TonyV

If you are a Colts fan, you have my deepest sympathies, and I'm not being facetious. Whoever made the boneheaded decision to pull your starters 1.5 games from a perfect season deserves to be blindfolded, put in a shack, and then all of the Indianapolis Colts players allowed to march through one-by-one with baseball bats.

I am still in shock at the stupidity of Chris Polian and/or Jim Caldwell. Super Bowl glory lasts for a season, maybe two if you're really good. Perfect season glory, that lasts for 37 years and counting. Think about it. Most sports fans know that the Miami Dolphins had a perfect season in 1972. How many people know who won the Super Bowl the year after? The year before? Sure, there are some sports nuts who probably know, but the real answer is hardly anyone. To take that kind of historical moment away from the players who have worked so hard all season is a disgrace on the management of the franchise.

From the editorials I've read coming out of Indianapolis, most of the fans are devastated. They had built their excitement to a fervor in having something so important so close to them. If I had tickets to that game, I'd seriously be raising hell in demanding my money back. I know I'd probably be screwed and wouldn't be able to get it, but to me, there's an implicit contract with the fans that we will support our team, and in return, they will make an honest effort to try their best to win the game.

I honestly think that the players are devastated. I saw the looks on their faces when they were pulled from the game. I saw the disappointment as the game slipped away from them. From the time they were pee-wee players, they've had it ingrained into their heads that they have to give it all they've got. As professional players, they are paid millions of dollars to be the best damn sportsmen in the world. Here, they have a chance not just to prove that they're the best in the league, but to be the first team in NFL history to win a perfect 19-game season.

I have to think that this will have all sorts of bad ramifications for the team going into the postseason. Ponder this. The Colts management basically said, "This game doesn't really matter." If you're a player, what does that mean? A linebacker thinks, "We're ahead by four and I doubt that a pass will come my way, so this play doesn't really matter." Bam, touchdown, you've lost the game.

I'm so sick of hearing how the players have to go into the playoffs as "healthy and fresh" as possible. Peyton Manning has played for twelve years and never missed a game, not one single time. That's around 170 consecutive games. Will those 1.5 games he's resting now really make a positive difference? These guys are professionals. They don't need to be "fresh" to play. They don't really even have to be completely healthy. Before you feel too sorry for them, remember that most of the starters will make more money in one season than most people make in a lifetime. That's why.

Most of these guys even already have Super Bowl champion rings from the 2006-7 season, when the Colts took home the Lombardi trophy. Would another Super Bowl championship be nice? Sure. But I know that if I'm a Colt and I already have one of those rings, I've got to be thinking, "I don't want another ring, I've been there, done that. I want my name in the history books for all time!"

Now, no matter how the season ends, the Colts are in a lose-lose situation. If they go all the way and win the Super Bowl, the season will be marred by the fact that for want of around 20 more minutes of play time, these players will be denied their rightful place in the annals of NFL history. If they don't, people (myself included) will always believe that it is because the franchise management dealt the players and the fans an irrevocable blow to morale 1.5 games away from a perfect season.

To the Colts players and fans, my hat's off to you for a season so well played. You really deserved that perfection, and I hope that you get Polian's/Caldwell's head on a platter for denying it to you. To Colts management, I give you my heartiest "BOOOO" for displaying an unforgivable morale-busting lapse in sportsmanship.

Sorry about that. For what it's worth, when we do do back-end work, we usually try to schedule it during non-peak hours, or give notice when it will be particularly intense or might result in an outage. You probably just caught Nicster making a backup or something, which tends to slow things down a bit.

One of these days, I hope to post an actual maintenance window, but with most of us having day jobs and being on different schedules, it boils down to "whenever we have time" a lot of times.

Still, if something is amiss, we do appreciate reports of it in case something is glitches up, so thanks for the heads-up! Probably the best way to alert me is by either:

- PMing me here,
- Sending me an e-mail at TonyV@CoHTitan.com, or
- Hitting me up on Skype (tonyv.paragonwiki) or Gtalk (TonyV@CoHTitan.com) if I'm online.

