October 26, 2014 Sunday Meeting
5pm
EDT (UTC/GMT - 5)
AIM: Valar Guild Meetingplace
Back to News
Transcript work by Ar-Pharazon and Varda.
Attending: (5)
AriehnV, ArPharazonV, Gwaihir Valar, Pallando Valar, VardaValar1
(presiding)
Before-meeting
Meeting begins
Membership:
Daylight Savings time shift
Web:
Games Site
Gaming:
Tolkien:
Topic: In the time of the War of the Rings, where would we find elven children?
After-meeting:
More gaming news
Time zones
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Before-meeting
You have just entered room "valarguildmeetingplace."
ArPharazonV: Aiya!
VardaValar1: Aiya :-)
ArPharazonV: Sorry, right, DST ended here. It's an hour early for me.
GwaihirValar has entered the room.
VardaValar1: Glad to see you!
ArPharazonV: What'd I miss?
VardaValar1: Not on my usual computer
GwaihirValar: hello! Glad I was able to make it this week
VardaValar1: Nothing, just now 4
VardaValar1: Yay!
ArPharazonV: Allright :-)
VardaValar1: Gilraen is not on anything that lets her be invited, but she's welcome to come. :-)
ArPharazonV: I spy no Urwendi on bnet.
GwaihirValar: ya, she doesn't have her computer at hand at the moment, but I'll let her know :-)
VardaValar1: Thannk you
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VardaValar1: Elen sila lumenn' omentielvo!
VardaValar1: Membership:
VardaValar1: Hello from Elwing and Fangorn and Sauron from this side of the screen.
VardaValar1: Meriadoc was here but had to drive home a little while ago.
VardaValar1: Any news from you folks?
ArPharazonV: *waves to all*
ArPharazonV: And yes.
VardaValar1: ~~~~
ArPharazonV: New internet provider for me, came without problems!
VardaValar1: Huzzah! It can happen!
ArPharazonV: Internet is now like.. 8-10 times as fast as it used to be.
VardaValar1: Didn''t reallyl expect you here, nice surprise. :-)
VardaValar1: Egad, that's a lot of difference
ArPharazonV: Very good thing for my torrents, and good for my WoW and other games ;-)
ArPharazonV: And I can run more of this stuff at once :P
ArPharazonV: Also, unrelated note, DST ended here in Europe, so will be off for a few weeks.
ArPharazonV: Just remember to invite me as I'm late!
VardaValar1: *removes DST worldwide*
VardaValar1: Aye aye!
ArPharazonV: And that's it, I think.
VardaValar1: That's a lot, thank you.
VardaValar1: On a notebook computer here, usual resources not available, but doing work-arounds.
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VardaValar1: Web:
VardaValar1: My apologies for not having put up anything new. Should have just forced some time in for it, sorry again.
VardaValar1: Games Site:
VardaValar1: Eonwe put updates on gaming news for us, thank you!
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VardaValar1: Gaming:
VardaValar1: Non-WoW or LotrO quick news:
VardaValar1: StarCraft 2:
VardaValar1: Patch 2.1.6 has been released.
VardaValar1: Gwaihir's typing - will wait a sec.:-)
ArPharazonV: Quick Hearthstone news: new season next week
GwaihirValar: I just wanted to quickly speak up while we're talking
gaming... I've been mostly reviewing anime lately, but I did review Middle Earth: Shadow of Mordor recently: http://www.shadowedblade.net/2014/10/middle-earth-shadow-of-mordor-soulless/
VardaValar1: soulless. Hmmm. Does not bode well
GwaihirValar: Kind of
ArPharazonV: I thought the whole point was that the guy had like.. an extra soul? ;-)
GwaihirValar: It was an extraordinary game as far as purely mechanics
go. One of the best I've seen lately... it's just.... as a Tolkien fan,
it kind of doesn't work too well
GwaihirValar: from a story/world perspective.
GwaihirValar: Not very respectful of Tolkien's mythos
VardaValar1: Ouch. Agreed, should have just used their own names for
their lore, since it's so poorly researched for Middle-earth.
GwaihirValar: Ya, that was my big point. They could've created a new world that could've become something special
GwaihirValar: but they tried to shoehorn it into Arda, and it just didn't fit.
VardaValar1: Must have been trying to ride JRRT's populariy coat tails. Originality would have been better this go.
