I am slow these days due to crunch at work.  Had an epic game against a friend where I was crystal rushing and he was guarding with a buffed necro.  He took down unit after unit of mine going for crystals.  By the end he had eight(!) phantoms on the board against me and had blocked off effective routes.  I did not realize that phantoms made by a buffed necro have more health than normal ones.  The final blow came when I had my last two units in range of an impaler.  I also didn't realize impalers could shoot over friendly phantoms.  Doh!

Got my 300lb deadlift this morning. Feels good man.  I likely won't keep pushing the weight up, and instead focus on trying to up my rep range a bit to about 5-6 per set.  Also time to get back in control of the diet and cut out the junky carbs.  I'm still around 285 on the squat but I don't think that's going to make it over the 300lb line any time soon.  285 still feels incredibly heavy and I have a terrible time actually getting properly low on the reps.  I'll probably have to lower the weight to refocus on form there before pushing up significantly.

Out of curiosity what is your weight in putting up those numbers?  I'm always fascinated by strength-to-weight ratios.  For me DLing 225 isn't bad for someone weighing 150 lbs, but my goal is to eventually do double my own weight.  

Weighing in just above 180 now.  My body fat % is certainly higher than I like but I tend to be pretty ectomorphic, so I have to shove a lot of food in to keep making gains.  Part of my after-workout meal is currently a few spoonfuls of frozen custard

Cool thread.  I am on Fitocracy too so feel free to friend me up.  I need more fist bumps!  User name is kathode.  Been in some crunch at work but I'm hopefully coming out of it for a bit now.

I've been pushing up on my deadlifts and squats the past couple months.  I want to hit 300lbs on both before I start to cut and I'm pretty close.  I managed to squeeze out a single deadlift rep at 290lbs this morning.  I'm at 285 for my squat but having trouble forcing myself to get down low on those heavy reps.  Still working at it and improving bit by bit.

I do a simple routine - I go to the gym every other day, and alternate through chest/tris, back/bis, and legs/shoulders.  Concentrating on 7-10 sets of the heavy lifts - bench press, deadlift, squat.  I stick to three reps per set on those to push for strength.  

Also might be of interest that I always work out in a fasted state.  I work out early in the morning and have to get out of bed and go, so I take N.O.Xplode and a few BCAA pills.  Other than that it's just water until I'm done, when I down a protein shake, shower, and then have a full breakfast.  First couple of times were tough but now I prefer it to working out with a protein shake sitting on my stomach.  Unfortunately working out in the evening doesn't fit my life at this time.  Plus the gym is full of douchebros then anyway   At 6:30AM it's just me and the elderly.

I really enjoy it.  I just wish there was an AI mode I could play against.  And as long as I'm wishing, also wish it came in native ipad resolution.  But I play scaled up and it's not bad.

I'm also pretty terrible at the game and get steamrolled quite often.  I did manage to eke out a win against Hark, but it came down to literally the last unit for both of us, both of them doubled over from being hurt, and I was just one turn ahead and took him out.  I have a lot of trouble putting off attacking units in favor of attacking the crystals.  

That Council archer is insane with the upgraded weapon.  Kato just took out my armored, upgraded Lich with two shots.

I started playing this yesterday and I'm hooked, although getting destroyed in just about every game.  Username is kathode.

I've been almost a complete shut in for the last few days.  I worked from home Monday, Wednesday, and today.  We had people in the office for about three hours on Tuesday and it was a madhouse.  Someone decided to leave early and got kinda-stuck in their parking spot for about 60 seconds.  People started literally running for the doors, like an evacuation   I like the snow but it's getting a little tired at this point.

Yeah I love Zappos and have shopped there for several years.  I've bought a bunch from them including shirts, bags, running pants, hats, and shoes.  About the only thing I don't feel comfortable buying online are jeans.  Free returns helps a ton on a clothing site of course.  But the main thing they do really well is blazingly fast shipping.  Your order almost always gets automatically upgraded, and it's rare that I don't see an order from them arrive the day after I place it.  It would take something pretty awful for me to stop shopping there.

Anyone else still playing Ravenmark?  I cannot get past the level with the suicide bomber demon things.  Anyone beyond that point?

Saw the movie on opening day and really enjoyed it.  I had never read the books and only had a vague sense of what the story was about, so I was on the edge of my seat the whole time.  The soundtrack especially serves to heighten the tension in a lot of the scenes.

