I've had fond memories of playing the Avalon Hill boardgame: B17 Queen of the Skies. Its a solitaire game where you create a crew, name your plane, and try to survive 25 missions so you can be rotated home. Its not so much a simulation as it is a game narrative, as I tend to root for my individual crew members and dread the roll of the dice to see what happens to them. I put the game away a long time ago because it seemed a bit lonely playing by myself and because it just seemed so cumbersome dealing with the charts.

Well two things changed that this week. One was the discovery of a B-17 Vassal module. Vassal is a open source java engine which lets you load modules to play virtual boardgames on your computer. The other was the discovery of an ongoing play-by-forum bombing campaign on boardgamegeek. I decided to jump right in since the folks there seemed nice enough and they're always looking for new B-17 crews in the campaign.

If you have fond memories of playing B-17 then I recommend you check out both the vassal module and the ongoing bombing campaign. Or you can just enjoy the after action reports and root for my B-17 crew:

After Action Report

B-17: Maid'n America (1)
Pilot: 1st Lt. Lester Husby
151st Squadron
Mission: 83
Date: August 16, 1943
Target: Le Bourget, Aerodrome
Position: Low squadron, middle

Crew Status:
Pilot 1LT Lester Husby (1)
Copilot 2LT Sam Lohr (1)
Bombardier 2LT Derric Benzing (1) - SW, recovered, non-mission capable
Navigator 2LT Tim Stenzel (1)
  -probable Me109
Engineer Sgt. Wesley Havener (1)
  -confirmed Fw190
Radio Op Sgt. Greg Sidney (1)
Ball Gunner Sgt. Karl Harshmann (1)
  -confirmed Me110
Port Waist Sgt. Clyde Everton
  -probable Me110
Starboard Waist Sgt. Dustin Brady (1) - SW, died of wounds
Tail Gunner Sgt. Tim Shoulders (1)

Fighters Claimed (Dmg/Prob/Kill): 0/2/2

Bomb Run: on target, 30%

B-17 Status:
engine fire extinguisher out
starboard aileron inop
port tailplane root hit 1
stbd waist gun out

Replacements:
Bombardier: 2LT Neil Gosser
Stbd Waist: Sgt. Max Junkins

Debrief:
Outbound trip to target generally uneventful due to excellent fighter cover. Noticed numerous enemy aircraft driven off by P-47s. It was only over the target that our gunners were able to draw some blood, in return for damage to our starboard wing. Still, it did not affect our ability to bomb the target, tail gunner reports seeing a few good effects on target.

Flak over the target was initially light, then turned heavy during the turn to head back home. Luckily no bursts damaged our plane. Germans decided to hit
us with everything just as we were leaving the target area. An Me110 at 9 level came close enough to rake us all along the fuselage. Engine fire extinguisher controls and starboard waist gun rendered inoperable. Ground crew reports several holes in the bomb bay, right where the bombs would have been if he had caught us before they dropped. Thank God for small favors.

Shrapnel from a second Me110 wounded Lt. Benzing in the leg, causing severe bleeding. He managed to apply the tourniquet to himself. Doc says he may lose the leg but at least he's still alive.

A quintet of Fw190s hit us near the French coast. Three were driven off by our little friends. The remaining two 190s were so rattled that they fired off
short bursts at long range before disengaging. Would like to pass on our formal thanks to the fighter squadrons on the inbound trip.

Thought we were home free over the channel but were attacked by two more 190s. One coming in at 12 level was destroyed by our engineer. The other took his revenge on Sgt. Brady who suffered severe wounds to his neck and chest. He died on landing.

1st Lt. Lester Husby
151st BS, 281st BG(H)

Did my sage's first mission impersonating a Sith, infiltrating Empire territory. I found it amusing that she started speaking with an English accent when trying to bluff past the guards. Wonder if there are impersonation style missions for any of the other Republic classes.  And hmmmmm, does that mean Empire classes impersonating as Republic drop the english accent?

I came in here thinking it was going to be a rant on college football

B-17 Flying Fortress: The Mighty 8th w/ up to 64 player coop and the ability to have multi-crewed bombers.
Search and Rescue: Vietnam Med+Evac
And a spiritual successor to Rescue on Fractalus, where you play a SAR space-pilot in the future.

Oh, and anyone want to post guild info in case I decide to stick with it?

