Junkgle

Fake Sakura

2009-03-18T09:14:00.000-07:00

Maybe something happen to the weather? Suddenly we got this fake sakura blooming all over the place.

Taiping Zoo

2009-03-18T08:30:00.000-07:00

Went to the zoo few weeks ago. I have only manage to snap a few photos before it rained.

Happy Chinese New Year of Ox!!!

2009-02-02T09:07:00.000-08:00

Back to hometown for Chinese New Year. Here are some of the photos I took during the stay. :)

Wish you have a strong Ox year.

Langkawi Trip

2008-12-28T20:58:00.000-08:00

I went to Langkawi Island during the Christmas holiday, here are some of the photos (Click to view full size). Please comment :).

This is the HDR using 2 different exposure photos.

These are the pseudo-hdr using only one raw photos, you can see some noise in the darker area.

These are panning photos that I'm still learning to take :).

These are some of nice and clear photos.

This is the effect after I change the color temperature, nice? :)

Wedding Photos

2008-11-16T08:34:00.001-08:00

First of all, I would like to thank JW for the Canon 580EX II Speedlite and the 50mm prime lens. Below are some of the pictures I took during my girlfriend sister wedding. Please leave comments. Thanks.

These are pictures taken using 580EX II

These are pictures taken using 50mm prime lens.

Still remember this?

2008-11-09T08:26:00.000-08:00

Found this picture, it really bring back memories, my favorite show last time.

My first HDR and Silhouette photo

2008-10-26T08:40:00.000-07:00

Here is my first HDR and Silhouette photo. Kind of noob... still learning :)

This is my first HDR of sunrise with the cloud taken in -2 exposure and the rocks in +2 exposure.

This is my first silhouette with Jeremy as my model, hahaha... :)

I got a new toy, Canon 1000d :)

2008-09-26T23:56:00.000-07:00

Just bought my DSLR 2 weeks ago. It's a entry level DSLR, inexpensive and suitable for newbie like me.

This is how it looks like in my hand.

Now time to show some newbie's photos, these are the photos I took in Cameron Highland last weekend:

This is the "florescent" cactus.

Cactus

Depth of focus.

Blurring on roses

Macro... isn't it nice??

More macro

Blurring on the background

By using different shutter speed...

...you can get different feel...

Flowers...

My Favorite Lyrics

2008-08-04T08:21:00.000-07:00

"Welcome To Wherever You Are"

Maybe we're different, but we're still the same
We all got the blood of Eden, running through our veins
I know sometimes it's hard for you to see
You come between just who you are and who you wanna be

If you feel alone, and lost and need a friend
Remember every new beginning, is some beginning's end

[Chorus]
Welcome to wherever you are
This is your life, you made it this far
Welcome, you gotta believe
That right here right now, you're exactly where you're supposed to be
Welcome, to wherever you are

When everybody's in, and you're left out
And you feel your drowning, in a shadow of a doubt
Everyone's a miracle in their own way
Just listen to yourself, not what other people say

When it seems you're lost, alone and feeling down
Remember everybody's different
Just take a look around

[Chorus]

Be who you want to, be who you are
Everyone's a hero, everyone's a star

When you wanna give up, and your hearts about to break
Remember that you're perfect, God makes no mistakes

[Chorus]

This song is from Bon Jovi. First time I hear it, I nearly cry.

The Last Lecture

2008-08-02T07:29:00.000-07:00

This is the last lecture by Randy Pausch who just pass away on 25 July 2008 . He has pancreatic cancer and has fought the disease and extended his remaining days far more than his doctor predicted.

His last lecture is very inspiring, after watching this, I started to realize there is no such things as fair or not fair in life, things just happen and we just need to do the best in that given situation like those young soldier fighting for the beach from German on D-day. It is pointless to ask fair or not, we just need to fight it.

DIABLO 3 IS OUT!!!!!!!!!!!!!

2008-06-29T04:35:00.000-07:00

Un-diablolical!!!

This is more like it but damn, I hate that witch doctor, he look silly.

I just watched the gameplay trailer. A bit disappointed, it is not dark enough, not creepy enough and not bloody enough, I like the dungeon part but the outdoor is just too dreamy, too colorful, too un-diablo. There are already too many games out there that are as colorful and as fun but diablo 3 should not be one of them, diablo is dark, creepy and cool, that's what make it stand out.

Since the original development team for Diablo has already left Blizzard, I have some worry that diablo 3 will lose some of its dark feels and great arts. Hopefully it won't.

Anyway, the game is just at the early of the development stage, I think blizzard will make it cool just like its other games. I like the game pace, still very fast, and the monsters still come in hordes, the skills also looks promising. I'm waiting for a darker and cooler diablo 3 to come out then I will change my whole pc just for it.

