Games

Wow it’s been a wildly long day!

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Fell asleep on the couch last night, so I couldn’t get to sleep early (nodded off after 0300Q), woke up around 0600Q and decided that was just TOOOOO early even for me! The doctors appointment was for 0945 and we had to be in the office NLT 0915, so I’ve been awake since around 0830.

The doctor was very kind and seems to know what he’s doing quite well; personally I like people with experience ;). He examined the toe during the usual questioning. He removed the lump of dead tissue with an angled scissors, something I had to previously convince my mother that it wouldn’t be a good idea to do at home with a table scissors. For better or worse it actually was more painful for him to get the thing in position, then cutting it away; and at least I can say, I have nice red blood lol. The Dr. then decided to put a small piece of cardboard underneath the (clipped) nail to keep it away from the injured side, leading to it falling out when he tried wrapping it in medical tape 8+). He proscribed some antibiotics, *not* slamming the damn thing anymore (haha!), plus the usual cleaning and bandaging. I’ve also instructions to pry up the nail several times a day to keep it from damaging anything, really not sure what is worse: that I have to do such a thing or that doing it doesn’t bother me in the least. The nurse was also kind enough to “pad it well” just in case, when she dressed the wound. There was errands to run afterwards and the pharmacy tor drop by, so needless to say it wouldn’t have helped to crack it apart *again*.

Got it filled and picked up some stuff while waiting on the pharmacist; dressings, tape, etc. Since by then the bill was starting to add up, I told ma if she would cover the proscription, I would pick up the tab on the other supplies; I also snatched a small pound cake on sale for like $2 before we left the store. Hey, if I’m spending money, may as well buy something to gnosh on too!

I’ve spent the rest of the day largely trying to NOT slam this freaking toe into anything else, and playing a lot of SWAT 4. It’s nice to see Rct Cara progressing well; think I owe Duke even more gratitude, for what he accomplished with [SAS] “SWAT day 2009”. I’ve been playing a lot of SWAT 4 lately, between my own operations and watching over the Trps/Rcts. At night sometimes I pop in and join the night crew (mostly fellow Americans and Canadians) for some games on our Raven Shield servers. But really, RvS has been pissing me off a lot with the bugs lately. SWAT 4 is as buggy as RvS, yeah… but at least most of the bugs are not combat critical in SWAT 4 o/.

During my break times and tonight also, I’ve been studying more bits of the DirectX Software Development Kit (SDK). So far DirectX itself seems to be an alright way of getting things done. I can’t stand the ridiculous influnces of Hungarian notation that permeates so many aspects of Windows programming interfaces… the concept is sound but the implemetations I commonly see in code, is just a load of bollocks. Naming identifier well and placing good information in them is a tricky thing at times (gets better with experience) but encoding type data in it, oy. The most useful of which I can think of is adding a ‘p’ in front for each level of *pointing used in a C app (or comparable). In one of the DX samples when I saw a variable named something like pbNoFurtherProcessing or something similiar, I nearly fainted from the stupidity of it all. The pb tells you it’s a pointer to a boolean (bool * in C++), by the time you see it’s being used with the arrow operator (->) and bears an obviously boolean name, that kind of makes it useless information. Not to mention anyone with a *decent* code editor for the last 20+ years can just make a quick jump and look up the variables type if they totally forget it – which shouldn’t happen often.

I’ve also been abusing Visual C++ Express 2008 into cooperating. Right now I have it setup, basically to just be a project and build manager – all the actual code editing is being done in Vi IMproved. MSVC/VS/etc are very very good Integrated Development Environments (IDEs) and I would recommend them to anyone who wants an IDE for serious Windows development (along with a cat scan). However I am used to having UNIX as my IDE, which means powerful tools ;). With more time off work I could probably get vim semi-integrated with the IDE via the +clientserver feature in vim and maybe a plugin of some sort. Non essential though, since right now all the IDE is helping me with is not having to hand-write a makefile for nmake, which would probably have been less trouble then using the IDEs concept of solutions and projects lol.

Life’s been good to day.

OpenArena – addictive Quake III style!

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Finding myself a bit light on time today, is tarted looking again at the ioquake3 engine with an interest in playing around with it. Of course, there is nothing better then a real world example – I tested Urban Terror and OpenArena, two games based on ioquake3 and Quake III: Arena game play. Urban Terror applies modern weapons and equipments but beyond that is not really a realism game IMHO. OpenArena on the other hand, sticks close to the core—it is as Quake like as the game play lol.

OpenArena is addictive and you can just feel your brain cells rot away as you engage in the carnage! The game is fairly simple and straight forward, you spawn, you run around, you blow people apart (gibs all over), oh yeah, and there are power ups here and there. Really, there isn’t much more to say about it then that, other then it is strangely enjoyable; no wonder the Quake franchise has made millions.

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So far experiments continue with SWAT 4 performance issues. Deeper testing has shown that it is no longer connected to graphical issues, not when running on my current hardware/driver config; nice to be able to max out the graphics online *and* in single player.

