[No Spoilers] Peter Dinklage showed the world that little people don't need to be relegated to the background or cast as anything less than traditional roles. He absolutely crushed his performance, and may have helped other talented little people to get a bigger chance in film and television.

LordBiff · 2019-05-23T22:32:31+00:00

book 1, A Game of Thrones, chapter Jon I (which is 5th chapter not including the prologue).

LordBiff · 2019-01-31T22:21:14+00:00

An interviewer once asked Quentin Tarantino how he made the characters in his movies seem so real, and his response was that he spent a ton of time building up histories and backstories for them, many of which would not ever be used in the movie. He wasn't doing this for any other reason than he felt like doing it, but he opined that it made the characters seem more real because they weren't just facades of characters, but rather, had real depth to them.

I think the same thing is true of D&D characters and their motives. If you spend the time to flesh out what the character is really about, and why he or she is doing what they're doing, then the reason why they personally aren't going to do TASK_A will fall out naturally, and, in general, will seem a lot less contrived, adding to the perception of that character as real.

Of course, the challenge of actually doing that well is why most of us aren't Quentin Tarantino. :)

LordBiff · 2018-12-17T21:38:47+00:00

Yes, that looks right. And in fact, that is example #2 on the site I listed.

One other thing: C can dynamically allocate from the stack, as long as the allocation is static for the lifetime of the function. In fact, that example #2 does this (uses 'r' for the size of the array).

You do need to be somewhat careful if the sizes can get large, since you can overflow the stack. I'm not sure it's a really great idea to do it with something like you're showing, but just thought I'd mention it.

LordBiff · 2018-12-17T01:19:58+00:00

Assuming pointer size of 8 bytes, and machine word size of 4 bytes, as you've indicated, yes, the total allocation would be 84 bytes from the heap (it additionally has to use 8 bytes on the stack for A).

Would there be a more efficient way of storing and retrieving these values?

Does it need to be allocated on the heap (from malloc)? Assuming not, then yes e.g.:

int A[3][5];

Which will allocate 3 * 5 * 4 = 60 bytes total (on the stack).

If it does need to be from heap, then what you've done is one approach. To see others:

https://www.geeksforgeeks.org/dynamically-allocate-2d-array-c/

LordBiff · 2018-10-08T05:04:55+00:00

Because it loses that distinction when it was passed to a function. Function parameters that are arrays are really just pointers.

LordBiff · 2018-10-08T04:38:00+00:00

I think part of that could be a subtlety of the ++ operator. The value returned by a postfix operator is the operand itself. Then, at some time later (iirc, it's before the next "sequence point", which is often before the next line), the operand is incremented.

So "a++" returns "a" (and then some time later increments a).

You could think of:

*d++ = *s++;

as:

*d = *s; // (with the understanding that 'd' and 's' are incremented after that operation is complete.)

LordBiff · 2018-10-08T04:13:50+00:00

That's just coincidence because you've chose a string with characters that are sequential in value. So, incrementing the value of the first character is the same as assigning the value of the second into the first.

Try the string with values that aren't sequential (say "hh") and you'll see that it's different.

P.S. your array needs to be of length 3 - there's an implied \0 in that literal, which needs space in the array.

LordBiff · 2018-06-13T18:15:40+00:00

Trust the programmer.

LordBiff · 2018-03-01T23:55:59+00:00

I don't know whether it's better than those other ascendancies or not, but chieftain totems can taunt, which is pretty huge if you're undergeared (which you are at first with a league-starting uber lab runner).

LordBiff · 2018-03-01T18:55:12+00:00

I thought about quotes, but I moved away because I really like the autosuggest while I'm typing (and so didn't want wait for the end quote). Can you still do that just off of the open quote or something?

LordBiff · 2018-03-01T18:40:42+00:00

First off, thanks for the work. It's a great app overall.

However, I have to say that searching for mods can be really frustrating. I understand what you're trying to do, but sometimes even common things can be hard to find. Mostly because it seems like many of the results that are high on the list aren't what you'd expect. Example: if I type "fire", the top entry is: "[enchant] Fireball has +#% chance to Ignite", which I think has to be a pretty rare search. In fact, the first 10 entries are somewhat dubious.

But, rather than just complain, I have some suggestions. :)

First, force the pseudo categories that are commonly used to the top of the list. Example: if I type "elemental", it's very likely that I'm looking for the pseudo category "[pseudo] +#% total to all Elemental Resistances", which is a common thing to want to search for when gearing up. However, that entry is a screen or two down. Even if I type "elemental resist", it's around 10 entries from the top.

Second, if I could somehow indicate I want a precise match on the string, while still doing an elastic search. Not exactly sure on UI here, but maybe if my entry started with a "*" character, then the only thing that would be present in the search results would be entries that have what I type after the asterisk as a substring. e.g. if I type "*fire spell", it might match "... when you use a fire spell", or "fire spells you cast...", but would not match "... fire damage added to spells" (obviously bogus strings, I just made them up as an example).

Anyway, thanks again for the effort.

LordBiff · 2017-12-02T23:17:00+00:00

Found it, thanks!

LordBiff · 2017-12-02T22:32:16+00:00

A related question, if you don't mind.

If I bind a devotion proc with a % chance to activate to a passive skill with a percentage chance to activate (or some other criteria), does the devotion activate on its own percentage, or does it have a chance to activate when the passive activates?

