Quoting: Liam DaweUpdate: Feral Interactive emailed me to correct the record that they're not actually doing a Linux port this time. They said the Creative Assembly FAQ post was incorrect. Feral are now doing macOS only.

Wow, that's kind of short sighted, isn't it?

Ha, does this mean you should just take the article down, since it's no longer 'gaming on linux' if they're not providing a Linux port?

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Quoting: Purple Library Guy

Quoting: 14

Quoting: slaapliedje

Quoting: 14Even though I play board games with a couple friends on a routine schedule, they will never play a pen & paper RPG again. We did it long ago with a DM that we didn't enjoy, and they're stuck with that memory and won't ever try it again. So, programs like this would be a hopeless, disappointing waste of time and money for me.

/saltiness

Sad. But I could see this happening for sure. Sometimes the RPG experience is just a reason for friends to get together. Boards games work as well, but I think the advantage of RPGs is you don't have to learn new rules every time you get together (unless of course you play the same board games over and over.)

We used to learn a new game every time because one of my friends has a very large collection that continues to grow. Not too long ago, we switched to sticking to a new game for 2-3 sessions in a row so we get better at it. We've got a good thing going that I can't complain too much about.

Even with board games, it's nice if you don't have to spend half the evening learning the rules every dashed time.
Now our group is kind of at the other end of that--although we've tried a few game systems over the years, the initial GURPS campaign we started in 1987 is still going. Every now and then we start new characters, but the old ones are still around, just settled down a bit because they're rich and powerful. So that's the same game system for, what, 36 years?

I love GURPS, though its flexibility also made it so I had a billion game ideas back in the day and so we were always trying out different genres.

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Quoting: 14

Quoting: slaapliedje

Quoting: 14Even though I play board games with a couple friends on a routine schedule, they will never play a pen & paper RPG again. We did it long ago with a DM that we didn't enjoy, and they're stuck with that memory and won't ever try it again. So, programs like this would be a hopeless, disappointing waste of time and money for me.

/saltiness

Sad. But I could see this happening for sure. Sometimes the RPG experience is just a reason for friends to get together. Boards games work as well, but I think the advantage of RPGs is you don't have to learn new rules every time you get together (unless of course you play the same board games over and over.)

We used to learn a new game every time because one of my friends has a very large collection that continues to grow. Not too long ago, we switched to sticking to a new game for 2-3 sessions in a row so we get better at it. We've got a good thing going that I can't complain too much about.

Nice! My collection seems to keep growing as well, though I get more RPGs over board games, though I have plenty of those!

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Quoting: F.Ultra

Quoting: slaapliedje

Quoting: F.Ultra

Quoting: slaapliedje

Quoting: F.Ultra

Quoting: slaapliedje

Quoting: F.UltraI think that it's a bit more complicated than that, yes patent trolls use this all the time, they have no products and no employees so that they will never ever be hit by a countersuit. But then you could be a lone inventor that just invents new interesting stuff that you then license out to industry that have the capacity to create the stuff that you yourself doesn't and such a rule would hurt such individuals.

Yeah, though licensing stuff out still kind of makes you a patent troll, right? The lone inventor should be able to pitch his idea to a company that either pays him a bunch for it, or royalties, and then that company makes such things. This is how it used to happen.

Then again it used to be that you bought software and owned that copy for your usage, these days you just rent software that becomes obsolete the moment the publishers decide they don't want it to work anymore.

No a patent troll is someone that collects patents to then go look for companies to sue for infringement. You inventing something and then licensing it out to companies that find your invention useful is exactly your "pays him a bunch for it, or royalties". Hiding the patents in secret until you find an infringing party is the troll part of the patent troll.

E.g lets say that you invent some new fantastic new thing that makes something in cars much better, cheaper and environmentally friendlier. Would it be better for society for you to just throw that idea away because you have not enough money to create cars, or if you did then only your cars would benefit from this and no one elses, or you licensing the patent out to all car manufacturers for a fair price which is win-win for everyone.

Ofc you could just hand out the idea for free (which under the current patent system means that some of the big companies could patent it under the first to file rule and thus lock everyone else out including you) or you could hand the patent out for free and starve to death.

This is not a defence of the current patent system, just that I don't think that automatically invalidating patents from holders that do not produce anything would be beneficial for society, or rather it would be less beneficial for society than the current broken system, aka make it more broken and not less.

That software in many aspects is no longer owned but rented out have nothing to do with patents, that is all covered within copyright (which is another system that is broken), though at the same time copyright is what protects things like the GPL from being exploited.

IMHO the main problem is more to do with greed, not to go to far politically here since this is a forum for games and not politics but one way could be to cap the amount of wealth a person or company could acquire, say by means of the type of progressive tax regulation that existed in the US before JFK loosened it up where the top tax bracket was 94% and limiting the time on patents and copyright to more decent values, I mean 25 years for a patent in our fast evolving world is en eternity.

