Run into some problems last week with our hack-day project that mean that it we decided to postpone completion of it until AFTER the hack day - and work on another idea, which, as it turns out - is waay easier, and also a much better project in the end we think!
New blog for it: www.yahoohack2.blogspot.com
Monday, March 21, 2011
Thursday, March 10, 2011
Hystericlees and Dragons Part 2
Round 5:
Evictus: Evictus starts advancing towards the Drow Ranger at the rear
Drow Sorceror: Attempts to FeebleMind Edgar but Edgar passes his Will save.
Drow Ranger: Stepping back, fires a volley of arrows at Evictus, dealing a chunk of damage before the inevitable charge.
Dreinell: Attempts to bestow curse on the Sorceror but fails to slay him.
Edgar: Take a moment to pop another potion to get some health back.
Umberhulk: In a surprise move, the ground beneath Dreinell gives way as two hulking big claws rip through the earth and pull him in.
Round 6:
Evictus: Charges the drow ranger about ripping him in twain on the charge.
Drow Sorceror: Re-attempts to Feeblemind
Drow Ranger: Stepping back, casts Darkness around him and Evictus
Dreinell: Passes a concentration check to cast his last Phantasmal Killer the Umberhulk, but fails to drop him
Edgar: Floats over to the hole in the ground where Edgar was attacked by the Umberhulk: and hovers into it, out of sight from the Drow Sorceror, and uses his final Phantasmal Killer on the Umberhulk, but fails to kill it - but does deal a chunk of damage from it failing its will save.
Umberhulk: The umberhulk proceeds to bite another chunk out of the Lich/Dread Necromancer
Round 7:
Evictus: Sniffs the air intently, and stepping forward through the darkened shroud, raises up his sword and brings it down, lopping the torso of the Ranger in Two, and mutters "Sheen!"
Drow Sorceror: With no currently visible target, he steps out of the line of sight of evictus behind a building.
Dreinell: Passes a concentration check and decides to try out a relatively new spell in his arsenal: Finger of Death - pokes the Umberhulk in the eye and instantly kills it
Edgar: Focuses intently, grasps Dreinells hand and Teleports them over to the Sorceror - but misjudges the landing spot and appears a few feet further back than intended.
Round 8:
Evictus: Picking up the dead Drow's Composite longbow and a fire arrow, he steps out of the darkness, lines up a shot and fires onto the Sorceror who he can see sticking out from behind the building... But he misses... The arrow hits the wall... bursts through the wall, then bursts through the wall behind and impacts the sorceror in the shoulder, about dropping him (double critical confirmed - 6d8 +1d6 +18 damage... (double crit effect under my rules.)
Drow Sorceror: Flanked by the dread necromancer and the Hybris werewolf warrior, he decides to move to a better spot, and teleports himself onto the roof of the Palace.
Dreinell: Spotting the mage teleport onto the roof draws his bow and launches a volley of magic missiles into the Sorceror, but doesnt do much damage.
Edgar: Points floats up for a better line of sight and aims his finger at the Sorceror, and with a mutter of "Kerpow!" launcher a volley of magic missiles that send him hurtling from the rooftop into a flowerbed below. He blows on his finger tip and turns around to smile at Dreinell.
At the end of round 8 - another Drow is seen rounding the corner into the gardens...
Round 9:
Evictus: Aims his bow at the new target, and unleashes a volley of arrows at him, hitting and lightly wounding him.
Drow Ranger: Steps forward and uses his multishot ability to hit Edgar with a couple of fire arrows, nearly dropping him. The Rangers Spider gallops forth to attack the two casters next round.
Dreinell: Spots the approaching spider, points his finger and kills it instantly with another insta-kill spell.
Edgar: Fires off a volley of magic missiles at the new target, finishing it off.
Drow Assassin: Makes a surprise attack against Evictus and attempts to knock hi out with his Death Attack - but misses (by 1!)
Round 10:
Drow Assassin: Having the bead on his victim, perforates him with several sneak attacks from his Frost Rapier.
Evictus: Spins to counter attack the assassin landing a blow or two but only doing a little damage.
Dreinell: Once more he points his finger out and casts an instant-killy spell, dropping the Assassin.
Combat ends.
