I actually do try to stay out of creationism/evolutionism arguments because people expect me to pick a side and I like to point out "Why can't [Diety] have instituted evolution?"
(I do enjoy watching people when their brains short circuit on a question like that)
Because evolution is basing on death, and death didn't exist before sin. How much pleasure did my brain deliver you?
Point.
I have an argument against that but it largely hinges on the LDS perspective, which includes "You have to die in order for the body to be resurrected" and "God created Creation for the purpose of perfecting His children", and the argument doesn't really hold up in an Evolution/Creationism dispute anyway since it's more a dogmatic argument against... I think it's against Original Sin but it's been so long since I even had to pull that one out I don't remember what it's arguing against.
Stuff I agree with, which was basically everything that was posted
I actually do try to stay out of creationism/evolutionism arguments because people expect me to pick a side and I like to point out "Why can't [Diety] have instituted evolution?"
(I do enjoy watching people when their brains short circuit on a question like that)
ars4326 wrote:
stuff discussing covenants
The fun thing about covenants is that it's a two-way agreement. You do this, this, and this, and then I will do this, that, and the other. If you follow God's instructions, He will by definition keep his end of the covenant. The problem here is that people generally get impatient and start demanding God hold up His end of the covenant before God is ready to do so - Solomon is a good example of this in that he was initially obedient but over time in order to keep peace among his political wives he drifted in a less obedient direction. I want to say the word covenant still gets used in modern legal parlance because of that bidirectional distinction.
(Note: Solomon is not necessarily a perfect example but it demonstrates what I was aiming to say well enough. Now if only I knew what I was aiming to say.)
The category would probably rake in a lot of donations at a GDQ, to be honest - it looks entertaining, even if this particular execution is long-winded (why even get the Master Sword when the game assumes it to you in the Ganon Battle after pickup even as Kid Link?). I presume you can more-or-less do this in realtime with some practice?
How do we justify all that rape stuff? How do we justify evaluating the value of a woman on the basis of her sexual EXP? By saying that men and women have some intrinsic differences? This goes especially to ars4326, who says that the Bible gives great honor to women. How is that compatible with the fact that God and Moses accept the raping and killing of women based solely on an arbitrary attribute that doesn't even have anything to do with gender in the first place, namely the sex EXP?
Aqfaq, I am going to need a Scriptural citation here. I do not recall any verse in the Bible which states or alludes to God and Moses accepting the raping and killing of women based on sex, or anything similar to that.
Probably referring to the Law of Moses as given in the book of Leviticus. Bear in mind the context in which the Law of Moses was given.
The Hebrews had just proven themselves incapable or unwilling to live the first code of laws given in Exodus (the Golden Calf incident), so Jehovah had to give them a more temporal law that explicitly told them "Yes you can do this" or "No you can't do that".
The Hebrews hadn't had a prophet since the dynastic upheaval in Egypt that led to their enslavement, so they wouldn't have been on target for Jehovah worship anyway.
People in general are dumb and look for any excuse they can to not think; a large part of the Law of Moses was explicit instructions on what can and can't be done because the Hebrews weren't willing to think to themselves "okay, why would Our Lord require us to do this?"
The Hebrews had been slaves (property) during the last half of their tenure in Egypt and would have needed a code of laws regarding slaves and other human property just because, well, that was the culture at the time.
And really, anybody who calls themself a Christian yet still looks to the book of Leviticus for their code of conduct has rather missed the point of Christ's teachings.
I have questions.
I don't speedrun the Zeldas, nor do I pretend to, but I don't see the purpose of the bombchus that you set on the ground (there are two three of them, one of which visibly runs down the wall) when trying to Ganondoor. What precisely do they accomplish? Chu #3 when Ganondooring, why the delay?
As much as the Bible tries to convey a utopian lifestyle
Are we reading the same Bible? All throughout the old and new testaments there's something horribly wrong about society.
(NOTE: All of the following is (1) citing KJV and (2) from an LDS standpoint)
Garden of Eden: No babies; Adam and Eve would by modern people be called "Sheltered Beyond Belief" despite the whole "Married Nudists" thing. Hell, sex isn't even mentioned as being a thing until Genesis 4:1, after the expulsion from the Garden of Eden.
Between the Expulsion and the Flood: No temporal deterrent against crime; Man has to till the ground with tools that won't last. LDS: The only recorded utopia in the Bible is the City of Enoch, which doesn't even get mentioned in the Old Testament - it's only known because of references to Enoch in other scripture. It's a bit easier from the LDS perspective because we get an abridgment of the Book of Enoch within the Book of Moses but we still don't have anything close to the original Book of Enoch. It ultimately got so bad that God/Jehovah/Whoever you believe to be in charge basically said "screw it, we're resetting."
