My first EVE PvP kill.
By Brandon Reinhart | April 27, 2008
I scored myself a Scimitar:
http://www.iron-alliance.com/kb/kill.php?k_id=66482
A 67.3 mil isk loss for the dead guy. Not bad. I lost my punisher/tackler and got podded in the battle. A less than 1 mil isk loss for me. Kek.
Because I got a kill, the automated system rewarded me with a custom sig:
Topics: EVE | No Comments »
2-1! (Well okay, more like 1-1.)
By Brandon Reinhart | April 26, 2008
I ended up with a “sorta” 2-1 record with one win, one loss, and one bye (final round). So I guess that’s more like 1-1-1. Whatever, I’m pumped up and excited that I won my first round. When they called me up I had only started warming up. They had just finished the kids division and I was the first match for the adult whitebelts. Turns out there weren’t enough people in my weight class, so I ended up fighting the featherweights anyway!
I won my first round on points. My opponent was a woman from Relson Gracie San Antonio. I don’t recall her name. She was about the same height and weight as me and we seemed evenly matched. I got the take-down with a monkey toss: grabbed her lapels, right foot into her gut, fell to my butt and pitched her over. I was hoping to land in mount, but ended up landed on my feet to the side. This earned me take-down points. I then worked inside her leg and got knee on belly, waited for the points, then converted it to full mount (for more points). From this position I went for a choke, but she blocked and we spent some time grip fighting. At one point I went for her arm and almost got an Americana, but couldn’t quite get the hold.
Somewhere in there she swept me onto my back and I locked up the guard. At this point I went on the attack at her collar, working grips for a choke. I think I had a decent grip on one side, but she did a good job of getting her head inside either breaking the grips or making them less effective. My attacking seemed to distract her from passing, although she made a few attempts that I blocked.
I underhooked her left leg and swept her. I probably got reversal points for this, but I’m not sure. I had side control briefly and somehow was reversed and ended in my guard again. I’m not exactly sure what happened. From there I attacked her right arm, getting it across her body with a deep grip. I went for the armbar but couldn’t get my foot around her head. We fought grips a bit more and she worked to pass, then time was called.
I felt happy about my round. Say what you want about me fighting a woman, I’ll disregard it. I have a lot of respect for the women who practice jiu-jitsu, they aren’t pushovers and the art emphasizes technique and not using strength to overpower an opponent. I feel I won on the basis of attacking and keeping her on the defense. I also felt really calm and felt my breathing was good, I didn’t gas out although I was breathing hard at the end. It helps that I’m more used to sparring after two hours of conditioning and technique training.
I was pretty excited about my win.
Next round was up against Ben from my team. Ben is the guy I sparred with on Friday, who slammed me with a strong take-down that bruised my chest a bit. (Incidentally, my chest didn’t really bother me much during matches. I wasn’t really aware of it.) Ben is a senior white belt (has stripes) and has been doing this for a lot longer than I. He’s also at the top of the weight class. Needless to say, I was outclassed. I’m not strong on my feet and I tried another monkey toss. Unfortunately he had grips on me that enabled him to interrupt it and take side control. We fought from there a bit, but I think I accidentally gave him my back when I tried to shrimp out (note to self: turn into him, not away). Once I realized he was going for my back I attempted the turtle position, but it wasn’t fast enough. He got a hook in and rolled me back with a good grip on my collar. From there it was rear naked choke all the way, for a loss by submission. (Ben went on to take second.)
Last round was a bye, they had an uneven number of contestants.
So one win and one loss. I’m very happy about the win and really excited about the fact that I just didn’t get crushed like I thought I was going to be. I have a few specific things I want to work on and I’m ready to get back into the gym and train. Next time out I might try to compete in the no-gi division as well, we’ll see.
Topics: Crappling | 1 Comment »
Made my weight!
