2010 March » Undergopher Central

My flowers let me show you them

Mar 312010

The theme this site uses was recently updated, so I installed the update thinking that it would just overwrite the old files and leave other things alone. Shows me what I know. It got rid of the rotating images I loaded. (apparently when updating the theme it deletes the old theme files and writes the new ones.) Because I’m a moron I didn’t have those files backed up, so I’ll have to recreate them and reload them when I get home tonight.

Moral of the story: don’t assume you know how something is going to work unless you actually know how it’s going to work and always make a backup.

For now, enjoy the default images.

Everyone Gets a Backstory or The Iliad by Homer

Reviews No Responses »

Mar 292010

I just finished reading The Iliad by Homer and I want to get this down while it’s fresh in my mind. More than anything this book was a major let down. From the epic story of the seige of Troy I was expecting something, well, more epic.

The story is a long, detailed, account of the beginning of the war. How detailed, you may ask, and what’s this about the beginning of the war? Well, a lot of people die in this story (as befitting a story about a war) but most of these people are not important to the story as a whole. They’re what we who play RPGs call NPCs. Most of the time these characters wouldn’t even get a name if they didn’t have an impact on a story. Homer, however, gives everyone a backstory, usually giving it after the poor fellow has already suffered a gilling blow, making it almost completely unnecessary. Also, the book doesn’t cover the actual fall of troy.

That’s right, no horse, no heel, nothing!

In the end I’m going to have to recommend that people skip this entry in the “best books ever written.”

Test one two

Transmissions No Responses »

Mar 252010

So the initial tests of the recorder are promising. I’ll most likely be recording at medium gain and I’ll have to amplify the audio in audacity before it is workable. I need to decide on a format for posting. I’m pretty sure that the first few are going to be digests from the games we run, but I’m bound to get more creative as time goes on. For now, here’s one of the test files I recorded.

audacitytest1

Podcast: Play in new window | Download

Recordings from a Distant Galaxy

Transmissions No Responses »

Mar 232010

I’ve been searching for a good solution for recording game sessions that would give decent audio and maybe allow for podcasting. I think I’ve found it.

I’ve ordered a Zoom H2 Handy Recorder. I’ve been searching for a good, simple, and relatively inexpensive option and it meets those needs. I don’t need anything more than just the H2 to record and all of the reviews that I’ve read say that it’s great for the price.

I’ll be testing it out once it comes in, and should be more than ready for the first Hybrid Galaxy Game. (I’ll be testing it out with the Ghostbusters game to see how it does in a “less than optimal” recording conditions.