"Even death can't save you from me." - Diablo

In the Age of Personalise

2008-05-07T05:58:00.000-07:00

If you are bored with your browser homepage like I do, please kindly allow me introduce you some new stuff.

Boring with the plain google as your homepage? This 1990's homepage lah.

Since internet connection speed is no longer an issue for us, we can now have a better homepage.

1. my Yahoo!

Aren't it look cool? If your answer is no, well, you have no taste.

It's not only look cool, it's very useful too.

I can see this week got Naruto updated or not. Hehe, you can add your hentai feed also.

I can see stock, for example Altera, faster up so that I can see my option.

I can get my yahoo mail preview, damn, all that junk!

And my favorite blog, it's all government's fault!

2. iGoogle
igoogle is simpler, wait, you said it is ugly? see the next picture!

Hehe, art collection from famous artist serve as your skin.

iGoogle is much more simpler and less module/gadget/application/whatever-u-call compare to my Yahoo!. I only found 2 module is useful so far, google news and google mail preview, but of course you can add any RSS feed that you like.

Google news. Pity Myanmar.

Gmail preview, hehe, sorry, I censored all email subjects.

I use my Yahoo! as my homepage because it got more things to play with but some people might like igoogle simplicity and the art collection(now you know what google is thinking.). You can maintain the login session for 2 weeks I think, so that you don't have to login every time, but of course, this is not recommended for public pc lah.

Every morning I start my browser, I got all the information, news, etc, etc. I need not search for information, it is display in front of me as the way I want it to be.

I help in launching the rocket...

2008-03-13T06:17:00.000-07:00

Actually I was thinking to witness the vote counting process and record down the cheating using hand phone and post it on youtube so that I can contest in the next general election but damn, they put me to help people to check their polling stream, shit.

Briefing on the night before election.

My command center on that day.

Book to check polling stream, BN use laptop, damn.

I hate rain, especially on the lousy command center.

hahaha, rockets on the sky now.

I should went to be BN volunteer instead, got $$. This poor rocket can only provide meal only, haha, nevermind all that, I just hope they really can bring changes and don't disappoint us.

This is how we warm our dota kaki new house

2008-02-23T09:15:00.000-08:00

DotA Article by World No. 1 Team Episode 2

2008-02-23T09:08:00.000-08:00

This is the article by the world top player Virtus.NS

On Push Strategies

Recently, I decided to think over some push strategies and I really believe thats one of these strategies can work! There is one major problem though: effective pushing strategies are very rare.

I don't know how SK planned to push against MYM during their last game (this was when the article was written, the replay is attached) but the strategies used had a lot of issues. However, it really did have some great ideas. For example, Chen with boots of speed in enemy forest is very smart.

Let's study what push strategies are and how they can be used.

What makes an effective push strategy

First of all, heroes like Keeper of the Light and Death Prophet (which are generally considered push heroes) are not really push heroes at all.They may be used in some kinds of pushes, but they should be marked as"anti-push" heroes. They are very good with disrupting any sort of push. Also, more examples of *so-called* push heroes are Shaker, Brood Mother and Furion. They are generally considered pushers – but the truth is that they break the push down.

So, what do you need for a successful push? I came to the conclusion that you need to maintain some concurrents. Here they are:

You need Pugna. If the enemy team has Pugna – gg to your push. If Pugna is banned, it is still possible to push but it will be much harder.
Heroes that have a lot of nukes – They need to do a lot of damage to all enemies, preferably at some range. Zeus suggests itself, maybe even Tormented Soul, and at the moment I can't seem to remember any other heroes.
You need to create a situation when the enemy team has used all of their spells/abilities/items, but your whole team needs to be alive. You are going to need heal. There are different kinds of it,but the best one is Chen's ultimate and Abbadon's death coil/shield.
Note that Abbadon is a really imbalanced for push strategies. I can't understand why nobody uses him to push. The time before level 11-12 is his time – he is so strong at that point! He has an AoE nuke, a heal/nuke, can dispel disables/stuns/slows and so on. He is also very tough and not easy to kill.
Heroes that can tank the tower and take it down quickly. Best variants are Syllabear, Terrorblade(like SK did) and Chen. Chen is necessary for many reasons, as you can see.
Pushing is better for you if enemy heroes can't move around the battlefield freely – You need to lay some pressure, like a lot of units– Sylla's and Chen's summons, for example.
You need the right items! It's hard to be specific with this since it depends on heroes,but the essential ones are – Ring of Basilius, Mekasm, Headdress. Yes,Headdress of Rejuvenation! You may think that this 2 hp/sec is not that significant, but 2 hp regen from Headdress, plus 4 from Mek, plus 2from Satyr's aura – it's really helpful. Also, you will need 3-4 heal potions. You use these to heal your allies and prevent them from getting killed by re spawned enemies. In push strats, people usually don't buy bottle, but a couple of them can help a lot, especially if they can be passed.
A Hero that can initiate the battle – A team needs to be stronger while pushing, but 3-4 lighting storms from Leshrac will cause all your team to be low on hp. If the enemy attacks,you will lose. To avoid this – we need VENGE. Vengeful Spirit should be used in pushes as a hero that can initiate combat.

