Annoying Questions I'd Like Answered...

OgreBattle · Post by **OgreBattle** » Fri Apr 17, 2015 7:50 pm

Was there any dinosaur equivalent to the beaver, bat, mole, whale?
It seems like there's a greater diversity of mammals than dinosaurs, yet they had millions more years to evolve as the dominant life form on earth compared than mammals did.

TiaC · Post by **TiaC** » Fri Apr 17, 2015 8:06 pm

Remember, small mammals existed during most of that period. Also, we only have fossils from a few species, so we can't see most of their diversity.

erik · Post by **erik** » Fri Apr 17, 2015 9:07 pm

TiaC wrote:Remember, small mammals existed during most of that period. Also, we only have fossils from a few species, so we can't see most of their diversity.

+1. And it'd be even harder to find structures made by animals of that period for a "beaver" analogue.

There's selection bias in what fossils remain since large fossils are a lot more likely to avoid total destruction and are easier to find. There could have been an abundance of tiny specialized dinosaurs and we'd have no way of knowing it.

OgreBattle wrote:It seems like there's a greater diversity of mammals than dinosaurs, yet they had millions more years to evolve as the dominant life form on earth compared than mammals did.

As addressed above, we cannot observe the full diversity of species from 200+ million years ago. Being the dominant life form makes you less likely to change, not more.

erik · Post by **erik** » Sat Apr 18, 2015 2:46 pm

My google-fu is coming up weak.

I am flabbergasted that I cannot find a record of Amazon best selling books that I can go back through. Surely someone out there has cached and compiled this data but damned if I can find it.

Prak · Post by **Prak** » Sat Apr 18, 2015 10:00 pm

Well, there's this: http://web.archive.org/web/201107150000 ... llers/zgbs

erik · Post by **erik** » Sun Apr 19, 2015 3:05 am

That got me farther than I had been previously.
Using http://web.archive.org/web/201401010000 ... zgbs/books gave nothing useful, but on a lark I tried clicking the link for "books" from the archived one you listed there Prak and that was solid. Solid for a listing that updates multiple times a day anyway. Solid enough that I can shit all over the claim of the 5e PHB having a lasting presence as a top seller is bragable. I'll post my rundown in the 5e zero buzz thread.

Thanks.

tussock · Post by **tussock** » Sun Apr 19, 2015 3:24 am

OgreBattle wrote:Was there any dinosaur equivalent to the beaver, bat, mole, whale?
It seems like there's a greater diversity of mammals than dinosaurs, yet they had millions more years to evolve as the dominant life form on earth compared than mammals did.

Those things specifically? Not actually dinosaurs, but lived at the same time.

Beaver: there are flat-tailed things, but there's not going to be evidence of dam-building. The trees that beavers primarily use now didn't exist yet, so maybe not possible at modern scales.

Bat: small pterosaurs abound, some of them hairy (pycnofibers), but there's no way to know if any of them used echolocation, I can't think of any obvious Owl analogues, but having a big ear isn't going to show up well.

Mole: little burrowing mammals were the only mammals for the whole period, probably nocturnal insectivores. Some could likely stay underground for years to survive the mass extinctions that way.

Whale: and then some, icthyosaurs, mosasaurs, plesiosaurs. They didn't have the krill eating developments of baleen whales, but did have much more variation in body plans than modern whales and dolphins. Sharks and rays much like the modern ones and bigger.

There's flying carnivorous giraffes with a bony beak long enough to reach the ground. There's fourty tonne plus giant elephants with snake necks and tiny heads instead of trunks. There's six tonne bipedal predators, big duck-billed wetland filter-feeders, things like cattle all the way up to elephant-size. Armoured ones like the big extinct mammals, things that look a hell of lot like chickens with grasping claws, most of the niches now filled by birds and mammals had analogues in the dinosaurs, pterosaurs, and marine reptiles.

Hell, there's things look a lot like anteaters with the oversize claws and long, narrow snout, only weighing a few tonne, closely related to T-Rex, and covered in compact fibres. Probably because they ate ants and termites.