Ha, not sure why you're saying the same thing I'm saying, but saying I'm not. :P

To correct you on what a patent troll is and to point out that the hole in your idea to solve this by invalidating patents if the holder does not produce anything.

I know what a patent troll is. It is by its very definition someone who sits on a patent and doesn't create anything and only forces others to pay them or they sue if they want to make something similar.

If you patent something, you should be required to actual produce / create thathat thing. Whether that is selling it to a company to do that for you, or doing it yourself.

It also used to be required for a prototype to exist before you could get a patent. That changed at some point, so now you can patent an idea.

Patent trolls usually buy other patents and simply make money off of suing or licensing and do not ever make anything.

Wikipedia:

QuoteIn international law and business, patent trolling or patent hoarding is a categorical or pejorative term applied to a person or company that attempts to enforce patent rights against accused infringers far beyond the patent's actual value or contribution to the prior art,[1] often through hardball legal tactics (frivolous litigation, vexatious litigation, strategic lawsuits against public participation (SLAPP), chilling effects, and the like).

That does not, to me at least, sound like some one coming up with fantastic new inventions to then license them out via the patent to willing companies in order for them to create better products. The main difference is that the trolls are hiding the patents (so not licensing them out) to only later file suits out of nowhere (hence the name of trolls, since they hide under the bridge).

A living example is Håkan Lans, who happens to be Swedish, he have invented lots of stuff that is used the world over by several industries. He does not produce anything himself and he is not a patent troll (he was trolled by HP, Dell and Compaq though since they basically stole his patents).

Right, not all of them hide under the bridge, some of them hang around and just leap out like brigands. Read up about Commodore and the XOR. They were basically taken out by a patent troll. Everyone else paid the bridge toll, but Commodore refused / couldn't, so the CD32 was blocked from being sold in the USA.

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Quoting: Guest

QuoteFixed Big Picture mode performance when using Nvidia GPU

Did they really claim that? I still get maybe 3 fps in big picture mode (at 4k resolution) on my gtx 1080. It's silly because there are some games I can play on ultra at 4k resolution and 60 fps.
The old big picture mode ran at 60 fps without any issues, because it didn't use shitty web tech.

Curious what Desktop environment everyone is using. I know it was mentioned that KDE crashed. I run Gnome and it seems fine (though at 4k, it runs like the Atari VCS at 4k... actually it may be smoother...)

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Quoting: F.Ultra

Quoting: slaapliedje

Quoting: F.Ultra

Quoting: slaapliedje

Quoting: F.UltraI think that it's a bit more complicated than that, yes patent trolls use this all the time, they have no products and no employees so that they will never ever be hit by a countersuit. But then you could be a lone inventor that just invents new interesting stuff that you then license out to industry that have the capacity to create the stuff that you yourself doesn't and such a rule would hurt such individuals.

Yeah, though licensing stuff out still kind of makes you a patent troll, right? The lone inventor should be able to pitch his idea to a company that either pays him a bunch for it, or royalties, and then that company makes such things. This is how it used to happen.

Then again it used to be that you bought software and owned that copy for your usage, these days you just rent software that becomes obsolete the moment the publishers decide they don't want it to work anymore.

No a patent troll is someone that collects patents to then go look for companies to sue for infringement. You inventing something and then licensing it out to companies that find your invention useful is exactly your "pays him a bunch for it, or royalties". Hiding the patents in secret until you find an infringing party is the troll part of the patent troll.

E.g lets say that you invent some new fantastic new thing that makes something in cars much better, cheaper and environmentally friendlier. Would it be better for society for you to just throw that idea away because you have not enough money to create cars, or if you did then only your cars would benefit from this and no one elses, or you licensing the patent out to all car manufacturers for a fair price which is win-win for everyone.

Ofc you could just hand out the idea for free (which under the current patent system means that some of the big companies could patent it under the first to file rule and thus lock everyone else out including you) or you could hand the patent out for free and starve to death.

This is not a defence of the current patent system, just that I don't think that automatically invalidating patents from holders that do not produce anything would be beneficial for society, or rather it would be less beneficial for society than the current broken system, aka make it more broken and not less.

That software in many aspects is no longer owned but rented out have nothing to do with patents, that is all covered within copyright (which is another system that is broken), though at the same time copyright is what protects things like the GPL from being exploited.

IMHO the main problem is more to do with greed, not to go to far politically here since this is a forum for games and not politics but one way could be to cap the amount of wealth a person or company could acquire, say by means of the type of progressive tax regulation that existed in the US before JFK loosened it up where the top tax bracket was 94% and limiting the time on patents and copyright to more decent values, I mean 25 years for a patent in our fast evolving world is en eternity.

Ha, not sure why you're saying the same thing I'm saying, but saying I'm not. :P

To correct you on what a patent troll is and to point out that the hole in your idea to solve this by invalidating patents if the holder does not produce anything.

I know what a patent troll is. It is by its very definition someone who sits on a patent and doesn't create anything and only forces others to pay them or they sue if they want to make something similar.