The party proceed to pile the bodies up in a heap in the yard for burning, and gather what treasures they can find. Upon exploring the two holes left by the drow, they also find a hidden chamber under the gardens containing numerous items of artwork - from tankards to silver swords, and several Wondrous Items...
Monday, March 7, 2011
Hystericlees and Dragons
Werewolf Warrior (10(14))
Human Sorceror (11)
Human Dread Necromancer/Lich (10/1)
They came up against an attacking force of Drow in the middle of the night just outside the Palace they Annexed in the town of Dyonnesia that they Have been working in for the latter half of their game.(picture shall be edited into the bottom of this page)
The attacking force consisted (initially) of:
12 Drow Sorceror
12 Drow Cleric
12 Drow Ranger (Huge Monstrous Spider companion)
Mutated Umberhulk (basically half way stats wise between an Umberhulk and the Gargantuan version - on the Umberhulks template)
------------------------------------------------------------------------
During the night you are awoken by the clash of a gong from outside... You hear some funny sounds coming from outside the windows...
Looking out you can see some large hulking figure crashing about in the gardens, and several militia men attempting to subdue it with nets and spears, but the spears simply shatter against its thick hide and the militia are crushed by its huge fists. A flash comes from the trees at the edge of the garden and several volleys of fire trace from them at high speed impacting with another guard Impacting in rapid succession leaving him a smouldering corpse on the ground.
Another figure is seen flitting past the Dread Necromancers window... agile, black figure, but with almost radiant white hair. Clearly skilled in acrobatics since this is not the ground floor... (Que "Ahh, Fuck!" from the werewolf OOC)
After looking out the window, Evictus reaches to his equipment and picks it up, strapping it on he dives out the window, drawing his sword and charging towards the Umberhulk, only to find himself getting trapped on a sheet of spider webbing laid out in the grass not 15 feet from his target.
Dreinell Jumps out his window and Bestows Curse on the Umberhulk, reducing its Strength by 6.
Edgar crashes through his bedroom window with flight on, and surveying the battlefield follows the entrapped Evictus's instructions and lands a Fireball beside the Monstrous spider lurking behind the Umberhulk - lighting up the scene for all to see. The Clerics spell resistance counters the Fireball and the Ranger evades all damage entirely, ducking behind the trunk of the tree beside him.
Round 1:
Evictus: Struggles with the webs to move but fails, so opts to unload his Double Barreled Cannon into the Umberhulks chest inflicting a good deal of damage, blowing a hole in its armoured chest.
Drow Sorceror: From the safety of the back ranks, sends forth an Ethereal Mage Hand and removes the Umberhulks curse, and casts a Quickened Scorching Ray at Dreinell, whose damage reduction reduces it to all but a smouldering tickle.
Drow Cleric: Steps forth, and placing a hand on the wounded Umberhulk "Heals" it back to full health.
Drow Ranger & Spider: The ranger Shouts in drow "Get the damned mage!" then releases a rapid-fire volley of Fire arrows into him, inflicting a hefty amount of damage, the spider then charges in, sinking in its fangs and draining the wizard down to 7 strength.
Dreinell: Upon seeing the Cleric and Sorceror undo all the offensive work from the party's initial assault, he Bestows Curse on the Cleric, stripping her Wisdom (and will save) by 6.
Umberhulk: Steps forward becoming trapped in the webbing itself, but being within reaching distance of Evictus, it starts trying to pummel him with its fists, inflicting some light damage.
Edgar: Following up on Dreinells Will save strip on the cleric, flys 5ft Up out of the spiders reach and launches a Phantasmal Killer towards the cleric... Bypassing its spell resistance, the cleric then Fails the lowered will save and Just fails his Constitution save. Bam, with a piercing screech her hands cover her face and she crumples onto the ground a lifeless heap.
Round 2:
Evictus: Unable to unroot his feet from the webbing, he proceeds to reload his cannon (Should have provoked an AOO but I forgot.)
Drow Sorceror: Launches a Fireball into the midst of the party, just missing the nearly-dead Edgar, but catching Dreinell, Evictus and the Umberhulk. The Umberhulk and Dreinell succeed in their reflex saves, taking half damage: another tickle to Dreinell.