By Brandon Reinhart | April 25, 2008
Woot! I made my weight. Just weighed in on the official scale at 134.9, the exact top edge of the super featherweight class. I put in about 15 miles on the bike, some sparring, and a bunch of jogging and other stuff in full gi and underclothes to drop about 3-4 pounds today. Now its time to eat, drink, and rest.
Unfortunately, during sparring I got hit with a very heavy takedown that bruised my chest. I’ve got ice on it now. I expect it to get a bit better before the morning, but chances are I’ll be hitting the mat with a bit of a disadvantage. Last time this happened it took about a week and a half before the soreness went away.
Topics: Crappling | No Comments »
Jiu-Jitsu Competition Tomorrow at Baylor
By Brandon Reinhart | April 25, 2008
I’m going to get up at 6 AM tomorrow to drive to Waco to attend a Relson Gracie Jiu-Jitsu competition at Baylor at the Marrs Mclean gym. I’ve been calorie light this week trying to keep my weight down so I can make a press to weigh in at Peso Pluma (Super Feather Weight). The cut off is 134.X and I’m getting close. Pushing to drop a weight class is probably pointless given my relative lack of experience, but I figure I’m very close and I might as well try for the complete experience. I spent an hour today sweating on the upright bike. Pretty soon I’ll head over to the gym and check my weight on the official scale, then see if I’m in a position to make the final push. If so, I’ll suit up and sweat out the last few drops that I can, weigh in, and go refuel.
Yesterday’s conditioning session really wrecked me, probably because I didn’t eat enough before hand. I usually try to eat a piece of fruit or some kind of energy bar before sessions so I’ve got enough sugar in my blood to push me through. I made it through yesterday’s session, but had to call it quits before we did sparring.
I’m not anticipating winning any rounds, I’m very new to the sport, but I’m committed to giving it my best and not giving up any easy submissions to my opponents. If I lose, I’d like to lose by points and go the distance in each round rather than be choked out. Of course I’ll psyche myself up to want to win every round once I’m on the mat. I would like to make some good attempts and hopefully execute at least one classic armbar from the guard, a move I feel very comfortable with.
Topics: Crappling | No Comments »
The Old Man is Back in Action
By Brandon Reinhart | April 14, 2008
This is my EVE character, Iacton Qruze:
A true Amarrian, shining star of a small family of “wealthy commoners.” Graduate of the Imperial Academy, former Captain-Paladin of the Imperial Navy. Records indicate a stint in special operations that may or may not be ended. On record as having pursued some of the harsher contracts for the Ministry of Internal Order: apprehension of political enemies, executions, that sort of thing.
Iacton is also a small time member of the financial and production wing of the IRON Alliance: the Imperial Republic of the North. A large pvp-centric faction operating out of the isolated Drone Regions in zero security space, far beyond the reach of the Empire.
Topics: EVE | 2 Comments »
Back to EVE?
By Brandon Reinhart | April 13, 2008
I’ve reactivated my EVE account, since I’ve been jonesing for the mining. My only concern: logging in. I was member of a moderately well organized 0.0 alliance in the Drone Regions that has since become an extremely well organized 0.0 alliance in the Drone Regions. I’m very likely to be killed on sight and most likely my possessions have long since been redistributed for the good of the corp. I wonder what the usual protocol is for safely re-entering corp OR getting my ass back to empire space without getting it shot off? I have no idea where my jump clone or standard clones are, but I’m 99% sure I’m logged out in the alliance HQ station.
EVE may very well be the only MMO where you have to negotiate your return to play after reactivating your account.
Topics: Uncategorized | 1 Comment »
My “Ten Words” Contest Submissions
By Brandon Reinhart | April 11, 2008
Penny Arcade held a contest for people to submit ten word stories set in the World of Warcraft. Here are the stories I submitted:
A story about being a Rogue:
Twenty-four friends dead. I hide silently among them, gloating.
A story about Baron Geddon:
Grin on my face, I run. I am the bomb!
