Green Monster Games (Curt Schilling)

[Daezuel]

Originally Posted by Draegan

All NFL players are tested. They have strict rules against it.

uh yeah, many many ways around tests...

[Draegan]

Just saying.

[Agraza]

Originally Posted by Ngruk

You have little respect for him? Or you just aren't a fan? Respect denotes personal knowledge of someone doesn't it? Maybe that's just how I take the word, it's a pretty significant to me, my respect for someone else.

Not liking an artist has zero to do with respect to me.

He's basically entered the NYT best seller list multiple times in a genre that gets very little play there. His audience is world wide, and ya I am biased because I am a fan, but his talent is irrefutable imo. The guy knows how to make iconic characters and memorable worlds, far more than I could ever do with a pencil and paper.

I don't consider a best seller list the definitive mark of quality, but marketability. McDonald's sells millions of burgers a day, but the bar at the airfield in DeLand has the best burgers in the world, and I imagine they sell less than 10,000 a year. WoW is a great game, and anyone can easily take away a thousand good and bad lessons from the game, but there are still plenty of reasons to complain despite 9 million subscribers worldwide.

I dislike Salvatore's Drizzt novels because he makes weak choices in regards to the characters and the world that they inhabit. It's almost childish. His short Crimson Shadow series was textbook formulaic fantasy. I wasn't repelled by the story, but I was disappointed as, at the time, I was a Salvatore reader. I ended up taking nothing away from those novels, and after trying to read a few more of his works just abandoned him altogether. He is a titan of today's fantasy literature in much the same way Budweiser is a titan of beer. He produces a marketable, easy to swallow story that you're comfortable with - full of stereotypes and those that defy their stereotypes, in stereotypical ways.

I'm sure Salvatore is a great guy, and he can write better than I can, but I like my novels to be more heavy hitting than he cares to deliver. That says almost nothing about his potential as a loremaster for your game, or whatever your team refers to him as. I don't respect his fantasy novels, but I respect that he has helped the genre along, so I suppose that I don't disrespect him as a person. I think that is the correct term. It doesn't have much to do with being a fan to me. I don't support or slam artists based on an irrelevant bias, as far as I know. Hell, I drink Bud, and I've read Salvatore cover to cover.

Steven Erikson and George Martin, two of my current favorites, deliver plausible characters that face consequences for the choices they make. The story revolves not so much around their pet characters as around the events of the entire world, despite any characters they might cherish. The characters often help shape the events, but they are just as often witnesses to them as well. I don't know how they stand on best seller lists either, but along with Alastair Reynolds (science fiction) they're the best in their field from what I've read.

[Ngruk]

Originally Posted by Agraza

I don't consider a best seller list the definitive mark of quality, but marketability. McDonald's sells millions of burgers a day, but the bar at the airfield in DeLand has the best burgers in the world, and I imagine they sell less than 10,000 a year. WoW is a great game, and anyone can easily take away a thousand good and bad lessons from the game, but there are still plenty of reasons to complain despite 9 million subscribers worldwide.

I dislike Salvatore's Drizzt novels because he makes weak choices in regards to the characters and the world that they inhabit. It's almost childish. His short Crimson Shadow series was textbook formulaic fantasy. I wasn't repelled by the story, but I was disappointed as, at the time, I was a Salvatore reader. I ended up taking nothing away from those novels, and after trying to read a few more of his works just abandoned him altogether. He is a titan of today's fantasy literature in much the same way Budweiser is a titan of beer. He produces a marketable, easy to swallow story that you're comfortable with - full of stereotypes and those that defy their stereotypes, in stereotypical ways.

I'm sure Salvatore is a great guy, and he can write better than I can, but I like my novels to be more heavy hitting than he cares to deliver. That says almost nothing about his potential as a loremaster for your game, or whatever your team refers to him as. I don't respect his fantasy novels, but I respect that he has helped the genre along, so I suppose that I don't disrespect him as a person. I think that is the correct term. It doesn't have much to do with being a fan to me. I don't support or slam artists based on an irrelevant bias, as far as I know. Hell, I drink Bud, and I've read Salvatore cover to cover.

Steven Erikson and George Martin, two of my current favorites, deliver plausible characters that face consequences for the choices they make. The story revolves not so much around their pet characters as around the events of the entire world, despite any characters they might cherish. The characters often help shape the events, but they are just as often witnesses to them as well. I don't know how they stand on best seller lists either, but along with Alastair Reynolds (science fiction) they're the best in their field from what I've read.

I just started getting into Martin last year. As far as delivering plausible characters, I'd argue that while Martin may do it, the fact of the matter for me is that by page 22 he's introduced 11,423 of them to me and I can't remember who's who.