Drow Ranger & Spider: The ranger opens fire on Dreinell, missing all but one shot which is mostly absorbed by his Lich powers. The Spider moves onto Evictus, but in the charge, Evictus draws his greatsword to defend himself and bringing it down, slices the spider cleanly in two. The words "charlie sheen" and "Winning" erupt from his lips as he then proceeds to cut the webbing from around his feet (in his next round).
Dreinell: Attempts to Phantasmal Killer the sorceror but fails to beat his spell resistance.
Umberhulk: Continues to pummel into evictus, inflicting a critical hit with its bite, and doing a significant amount of damage to him.
Edgar: Also attempts to Phantasmal Killed the drow sorceror - but the Sorceror succeedes on his will save and disbelieves - and then moves up behind Evictus to break line of sight with the Ranger.
Round 3:
Evictus: Cuts himself free from the webbing, 5 foot steps and finishes his turn with the remainder of his attacks on the Umberhulk (possibly an illegal move, but its a full round attack with a 5ft step in my book which I allow.)
Drow Sorceror: Launches another Fireball into the group, this time catching Edgar aswell. Edgar and Evictus make their reflex saves, and Edgar survives. Dreinell and the Umberhulk fail taking full damage, but the Fireball is underpowered and doesnt do too much damage
Drow Ranger: Launches another volley at Dreinell, inflicting a bit more damage this time, but still leaving him relatively intact, if pincushioned.
Dreinell: Casts CloudKill at the Sorceror - dropping his constitution by 2, reducing his health and Fort save
Edgar: Downs a potion of healing and moves out of the kill-zone of those fireballs.
Round 4:
Evictus: Hacks away at the umberhulk, but fails to land half his attacks and fails to kill it.
Drow Sorceror: Steps out of the Cloudkill and launches a volley of Scorching ray at Dreinell, peeling away a little more of his health.
Drow Ranger: Stepping back, fires another volley of arrows at edgar, but doesnt inflict much damage.
Dreinell: Phantasmal Killers the Umberhulk, dropping it there and then.
Edgar: Attempts to Phantasmal Killer the Sorceror again, once more failing to break though his defences.
Wall of text for the win - Ill make a follow up post with the remainder!
Friday, March 4, 2011
Dundee & Yahoo! Hack Day
The Hack Day is an event that Yahoo travel the world doing - and at the end of this month they are coming to our University. The theme of these days is for groups to put together a "hack" - a solution to a real-world problem, or functionality that they would like to see in action.
We are given a couple of weeks to come up with an idea, develop that idea and produce a prototype for demonstrating on the day. We think we have quite a good idea, but the work involved in it may be quite extensive!
If interested, the blog can be found at: http://gojammit.blogspot.com/
Have fun!
-V
Sunday, February 20, 2011
FireFly... to be or not to be? :o
As I understand it, at the very least Nathan Fillion is wanting to do it - and the old crew (writers, etc - not cast.) are game to make things work - but by the sounds of it they will make it webisodes rather than a TV series.
I love FireFly... I was saddened by Serenity (awesome film, but it pretty much killed off the hopes of a reboot) and the fact that this looks like this could be completely different makes me... sceptical.
If it follows on from Serenity, then things are clearly going to be different (Ill avoid spoilers here.). If it does not, what are the chances they will get the original crew? In my eyes, its going to be a sort-of spin-off of FireFly. Different crew, different format - and if its done in webisode form: Different quality (I have yet to see a web-based series that is of high quality. The best I have seen is The Guild and Dr. Horrible's sing along blog - and they have this "feel" to it that flags them as low budget productions - made for fun, with some impressive results.
Regarding the crew: many of them are main stream actors/actresses now (although some were before) that are contracted in to do other stuff, if they are not interested enough to do it on the cheap - I doubt we will see them. I know firefly was not done with a massive budget, but it seems to add to its charm.
Anyway, it sounds like Im slating it all - Im all for it... Im just worried that its going to be TOO different, but Ill take any portion of Firefly they wish to dish out! Even if it is just the adventures of Malcolm Reynolds and the glowy-bummed space-junker.
-V
Saturday, February 19, 2011
Joys of Web-Design
My biggest project on the go at the moment in university is to develop a Fault Reporting system. The website will use .jsp web pages, java servlets and connect to a mySQL database, hosted on the university system.