A story about Gruul’s Lair:
Gathered around me: six silent statues. This is gonna hurt.
A story about fighting Archimonde:
“This world will burn!” he shouts, but I’m already burning.
Yet another story about fighting Archimonde:
Druids burning brightly, crisp. “We have failed you again, Tyrande.”
A story about raiding:
Guildmaster sighs. Ill concealed disdain. “Alright, let’s try it again.”
A story about raid consumables:
I choke down the flask, every sip tasting of gold.
Topics: World of Warcraft | 1 Comment »
So you play video games all day?
By Brandon Reinhart | April 8, 2008
No. This is what it’s really like to be a game developer:
Topics: Uncategorized | 5 Comments »
Munching on Chalmers’s brain.
By Brandon Reinhart | April 6, 2008
I’m fairly weak at constructing philosophical arguments, something I want to improve on but as of late haven’t had time to pursue the necessary reading material. One subject I wanted to learn more of was epiphenomenalism. I’ve read Chalmer’s book but it didn’t hold together for me. I’ve been wanting to reread it and his recent papers and also criticisms, but haven’t been able to get around to it (still working through material on Bayesian reasoning). Recently, Eliezer Yudkowsky has posted a fantastic series of short essays on the subject of epiphenomenalism and theoretical zombies.
- Post 1: Zombies! Zombies?
- Post 2: Zombie Responses
- Post 3: The Generalized Anti-Zombie Principle
Setting up a strong set of arguments against epiphenomenalism. Acting in defense, Richard Chappell of Philosophy, etc cetera, has posted his own set of responses:
- Response 1: Overcoming Scientism
- Response 2: Zombie Rationality
I’m sure he will have more posts on the subject in the coming days, as it seems to be one of his favorites. As is usually the case with these two blogs there is a lot to be learned in the discussions-comments.
In his most recent post Yudkowsky set up a fictional dialogue in which the participants discuss the effects of slowly replacing the components of one’s brain with nanomachines capable of functioning in the same way as the organic components and which produce the same results as the biological components. To the epiphenomenalist this would lead to the termination of consciousness as the epiphenomenal properties of the mind that make consciousness possible would be replaced. To the substance dualist this might lead to the termination of consciousness if the metaphysical “something” that makes consciousness possible was somehow removed. However, since substance dualists can retain a very loose connection between how the “spirit” and “brain” are bound together (by not offering much by way of explanation) it isn’t entirely clear that replacing the brain piece-by-piece would actually result in the loss of the soul. This dialogue reminded me of Max More’s dissertation “The Diachronic Self” which discusses the conditions for continuity of consciousness in a variety of situations like sleep, brain damage, or gradual brain-replacement. Specifcially, Dr. More establishes a method of discussing related phases (or slices) of self and how they relate temporally.
No conclusions to discuss here, just that now I’m interested in re-reading The Diachronic Self while keeping in mind the three perspectives of materialism, epiphenomenalism, and substance dualism. Previously I had always read this kind of stuff assuming my own perspective of materialism, which probably biased me against certain kinds of insight or understanding. It seems to me that there is probably something to learn about the philosophical zombie argument by approaching it from the direction of continuity of experience. Not sure what that thing is, but there may be something.
Topics: Philosophy | 1 Comment »
March Loot Roll
By Brandon Reinhart | April 6, 2008
March saw us take out Gurtogg Bloodboil and nearly get Archmonde down (he’ll probably die tonight). Gurtogg was quite a challenging fight and required us to make some significant changes to our raiding line-up to improve our healing efficiency. One of our main tanks has switched to a Resto Shaman and a few other characters have also changed mains. This hasn’t really impacted our ability to do content.
As I mentioned before, the new patch has helped a lot with my gold situation. Whereas I used to be almost constantly broke I now have 1265 gold in the bank. I suspect that some inflation will set in to offset the new influx of cash.
Here’s the loot roll:
Topics: World of Warcraft | 2 Comments »
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