Here's the thing. If they announced tomorrow that every single one of these things has been implemented, I guarantee you that by middle of January at the latest, people would be complaining yet more about how there's no new content, and the devs need to [insert more ideas here].

It's a never-ending cycle. The devs do add new content, for 50s and for other levels as well.

Happy HumanLight!

...Well, kind of.

First of all, thanks to Cathartic for pointing this out to me today. I've had a miserable week of having a car accident (totaled my car), a friend who damn near died of a heart problem no one knew he had, his brother having a car wreck (totaled his car), transitioning from a company I've worked for for 10 years to a new one, and a ton of other minutiae. Yes, Cath, it helped.

Anyway, he pointed out to me that Massively.com has a short entry under their "Daily Grind" column titled How do you learn the game? That screenshot at the top of the article looks very familiar!

Also, I'm honored that we made the pages of The Paragon Tattler as what they refer to as "the enablers." Personally, I figure that every dollar that Paragon Studios saves on killing trees with official manuals (or for that matter, every dollar they don't ask players to spend in the form of official third-party guides) is a dollar that can be put to better use in developing (and paying for) the game.

Last, but not least, I think it's kind of funny that our reach even extends to "that other game." I saw this post on their forums, asking if there's "an equivalent to Paragon Wiki." (The answer is yes, and hopefully the non-Wikia one will be successful, as I wouldn't wish selling one's soul to Wikia on people...)

So, I just wanted to say thanks again to everyone who has helped make the Paragon Wiki an awesome community resource, and for your continued support. It really does mean a lot!

P.S. In case anyone is curious: My friend is recovering well with a brand spankin' new ICD implanted, his brother is bruised but okay, and the insurance company offered a fair amount for the car and I'm buying one just like it but upgraded and with less mileage. If I can just survive 2009, hopefully life is finally headed in the right direction again for 2010.

I wish they would get enough GMs so that they could reply immediately to harassment petitions, and when they see someone deliberately being an a**hole, at least temp ban them on the spot.

To the OP, when encountered by a griefer, I generally deliberately stay and continue doing what I'm doing and act as completely oblivious to them as I possibly can. That is how you get to them. No matter how irritating they're being, don't acknowledge their presence in any way, because every millisecond of attention you give them after determining that they're griefing you is only giving them pleasure and every millisecond you ignore them irritates them more.

By standing there and taking it, you are accomplishing three things: 1) You are actually irritating them by not reacting (thus how you "win" against a griefer). 2) You are giving the GM time to show up and witness what's going on firsthand. 3) By wasting the griefer's time, you are helping out other players who the griefer would move on to if you leave.

To anyone who is confronted by a griefer, make sure that you DO NOT provoke them in any way. In particular, DO NOT get mad and start cussing them out. If you do, end of game, they win. If anything, be overly nice to them, and I don't mean in a passive-aggressive sarcastic way. The goal is for when a GM reads the logs, you want it painfully obvious that they were harassing you completely without cause. If you dish out any at all, the GM will simply chalk it up to two people fighting amongst themselves. On the other hand, the more they dish out while you stand there being nice and taking it, the more likely they will get banned and you have removed a disruptive person from the game, which makes it more fun for everyone.

They know about it and don't have an ETA on it coming up yet.

BNY missions might be faster, but I'd argue that defeating Winter Lord is more interesting and much less repetitive. It also has the added advantages of: 1) getting to hang out with more people (and helping some of them get the new badges), 2) collecting stuff while you're opening presents while looking for the Winter Lord, 3) getting merit rewards when you defeat the Winter Lord, and 4) snagging a few extra candy canes here and there by hanging out in Lord Winter's Realm after he's defeated and defeating snowmen.

Totally my opinion, though, YMMV.

22 without studying first, 49 when I started cheating by looking stuff up on the wiki. Cool quiz!

Here's my proven method of avoiding motion sickness: Do the ski runs--while actually skiing. That way, your eyes, ears, and "muscle sense" are all in sync, and your brain is perfectly okay with it. VR goggles, a waterproof laptop backpack, and good balance help a lot, too. I've been able to get my time under 20 seconds using this method. Last year, though, I missed a couple of the medals because I broke my leg while getting the silver on the bobsled run.