Unfortunately heard that it kind-of bombed at the box office.  They were talking about shooting the next two films back-to-back, Lord of the Rings style, so I hope those can still get made.

Been without cable for a year or so now.  I don't watch sports and can wait on HBO shows for the DVDs, except for Game of Thrones where I go to a friend's place to watch.  It's been fine - there's more on Netflix than I could possibly watch given my free time.  The only thing I miss is kind of the random noise that's provided for cooking or laundry or other household stuff where I used to just turn on the Discovery Channel and watch Mythbusters or some bullshit.  I miss it but it's not worth $100/month or more.

Whenever my phone does something odd, I just reboot it and hope that it doesn't happen again.  It's worked for me so far

Apparently Ravenmark uses the retina resolution on iPad2 in 2x mode (960x640?). Found that out this morning, which makes it even more tempting to pick it up now instead of waiting for the universal update.

Oh awesome.  It does look damn good and appears to fill just about the whole screen.  I haven't been able to get back to it.  Been in a crunchy period at work and Skyrim has taken up all my gaming hours!

[From Hell]

From Hell is absolutely my #1. Incredibly detailed and researched, with fantastic art.  Unfortunately it got made into a bad Johnny Depp movie which tarnished its overall reputation I think.  I think the book is an incredible piece of work.

Other ones that bear mentioning are of course Sandman, Watchmen, and Maus, all somewhat classics in their own right.  I have some of the Y: The Last Man books but have trouble getting into it.  Yorick is such an immense idiot sometimes.  I've enjoyed what I've read of Transmetropolitan so far a great deal.  I've also enjoyed some graphic novels in more of the autobiographical vein.  Blankets is a great book, as are the two Persepolis books.

Tracer Sanction?
http://www.mobygames.com/game/tracer-sanction

Yeah if you're noticing a difference with the controller, it's probably input lag.  Different sets can have big differences in lag.  Did you change technologies like go from a plasma to LCD or something like that?  Check and see if your TV has a game mode as you'll want to use that if so.

I started playing Ravenmark this morning and it's pretty awesome.  Fairly hardcore strategy game like Final Fantasy Tactics or Fire Emblem, although looks like few RPG elements.  It uses the system where you plan out your moves ahead of time and then they're executed at the same time as the enemy.  Lots of tension involved.  It's an iphone game but I played it doubled on ipad and wouldn't have noticed at all if it had started up in 2x mode.  TouchArcade gave it 4.5 - http://toucharcade.com/2011/11/15/ravenmark-scourge-of-estellion-review-everything-a-strategy-fan-could-want/

Can you join both the Empire and the Stormcloaks?

That gem can be taken at least 4 places, since I have 4 copies of it

There are 24 of them actually.  It is an annoying (IMO) "find them all" quest.

Looks like the resistance bug was a real thing as they're putting out another patch to address it (as well as backwards dragons).  Lots of updates on the tools release, too-

http://www.bethblog.com/index.php/2011/12/01/skyrim-what-were-working-on/

Looks like the resistance bug is a real thing and they're going to release another update next week-
http://www.bethblog.com/index.php/2011/12/01/skyrim-what-were-working-on/

It's crazy to me to say Halo is relevant only because there were a few good ones and then they just kept making more.  There are tons of games that have a great debut and try to run with it and fail over the course of a sequel or two.  There are certainly criticisms you can level at Halo, but just writing off campaign and saying people only care about MP is not accurate, I think.  Master Chief and Cortana are as big for a newer generation of gamers as Link and Zelda were for me.  ODST and Reach kind of put them aside, sure, but I don't think that means people don't care about them or don't care about the story in Halo.

Full disclosure - I work on Halo 4, so disregard everything I say if you like.  I still think you guys are nuts

Hetz are you seeing that resistance issue?  Just curious - there seem to be a lot of conflicting stories out there. 

Not saying there aren't issues, but I never put any stock in official forums for any game I follow.  It is where people go to bitch, plain and simple.  I would kind of like to see that backwards dragon though

still the bastard won't follow me out of the cave.  I even tried using the unrelenting force on him, thinking it might get him closer to the door.  nope, no good.