The first post in this link shows the people by server and the very first server shows the GT guild name and who is in it:
http://gamingtrend.com/forums/massive-multiplayer-madness/star-wars-the-old-republic-(gt-forum-member-characters)/

Wrong "Star" thing

Holy brain fart batman! I forget what the hell our fleet name was, but if they kept my character all this time she would still be in it. So, maybe I can send you an invite when I log in. I can certainly try. What's your character name?

Oh, and anyone want to post guild info in case I decide to stick with it?

The first post in this link shows the people by server and the very first server shows the GT guild name and who is in it:
http://gamingtrend.com/forums/massive-multiplayer-madness/star-wars-the-old-republic-(gt-forum-member-characters)/

Anyone know whether legacy XP will be back-added for characters started before one gets a legacy name? I'm debating whether or not to start an alt until after I get my legacy name.

My Smugger>Gunslinger's nearing L45 now. Tatooine probably remains my favorite zone. For my tastes, it had the best mix and volume of both regular content and Heroic 2/4 content. Riding around the dunes on my STAP mount was always fun, and I think because the 1977 SW film starts out on Tatooine, it just tugged on my nostalgia strings to run around there despite being in a different era.

Places like Quesh and even Alderaan (which I only know from the original movie as a place our intrepid heroes were trying to get to that blew up) don't really tug at my movie memories that way.

I actually wish Bioware would have left all the iconic worlds from the movies out of the game. This is the Old Republic and IMHO I would have enjoyed them taking a chance with more new worlds.

this.  did we really need to go back to Tatooine again?  I can see using Alderaan since it was barely featured in the films, same could be argued about Hoth, but fuck we've spent plenty of time with Tatooine already.

And I don't like sand. It's coarse and rough and irritating and it gets everywhere. Not like here. Here everything is soft and smooth.

I don't know if this is worth something to someone, but I got schematics: avenger boots (requires synthweaving 30). I can send it to a crafter in Gaming Trend Heroes if they want it. I'm just a gatherer, not crafting at all, so this is useless to me.

The US and the EU have more in common structurally than the US and Denmark. With this in mind, a parallel would be like the people of Denmark "electing" the President of the European Council, who is indirectly chosen by the member states. He has similar, though much weaker, domestic and foreign policy powers to the US president.

Continuing this analogy, imagine the EU had an electoral college system for electing the President of the European Council, whereby each country had a certain number of votes. And because of that any prospective candidates had to actually campaign in small countries like Denmark, and pay attention to the problems of those small countries, as well as campaign in the bigger more populated countries like England and Germany.

Then imagine some idiot from the US just says "why don't you guys just let all the people vote, count up their votes, and then the President is the one with the most votes?"

If you were from a small country like Denmark you'd say "Because then the President wouldn't care about my country, he'd just go campaign in Germany and France you idiot."

I believe the best thing that could happen for the US, politically, would be for every vote to count individually, regardless of state (I guess that's what national popular vote means?) and to get rid of the winner-takes-all mentality. I say this as someone who lives in a country where both these things are in effect already, and it works very well. It's rare for a single party to get a majority vote, so they have to cooperate with other parties. These could even be some of the smallest parties as long as it gets them the majority, which means that even fringe opinions could end up having a certain degree of power. Norway typically ends up with three parties sharing the power and trying to appease each other, and any one of them could topple the leadership if they feel slighted.

This kind of system also means that the leadership usually isn't so polarized. Even if, say, a far-left party gets voted into power, it'll still have to cooperate with other parties to get anywhere, which means it'll have to pander to the middle most of the time. This is a good thing IMO.

I'd rather not have the Presidential votes be decided by the top 5 biggest cities in the US (or however many it would take to get majority votes). At least in our electoral system the less populated states still matter. What I would agree on is to have the electoral results from each state be proportional to the vote in that state. Thus, if the voters in a state are split 3 to 1 for Candidates X and Y then the electoral votes from that state should also be split by that amount.

I couldn't tell what was going on in that video.

A lot of what I could make out is stuff that I'm doing but his health dropped way way faster than what it seems to for my.  I am running over to where they went to and trying a lot of the same things but Corso dies almost right away leaving me to trade shots with Diago and he always heals faster than I can damage him.

I'm confused by that video too. I'm guessing Corso pulled Diago away from Zare so Zare didn't come and help pound the player smuggler. Then, for some reason Diago is floating in the air. Is that because the Jedi did a force lift? But, it doesn't seem like the jedi was player controlled, so is that just a scripted event or something that happens at random? And then Diago seems to still be floating in the air even while the smuggler is hitting him with everything he's got. Shouldn't the first couple of hits have freed Diago from the force lift?