GwaihirValar: Yep
VardaValar1: If we ignore the M-e references, is it worth playing anyway?
GwaihirValar: Yes
VardaValar1: ok, good to hear.
GwaihirValar: and, to be honest, you'll probably find some of the butcherings of Tolkien lore funny.
GwaihirValar: Because they got some things SO wrong.
GwaihirValar: Gilraen and I were laughing about a lot of stuff. It kind
of falls under the same header as a really bad fanfiction.
VardaValar1: Ok, so laugh instead of gritting teeth, got it. Wonder how they got a license though.
GwaihirValar: Ya, hard to say.
VardaValar1: Any other games non-WoW, non-LotRO with general news?
VardaValar1: WoW:
VardaValar1: oops, pardon, suppposed to be a pre-type,not hit yet
VardaValar1: Any other general gaming news?
VardaValar1: Pallando, still active in EVE?
ArPharazonV: I'll throw mine at the end as usual :-)
VardaValar1: No general, Phar?
VardaValar1: okie dokie
VardaValar1: WoW:
VardaValar1: Blizzard has put up updated level 90 crash course videos for the various classes.
ArPharazonV: Just the HS thing I mentioned.
VardaValar1: Thanks. Looking forward to your bit in the After-meeting. :-)
VardaValar1: See the latest hotfixes.
VardaValar1: There's a new blog up: Beasts of the Savage Lands - Gorgrond.
VardaValar1: You can also see Behind the Scenes of Lords of War.
VardaValar1: That's the news from Eonwe's Games Site
VardaValar1: Any other general WoW news?
VardaValar1: LotRO:
VardaValar1: Harvestmath is going.
VardaValar1: We were in there a while ago in the Haunted House working
the puzzles and mazes. Also the regular dancing and races.
VardaValar1: Two new horses or their warhorse caparisons for 30 barter tokens.
VardaValar1: Plus people are working their way through the mass of level100 questing/deeds
VardaValar1: Any other news, business, suggestions?
VardaValar1: This is a good time to contact an officer (any meeting)
for live discussion about any problem anywhere in the guild to have a
chance to fix it before it becomes too obnoxious.
VardaValar1: Also a time if you want to take a test or bring a friend for an entry test.
VardaValar1: Tolkien:
ArPharazonV: Interestingly specific. Has that problem come up lately?
GwaihirValar: I suppose the guild has become a lot more spread out over the years, so I can see the difficulty arising.
VardaValar1: Nope. Just a reminder, trying to cut off any problems
before they get bad. We have had problems before where no one has said
anything until they just left.
VardaValar1: Aye, the spread has caused a lot of communication
problems, so we try to make ourselves accessible as many ways as
possible. :-)
VardaValar1: We no longer have battlenet connecting all of our branches.
VardaValar1: Since a number of people would rather toss their comps in
a trash can than use AIM, we try to have officers in all the branches
who are able to email others for help.
VardaValar1: Like Pallando with EVE, Sauron with SWTOR, Eonwe for WoW, Irmo for GW2, me for LotRO, Diablo, SWToR
VardaValar1: Normally a branch manager can handle anything coming up, but the rest of us try to be there for them.
VardaValar1: And of course we have those who are only interested in the website.
VardaValar1: We try to take care of them all. :-)
ArPharazonV: To be fair.
VardaValar1: The forum is also available but it tends to be very public with a long-time record for any to see.
ArPharazonV: It's an interesting website.
VardaValar1: We are both a Tolkien fan club and a gaming group. :-)
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VardaValar1: Tolkien:
VardaValar1: Don't forget to think about the forum rp. Some birds need to come make a report, and some elven scouts.
VardaValar1: Here's a topic I and Elwing were considering in rl:
VardaValar1: Elven children.
VardaValar1: In the time of the War of the Rings, where would we find elven children?
VardaValar1: Would some elven communities have zero? Which would have a thriving lot of children?
ArPharazonV: Well, the Noldor were already leaving, or preparing to
leave. So they would probably hold off on having any kids to raise, and
instead wait until they were back in Valinor.
VardaValar1: That makes sense. So Rivendell would have few or none, most likely?
ArPharazonV: The Silvans might have more children, but they were in a
dangerous area and in a constant state of war, so they would have
rather few, but that would change after the war when suddenly their
territory increased.
