docbuzzard

I have no idea how it might be useful to you. I have plenty of knowledge on how it is useful to me.

I use it for:
A) an e-reader which it is quite nice for
B) I watch videos on it (commonly at the gym while on an exercise machine, which won't work on a laptop or e-reader. A smart phone might do it, but the screen would be too small). The fact that it does videos, music, newspapers, and books all well means it is a wonderful media device for traveling. It is small and lightweight and ends up being the only thing you have to fetch out of your carry-on (well except snacks).
C) A web browser of convenience. I can use it comfortable in my recliner while watching TV, or lying in bed. The easy switch over from reading a book (or my newspaper) to looking up something on the web if I'm curious is very handy.
D) It is a great pen and paper gaming tool. I store all the Pathfinder books I use in it, and I also have access to the online Pathfinder Reference Document, which makes searching the rules even easier. I can output PC Gen character sheets into html format, and use the iPad as my character sheet. On top of that I can run spreadsheets to do in game calculations. The other day I wrote up a damage per round calculator in Excel for Pathfinder and will likely import it onto my iPad before my next Pathfinder Society game so I have that tool handy. I have a nice dice roller on the machine as well. While I do prefer my physical dice, I do have the option of letting it take care of that. For a gaming session, it could very well be all I ever would have to lug around.
E) A nice email reading tool. The bigger screen makes the reading easier than a smart phone as well as the bigger virtual keyboard is easier for typing.

This is all I use it for, and I find that to be quite enough for me to be satisfied with the purchase. Other people find a lot of other uses (the horde of available apps is a testament to that).

Now you can ask how many of the above things are exclusive to it over a laptop or smart phone? Certainly not all. However with its very long battery life, it surpasses a laptop in a lot of the applications purely on endurance. The much larger screen makes it much more pleasant for most any data interaction than any smart phone. While you could cover what it does with a laptop and smart phone, you wouldn't be able to do it as well (of course those other two devices can do things the iPad can't, which is why I have all three).

Though I suspect it is pointless to argue with you, you are obviously wrong, and plenty of millions of users could easily point that out by demonstration.

The tablet computer market was a joke before Apple introduced the iPad. Now there are slews of imitators lined up to jump into the market with comparable products. If you don't grasp how a tablet computer like an iPad can be useful, fine. However that doesn't have any bearing on their actual utility.

You appear to be equally math challenged as Je Saist

DCUO $200 lifetime
CO $200 lifetime
LOTRO $200 lifetime
(I don't really consider Hellsgate:London a normal MMO)

Monthly fees $15 per month. If we take longer chunks they do scale down somewhat (can't seem to find the 12 month price for COH, for 6 months it was about $13 per month last time I renewed, so I doubt 12 months drops it $3). CO does come up with a $10/month price, but DCUO doesn't get that low even at 12 months, it only drops to a bit over $11.

So let's look at a year. If we assume your Pricing model ($10 per month, which doesn't exist too often), you claim of 1 year +/- a couple of months fails badly ($200 vs. $120). Assuming base pricing, $15/mo you actually manage to be correct ($200 vs. $180).

Apparently you didn't read what I actually said, but I'm used to that enough around here. While I did dispute the fee she claimed to be standard (as it isn't really standard), my main point was about time value of money. Go back and check the link if you don't know what that is.

People should not presume to make economic analysis when they don't understand what they are talking about.

I find it rather odd that you would presume to lecture on economics when you forget about something as basic as Time Value of Money and don't even get the subscription costs right.

Now I will say that at this point in the CoX dev cycle, it is certainly too late for a lifetime subscription to appear. Early in a development cycle, it can be a valuable tool for raising capital to get a game steady on its feet. While it doesn't seem to have worked out in all cases, that is no indication that such an outcome is guaranteed (and your simplistic analysis is not proof by any means).

This I would not dispute. Just sometimes a director is lucky enough to have him cast in a part where playing Costner will pass for the character in question.

While I generally agree with this assessment, I did like him in Untouchables.

If you think HBP was only loosely related to the book, then you will be amazed that The Postman movie and book even share the same name.

About the only thing that book and movie have in common is the protagonist wears a postal uniform (and the setting).

How about after it, you know, goes to beta?

Indeed. MTV and VH1 with the avoidance of music videos has long been a cliche. AMC showing recent movies also decided to pitch their raison d'etre over the side.

One is left wondering what the point of having 200 channels is if specialty channels are going the way of the dodo. I guess at least the Food network does stick to it's subject, though if I see one more cupcake show, I'm really going to freak.

People love to say this. In fact, for about as long as I have been paying any attention people have always said this. Do you want to know why? Because Hollywood has always been rehashing ideas, recycling franchises, and spawning sequels. This is simply because a known quantity is assumed to be a safer bet than investing a great deal of money into something new.

Let's look at some examples:
Earl DerBiggers wrote five Charlie Chan novels. Hollywood made 44 Charlie Chan movies over 18 years.

The Blondie comic strip you've seen in the paper spawned 28 movies over 12 years.

The James Bond franchise has been running along for five decades now. This has been 22 films over almost five decades. Some of the stories are almost directly recycled from previous films.

Would it be fair to point out how many versions of Romeo and Juliet have been made? Hamlet? Or how about how many Robin Hood films?

Let's not fool ourselves. Hollywood has always been like this because rehashing things has always brought in the dough. When it stops bringing in the dough, then it will stop.

Personally I see this more as a sign that the Science Channel is going to pot. I mean is it really impossible to make a channel focused on science stay on science? They are already getting pretty damned sketchy with extraneous things like Idiots Abroad, but really this is pushing it. They seem to be going the way of The Learning Channel.

I imagine the ghost shows are inevitable.

What do you mean by the level shift takes away?

How exactly did they do that? The weapons/armor/names are all Roman. Where the Greek part? (since the Romans pretty much ripped off Greek mythology, you can't very well cite the Minotaurs and Cyclops, since they carried over).

Because the invaders in question are from another dimension and the main site for portals between the dimensions is Portal Corp which happens to be in Paragon City.

When playing a villain my rational for this sort of TF (like LGTF as well) is "They can't conquer this planet, I'm going to conquer this planet."

Nah, a crab would be better for this. Mind Link is a click power so you'd be missing out on a huge portion of their defense boost. I guess it could be set on auto click, but that would take a pretty hefty amount of +recharge in the build.

Does this mean I have to call you a doody head to avert the Apocalypse?

Actually the holds take down the shields on the green mitos which enables you to do real damage. With the shields up you can see how lousy your damage is. It's not about regen.

Good idea, I'll try to take my Huntsman on a LGTF and see if surveillance can give a definitive answer to this conundrum.

Well if you intend to do a 30 minute ITF you need to do just the objectives and nothing else. That's pretty clear. Even with doing that you will get shards since there's a fair amount of mandatory 'arresting' in a number of the missions. Did a fairly speedy one last night and got around 5 shards. I can't remember the time, but it must have been around 35 minutes. I think it might have taken the originator longer to recruit the team given that everyone wanted a LGTF.

Actually the Ramiel's arc only demonstrates that missions can be tough solo. I've never seen it be even vaguely difficult on a team, nor have I even heard of such being the case. Every time I've had difficulty on an alt, I've recruited 1 or more people (never need more than one, I just sometimes get more when I ask), then the missions become utter pushovers.

Given that we'll be seeing more than the +1 level shift (or so the rumors go I believe), that +4 business will get chopped down a fair amount. Honestly having them use the level difference as a mechanism allows for the incarnate ability level shift to cut through it, and I think that's a good thing.