OgreBattle · Post by **OgreBattle** » Sun Apr 19, 2015 10:07 am

Are there records of how fast infantry and cavalry charged in medieval times? Say if they did run full sprint at each other or if it was more like a steady walk, or if they only charged when a certain distance was achieved.

When it comes to cavalry I found a source for napoleonic warfare that says:

Warhorse speed
Walk 97-107 m/min or 5.8-6.4 Km/h
Trot 194-214 m/min or 11.6-12.8 Km/h
Gallop 300 m/min or 18 Km/h

With charges conducted at galloping speed, and some battles it was more like they walked at each other:

Common sense tells us, too, that cavalry coming 'to the shock like walls' and 'at a swinging gallop' will achieve nothing but a collapsed scrummage of damaged horses and men, growing bigger as succeeding ranks are carried on to the leading ones by their own impetus. A little inquiry reveals, in any case, that formations were much less dense and speeds much lower than casual testimony, and certainly than the work of salon painters, implies. The British cavalry were too few in number to cover much expanse of ground and though French cavalry formations were fairly dense at Waterloo, their leaders attempted, even during the charges into the 'funnel' between La Haye Sainte and Hougoumont, to keep an interval between the squadrons, while regiments and squadrons themselves were formed in line. This meant that the 120 men of the squadron were formed in two ranks, one close behind the other, but that the succeeding squadron rode, if possible, 100 yards behind. In theory the squadron could be manoeuvred at a gallop, say over twenty miles an hour, but it would very shortly lose cohesion if it was, as stronger horses outstripped weaker; and in any case distances and gradients on tbe Waterloo field make it seem unlikely that high speeds were achieved with any frequency.
-Faces of Battle

With infantry I haven't found much. But I imagine that it would vary with the times (romans with big shields probably not fighting quite the same way as men-at-arms with polearms)

name_here · Post by **name_here** » Sun Apr 19, 2015 6:40 pm

As I understand it, they only charged when close enough. Obviously, sprinting while loaded down with gear tires people out pretty damn quick, and as your source notes formations become disordered. Note that at Waterloo the cavalry of the time were quite differently equipped; they'd fight with sabers and pistols (and I think carbines, but obviously those aren't for close quarters) and hack at infantry as they passed, while knights used lances and depended on their momentum to really drive them home.

Infantry would also depend. The Romans actually had a specific tactic with theirs; they'd pause to throw a shower of javelins and then charge to hit the enemy lines while they were disordered. Also, at Pharselus Caesar's army stopped short out of javelin range and stood around a while to catch their breath before moving to attack.

Prak · Post by **Prak** » Thu Apr 23, 2015 1:03 am

So, as I draw nearer to being able to produce the notebooks I've been working on, I find myself with some questions about what I need to do to bring them to market.

I'm looking at a kickstarter, and selling on Etsy or possibly just my own site if I get to that point. I would imagine that if I were to just get these printed and sell them at cons, I wouldn't need to worry too much about business licenses and such. But assuming I want to make this a year round thing that doesn't rely on my ability to get to various cons, what all is necessary to start selling a product? Do I need to register a business, or can I just start selling shit? Do I need a license, or can I just put up my wares? Is there going to be something approaching a standard way to get them into stores, or is it going to be so dependent upon the owner that only the most general of pointers can be given?

MDT · Post by **MDT** » Sun Apr 26, 2015 12:17 pm

If you're selling to game stores you can just drop in when it's quiet and sell directly to the manager/owner. They don't usually have buying infrastructure behind them.

Sell on ebay and etsy as well.

You would need to register/declare as a sole proprietor.
Looking at the ca.gov site, the licenses required or not required varies by county or city. You would have to check locally.

erik · Post by **erik** » Thu Apr 30, 2015 3:25 am

Follow-up on Ogre's question about bat-like dinosaurs.

Usually I have to wait longer than a couple weeks to be vindicated on stuff like this, but hey, I'll take it.

http://www.nytimes.com/2015/04/30/scien ... thers.html

erik · Post by **erik** » Mon May 04, 2015 4:51 am

I've decided today to find a script or plugin or extension that I can use to either click to ignore threads on a bb forum like this, or enter a forum user name in the script code to ignore threads started by that user name.