ArPharazonV: Yeah.
VardaValar1: A baby boom for silvans at the end of the war then?
VardaValar1: That might not have worked for the Lorien silvan elves.
VardaValar1: Mirkwood, though, very likely.
ArPharazonV: Yeah, Mirkwood I meant.
VardaValar1: Plus Mirkwood added a colony over in the woods of Ithilien after the war.
ArPharazonV: Lorien might be.. somewhere in between.
ArPharazonV: Also true!
ArPharazonV: More room for the kiddies.
VardaValar1: Lorien, run by Galadriel and Celeborn.
ArPharazonV: And with the stewards of Gondor also located in that region...
VardaValar1: Celeborn wanted to stay in Middle-earth, saw the territory of Lorien increase, but it lost the Ring protection.
VardaValar1: Pardon, go ahead, Phar.
ArPharazonV: I wonder if Ithilien might have seen an unusual increase in halfbreed mixing, post-history.
ArPharazonV: Closer alliance than they ever had, and living in the same area.. never know.
VardaValar1: I kind of doubt it, after the pain for Elrond and his children, but if it would happen, that might be it.
ArPharazonV: True.
VardaValar1: Death enters the equation very quickly.
VardaValar1: The Mirkwood elves had each other, and a great work to do bringing them together.
ArPharazonV: The Silvans are less connected to that history though. They may want to try it out for themselves.
VardaValar1: If it did happen though, that would be the time.
VardaValar1: The silvans were taught by Sindar, and Legolas ran the colony.
VardaValar1: He was very aware of the problem.
ArPharazonV: True.
VardaValar1: The Lorien elves had a chance to spread out and increase,
but thanks to Galadriel and her Ring, they were used to a more
Valinor-like, protected living.
ArPharazonV: Didn't they claim part of southern mirkwood?
VardaValar1: They mostly became disenchanted, apparently with all that
work. Lack of what they were used to. They mostly followed Galadriel
when she went home to Valinor.
VardaValar1: Aye, they did.
VardaValar1: It was given in thanks for their help taking Mirkwood back, after the battle with Dol Guldur.
VardaValar1: Otherwise the Ithilien colony might have located there. Interesting how that help affected locations.
VardaValar1: Celeborn wanted to stay, even remaining behind in
Rivendell with Elladan and Elrohir for a long time after his people
abandoned Middle-earth, even his wife.
VardaValar1: Mirkwood had been burned in the war, for large areas, so the elves there would have been working hard to repair it.
VardaValar1: That would have been hard but peaceful work, so they could have had lots of children to help with it.
VardaValar1: The forest of Ithilien also needed help, as it had been damaged by being right next to Mordor and the war.
ArPharazonV: Indeed.
VardaValar1: It was a beautiful place and deserved care.
VardaValar1: Morgoth's Ring tells a good bit about the nature of elven
children. That would be a good subject for an article in the future, if
anyone would like to try it. :-)
VardaValar1: Pallando, Gwaihir? Are you there? Any comments before we end the meeting?
VardaValar1: Comments on elven children?
ArPharazonV: How about the Avari?
ArPharazonV: If there were any remaining? :-)
VardaValar1: I had the strong impression that they joined the silvans
over time, since none of the stories in the time of the War of the Ring
mention them as running about separately.
VardaValar1: They should have been present. So that may have been where they went: mostly Mirkwood and Lorien.
VardaValar1: That might have added to the attitude of the Mirkwood elves.
ArPharazonV: Good point.
VardaValar1: Helped them with surviving without Ring protection,something they would have been comfortable with.
VardaValar1: It would have been very interesting to have had the Fellowship bump into a few Avari!
VardaValar1: Or Thorin's Company.
VardaValar1: Might make some good fan fics. :-)
VardaValar1: That would also help versus inbreeding.
ArPharazonV: Until they were all integrated.
VardaValar1: Perhaps they were not mentioned to help the stories focus more on the main subjects.
ArPharazonV: Something to be said for keeping the population level up, anyway.
VardaValar1: Aye, diversify the gene pool.
VardaValar1: With their longevity, that may have been enough.
ArPharazonV: Well we don't know what happened in the east. Avari, blue wizards, and all of Sauron's allies there...
VardaValar1: Being a prince with an undying father could feel meaningless without new colonies too.
