Another Newbie Slugfest - Restarted

[DragonFire11]

I could not find a cbpgod.tga file - what does that mean?

[DragonFire11]

Deccan:

I think I did since I downloaded the map from Aku's link on the first page of this thread. Do I have to do something else?

[deccan]

Oops, we may have had a false start then. It looks like you didn't install the mod when you created your pretender. Hmm, wouldn't the game make the pretender illegal then?

[deccan]

You needed to go here:

http://www.techno-mage.com/~zen/

Download the conceptual pretender mod Version 1.81, copy the contents into the mod folder, enable it in preferences, then create your pretender.

[DragonFire11]

I didn't know that I had to have the map before the pretender load or creation. Yes, strange that the game accepted the file . . .

[DragonFire11]

I'm in!!!!! Thanks Deccan!!!!

[The Panther]

It turns out that if you take a pretender that does not work under the proper mod, the game will keep your scales and dominion and castle, but will replace your pretender with an arch mage containing exactly zero magic! This, of course, is a total disaster and worthy of resigning on turn one. Make sure you don't let this happen.



As for the election, my daughter (yes, that very girl who is majoring in pre-law at Oklahoma) won a national award in a mock congressional trial contest about 4 years ago. She won state and then also won the top national award against all other 49 state winners.

One of her questions was on the electoral college. She testified before a mock panel that it needed to be changed to the Maine/Nebraska method. In case anybody does not know about that, both those states split their electoral votes along congressional district lines. The overall state tally gives the two (senate) electoral votes to the winning candidate in the full state. Then, each congressional district (house) gives its one electorai vote to the winner in that district alone.

What this would do is bring states like California and Texas back into the equation. Neither of those two states ever saw either candidate throughout the entire election, for they were written off by the losing side very early on. Under the Nebraska and Maine method, places like Los Angelos and Houston would have seen all the ads and candidate visits we saw here in the swing state of New Mexico.

It also would not increase the probability of a tie at all, unless there was a strong showing from a third party. After all, every electoral college votes must go to one side or the other when all is said and done.

My daughter convinced me in her mock testimony. This would work much better than our current system of winner takes all in most of our states.

Go Maine! Go Nebraska!

[KroolDeath]

The problem with tallying the vote across congressional district lines is that those lines change, and frequently do, at the whim of our representatives. State borders are static. In fact, I think, at least here in MO., they are re-examined every 10 years and redrawn. So consequently, an electoral vote could be manipulated by redrawing a district to include a favorable portion of the population. Also known as gerrymandering...

But regardless, it is interesting to see the election results. Besides a few states on the northeast (Maine, Vermont, etc.) that aren't that populated, it seems that the majority of urban areas vote Democrat, while rural areas seems strongly Republican. Even looking at the breakdown of each state (www.yahoo.com has a good breakdown), you can see it. For Missouri, you can see Democrat victories in KC and STL, but the rest of the state is strongly Republican. Surely nothing new, but cool to analyze.

There's a message to be had in the voting patterns, just can't put my finger on it.

Krool

[Grim Knight]

If anyone's pretender is FUBAR as described above by Panther speak up.

Grim Knight

[PashaDawg]

If Dragonfire did not install Zen's pretender mod, does that mean that his pretender will be invalid? Do we need to restart the game?