Between the Flood and Abraham: Human Pride leads to the Tower of Babel and the dividing of the languages. LDS: Jaredites split off at this point, not that they have a happy ending. Sodom and Gomorrah, regardless of what you believe to have gone horribly wrong there, goes so horribly wrong that the one named survivor of the two cities is Lot (whose daughters effectively raped him in order to keep his bloodline in the general area); non-Jehovan faiths practiced human sacrifice with such regularity that, in so far as our records go, Abraham did not hesitate to prepare his heir for sacrifice (bear in mind this is after Ishmael was disinherited); Abraham wed his half-sister and had to routinely tell the authorities of the places that he visited that Sarah was his sister out of fear for being killed over her.
Patriarchs through Jacob: Isaac marries Rebekah (his cousin through Abraham's brother Nahor); Isaac and Rebekah both play favorites with their kids (Isaac preferred Esau while Rebekah favored Jacob); Jacob takes advantage of Esau's inability to think ahead in order to claim his heirship, and through Rebekah's deceptive plan he also takes a blessing that Isaac intended for Esau LDS: This situation gets mirrored in the relationship between the Nephites and the Lamanites, except this one has a somewhat happier ending; Jacob sends himself into exile because he's afraid that his brother will kill him over the deception, then sells himself into slavery for 7 14 years in order to marry Rachael (his second cousin, a granddaughter of the aforementioned Nahor - a bit less related than his parents (and grandparents) were but still a bit too close for modern sensibilities), only to get tricked by Laban (Nahor's son) into marrying Leah first; Jacob eventually ends up married to not only the sisters Leah and Rachel, but due to Rachel's inability to conceive also ends up married to their servants Bilhah and Zilpah (and we know it wasn't daddy's fault Rachel couldn't conceive because he had ten other boys and at least one girl between his three other wives); Rachel dies giving birth to Benjamin (it's implied that Jacob went celibate after that out of grief).
Joseph and the Occupation of Egypt: Joseph gets favored by Jacob because he's the firstborn of his beloved Rachel and ultimately gets sold into slavery by his own brothers; said brothers end up preventing an alliance with another nation when they basically massacre a village worth of men for violating said known sister; Joseph gets thrown in jail because he won't be his boss's Wife's Boy Toy. LDS: Joseph was in a no-win situation here regardless of how Potiphar would have reacted to the whole Boy Toy thing because it was either "Get thrown in Jail for refusing" or "Commit Adultery" - the latter would have cost him his priesthood authority and would have ultimately led to someone else being named Zaphnath-paaneah. Ultimately this whole mess ends up with the Hebrew peoples occupying Egypt under that dynasty's rule - and when that dynasty got overthrown, the new boss in town decided to enslave the old dynasty's most vocal supporters (the Hebrews).
Moses and the Exodus: By the time Moses came into play, the Hebrews had been enslaved for at least a century, probably two, and their religion had been intermingled with the Egyptian pantheon to the point that they were effectively worshiping neither Jehovah nor any known Egyptian diety. LDS: There's the Temporal, or Aaronic, Priesthood - the Priesthood authority to perform temporal administrative duties (including baptism), roughly equivalent to being a non-teller clerk at a bank: only handling paperwork, not actually making decisions; then there's the Spiritual, or Melchezidek, Priesthood - the Priesthood Authority at which the Patriarchs, Moses, the Prophets of ancient and modern dispensations, and the Apostles During The Ministry of Christ were ordained, and is the authority required of all saving ordinances beyond Baptism - maintaining the bank analogy, these would be underwriters. The upshot of all this? Moses got his Priesthood Authority from Jethro of Midian, not from any Hebrews in Egypt. Aaron did not have the authority to be a Prophet until after the Exodus. That's how far removed from Jehovah Worship the Hebrews had gotten.. Moses was so far removed from Hebrew society both as an Egyptian Noble and during his Exile to the Ishmaelites in Midian that he had to have his brother Aaron act as interpreter. After the Exodus, the Hebrews were still so embedded in worshiping whatever it was they were worshiping that as soon as Moses left to get Jehovah's Laws that Aaron had them make a golden calf just to shut them up about not having an idol to worship. As punishment for this the Hebrews were cursed to wander the Sinai Peninsula for 40 years, living a nomadic lifestyle - meaning that the Hebrews of the Exodus didn't get to see the Promised land, but their children (who were innocent of the Golden Calf incident) did. Moses himself did not get to enter the Promised Land during his mortal life (bear in mind that the first thing we see Moses do is commit murder).