VardaValar1: The Avari were between the area where humans were taken over by Morgoth and the other groups of elves, it seemed.
VardaValar1: As the humans started taking over so much territory, they
may have been pushed west into silvan territory, and probably welcomed.
ArPharazonV: Could be.
VardaValar1: The blue wizards seem to have made cults in the East.
VardaValar1: Aragorn and Eomer are known to have taken their armies out to keep the peace after the War of the Ring.
ArPharazonV: But how far?
VardaValar1: They must have been handling roving orc bands, old
followers of Sauron, people of Sauron's just coming out from under his
control.
VardaValar1: Good question
VardaValar1: I figure Aragorn and Eomer would mainly defend encroachments on their territories.
VardaValar1: Would have been interesting if some of those areas asked to join Gondor or even Rohan.
VardaValar1: That could have led to dissent among their own people.
ArPharazonV: Great empires could arise from this.
VardaValar1: Aragorn already had one: the north Arnor plus Gondor.
VardaValar1: He may have added more. That would have been a tough job to handle.
VardaValar1: Even Isildur divided the work between his sons, into north and south.
ArPharazonV: Multiple sons, divide the realm.
ArPharazonV: Right :-)
ArPharazonV: Merge, divide, annex, divide, conquer, divide...
VardaValar1: heh
ArPharazonV: that's how kingdoms grow and shrink I guess.
VardaValar1: Aragorn had one son, "full ripe for kingship".
VardaValar1: The rest were daughters he could have married out to help cement the peace, as happens so often.
VardaValar1: That could also increase the holdings.
ArPharazonV: That's politics for you.
VardaValar1: Aye
VardaValar1: Human children would have been very busy growing up into
such an active world, being sent out to help teach the areas left in
poor shape by Mordor.
VardaValar1: Helping the residents repair their lands.
VardaValar1: Could have been a fair bit of intermarriage between human groups from that.
VardaValar1: That would bring all sorts of conflict.
ArPharazonV: Arranged or otherwise.
VardaValar1: I figure mostly not arranged, just proximity.
VardaValar1: Arranged would mostly be royalty.
VardaValar1: I would also bet that Aragorn and Arwen's daughters would
have been allowed to choose among a large pool of suitors.
ArPharazonV: Hah, probably.
VardaValar1: Arwen had figured out that human ïmmortality"would be children and had lots. She would have been very strong.
VardaValar1: Any ohter thoughts? :-)
VardaValar1: *other
VardaValar1: *picks up a hammer*
VardaValar1: *whommmmp*
VardaValar1: hmmmm, good hammer
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VardaValar1: After-meeting:
VardaValar1: Fire away, Phar. :-)
ArPharazonV: Allright.
ArPharazonV: Diablo 3: Level 68 now, almost 69. Might continue and finish at 70 later tonight. And season's not over yet, so I've got time :-)
ArPharazonV: Hearthstone:
Besides the season-change (and I don't think it's necessary to announce
that every month, but why not?), I've also more personal news: My first
golden legendary card, the rarest type of all :-)
ArPharazonV: Looks pretty, but the card itself is not that useful.
ArPharazonV: For flashgaming,
not too much to mention, but I've been clearing a few games out of my
to do list, so that's progress! As game I'll give you one that held my
attention for a few days this week.
ArPharazonV: http://www.kongregate.com/games/BarbarianGames/building-rush
Build a factory or two, build trucks, deliver a lot of goods all over
the place, thinking a bit financially.. and when you get profit over
the reward-goal, and achievements, you get money to upgrade things and
make it easier :-)
ArPharazonV: Seems complicated at first, but I got the hang of it pretty easily.
ArPharazonV: And for WoW:
ArPharazonV: My warrior's cloak-quest, mentioned last week, hit a bit
of a snag, since I only got a few questitems this week. But there's
still some hope, so I'll just keep going and see what happens.
VardaValar1: And a quick bit from Eonwe to add to your WoW:
VardaValar1: Personal gaming for
those interested: I got my Bone-white Primal Raptor from gathering 9999
dinosaur bones on the Isle of Giants. Gives me 185 mounts. Still have
another I need to get from the Isle of Giants.
VardaValar1: /endquote
ArPharazonV: We've started doing the Siege of Orgrimmar raid on Mythic
for the first time, and mostly killed the bosses we already killed when
it was still Heroic mode, but also added Thok the dinosaur to our
kill-list!