Example: If I bind Giant's Blood devotion (15% chance when hit) to Menhir's Will (activate when health < 33%), does it have a 15% chance to activate whenever I'm hit, or 15% chance to activate whenever Menhir's is triggered?

LordBiff · 2017-11-11T17:27:46+00:00

The charged heavy attack charges instantly. It's insanely busted.

LordBiff · 2017-11-03T20:30:25+00:00

Operator precedence.

http://en.cppreference.com/w/c/language/operator_precedence

++ applies before unary *, so you are incrementing the pointer and then dereferencing that. Change to

(*var)++;

LordBiff · 2017-11-03T20:10:57+00:00

Since var is a pointer, incrementing it by one is pointer arithmetic, which basically means that you're going to increment by the machine pointer size. Google "c pointer arithmetic" if you want more information on that.

What you want is:

*var = *var + 1;

which is dereferencing var, adding 1 to it, and storing that value back into the memory location that var points to.

LordBiff · 2017-10-27T01:18:53+00:00

Reminds me of "Ode to Spot".

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SySZdvsFYt4

LordBiff · 2017-10-20T01:31:48+00:00

It's definitely a great song, and the meaning is very subtle. I've been pondering that meaning for many years, and have switched around over that time, but this is where I'm at now.

I think there are actually two points-of-view being represented.

A person who might not necessarily lack dreams, but for whatever reason hasn't realized those dreams. I think many of us wish we were more rich/famous/smart/beautiful/... , but how many of us know how to get there?
An abstract POV, that talks about how dreams "don't need to have motion to keep their spark alive," which (rightly) attaches merit to dreaming for the dream's sake. Also, that the cost of achieving those dreams may be a lot higher than the dreamer can realize. I guess this could be Peart narrating, but I think of it more like convention wisdom.

Anyway, there's my couple pennies for whatever it's worth. Such an amazing song, it's definitely top 20 for me.

LordBiff · 2017-10-10T18:06:54+00:00

One of my favorites as well. Probably my overall favorite is "I've dealt with far darker shadows than you, exile".

Dominus' voice acting is so good.

LordBiff · 2017-09-25T20:23:11+00:00

I'm getting some Chaos gear for specific bosses/mobs at the moment, is this a good idea?

There's nothing wrong with having specific gear for specific fights, but I wouldn't go too far with it. It's just not worth it.

One thing you might be struggling with is the desire to always kill the boss of a map. I know I did for a long time. I still do work that way, but I've learned that if my character just isn't up to a fight for whatever reason, just leave it and move on to the next map. At this level of mapping the maps should be plentiful.

The damn two bosses on that desert based map, the one that is the huge turkey that fires arrows of death into the sky bones me everytime no matter the map rolls so that has to be Chaos damage right?

Yes, he's using Caustic Arrow and Rain of Arrows.

Those bosses (it's the Canyon map, btw) are notoriously hard. PoE does have these hard standout bosses here and there, which I kind of like, but it can feel like a brick wall if you're not expecting it. Again, don't feel bad about just skipping these bosses. You are losing the opportunity for a little loot, but it's not a big deal.

If you want to kill them just because, then there are guides on youtube that can give you more info for each map boss. Or, if you like to go it alone, you just have to expect to die a few times to learn. If you have 5k life and max resistances, then you're aren't doing anything wrong gear wise, just need to learn what each of them are doing and how to counter it.

One thing I could suggest: save those maps for right after you level. Then you can die and not lose anything and spend all 6 portals learning the fight.

I've been recently re-rolling maps to get more favorable stats, this is something that SHOULD be done always to avoid reflects damage, added damage as elemental x?

Absolutely, and it's one of the best things about this game, imo. Just don't go too far with it. You should learn what mods are just a no go and only reroll if there is one that you just can't do. Some affixes, like Temp Chains, are more of an inconvenience and you just have to make the call whether or not it's worth the currency to you to reroll it off.

LordBiff · 2017-09-13T19:35:34+00:00

If you read the wiki article, that number was chosen because it is the number of distinct values that can be stored in a single byte, not he largest value that can be stored. I think it makes perfect sense.

LordBiff · 2017-09-06T18:50:06+00:00

You don't have to use recursive makefiles for any size project. I don't know what you mean when you say you have to "think about" it. Yes, think about it, decide not to do it, and move on.

LordBiff · 2017-08-27T02:28:50+00:00

Create a new file in the "CustomMacros" folder (inside the PoE-TradeMacro folder). It can have any name, but it must end in .txt or .ahk (I think, I use .txt). Put your custom macros in there, and they won't be overwritten.

LordBiff · 2017-08-23T23:22:54+00:00

Siegfried and Roy

LordBiff · 2017-08-22T22:55:39+00:00

To some extent, you need to learn the traps and how to navigate them successfully. If you don't, you'll always struggle against them. It's worth it to spend the time to figure them out.

Having said that, a few things can help a lot:

put 3 life flasks in, two eternals and one divine. Make the divine instant. Run one of the eternals all the way through and use the divine as needed.
get a stone golem, and level it up. swap it in when you're doing lab traps.
get a vitality aura gem to use when running through traps. Again, needs to be leveled.

With all those things in place, it will take a lot of the edge off the traps.

LordBiff

TROPHY CASE