So, after some thoughts we end up with a strategy like this – Chen, Pugna, Zeus, Abbadon, and Syllabear. It is possible to replace Bear with Venge and Zeus with Leshrac. It is difficult to compare Venge and Syllabear – it will be two different pushes and two different games. Venge is a useful hero with stun and swap, and her aura is great for the whole team. On the other hand, Bear takes towers down quickly and his summon is very strong. If your push is succeeding, he will get his Radiance soon. This will cause the game not to be about pushing, but more about Sylla killing the whole enemy team.

Replacing Zeus with Leshrac can be a fatal mistake. This is because Zeus is simply stronger, so as all of the other heroes we need will be infrequently picked by your opponent,its better to first pick him.

You may ask – why Venge? Because we have another important part of push – Lane phase. Push heroes need to win or at least not lose their lanes. A skilled Zeus/Leshrac can solo against any two heroes, Pugna can do it too. However, Syllabear =dead lane. Even with Abbadon it will be very hard to hold their lane.Venge is another story, she has strong nuke and is not bad at laning.Vengeful and Abbadon are not the best combination in DotA, but they can at least survive.

In depth on our lineup
Zeus, Chen, Abaddon, Pugna, Vengeful Spirit

Zeus needs to solo an easy lane, Pugna to solo mid, Abbadon and Venge at a hard lane, and Chen jungling.
Or Zeus can solo mid instead of Pugna. In principle, Pugna is harder to stay in lane, but recently Maelk has shown some interesting tricks. For example, Pugna with boots first item (Maelk's idea) - he used it for along enough time. Pugna with boots in an easy lane is hard to kill if you control him well enough. Pugna (solo mid) with Basilius (don't turnoff aura) can take the tower down really fast against almost any solo hero – this is Maelk's innovation too. The choice of lane depends on enemy lineup and disposal of enemy heroes on the map.

Items –Zeus Arcane Ring, Pugna Necro book, Chen Mek, Abbadon – he may buy anything, even a euls. He can even buy Mek, and Chen can just mass hp.This is because in combat Chen is one of your key heroes. If he dies before using his ultimate – it's gg to your team. His creeps die veryfast without heal and the +200 hp to all teammates can often change the outcome of the game. Abbadon has enough mana for all his spells, even with Mek, while Chens mana is very limited. Venge doesn't really need anything except HP, preferably boots of travel, but 5 bracers will be good too.

Accordingly, if everything goes well, at lvl 7-8-9 itis time to attack. You need Zeus with Arcane, somebody with Mek, three strong neutrals, and Pugna's ward level 4. All other components aren't very significant. If you don't have Necrobook – it's okay. The first few towers can be taken down without it, and those will give money to buy other necessary items.

Counters to push strategies

What or who can oppose us? First and foremost – anti push heroes. Even if you owned lanes and everything is going well – pushing KotL is a problem that is better to avoid. So you will need to conceal your push. That isn't easy. For example, if you first pick Zeus, then Venge and Abbadon, guys on the other team will think that you are idiots or that you might have some strange plan, but this doesn't make it look like push. On the other hand, it's a risk that enemy may take Pugna. Anyway,push strategies are so uncommon that it's almost always a surprise to your opponents and I doubt somebody is ready to pick KotL so early instead of others heroes that are considered "strong" (Lina, NA, BB,Sven). They might take KotL as last pick, but KotL alone is not so dangerous. Other anti push are: Magnus and Shaker, it's better just to ban them. Also, it's hard to push against Warlock, but you can hope he will be banned by the other team.

Also, our strategy may be countered by a trained anti push combo. But you do not fear this because I have not even seen well executed pushes yet – I remind you of MYM,who didn't even buy Basilius in that game vs SK.

The main problem that can disrupt our entire plan is the laning phase – the lanes are very likely to lose, because almost all pushing heroes are mediocre at that phase. And you have to lay yourself out to not being owned during this phase.

Closing comments

Note,this article is only one kind of push strategy (imho, the best variant)other variants are available like: "nuke" pushes (Shaker, Zeus, Tinker,or something like it), Warlock pushes, old school mana-rush, push with Venge and Magnus and so on. I mean, they exist, but even if they are used, it seems like nobody thinks them over, and attempts to use them were poorly executed. In my opinion, push strategies can be very strong and I hope to see teams experiment with lineups and strategies in the future.