The Occupation (and Conquest) of Canaan: Long story short, the Hebrews were commanded to completely extinguish the Canaanites. This is pointed out in the Book of Judges, as the tribes of Judah, Simeon, and Joseph were the ones to comply with the command while the other tribes did not. This meant that peoples left alive in the land continued to worship their dieties, and the Hebrews once again ended up with a corrupted version of Not-Quite-Jehovah-Worship. Eventually. This took far longer than the corruption in Egypt took due to the Hebrews not being continuously enslaved (read: enslaved for three or more successive generations) - it was still Jehovah Worship by the time of what I call The Royal Fuckup, but only just.
The United States of Israel (and their subsequent Civil War): Continuous period of war in one form or another. Samuel was ordained Prophet at a very young age (presumably 15 or 16, possibly as young as 12 but no later than 19) and the previous prophet Eli (along with his sons) were slain in the war as divine retribution for committing Priestcrafts. LDS: Priesthood Authority is summarily defined as "The Authority To Act In God's Name" and is intended to only be used to aid and bless others. This is why you don't see a Mormon blessing himself by the laying on of hands. Priestcraft is a specific crime against God in which one abuses their Priesthood Authority for personal gain and is for that reason a very bad thing to do. Israel rejected the Judges and sought for a King to rule over them, and Jehovah gave them King Saul - righteous at first, but his pride got the better of him. After Saul was King David (who left a trail of bodies to the throne - next time you read 2nd Samuel, remember that the first rule of assassination is to kill the assassin). LDS: King David is an interesting case study in addiction. It's implied that Bathsheba was the last in a long line of... questionable acquisitions, and he fell from grace as a result of trying to cover up his indiscretion with her - the adultery happened while Uriah was still out leading an army (and Uriah would not lie with his wife while his men were afield, so David couldn't say "It's Uriah's kid I don't know what you're talking about SEVEN YEARS DUNGEON!"). There was a degree of faithfulness and peace during Solomon's reign but that only lasted as long as he lived, and he did something that is now applauded in a political leader - he put his nation in debt in order to do some construction projects. I'll grant you the Temple, he was commanded by Jehovah to build that, but he didn't stop there and it caused internal strain. His children split the kingdom into the two-and-a-half southern tribes of the Kingdom of Judah, with the remaining tribes in the northern Kingdom of Israel. I used to know by heart which tribes comprised the southern Kingdom but no longer do - I know it's two-and-a-half because "Joseph's tribe" is the the combination of the tribes of Ephraim and Manasseh, and I want to say Manasseh is the tribe that became part of the southern kingdom. I could be wrong though. LDS: 1st Nephi 5 indicates that Lehi, and by extension the Nephites and Lamanites, are descended from Joseph but it does not specify which of Joseph's sons - in fact he may well have blood from both just because of the distance in time.
I could go on at length about this, but I think I've made my point thus far (plus I have to go to sleep at some point and I want to do other things in the morning).
Link to video
1) In the future, when there's a video link in the strawpoll, please also put in the video instead of just putting in the strawpoll. Context is very important!
2) I agree with what the others have said - this appears to be the deliberate activation of a debug function, and should not be used in speedruns.
Would that then be 'abuses programming errors' or 'heavy luck manipulation'? Either you're abusing a seed reset error or else you're manipulating the seed favorably.
The final release version has the row of pots with the directional arrow.
The key cheat is very much faster than doing it normally, would like to see this screen refined to do it fast (hoorah for frame-precision and frame advance).
"externalized settings files for controllers"
Effectively, if I change my controller settings for a certain core from the default, I would like to see that saved to disk when the controller settings are set and not when the program closes cleanly. As I run the Real-Time Corruptor mod at times, I find value in not having to reset my controllers after the inevitable "The game has become so corrupt it's broken BizHawk" crash (especially given that RTC defaults to X360 buttons and I don't use my pad if I don't have to).
If this already happens, what file is that so I know what to keep a backup of between versions?
Question, why shoot the guy on the 2nd screen? Does he just not move out of the way fast enough (like with Hermit in the spider passage between starting area and Blechton)?
Is there a setting that I'm missing, or does BizHawk not support externalized settings files for controllers? Or am I looking for an ini file when I should be looking for something else?
I run both vanilla Biz and ircluzar's RTC mod, and Biz doesn't write setting changes unless it closes cleanly, so this is something that I'd value knowing the answer to.
Unless there's a major improvement to Any% Seasons that's been found since the last publication, we can probably just use the current Seasons run as the starting point.
A thing I need to check is if the Achievement Get rings track across both games or not. Similarly, unid'd rings are stored in memory as either +64 or as the two's complement (don't remember which) but I've long since forgot the address; I'll pull up the Ages Any% this week and scan it.