What happens is periodically when moving through an area, I get a stutter-lag-warp like motion: as if the whole game stopped spinning and then suddenly unlocked. The only consistency I’ve noticed is it happens when entering a region of the map that I have not been in previously—or have not been in for a while. One thought is that perhaps it occurs when the cache must be updated with stuff that has already been moved out of the games memory cache. My machine has RAM to burn so I have been testing the game with various cache sizes, but don’t honestly expect any positive result. On modern machines, cache size shouldn’t matter to much with the Unreal Engine 2.x lol.

Atm I’m defragging a few disks, maybe that might help a little. I don’t know if it is just the much greater frequency of crashes with Windows XP, or that NTFS really sucks that much worse then FreeBSDs UFS2 system. But for one reason or another, my windows file systems always end up very highly fragmented. Although on the upside, unlike Win32: FreeBSD does kind of encourage you to fsck afterwards hehe.

Hopefully my experiments will yield some fruit, and I can stop warping all over the place lol.

More [SAS] Dept. of Agriculture

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My work on the ‘[SAS] Dept. of Agriculture’ is nearly done, I have only 3 rooms left to do major work on, plus the “special” insertions hehe.

The goal is to be able to use the fire escapes outside the records room to gain entrance, replacing one of the spawn points. I may also modify the front-entrance spawn, so that the team spawns “outside” in a armoury room rather then the reception area. The building is supposed to be a mock-up for a hostage rescue after all, not purely a traditional map: so it wouldn’t be a big realism problem :-P.

Alcomplishing those aims appears to be easier then I expected. The real challenge at the moment, is I very much would like to erect breachable “Barricades”, that will have to be shoved out of the way. Getting that working so far has been of no real luck.

[SAS] Dept. of Agriculture, continues

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I’ve been working on the map some more tonight and have made some decent progresses. The thing that annoys me the most is how many times the rat bastard of an Unreal Ed likes to crash! I have often cursed about hex editing programs into the Nth level of DooM—if the editor for Unreal Engine 3 games is as bad as all the Unreal 2 games I’ve used it with, I will start cursing about hex editing the editors development team into all levels of the DooM II megawad: Hell Revealed.

I don’t really wish to comment on the specific changes here, mostly because I want the map to be usable as a Live Operation during its unveiling :-D. Needless to say, it is still the same map but it will not be the same. As long as I can get the stuff rigged up for the fire escape spawn point, I think people will enjoy the map hehe.

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Got what’s left of this toe in a scolding hot foot-bath with some Epsom salt; I think it is healed enough that I can eercise on it but I don’t think it has been healing properly… nothing I can do about that though. On the upside, hey at least I’ve still got the nail lol. I’ve never lost an entire toenail before but I know it takes a long time for them to grow back.

At the moment I am finishing watching Midnight Run, I love the part when the three schmucks are being chased by the mobsters helicopter—and Mardukas (Charles Grodin) is shouting, “You two are the dumbest bounty hunters I have ever seen! You couldn’t even deliver a bottle of milk!”, it just tickles my funny bone xD.

Spent most of the day playing SWAT 4 as seems to be the usual for right now. During the early phase I basically had to get a bunch of inexperienced people under control, but hey – I like orderly tactics. And when I am Element Leader, people get in line or they get taken offline ;). I organized them into a basic strike, secure, cover group. 1 and 2 man would be responsible for clearing the room, 3 and 4 man for securing contacts and weapons, while 5, 6, and when present 7 man stayed in the corridor to watch our backs. Very simple clearing techniques. I found it particularly well suited for dealing with a large amount of untrained people, while trying to avoid the usual massive conga-line-of-sloppiness and massive headless chicken problems of such a situation. People soon got the idea, and within a few maps I was able to transition to using RED / BLUE team call signs for the two groups; culminating in a simultaneous take down of 3 sectors at once by a 7-man assault force (of which I was basically the only seasoned idiot). Later on after our element had shrunk back to a more manageable size (4-5 instead of 6-7), I soon was able to take a break when [SAS]_Trp_COT showed up and started his EL practice for the day.

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Yesterday was a reaal cork popper! I have seen and heard a lot of crap over the years but I have never been so disgusted and angry in my entire life (thus far). It just took the cake and a half man… new record levels. And I’ve even seen a door breached and ripped apart practically by hand lol. That being said, the incident yesterday did not involve my blood kin in any way.

Maybe it is as the numeral unno says, just a week where everyone gets under each others skin… all in all though I am glad that I can be utterly pissed the F’ off and still be able to think clearly. I really had to learn at an early age how to deal with intense anger, my family is *that good* at pushing peoples buttons, mine included lol. The closet door still bears holes and knuckle prints from my hot tempered youth. We’re a lot of hot headed, loud mouthed, stubborn mules: and whether genetically or environmentally, have even worse then both my parents in that regard (That’s like saying you’re descended from lava and hydrofluoric acid).

One of the things that separates me from my family and many other people on this earth, is I can control my temper before it gets the best of me.