I am forever losing Lydia.  I turn around and she is just gone.  I'm sure you've tried it, but sleeping/waiting almost always resets her and brings her to me whenever she's gone.

http://www.dougswordclock.com/

I started using this again.  They've added a few new features, the biggest one being graphs to track your progress.  Pretty cool and basically what I wanted out of the site.  If you dropped off for a while like I did, you might try and give it another shot.

Anyone else get jumped by a group of thugs, and then find a contract note from someone named Moira?  Holy hell these guys slaughtered me over and over again.  I finally had to turn the difficulty down to Novice to get by them.  I read this is someone in Whiterun that I maybe stole from, but I can't find her.  Is this a quest or just some random event?

Sounds like you're being haunted by the ghosts of Fallout 3.

I thought it was some kind of easter egg at first too   But those guys were seriously way above my level, taking out me and Lydia together with no problem.  And apparently Moira is actually some old lady in Whiterun.  I stole some things rather indiscriminately from a few places, so I guess the game took notice even if I wasn't caught red-handed.

Chrono Trigger got announced for iOS.  I would be excited if I hadn't already played that on at least two platforms.  It really makes me wonder where the hell Final Fantasy Tactics is for ipad though.  What are they doing??

Anyone else get jumped by a group of thugs, and then find a contract note from someone named Moira?  Holy hell these guys slaughtered me over and over again.  I finally had to turn the difficulty down to Novice to get by them.  I read this is someone in Whiterun that I maybe stole from, but I can't find her.  Is this a quest or just some random event?

Loving this screenshot -
http://deadendthrills.com/2011/11/the-blades/

I haven't had any issues on xbox... and am wayyy too sucked in. We'll see if it lasts (tired of Oblivion/Morrowind after a while), but really enjoying it right now.

I thought everyone who installed was having texture issues.  Bethesda even confirmed it and said they were working on it.  Are you not seeing anything like that with a game installed on the HD?

They're the kind of issues you're unlikely to notice unless you're playing two versions of the game side by side.  I wouldn't lose sleep over it. 

The first halo was the worst.  Horrible horrible level design.  It's basically cookie cutter as far as rooms go.  I've played all four because of the hype but it always fell flat.  I think Reach was probably the I liked most, but that's not saying much.

You are over-remembering the Library level.  Everyone is entitled to opinions of course, but generally speaking, it's pretty uncontroversial to say the first Halo was the best of the whole series, and Silent Cartographer is still pretty much the FPS level everyone wants to beat.  I can't help but be biased, but Anniversary is a great intro to the series.  It's the first game with a new coat of paint, and it's still a ton of fun.

Got a note that my Kindle Touch is going to be here Tuesday or Wednesday.  I'll let you know how it is.

Actually scratch that.  I cancelled my order.  Reviews aren't bad but they aren't great either.  My 3 is doing fine.  I would like to get 3G again to get whispersync everywhere but sounds like I'm better off waiting for another revision.

Neogaf detectives say PS3 is around 240-250k based on the various percentage gains and declines mentioned in company PR statements.

So, finally a good use for the bluray space. I can't imagine compressing all those textures down to 1 DVD helped this.

Memory space is MUCH more limited than disc space.

Have they confirmed mod tools this time? I think I remember reading yes, but my memory has been crap as of late.

Yep, it's confirmed.

New video!  Music is great-
http://www.elderscrolls.com/community/reaching-new-heights-world-skyrim-0/

I eat dark chocolate where the cocoa is significantly high - 75% or higher (Lindt 99% is an acquired taste - which I seem to have). I have about 2-5 cups of coffee a week. I bounce between it and tea, and the only other thing I drink is water.

99% is hardcore.  At that point you're basically eating just plant matter  I found a good bar with a panther on it that's 88% and apparently helps endangered animals or something.  It's tasty but much higher than that and I think it's disgusting.

For a late snack I'll indulge in using a slow-release protein shake.

Do you use casein or some kind of blend?  I use casein from Optimum Nutrition.  The consistency of casein is amazing to me.  It's like glue.  I actually laughed out loud the first couple times I tried to make a shake out of it, and had to keep pouring in more and more liquid to thin it out.  I finally gave up and use a hand mixer in a bowl and eat it like pudding.  The ON stuff is pretty tasty, much moreso than their whey IMO.

MW3 tomorrow, but it will get pushed aside for Skyrim on Friday.

Desperately trying to finish up Uncharted 3 tonight.  I'm on Chapter 21 so I think I'm close.