Basically, your default answer is that you shouldn't be throwing any damage at an enemy that isn't Force Lightning if it's going to be a hard right.

What's a hard right? Is that like a Tea Partier?

Yeah, the trooper does have an "oh crap" button for a quick resupply of ammo, but mostly you want to be using its 0 ammo ability as much as possible and then send out healing probes when that isn't enough to do the job. I haven't gotten my first healing ability for my sage yet, but I assume that they have a similar 0 force ability?

Yes, our "Saber strike" ability costs 0 force, and only requires us to get into melee range. Don't get me wrong, I love having to be all strategic about my force management and carefully plotting what skill I'm going to use next during combat. I'm just putting information out there so other sages don't get caught flat-footed like I did.

Also, unlike the Trooper and Smuggler, our regen rate during combat does not change regardless of how much force we have left. As I understand it, the Trooper and Smuggler regen rate drops when their ammo or energy bar goes below a certain point.

Ive been playing on the Imperial side of things but have been thinking about starting a Republic character and joining the guild.  Ive never run an actual healer so i thought Id give it a go.  Whats the best class/spec for healing on the Republic side of things?

I would guess the Jedi Consular>Jedi Sage? (The "Seer" advanced class tier seems to have the strongest heals, but I don't speak from experience). The Smuggler>Scoundrel (Sawbones tier) and Trooper>Commando (Combat Medic tier) can also offer up substantial healing abilities if spec'd that way.

The various fan site skill calculators can be helpful in understanding all that, like Darth Hater's:
http://db.darthhater.com/skill_calc/jedi_knight/guardian/
*Use the button-panels at the bottom there (you might need to scroll to see them) to choose other advanced class builds to look through.

*I've revamped my first post on page 1 here to include everybody in the guild who had posted here (I'm sure we have a few that are in the guild in-game but didn't post in the forum, I'll add them later). Then I'll also list everyone else's listing here (I thought by Server Type, and then by server name, would be useful).

*NOTE: If you see yourself in post #1 listed with a question mark, I didn't see your character name or basic info (class type) in the posts here. PM me if you'd like me to update that. I tried to include everyone even the posts that said "I'm on so and so server" and didn't give more details. Later I'll check the GT Heroes guild list online and add anyone missing.

One note on Jedi Consular/Sage/healers - the Consulars have a fixed force regeneration rate during combat. Sure you can put skill points into increasing the max force you have or slightly increasing the force regeneration rate, but they have nothing like the skills given to Troopers and Smugglers that let them regenerate their ammo or energy while in combat. So, while it may seem that Sages can heal the most health, people playing that class have to manage their force bar so they don't run out of force at a critical moment.

I just found this out after doing one flashpoint with a group. I thought I was doing pretty well, throwing out heals and in between casting DPS on targets. Then I see that one group member is at 50% health and fading fast, but I'm all out of force power. And not to mention another baddie has targeted me and is causing MY health to drop. Luckily we were able to survive by the skin of our teeth. After that I read up on how to improve the Sage's force regen during combat and found out that you basically can't .

The congressional approval ratings were abysmal prior to them being elected. Nice try though.

Sent from my A500 using Tapatalk

Correction. They were low prior to them being elected. NOW they are abysmal.

Considering a server move to Dreshdae to join the guild before getting to deep in to the game. Is everyone 30+ now or are there a few lower level folks still around, we can probably hit low 20's by the weekend with a little work but if the majority of the guild is already level 30-40 might wait for the first wave of alts? Is there a decent turn out of guild members in the evenings? Would like to be able to run flashpoints more reliably and with just my buddy and I it's getting harder as they FP's ramp up in difficulty.

I would say some of us (at least me) have been playing the game more casually than others. For example, I have no alts and my character is only level 17. And I have seen a few alts already that are spread out among the 30 and under level.

Most Flashpoint teams that I've been on at least have a tank and true healer of some sort, and then some mix beyond that. What we've usually found (in later FPs after Esseles) is some end boss or mid-level boss does more damage-per-second than any mortal healer can successfully "out-heal." At this point I don't feel I need the misery (people screaming literally at each other that they're "not tanking right" or "not healing enough" or "not shooting the right targets enough"). My last 2-3 Flashpoint attempts all went like that. It absolutely drained all of the fun out of the game for me while I was in them, I don't play games to deal with that kind of BS. The solution seems to be to have at least a couple players way beyond the Flashpoint's level (say, 4-5 levels), which usually make those encounters a little less painful.