This hybridized file you speak of... how does one obtain the upgrade passwords? To my knowledge the NPCs only spawn in the starting game.
That's actually not a bad idea, now that I ponder over it. Most of the explanations of what TASing is as given during other runs as SGDQ only went so far as to say "Using frame advance and save states". Which while that's the most obvious bit, isn't the be all and end all of the process.
Anymore, what we do is we disassemble the game and study the physics, we search for loopholes and programming errors, and we watch what the game is thinking. Probably the "best" examples of what this can result in are the ACE runs and ACMLM's "A Bored God Plays Tetris". Another thing that we could help clarify is the difference between actual randomness and deterministic RNG - I saw a lot of people on twitch chat complain that it's not random if the same result can be forced during the 100% Chrono Trigger run. If we can include an explanation of that (probably best if we can console verify one of the more controversial Monopoly movies for this purpose) then it might make things easier on other runners as well.
That... actually changes quite a bit of thing.
New Hashes:
Boktai - The Sun Is in Your Hand (USA)
SHA1:7164326283DF46A3941EC7B6CECA889CBC40E660
MD5:FF75C62AB690410CC8FCA24204D783E9
I'll have to fiddle with the calibration; the game is programmed to overheat after so much SOL is collected in one sitting. Since more sunlight is better than less it'll need to be studied. In RAM. (dreading this)
Also, I'm making a baseline route rather than a dedicated TAS; any TAS of the same category should either beat my time or else have a very good reason for why it doesn't.
I've got a day off on Friday; I'll probably set up a full baseline then. Need to science with the RTC so that it's night up until entering Delusion Forest - having sunlight at night makes Bloodrust Mansion and Fog Castle a fair bit faster as you're not dealing with near as many enemies. I want to say it also screws with the Count's AI since he's supposed to be smart enough to not dash straight into light coming in from the skylights (why he even has those in his mansion...)
E: It doesn't screw with his AI, he did it to me again just now with the game seeing daylight hours. So having max sunlight for the first Count fight is a Good Thing™ since the stronger the sunlight, the more suicidal he gets past the halfway mark.
Mucking around with a baseline route for Boktai 1, and I ran into the issue that Delusion Forest can't reliably be navigated at night. Also, can't run max sunlight all the time, the game still gives overheats after spending so much time at max; maybe spend dungeons at 1 and only use max for purifications and finals.
Here's what's available so far.Uses Prof. 9's Solar Sensor Patch; this resulted in the following hashes:
SHA1:0D3A978EA8FB02A356B98DE51E7AB07BD1AAECC0
MD5:50411EC2A648DA081DABEE3162FC7DEF
Notes:
Went through Catacombs to pick up the Beatmania frame to make Monsters-on-weight-switch puzzles more direct (thus far there's only 2, both in Bloodrust Mansion, but BM trivializes the first one and the second one you need stunning to do anyway)
Picked up the Lance frame in Crumbling Mine; there's probably a faster route to Firetop Mountain (and probably better weapons to use, with how the Solar Piles work during Purification) but I like this type of "Gun".
Because Garmr plugs up the hole that the sunlight comes down through, it's considerably faster to do Muspell first; even without Permafrost forcing you to take both paths on a round trip, it takes longer to do Garmr without the Flame Lens than it does to do Muspell without the Frost Lens (to my knowledge, there aren't any useful Frost Lens-only paths in Firetop Mountain)
Lua Indexes start with 1 if you don't manually define 0 as an index. Since I have to manually assemble the string array anyway, I may as well define 0 as an index.
It depends on what you are trying to do. Explain more... Are the strings already done before the script starts, or they are generated after, by the user or the game? Is this collection way too big?
It's a collection of 65 names (the 64 rings in the Oracles games, plus a "No Ring" entry in position 0). I'm leaning towards it being in a separate file because of the dual nature of the games and the fact that Ring ID values shouldn't change between the two.
So I'm working on putting together a watch list/watch script for a hypothetical 100% run (Ages is the game kept in mind because of personal bias, but it's probably trivial to convert it for Seasons once the framework is in place). To my memory there's surprisingly a lot that goes into 100%. Here's what I've identified thus far in a pseudo-lua.
Language: lua
AGES
(Addresses are WRAM unless otherwise noted)
Track {"Trees", "UnRings", "Maple", "Signs", "Kills", "Ringdex", "Warps", "Rupees"}
Track.Trees {"Age", "Planted"}
Track.Trees.Age {0-15} --[[Root is at 0x0650]]
Track.Trees.Planted {0-15} --[[Need to find out how this is stored internally. Possibly Bitwise across two bytes. 0x????]]