I just tried fitting my knuckles into the dents in the closet door, and I am kind of proud how far I’ve come since then… both in stature and control. I don’t go nova, I’m not a violent person by nature: despite having developed a put two in the head and move on philosophy of logical problem solving lol. I am the single most rational person I know, and strongly value c;ear thinking over lashing out at others (but can’t say the same about the rest of my family).

Perhaps this is one time, that I should be thankful for my family…..

[SAS] Dept. of Agriculture map

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Last night I started working on a customized version of the department of agriculture map (SWAT4: TSS). Basically I want to make some ‘interesting’ changes but still keep it recognizable as the same building. My biggest interest of course, is in rigging a spawn point from outside and trying to use the fire escape outside the records room as a possible point of entry 🙂

I will also likely adjust the enemy spawn points and things and roll down the number of suspects so it is harder to figure out where you will make enemy contacts – and make it more realistic. The big question of course, unveil it as a training map or should the first unveiling be a Live Operation? Hehehe. I guess we will just have to see how much reimaging I have time to do.

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I’ve been working through SWAT 4 more lately then RvS, and when I am Element leader, more often setting the advanced plan of action — the [SAS] style plan of action.

My thoughts is to expose the younger members to more of these fluid, embedding, and flowing assault plans: and let them learn from it by sight and sound. I hope it will eventually trigger an evolution of their thinking, because my demostrations are in the direction they will be heading in a few months.

I rarely care for the “Immediate Action Plans” that some of my peers will occasionally employ; little more then a liquid element full of flashbangs with orders to neutralize everything that moves. It’s too simple and while it may reflect a common infantry problem of advancing into the unknown or opertional boondocks, however it does not reflect most of our SWAT 4 or Raven Shield environments significantly. 95% of the time we have intelligence enough to form a suitable Deliberate Action Plan and more then enough time to get it put together. Just assigning a liquid element IMHO is best done when any element formation (period) is unnecessary, or the effort of creating one far outweighs the value obtained from organization. Just doing it without the on the spot corrections or routine training sessions, is also not going to teach anyone how to better utilize their time in a liquid element. Most of the time I look at it as a stroke of laziness.

A fixed element has some advantages:

  1. It helps build that discipline you only seem to get with rigorous close order drills
  2. It is very simple, that’s why it is what Recruits are trained in
  3. That simplicity allows less experienced members to optimize their brains thinking around the static structure of the formation and how they will be able to perceive the environment around them

While a simple rigidness is its greatest asset—it can also become slow and unwieldy on tight contested grounds.

Having to drone on through overly verbose loadouts and duty assignments (usually >5min) are the finest sign of either of two things: the Element Leader is still in the learning stage or the plan is overly complicated. In my experience the former is understandable (Rct/Trp/LCpl are still mastering it) and the latter is doomed to failure (effective now is better then perfect later). Not the side effects of a fixed element, only the institutionalization of young minds around them. Fixed elements are very effective and require the least level of experience to employ them optimally; yet this still leaves much to be desired in many situations.

Liquid elements can be highly useful:

  1. It offloads most responsibility from leaders to subordinates
  2. It can quickly adapt to changes in the environment
  3. And it can be very smooth and effective when utilized by seasoned members who have trained long together

It is also like a tidal wave, liquid elements may crash down hard and obliterate all in its path—but it may just as easily wash away under its own weight.

Because it offloads so much down the chain of individual intelligence and experience, it creates a lot more mental over head for those who have yet to adjust fully to the ebb and flow of an element in a close quarters engagement. Everything that was static and rigidly unchanging is now dynamic and flexing every second of play; using it with newbies or the young in general, often results in watching newbies at work. I can only compare a liquid element formation to taking a section of fresh Privates and making them all commanders of Stoßtruppen units, then expecting success…. not gonna happen without the training and the experience. When the element members are up to the task it is highly effective but requires a driving will to keep the tidal wave always striking, and never fading in the wrong direction. To often I have seen liquid elements lead to “sloppy” actions, because of the inclusion of inexerpeicned members in the liquid formation or just a lack of directive!

An assault element must be both fixed in nature and free as a liquid—it must flow through the cracks like a fluid and overwhelm the enemy.

Fluid elements combine all of the mental-optimizational attributes of a fixed formations static nature, but frees operators minds to further-optimize their collective actions, much as they must do (or die) in a liquid element. Often times when working in a fixed formation, I’ve had those “Uh, this is so F’ing stupid, but I’ll do as the young one expects” moments that makes me cringe. It is generally the sign of one who is still learning being in the EL slot, one one whose brain was institutionalized at that level, and has failed to grow beyond it. Elements must have fluidity – that freedom to optimize things on the run that fixed elements drop on ELs alone, and lead to overly intricate plans (Yes, if you are reading this I and wondering if your included, I mean YOU). Professionals should have no need a rigidness or “liquid” way of doing things: instead a simply fluidness of action that comes with experience.

I find describing my point very difficult, beyond a simply exposing it to light through action. It keeps the circle jerking to a minimal.

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I’ve a haiku-inspired thought in my head, that applies to fixed / liquid / fluid elements… todo write it when I have a clear’er mind