I just discovered that my "force lift" power is excellent at crowd control - able to take at least 1 enemy out of the fight for 60 seconds. I assume other classes have similar stuns or crowd control effects. I'm just guessing here but perhaps there is a stun power that could be used to temporarily prevent the enemy boss from throwing out DPS while everyone heals?

Sorry Raydude, your force lift will not work on bosses or elites.

Actually it will work on elites, and most champions...it will not work on most bosses as they are immune to CC.

Well then, I have no further advice. I guess I will just wait to see once I reach later flashpoints. One would think Bioware would allow us to come up with tactics and end boss strategy that does not require mega-healers.

Most Flashpoint teams that I've been on at least have a tank and true healer of some sort, and then some mix beyond that. What we've usually found (in later FPs after Esseles) is some end boss or mid-level boss does more damage-per-second than any mortal healer can successfully "out-heal." At this point I don't feel I need the misery (people screaming literally at each other that they're "not tanking right" or "not healing enough" or "not shooting the right targets enough"). My last 2-3 Flashpoint attempts all went like that. It absolutely drained all of the fun out of the game for me while I was in them, I don't play games to deal with that kind of BS. The solution seems to be to have at least a couple players way beyond the Flashpoint's level (say, 4-5 levels), which usually make those encounters a little less painful.

I just discovered that my "force lift" power is excellent at crowd control - able to take at least 1 enemy out of the fight for 60 seconds. I assume other classes have similar stuns or crowd control effects. I'm just guessing here but perhaps there is a stun power that could be used to temporarily prevent the enemy boss from throwing out DPS while everyone heals?

I was merely responding to the fallacy that the shadow is not a tank class.  Their two roles are tank/dps, just as a Vanguard or Guardian are.

You are and have been correct in this. The shadow can definitely be a tank class. The problem in the groups I joined was that the shadow players clearly were not specced to be a tank (how else can you explain the shadow losing 1/3 of health on the first hit?) yet jumped in light sabers blazing. The only thing saving the tank wannabes was my healing and force shield.

Okay, crafting is just genius in this game.  I find myself looking forward to every crafting mission I send my companion on.  Will he return with something I need?  Or will he bring me back a broken toaster oven?  Good times, good times. 

Speaking of which, does anyone in GT Heroes need some "green goo" and other stuff from the archaeology and bioanalysis gathering trees? I am just doing gathering for now since I assume that crafters are going to have to make a lot of crap to get to the good stuff. So if any crafters need/want this stuff just let me know. Seems a waste to sell them for such low credits when someone else can use them to make crappy items to improve their crafting skills.

Skyrim. No other game this year has captured my attention and gotten me playing it exclusively for as long as this game has. My play time on it has only been usurped by Star Wars: The Old Republic and only because I have to pay a monthly fee and therefore I feel I need to play it to get my money's worth.  Don't get me wrong, SW:TOR is a good game but if it was F2P then I would be spending half my game time on Skyrim.

[Class Info]

If you're like me, and still find yourself mistakenly thinking a Jedi Sentinel can heal (it's melee DPS) or a Jedi Shadow's a tank (it's also melee DPS), or are otherwise confused by the various advanced class titles, this SWTOR Face list is a handy cheat sheet:

Class Info (aka, what does that name mean?)
http://www.swtorface.com/p/class-info.html

Yeah, I've done several group missions now where the Jedi Shadow seems to think he can stand toe to toe in melee with the baddies. Luckily once I cast 'force shield' on him he really is able to stand toe to toe for a while. Long enough for me to do my own ranged DPS before having to cast healing on him and the other group members.

That Sith needs to cut back on the doughnuts.

Yep, hence the low health upon fighting the massive bladed wookie.

I've heard it's on the bubble and it may or may not get renewed.  Any way a quick Google check says that was the case as of the dead of November.

I'd assumed that they're giving out the episodes for free in an attempt to help build audience interest.  I don't see why else they'd give out all the episodes for free.

The actress who plays the French girl (my favorite) tweeted that the show is cancelled (except for one episode after Christmas), but ABC is spinning that this is not the case, and that the show will finish its season and may even return next year.

I had not seen ABC's response.

Yeah, after the Berlin episode she became the most interesting of all the stewardesses. I was kinda bummed that episodes after that tended to focus on the other more bland ones.

Hey Hepcat, I tried doing a 'who' and adding you as a friend but the game said your character names don't exist

that's odd.  blackjack signed me up for the guild this morning under the alt name terwin.   

Well, now you're in the guild so no worries

Hey Hepcat, I tried doing a 'who' and adding you as a friend but the game said your character names don't exist

I got a girlfriend. 