I've gone through about a half-dozen scripts that were written for this purpose but find that I have not learned enough in one evening of downloading greasemonkey to accomplish this feat on my own. It seems like the biggest stumbling block so far is that all the other scripts are written for a different version of bulletin board software as evidenced by that none look for the cue "viewtopic", and still fail to work even if I change "showthread" to "viewtopic" in their string search code.

My deepest desire is that someone here already knows of a proper script that I can just pick up and use. I'm typically using greasemonkey/firefox, but am motivated to stop shitty *threads from appearing on my forum and can try other venues.

Prak · Post by **Prak** » Mon May 04, 2015 4:53 am

Is there some specific term for a phenomena such as my conservative parents not believing "The Science" about climate change which comes from experts and studies, but believing "The Science" about sugars and carbs that comes from bicycle designers, chiropractors and anti-vaxxers?

Josh_Kablack · Post by **Josh_Kablack** » Mon May 04, 2015 6:48 am

Prak wrote: I would imagine that if I were to just get these printed and sell them at cons, I wouldn't need to worry too much about business licenses and such. But assuming I want to make this a year round thing that doesn't rely on my ability to get to various cons, what all is necessary to start selling a product? Do I need to register a business, or can I just start selling shit? Do I need a license, or can I just put up my wares? Is there going to be something approaching a standard way to get them into stores, or is it going to be so dependent upon the owner that only the most general of pointers can be given?

Familiarize Yourself with Schedule C and your State's version of it California page found via 5 seconds of google.

Keep detailed records of any expense that is even remotely business related.

This stuff is dry and can be confusing, but doing it right can mean significant chunks of money, and for some friends of mine, being able to write off things like new RPG books and portions of convention costs as legitimate business expenses.

ishy · Post by **ishy** » Mon May 04, 2015 11:58 am

Prak wrote:Is there some specific term for a phenomena such as my conservative parents not believing "The Science" about climate change which comes from experts and studies, but believing "The Science" about sugars and carbs that comes from bicycle designers, chiropractors and anti-vaxxers?

Confirmation bias?

Prak · Post by **Prak** » Mon May 04, 2015 4:59 pm

Yeah, they seem to just be pulling the usual "I already agree with this, so I'll trust this expert" bullshit. I've seen people have success with high protein/adequate fat/low carb diets, but that doesn't mean you should just fucking listen to any asshole who espouses that.

They're reading "Eat Bacon, Don't Jog," which was written by a bicycle designer, and "The Blood Sugar Solution," which was written by an anti-vaxxer gp.

And they defend this act of taking medical advice from non-nutritionists by saying "everyone has a bias," and "you don't need a bunch of letters after your name to have done research."

Meanwhile, when I try to cite any research at all about, oh, say, global warming, or homosexuality, they hold the conservativetea bagger rancid dickparty line and imply that you can't trust scientists and your research is flawed.

Because, really, they're fucking science denier conservatives who think their son will never know as much as them or anyone who they did not watch grow up and thus don't see as a perpetual three year old (ok, this is veering into It's Personal territory...)

Orion · Post by **Orion** » Tue May 05, 2015 12:00 am

A: Normally my taste in liquor runs to whiskey and dark tequilas, and to drinks like old fashioned, gimlet, or whiskey sour. I bought some Kraken spiced rum last week. I've been drinking it neat, but what else can or should I do with it?

B: How is there not a "drinks which make me laugh, cry, or both" thread?

Meikle641 · Post by **Meikle641** » Tue May 05, 2015 7:49 am

I normally mix Kraken with coke.

tussock · Post by **tussock** » Tue May 05, 2015 8:04 am

Prak wrote:Yeah, they seem to just be pulling the usual "I already agree with this, so I'll trust this expert" bullshit. I've seen people have success with high protein/adequate fat/low carb diets, but that doesn't mean you should just fucking listen to any asshole who espouses that.