[Ngruk]

Originally Posted by etchazz

think this will ever happen with bud selig as commish? i mean, he's the main reason why all this cheating happened in the first place. he knew what was going on even in the mid 90's. the 98 season really "saved baseball" because that summer really got a lot of people reinterested in the sport after the strike. it was plainly obvious mcguire and sosa were on steroids (among others). i mean, you could see the zits all over mcguire's neck when he was playing and on his back in some post game interviews. i'm originally from pittsburgh, and when barry bonds came into the league he weighed maybe 190 pounds, then, in his mid 30's he goes to san fran and puts on 50 pounds of muscle and his head grows 4 sizes.

i just think it was a combination of selig knowing the homerun chase was good for the sport and being horribly afraid of the player's union. testing for steroids and other performance enhancing drugs should have been in place since the early 80's. however, i hope this investigation leads to many people being suspended and records being removed.

Please don't put the blame for the steroid era on the commissioner. While I would probably agree there was much more that could have been done by the powers that be, ignoring the true culprit does no one any good.

The players that chose to cheat and break the law are the ones to blame, and I think there is most likely an argument against players like me as well, players that just KNEW there was something going on, even though I have never seen it first hand, and through my and our inaction allowed it to grow and become the culture instead of standing up and voicing an opinion to stop it.

[Draegan]

I think it was actually only half that, so 5,711 of them.

[hamrlik]

Originally Posted by Ngruk

Please don't put the blame for the steroid era on the commissioner. While I would probably agree there was much more that could have been done by the powers that be, ignoring the true culprit does no one any good.

Jose Canseco?

[Daezuel]

Originally Posted by Ngruk

Please don't put the blame for the steroid era on the commissioner. While I would probably agree there was much more that could have been done by the powers that be, ignoring the true culprit does no one any good.

The players that chose to cheat and break the law are the ones to blame, and I think there is most likely an argument against players like me as well, players that just KNEW there was something going on, even though I have never seen it first hand, and through my and our inaction allowed it to grow and become the culture instead of standing up and voicing an opinion to stop it.

I don't see how anyone could possibly blame you...look, we all know its about money. Whenever there is big money in something, people will and do find a way to cheat. Thats not going to change no matter how many Mitchell reports are done. You could hardly be expected to risk millions of dollars standing up for something you have no direct proof of...

[Maxxius]

Originally Posted by Ngruk

RJ will go down as arguably one of the 3-4 most dominating strike out pitchers that ever lived, if not the most dominating. Josh still has his legacy to craft but I wouldn't bet against him.

My favorite at bat ever was John Kruk against Randy Johnson during an All Star game (I forget which year, unfortunately).

[etchazz]

Originally Posted by Ngruk

Please don't put the blame for the steroid era on the commissioner. While I would probably agree there was much more that could have been done by the powers that be, ignoring the true culprit does no one any good.

The players that chose to cheat and break the law are the ones to blame, and I think there is most likely an argument against players like me as well, players that just KNEW there was something going on, even though I have never seen it first hand, and through my and our inaction allowed it to grow and become the culture instead of standing up and voicing an opinion to stop it.

i don't put the blame entirely on selig, however i believe that he knew what was going on and turned a blind eye to it. that to me makes him just as guilty as everyone else. i know people will always try and cheat, but for whatever reason baseball refused to even acknowledge that it was going on, like all of a sudden it came out of nowhere. football had been testing for steroids for years, same with the olympic committee and many other sports leagues. i was only a young teenager in the early 90's but even i could tell which players were juicing (lenny dystra, brady anderson, jose canseco, etc...) when the players' forearms are as big as their thighs, it's really pretty easy to tell. my point is something should have been done when this problem was still in its infancy and the league should not have waited for congress to intervene to clean up the sport.

p.s. i live in philadelphia now and have season tickets, please come back and pitch for us!!!

[Menion]

YouTube - Curt Schilling's 38 Studios MMORPG Project

[Mymn]

orc on that horse?

[Gecko]

Originally Posted by Ngruk

I just started getting into Martin last year. As far as delivering plausible characters, I'd argue that while Martin may do it, the fact of the matter for me is that by page 22 he's introduced 11,423 of them to me and I can't remember who's who.

I'll bet when you finish the entire series, you'll end up a huge George RR Martin fan, like most fantasy people our age. I'd take your time as the man doesn't seem in a rush to finish it, which is maddening. Martin also certainly likes to do the unpredictable.

In regards to Salvatore, he doesn't write deep literature with hooks into classics, just light, but good fantasy fluff. It is what it is, so either enjoy it or don't, as with any novel. I like in depth books, and read nonstop in all genre's, and also have no problems with Bob Salvatore's work in my collection.

There's a reason many people enjoy Salvatore's work, and his in depth Drow society storytelling and fantasy creations lend themselves nicely to MMO development, I think. It's just surprising he wasn't more involved in the TSR/AD&D MMO process.

[Tyen]

Originally Posted by Menion

YouTube - Curt Schilling's 38 Studios MMORPG Project

YouTube - Everquest, MMORPG and Online Games KILL

Stupid youtube related videos =(

[Azrayne]

Martin is an author you'll need to read at least the entirety of the first book to appreciate, imo. By the end of chapter two I was still thinking 'sigh here we go, another ride on the generic fantasy train.' By the end of book 1 I was hooked, and he easily had a place as one of the best writers in the genre, in my mind.