Pics or it didn't happen

Just wanted to give a shout out to fellow GT Heroes guild member character Oxberger (sp?). The alt of the person who normally plays Jacobus. Apologies, I don't know the player's GamingTrend name and it wasn't in the player/character thread.

He and I just happened to end up near the final boss for one of the quests on Coruscant. I guess he saw me coming toward him so he waited until I was closer and added me to his party. Between the two of us we made mincemeat out of that boss. Which was great because I had planned to logout as soon as I killed that boss to finish the quest. He was fine with that and just wanted to give me a chance to share in the kill.

Even though I am playing SWTOR on a casual level as mostly a single player MMO, I do appreciate having guild members that may be around to help with quests, flashpoints, etc. And I shall do my best to help out as well, at least as much as my playing time permits.

Looking over the screenshots thread I realized that Blackjack's Corso Riggs isn't the default look. Not as I remember him from beta anyway. Was that a companion customization thing? If so, where, when, and how do I customize my companion?

Ryschea, Jedi Consular/Sage

Anyway, I'm more into trying to build positive relations in the game community. Which is why I'll probably always be broke, but I'm OK with that.   That's not to say that making great stuff and selling it at a fair profit isn't also helpful to the community (my L21 Smuggler's using two very nice, crafted pistols from the AH made by the same one guy). I'm just too incompetent at crafting to probably get to that point.  

Sorta like handing out business cards, but in this case you're handing out stims courtesy of GT Heroes? I like that 

So, if I'm not particularly interested in crafting would it make sense for me to just concentrate on crafting/mission skills and send items to crafters in our guild? If so, how do I send them, via in-game email?

How important is it to have your companions like you? Mako can be a bit of spoil sport. I ganked some target and she pooh poohed me with -30. I'm a bounty hunter, I need to collect bounties! They want you to be some bounty hunter with a heart of gold or something. I ain't Dog the Bounty Hunter, sister!

dislikes: "bullying, cruelty, snobs". So was the target something you could easily crush?

I've been mostly lucky with general chat and instances but I'm getting really pissed at grouping with republic people wanting dark side points.  I'm not going into spoilers for the instances but choices were made that I hated because they wanted dark side points only.  I know my personal choices still count for me but it leaves a bad taste in the mouth.  If you want to play the dark side there's a whole group called the empire just waiting for you.  Otherwise enjoying the game more and more as I play longer and get higher levels.  Still can't decide on a main but I'm leaning towards a dual Empire IA/Sniper and Jedi Knight/Sentinel.

Yeah, I know what you mean. For the first flashpoint there are definitely a few places where, if you were playing a la "WWLD" (what would Luke do?), some of the choices would leave a bad taste if they actually happened. You can definitely run through the instance again to get the story your way. If not with your main character then certainly when you come back to it w/ your alt.

  If you want to play the dark side there's a whole group called the empire just waiting for you. 

Why you prejudicial rebel scum!     Actually, you'll find plenty of Empire side players building light points.  My Imperial Agent has gone for light point as much as possible.  Its not a black and white universe, you know.  Keep your dark side republic punks, we dont want them!

Yeah, when I eventually play the Empire side I will play it as a 5th columnist and build light side points.

Server: Dreshdae Cantina (PvE, U.S. East)
Name: Ryschea
Class: 7 Jedi Consular
Guild: Gaming Trend Heroes

<raises glass>To the Heroes!

I think a third of our 4 GT Heroes guys did log in for a bit yesterday, not sure of Romeo_Echo or the other guy. I've added quite a few strangers to my friends list but haven't heard from anyone else here or the smaller forum I hang out at just yet, hopefully we'll get some more as more early access invites go out.

See my post 6 above yours. Romeo_Echo = me.

edited:must..learn..to...count.

[Dreshdae Cantina]

Hey guys, I'm logging into ... Dreshdae Cantina shortly, so please feel free fellow Republic scum to log in there, send me a tell and we'll try to make Gaming Trend Heroes a less fledgling guild.  

I just got my email for early access play, unfortunately have martial arts practice tonight. Will try to take off from work early today and try to play for a bit this afternoon. Otherwise, it won't be till Friday night at the earliest.

The first time I played that section I also went with him, just to see what would happen.  And, any movie buff knows that splitting up in the woods after someone says, "It's probably better if we split up", is a horrible idea. 

Especially after you just survived a dragon attack that wiped out an entire village.

That's how Kirk saw her.

This is how McCoy saw her:


And how the unlucky red shirt saw her: