Wars and Warmachine/Hordes over the entirety of the weekend of the 11th and 12th.

Which makes me think of my own birthday next year. Now Scotts place has plenty of room to work around. We can set up three/four consoles around a couple of tables in his downstairs room or even the garage.

I reminisced about going to The Bunker many years ago as part of my own birthday. And with the talking about "Nerd Hold", the Man-Cave/Club-House, it made me think about Mums Shed in the Back Yard.

The shed was built many years ago, back when I was young (Not that long ago for some of my readers - :P ) due to the old shed being... well a wreck. It was a few sheets of corrugated iron stuck together by rusty nails, cobwebs and Hope. Maybe a few dead bodies as well. Not people, just things like Spiders, rats, snakes, cockroaches, and the dead, dried out spirits of Skin Mags.

That was torn down and the new shed was built, along with a Pagola that mum asked for. The Pagola is pretty good too, with a very large tree over the top, and one of the best breezes that runs through it on a summers day. The Old Boy chucked all of his tools in there onto shelves he built into the walls, and then everything just sat there. Back came the Creepy Crawlies, but the spirits of the Skin Mags didn't come back. I think.

Now back to the subject at hand, my train of thought was going towards using the shed for a LAN party next year. This isn't likely, because of a few things.

1. The place is filled to the brim with crap from my sister and bro-in-law. They moved house earlier this year and just filled it to the fkn brim.


2. The creepy crawlies. They've probably nested in there, so it'll take some time to get rid of them and making sure the place is secure for people to stay in there for more than 5 minutes.


3. The rotting wood. I'm sure that the place is rotting on the inside, particularly those shelves that were built into the wall. So I will have to look into tearing those down.


4. The Wiring. Now, the Old Boy isn't an electrician. In fact, I think the only electrician we know is Aaron, and we didn't know he existed until I repeated Grade 12 at Aspley. So all the power going through to the Flourescent lights? They're from a power socket in Mums laundry which connects to an extension cord leading out to the Pagola and into a large array of other various extension cords. We're likely to blow the power out.

So there's a few things to sort out if I want to use the place for a small gaming space for a day or two. We could grab a couple of cheap couches and small entertainment units from the St Vinnies, chuck them in the middle of the place and hook up the systems for a good time. And in the Pagola, we'll have our table-top games or even some board games, and a BBQ is there which just needs a clean, and I can pull out my desk speakers and pick up some random music from Dee.

Sounds awesome to me. Heck, if I actually did go through with it and had the money/Time, I would build my Sonic Arcade Cabinet. That would be pretty awesome.

Board games and Pandora's Box

I've been getting more and more into board games and of a Tuesday I've been indulging in board games with a couple of the other regulars. Last week was "Wrath of Ashardalon", a D&D board game which worked out pretty well to play, and then last night was "The Order of the Stick Adventure Game".

The Order of the Stick is a parody of the classical Dungeons and Dragons game, following a mismatch band of player characters. The Board game follows one of the first dungeons that the party run through to fight the Boss at the end.

Now you follow through the dungeon and it's pretty cruisy. You explore rooms and attack the monsters that appear, grab the subsequent loot, and then move on. As you go deeper, you fight more monsters per room, based on the floor you're on. So floor 1 is 1 monster. Floor 2 is 2 monsters, etc etc.

Then occasionally there'll be a Leader monster which will increase the size of the monster fight. So instead of one monster, you get 2. Larger fights with bigger pay offs, but more risk. You're only rolling D12's and your friends can either be nice or they can be a complete bastard. I copped that once or twice from Cory.

There's also Support abilities, where if you have a monster of a type listed on the monster card somewhere on the same floor, they gain a special rule or bonus. Such as +2 to defence and attack. Or the Horde Ability.

Horde means that for each monster of the same type on the same floor, you add another monster. So if you have a Goblin Warlock with Horde, and you draw three goblins, you have to add another 3 monsters. And if they're more goblins, you have to draw more monsters per goblin.

We came against the fight for Lord Xykon, who has Horde for Goblins and Undead in his army, and we opened up Pandoras Box. We drew the Kobold King and two of the Goblin Characters, who also have Horde. We also drew about 5 Demon Roaches, who count towards Kobolds, Goblins and Undead. Basically, the battle Exponentialized until we got to 23 and said "Nope. That's it. We're leaving it at that."

After we got through the fight, I sat down and did the calculations. I ran out of cards after taking them from the top of the Battle Deck, and Recycling the discarded battle deck cards.

At least it was Fun! I got to put my Great Cleavage to good use.

Fk me I can ramble

I read an article just before about the state of PC Gaming and standardising systems. I found it was an interesting article and got me thinking about two things. One is building my own PC, something I had a friend do a few years ago with my current PC (Which has a wonderful time dancing through games like Crysis which is a system hungry game) and PC Games themselves, and the quality thereof.

When I got my current computer built all those years ago, probably about 3-4 years now, I gathered up a bunch of money and said "Take this and build me a slightly above average PC for the time. It was a good PC and outperformed his own (A small shot to his pride I believe, though he did make it... I liked taht he called it Beast-09)

The thing he was irked about was the case. He was adamant that I would need a new Case for my PC. However, I refused. I already had a computer tower and I just wanted it gutted and filled back up because for one, I wasn't going to fork out another $200 for a fancy box, and two, the case that I owned had a very comfortable handle on the top. So if I had to move it around, it was very easy. And three, even if I could get a new case that fulfilled the such needless desire of point 2, I still didn't want to fork out $200+ for a new case.

I was happy with this.


So I had him build it and did it for about $800 with almost the entirety of the internal hardware being refurbished. It was wonderful and it still is. I use it to play the PC games that I do have, and if I purchased any recently I would probably still be able to play it, though chances are that I may need to tone down some details.

Actually I haven't bought a PC game in a few years, so I'm not too sure on that, but I'll be sure to let someone know.

I've been thinking about case mods over the past few months though. I was originally thinking along the lines of my consoles, the Xbox260 and the PS3, but after surfing for ideas I couldn't really get any ideas on what I would want to do to either of my consoles. I'd want something unique so that it's MY console. Not anyone elses. Mine.

I also looked at computer Case Mods too, and there are some really nice ones out there. Some themed around computer games, some hilarious, and some you just laugh at because you're aware what it's a joke of.


A little while before I started searching case mods, I was also thinking about my "Nerd Hold", the game cave I had thought about at the time. How I wanted game tables and a small lounge in front of a projector or large TV. That sort of thing.

But what I didn't really think about was the Decor of Nerd Hold. In my mind, I kept thinking of something that didn't have much effort put into it. Like a large corner studio apartment with a support pole in the middle of the room, sitting a couple of stories up from the inner city street below visible through the slat windows that went from waist high to the ceiling.

In one corner is the kitchen on a raised level, with oven and a centre table, and either cupboards all around with corner steps leading to each other section. In the opposite corner are the lounges with the TV or top quality projector which is connected to the PC and consoles (naturally). In the windowed corner, a Wargaming table and painting desk, and I forgot what I was going to put opposite that. I think it was a Pool Table.

And apart from the kitchen, the entire thing is cement floor with rugs over them.

But that doesn't sound like a nice place. Sure, it's good enough for Nerds, but what's wrong with doing something nicer? Like I could go for class, and have polished wood floors, desks with leather trims, coffee tables that hide the PC's and consoles and display onto a wood framed television, or a theatre screen flanked by burgundy curtains, and just close enough for the 120* of vision. The kitchen would be as mentioned before, but put it level with the floor. and the inner corner is a Bar. I'd debate taps.

I'd match the Pool table to the theatre with Burgundy felt, and a flourescent light over the top with a wooden cover (rather than the usual metal one finds these days. The Wargame tables would have to be custom made, but something like the pool table without pockets. Like The Sultan.



Grain walls and polished floors, I wouldn't be able to get away with it unless I were rich or knew how to build it all myself. Which I don't.

But going back to the subject of Case mods, I had seen several Wooden Case mods which gave me the idea of the room just mentioned, and they were really nice. They could be used as really nice couch side tables.

There's always the idea of using the actual table though as the Computers Case. Given a bit of thought into the internal structure, and some space for air and such, and you'll have a really nice computer blended in with the scenery. Quiet too, as the wood absorbs fan noise and vibration very well.

That's one thing I like about PC's. Though they take up a large amount of space, you can make them look really nice. Alternatively, you can get them as small as a laptop. And while it won't be as powerful as a desktop (debatable), it's still the ability to have something that will do the job and cover as little area as possible.