The assignment was handed out over a month ago, and is due in less than a weeks time... thankfully with some help from a classmate, I started to push some progression on the task last night.
So far I have achieved the following:
- Created the web-pages (primarily html for now, but as the servlets come into play there will be java script aswell.)
- Designed the database tables and uploaded them to the mySQL server with the use of mySQL workbench.
After a coding session last night I now have working servlets for:
Logging in, Registering a user and the fault-report form. There is no existing connection to the database yet, although I think I have a session script set up and working for the user log-in that will help with logging in and out.
Ill spare the details of coding it all up for now, but Im taking notes as I go and may make a post as a sort of guide/reminder as I plan to do a lot more of this in the future...
Here are some images from my front end.
Its a... uh... work in progress... the actual design is a bit shit, but I had a theme in mind, just not the skills to do it yet :p
-V
The joy of Werewolves, vampires and Lichs - oh my!
Image courtesy of one of my gamers, Doug.
My d&d campaign is still running - it has been over a year and some 40 gaming sessions now, and there have been many changes. Changes in characters, change in player line-up - but I still think it is great fun (well, there is the occasional session that just doesn't flow, but sometimes its just hysterical :D )
I thought I would give an update on where we are now - since it will take me an eternity to write up all the games from the session notes I have.
By the end of the last gaming session the party consisted of:
Lvl 11 Sorceror with mighty fireballs of doooooom!
Lvl 10 Dread-Necromancer (in the process of becoming a Lich) (CL:TBA)
Lvl 10 Beguiler (in the process of becoming a Vampire) (CL12)
Lvl 10 Werewolf-Warrior (CL14)
Lvl 10 Rogue/1 Assassin with Silver Dragon Orb
Two side-characters (not currently playing)
Lvl 10 Werewolf-Monk (CL14)
Lvl 8 Druid
The last session ended with the destruction of a White-Dragon cultist lair, containing the Silver Dragon orb... the next session is planned to be a free-for all of wanton randomness. That should be fun to document!
-V
Sunday, February 13, 2011
R.E The Instance, So long Randy, and thanks for all the fish!
Randy Deluxe and Scott Johnson, writer and presenter of: The Instance
*Hugs them through the internet*
I must say, I am saddened :( - I listened to the last couple of episodes back to back to find out a couple of days ago that Randy Jordan, AKA Randy Deluxe, will be leavign after this episode... and now here I am listening at it...
Wow, so gonna miss his contribution to my favourite podcast on the internet (The only one I truly listen to religiously)
I started listening to the instance either early 2008, or late 2007 when I was either ending employment at one unnamable company, or starting work at another unnamable company... I like to think it kept me entertained for the countless hours that it took to listen to the backlog of podcasts, and have been listening since. It has kept me entertained during work hours, whilst listening while playing or for a period of my life where I was doing fortnightly commutes of 9-12 hours between Somerset and Fife to see my wife, son and family whilst working there till i could hand in my notice.
Between him leaving and the ending of Extra Life Radio - I feel a big hole has been left, but I am hopeful that the show will continue and that perhaps they will create a new podcast in the near future.
I love this show so much - I listen to it even during the phases that I dont have an active subscription, just to hear them discuss, and joke and laugh, and to feel part of the community.
I could go gay for those voices.
That is all.
-V
Thursday, January 27, 2011
Not dead - overloaded :D
Following the last post: I have LOTS and LOTS of stuff I want to post here - the stuff multiplies every week (D&D posts, World of Warcraft posts, general geekery posts) but I just aint got the time to get it on the blog.
Sunday, December 12, 2010
Procrastinating? Or dinging in real life?
It has been a fairly quiet past few weeks from the geek front. I have been doing final assignments and revision for exams that I have had last week, and this coming week.
WOW: Cataclysm was released a few days ago, I have spent a good few hours running about in game - but I dont have the expansion - simply checking out some of the changed low level zones, and tinkering with a couple of characters.
D&D will hopefully be on tonight - likely going to be unavailable after tonight to do a game until January unless people want to have random gaming sessions over the Christmas holidays.
Falalalalala go F*8k yourself.
\o/
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