AriehnV has entered the room.
ArPharazonV: Yeah, I did some of that dinosaur bone gathering last
week, but only got about 500 of em right now. Didn't seem to hold much
priority. Even though I'm at 198 mounts myself, so almost at the
200-goal :-)
ArPharazonV: Aiya!
AriehnV: aiya belatedly and grats :-)
AriehnV: sorry just came home
ArPharazonV: Oh, and I did the iron horde invasion questline with my
druid and warrior, getting the rewards for it, including a new pet,
Iron Starlette, which is basically a miniature explosive star as seen
in SoO.
ArPharazonV: While also checking out the new instance (only half
available at this level) with the druid. But nothing much for me in
there that I can use.
VardaValar1: Aiya Arien :-)
ArPharazonV: And that's it for me!
VardaValar1: Thanks Phar. :-)
VardaValar1: Pallando has news for us. :-)
VardaValar1: He had some news on the Leithian project.
VardaValar1: He keeps getting called by work. May be afk again.
VardaValar1: Arien, any news from you?
VardaValar1: Free chat time anyway, for whenever any of you are back. :-)
ArPharazonV: Fladrif spotted this week, btw, still in a weird timezone ;-)
VardaValar1: All time zones are weirded during this shift anyway. :-)
ArPharazonV: Haha, perhaps.
ArPharazonV: When is DST ending in the US?
AriehnV: not from me Varda no news .. well Bruce didnt get the job
AriehnV: how many hours are you behind now Varda?
VardaValar1: Sorry to hear about Bruce. But there are more jobs out there. :-)
AriehnV: yah i guess so
VardaValar1: For me the time is now 5:52 Central, so 6:52 Eastern
VardaValar1: Just checked. Nov 2 is when Daylight Savings Time changes here
VardaValar1: Then we go back one hour
VardaValar1: Almost 7 pm Eastern right now. What time is it for y'all?
ArPharazonV: 2 november, so only a week difference.
ArPharazonV: It's almost midnight here.
AriehnV: bit past eleven now
ArPharazonV: By the way, if anyone is a reader of the webcomic Homestuck, it's finally out of its year-long hiatus, with a number of pages and a cinematic added in the past few weeks.
VardaValar1: Cool. Have an url?
VardaValar1: Í don't remember anything about that one.
ArPharazonV: http://www.mspaintadventures.com/?s=6 is the first page
VardaValar1: Thank you
ArPharazonV: It starts off as a sort of command-based video game
simulator, as did the author's previous webcomics, but it rather grew
beyond that.
ArPharazonV: Now nearly at 7000 pages.
ArPharazonV: And possibly the most famous webcomic in the world :-)
VardaValar1: I thought that would be Girl Genius. :-)
ArPharazonV: Well, that's out there too.
ArPharazonV: Also, some people don't necessarily define it as a
webcomic anymore, because of it's varying format. There are also entire
chatlogs, cinematics, short gifs and cutscenes, and even actual gaming
sequences.
ArPharazonV: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Homestuck here, have a wikipedia link :-)
VardaValar1: cool
ArPharazonV: "Exemplary of the
community's size, one of Homestuck's Flash Animations crashed flash
game and animation site Newgrounds when uploaded due to the strain the
views put on the servers."
ArPharazonV: Hah, I remember that one.
ArPharazonV: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qOw44VFNk8Y by the way, seen this yet? Hobbit/Lotr related :-)
VardaValar1: Just watched :-) Thanks
AriehnV: very cute ad funny :-)
AriehnV: and beautiful of course :-) but time for bed for me :-) so have a good one if you get there! Namarie for now
AriehnV has left the room.
ArPharazonV: Namarie Arien!
ArPharazonV: There, level 69 in D3 :-)
VardaValar1: Grats Phar!
VardaValar1: Belated good night to the Sun Steerer. :-)
ArPharazonV: Halfway to 70 now, and not giving up yet!
VardaValar1: Elwing is about to drive home
VardaValar1: oohhh - go go!
VardaValar1: I have to get off this computer now. Good to have seen you all!
VardaValar1: Namarie for now
ArPharazonV: Allright, Namarie!
VardaValar1 has left the room.
GwaihirValar has left the room.
ArPharazonV: Level 70 at last!
ArPharazonV: saving and sending transcript
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