Track.UnRings {0-63}
Track.Maple
Track.Signs --[[100 Signs. Only tracked in Seasons? Define it anyway]]
Track.Kills -- [[1k Kills.]]
Track.Ringdex --[[IIRC, this is bitwise across 4 bytes.]]
Track.Warps --[[Activated seed trees. How is this stored?]]
Track.Rupees --[[10,000 Rupees. Does this cross over between games?]]
Link {"Health", "MaxHealth", "xpos", "ypos", "zpos", "Seeds", "Bombs", "Chus", "Ring", "Potion", "Song", "Plot", "Pegasus"}
Link.Health
Link.MaxHealth
Link.xpos
Link.ypos
Link.zpos
Link.Seeds
Link.Seeds {"Ember", "Mystery", "Scent", "Gale", "Pegasus"}
Link.Seeds.Ember {"Have", "Count"}
Link.Seeds.Mystery {"Have", "Count"}
Link.Seeds.Scent {"Have", "Count"}
Link.Seeds.Gale {"Have", "Count"}
Link.Seeds.Pegasus {"Have", "Count"}
Link.Bombs
Link.Chus
Link.Song
Link.Ring {"ID", "Name"}
Link.Ring.ID
Link.Ring.Name = RINGLIST[Link.Ring.ID]
Link.Potion
Link.Plot --[[Refers to collected essences + if have big seed, probably bitwise but make sure!!]]
Link.Pegasus
Foes {For each Foe in Foes make {"ID", "health", "xpos", "ypos", "zpos"}} --[[NEED ROOT AND OFFSETS!]]
Foes[Foe].ID
Foes[Foe].health --[[If MaxHealth is tracked anywhere scrapable, use that. Otherwise build an index.]]
Foes[Foe].status
Foes[Foe].name = FOELIST[Foes[i].ID]
Foes[Foe].xpos
Foes[Foe].ypos
Foes[Foe].zpos
--[[The BlahLists may end up in their own definition files for convenience's sake]]
RINGLIST { }
FOELIST { }
Addresses of note:
0x0620 (Maple?)
0x0641 (??????)
0x064F (??????) --[[Probably for Slayer's Ring counter? Need to find Total Enemies Slain pointer anyway]]
Question: What's the "best" way to store a collection of strings within the script architecture (NOT asking "What data struct I should use" since that's forced to be "Array of Strings")? Should I split that off into a separate file specifically for definitions like that or dedicate a section of the script for said Array of Strings?
I'll double check everything on my laptop momentarily; everything was working fine until this morning which actually suggests a system error on my end.
@hegyak: Megaman X3 for both Saturn and PSX, X4 for Saturn, and Civ II for PSX. I'll reboot and run the laundry list of tests.
E: Tested from 1.9.4 onward, clean folders for all tests.
Cues - 1.9.4 - 1.10.0 - 1.11.0 - 1.11.1
PSX
Civilization II - Loaded - Loaded - Index Out Of Range - Index Out Of Range
Final Fantasy Tactics - Loaded - Loaded - Index Out Of Range - Index Out Of Range
Rockman X3 - Loaded - Loaded - Loaded - Loaded
Tetris Plus - Loaded - Loaded - Index Out Of Range - Index Out Of Range
SATURN
Magic Knight Rayearth - Loaded - Loaded - Index Out Of Range - Index Out Of Range
Megaman X3 - Loaded - Loaded - Index Out Of Range - Index Out Of Range
Megaman X4 - Loaded - Loaded - Index Out Of Range - Index Out Of Range
Twinkle Star Sprites - Loaded - Loaded - Index Out Of Range - Index Out Of Range
So it may very well be that the cores are barfing when they get a dump that doesn't validate. I'll check my dumps against the Verified Good Dump List and see what mismatched. Redumping solved my problem. Not sure what caused the Index Out Of Range stuff but I'll keep an eye open for it happening again.
Happens on any cue file load. Is this a firmware mismatch or just something broken? Using BizHawk 1.11.1; I can also provide my firmware sha1 hashes if necessary.
Attempting to run my Zelda II Lua HUD script under GDI+ yields the following crash.
Lua HUD operates as expected under OpenGL. Am currently testing to see if it's across the board or if it's just an unexpected code interaction with my script.
Happens on any cue file load. Is this a firmware mismatch or just something broken? Using BizHawk 1.11.1; I can also provide my firmware sha1 hashes if necessary.
Lua HUD operates as expected under OpenGL. Am currently testing to see if it's across the board or if it's just an unexpected code interaction with my script.