Food in general is counter-intuitive, what food is and what it does in your body are different, so it's easy to lie to people about it.

Like, a low-fat diet makes you lose weight very quickly initially, but it's all water, you're just burning through all your glycogen stores without being able to replenish them properly. Long-term, low-fat diets make people hungrier, weaker, fatter, and more sedentary. Can't do otherwise, unless you compensate with massive lifestyle changes.

A low-carb diet does the same initially, water loss, but you maintain low-energy states better, and can very slowly burn fat. The problem is your energy levels won't come up without sugars and stimulants (which you constantly crave if you do anything) and so you generally still end up hungrier, weaker, and more sedentary, but can totally lose (or gain, depending on activity levels) a lot of fat along the way.

There's totally people out there who have spent years going on crash diets and blame some personal failing for putting on more weight and doing less activity afterward, and there's endless books and pills and tv shows ready to confirm that and "give you the secret". But that's the norm, it's exactly how the body responds to intermittent famine (do less, carry less muscle, constantly build fat stores).

The new high-protein diets are interesting. They should be super-unhealthy because of the random muscle cannibalism your body gets into between meals, but the added irrationality and anger they give people seems to help a few onto exercise regimes that work for them. Just don't expect it to help your parents understand logic any better. Also, Fox News, eh.

Minor point: an anti-vaccine gp could totally be right about medical things which are not vaccines. Obviously ...

doc wrote:the secret to losing weight and preventing not just diabetes but also heart disease, stroke, dementia, and cancer is

yeh, nah, crazy. Dude should really just cure everything else while he's at it.

@Orion, the drinking thing is all bullshit. Drunkeness in general, it's all social conditioning and people just act like they think drunk people should act, only slower. Adding extra bitter or spice to the bit of the experience you have before your taste buds give up is a pretty short story on top of that.

Starmaker · Post by **Starmaker** » Tue May 05, 2015 10:12 am

Prak wrote:They're reading "Eat Bacon, Don't Jog," which was written by a bicycle designer

A shitty bicycle designer, too. Wikipedia says he makes bikes emphasizing comfort and durability and favors bar end shifters. Which is to say, he places the most delicate part of the bike to bear the full force of an inevitable fall. Take it from last year's national marathonning champion, if that guy says the sky is blue, check twice.

Prak · Post by **Prak** » Tue May 05, 2015 6:13 pm

Heh. Thanks.

I'm kind of just going to go with "Whatever, do what you want." on this one because I'm pretty sure that if I told my parents a car was about to hit them they wouldn't believe me, or say I was arrogant for who the fuck knows what. Upshot of never having strong feelings for your parents is that I just don't give a shit and they can kill themselves in whatever manner they want. I'm pretty sure I still get the house.

Eikre · Post by **Eikre** » Tue May 05, 2015 7:35 pm

Orion wrote:A: Normally my taste in liquor runs to whiskey and dark tequilas, and to drinks like old fashioned, gimlet, or whiskey sour. I bought some Kraken spiced rum last week. I've been drinking it neat, but what else can or should I do with it?

You need to try the "Dark and Stormy," which is a highball with ginger beer. Goslings makes both constituents, but you don't want their brand on either account; You're already using the Kraken for rum, which is good and correct, and ideally you'll get your hands on the most facefuckingly intense ginger beer you can. Not always easy; I usually end up using Barritt's.

This is a drink that, when well-prepared, offers a singular quality of balance: Not only does the mixer moderate the hard taste of the liquor (as in most highballs), but the liquor actually moderates the hard taste of the mixer, too.

Meikle641 · Post by **Meikle641** » Tue May 05, 2015 10:56 pm

Oh yeah, I forgot that drink. Tried it once at an Irish pub and loved it. Will have to try it sometime.

Orion · Post by **Orion** » Wed May 06, 2015 4:37 pm

Wow, Tussock that's even more pointlessly depressing than usual. For the record if I were a big fan of drunkenness rum would already be in my vocabulary and vodka would be my staple. As it happens I think dark liquor tastes awesome and a single (1) drink is the best treatment for anxiety I'm aware of.