If you patent something, you should be required to actual produce / create thathat thing. Whether that is selling it to a company to do that for you, or doing it yourself.

It also used to be required for a prototype to exist before you could get a patent. That changed at some point, so now you can patent an idea.

Patent trolls usually buy other patents and simply make money off of suing or licensing and do not ever make anything.

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Quoting: DrMcCoyThis here is the Kickstarter campaign for the Bluetooth dice, that's still in development: https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/pixels-dice/pixels-the-electronic-dice

ouch, 200 bucks per set... granted doesn't look like you can get in on them now.

I'll have to check 'em out, but it might be cheaper just to get some android apps. Granted rolling real dice is fun...

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Quoting: Purple Library Guy

Quoting: DrMcCoyThe dice rolling and maths is mostly taken from you. Which simplifies things, but on the other hand, it takes away from the physical dice rolling that you might enjoy.

A friend of mine bought this snazzy set of dice where you roll the things and they export the die roll to Roll20 (presumably also to FoundryVTT etc). We were all really impressed and thought it was major cool. Unfortunately, they didn't work worth a damn. He would roll 3d6 and half the time only 2 dice would roll . . . which meant you had to look carefully, because he did get a result. Or they would trigger without him doing anything. They were a pain and he sent them back. Pity, because it seemed like such a nice idea.

As to the maps and stuff . . . I used to break those out for big fights, but not bother and just keep it abstract with small ones. Especially since often the small fights just happened because the players did something interesting and unexpected, not because I had anything planned. When I did break out the maps, often as not I'd just use dice and coins and things to represent opponents. At some instinctive level, on average I'd rather they were listening to my descriptions than looking at the map.

Don't get me wrong, I quite enjoy the tactics of a solid fight, and I do value the tactical information from that spatial representation. I just feel that the bare bones, just sparse lines and an arbitrary representation of combatants, are what give the information, and everything beyond that is just pulling you out of the imagination level by getting you to look at the map.

Wait, what? There are physical dice that'll upload to a VTT? If they can get that to work, that'd be pretty sweet! The Projector / FoundryVTT set up I currently have is pretty sweet, and now I've added a conference room style microphone / speaker to the mix, so that if people can't show up locally, then I can still have them join the game via Discord.

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Quoting: F.Ultra

Quoting: slaapliedje

Quoting: F.UltraI think that it's a bit more complicated than that, yes patent trolls use this all the time, they have no products and no employees so that they will never ever be hit by a countersuit. But then you could be a lone inventor that just invents new interesting stuff that you then license out to industry that have the capacity to create the stuff that you yourself doesn't and such a rule would hurt such individuals.

Yeah, though licensing stuff out still kind of makes you a patent troll, right? The lone inventor should be able to pitch his idea to a company that either pays him a bunch for it, or royalties, and then that company makes such things. This is how it used to happen.

Then again it used to be that you bought software and owned that copy for your usage, these days you just rent software that becomes obsolete the moment the publishers decide they don't want it to work anymore.

No a patent troll is someone that collects patents to then go look for companies to sue for infringement. You inventing something and then licensing it out to companies that find your invention useful is exactly your "pays him a bunch for it, or royalties". Hiding the patents in secret until you find an infringing party is the troll part of the patent troll.

E.g lets say that you invent some new fantastic new thing that makes something in cars much better, cheaper and environmentally friendlier. Would it be better for society for you to just throw that idea away because you have not enough money to create cars, or if you did then only your cars would benefit from this and no one elses, or you licensing the patent out to all car manufacturers for a fair price which is win-win for everyone.

Ofc you could just hand out the idea for free (which under the current patent system means that some of the big companies could patent it under the first to file rule and thus lock everyone else out including you) or you could hand the patent out for free and starve to death.

This is not a defence of the current patent system, just that I don't think that automatically invalidating patents from holders that do not produce anything would be beneficial for society, or rather it would be less beneficial for society than the current broken system, aka make it more broken and not less.

That software in many aspects is no longer owned but rented out have nothing to do with patents, that is all covered within copyright (which is another system that is broken), though at the same time copyright is what protects things like the GPL from being exploited.

IMHO the main problem is more to do with greed, not to go to far politically here since this is a forum for games and not politics but one way could be to cap the amount of wealth a person or company could acquire, say by means of the type of progressive tax regulation that existed in the US before JFK loosened it up where the top tax bracket was 94% and limiting the time on patents and copyright to more decent values, I mean 25 years for a patent in our fast evolving world is en eternity.

Ha, not sure why you're saying the same thing I'm saying, but saying I'm not. :P

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Quoting: SoulprayerI remember Darkstone@GOG as a refreshing action rpg after Diablo1. (I even bought it as boxed version in the old days :D)

It is on Steam as well and works great under proton (at least last time I played it, it did.)

Darkstone very much reminds me of the newer Gauntlet arcade games.

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