DotA 6.51 is out!!

2008-02-23T09:07:00.000-08:00

Here is the change log:

6.51 Changelog
===============
* Fixed a bug with Kellen's Dagger that caused it to sometimes not get disabled when hit
* Fixed Land Mines tooltip
* Increased cast range of Kelen's Dagger
* Undid previous Bottle changes. Bottle now works as follows: Costs 600 gold, does not require mana to refill, auto-fills it when you are near fountain, rune refills it to full, resells at 50% like normal, purchasable at base only, regenerates less than previously, has no usage cooldown.
* Fixed Medusa's Mana Shield from triggering Essence Aura
* Fixed Searing Arrows' tooltip
* Changed Hyperstone purchase hotkey to fix a conflict
* Fixed a bug with Invoker when creating illusions
* Updated Kelen's Dagger tooltip
* Undid some of Morphling's base damage buff from last version
* Fixed Bloodrage tooltip
* Fixed Pulse Nova and Invoker's Reagents from triggering Last Word
* Smokescreen interrupts teleportation once again
* Color coded Invoker's spell descriptions (203050)
* Improved Sange's percentage and Yasha's percentage, and lowered the recent buff on S&Y a little
* Fixed Vladmir's Offering sell cost
* Increased Counter Helix chance by 2%
* Minor bonus armor in True Form
* Improved the effect timing on Split Earth (187877)
* -swapcancel code is triggered when a swap is successful (to prevent other accidental swaps)
* Improved Shuriken Toss cast range
* Added new Backtrack icon (183079)
* Changed Battlefury recipe slightly
* Lowered Poof casting time from 2 to 1.5 seconds
* Lowered Elder Dragon Form's manacost and cooldown a little
* Added neutrals field to -cs
* Changed Phantom Edge's secondary ability from evasion to magic resistance
* Replaced Phantom Assassin's Shadow Strike with a different similar ability (132694)
* Fixed a minor coding bug with Time Lapse
* Fixed Impale based spells from moving Juggernaut during Omnislash
* Added new icon for Melting Strike
* Reduced some lag with Invoker
* Fixed level 1 March of the Machines doing slightly less damage than intended
* Removed stock cooldown on Ironwood Branch
* Added a new system that tracks when you help an ally kill a hero (no gameplay ramifications at this point)
* -swap is now allowed in -sd
* Fixed some minor neutrals' vision and pathing glitches
* Lowered level 1 and 2 cast range on Replicate
* Lowered Phantom Assassin's cast animation time
* Fixed a bug with Exorcism's cooldown after leveling Witchcraft
* Fixed some issues with -ah
* Refined how some kill related messages and sounds are shown
* Increased mana regeneration on Perseverance by 25%
* Lowered Buriza recipe by 250 gold
* Changed Voodoo Restoration to heal over a smoother interval (same total regen)
* Lowered Manta Style's cooldown a bit
* Fixed a bug with Voodoo Restoration and Impales
* Fixed a bug with invoker in -spreverse
* Fixed some inconsistencies with tower visions (TheLoneWolf14)
* Increased duration of Lycanthrope's wolves a bit and allowed them to attack air
* Temporarily disabled -unstuck command

Malaysia Boleh.

2008-02-21T05:56:00.000-08:00

A police pointing his gun toward a man with a knife in his hand, a death man lay beside him.
Police: "You are now under arrested, did you kill that man?"
The suspect: "I know my rights, I want to see my judge."
Police: "Did you kill that man?!"
The suspect: "I'm not going to answer your question until I phone Lingam and get me my judge."

Here blog blog, there blog blog, here blog, there blog, everywhere blog blog

2008-02-11T03:37:00.000-08:00

Have you ever experience this?

When you go out with your friends to have a drink, they just keep laughing and talking about something that you don't know. Then you ask them, "Can you tell me something about it? It seem like very funny." "Oh, you didn't know? You didn't read her blog?" Damn, now you are out of the discussion.

or

You heard about your friend having some minor accident, you want to go and show your concern. "Are you ok? How is it? How does that happen?" Then he just give you a straight face, "go read my blog."

Just imagine what will happen in the very near future:

In the court room,
The judge: "So do you confess that you committed this crime?"
The guilty man: "I have nothing to say, your honor, go read my blog."

In the class room,
The teacher: "So Kevin, where is your homework?"
Kevin: "I didn't bring it here, go read my blog."

In the meeting room,
The boss: "Alan, I heard you want to resign?"
Alan: "Yes boss, go read my blog."

In the living room,
The father: "Hi son, how is your day?"
The son: "Dad, go read my blog."

DotA Article by World No. 1 Team

2008-02-08T07:34:00.000-08:00

This is the article by the world top player Virtus.NS

What really owns?

So, what really owns now, and makes one team win over another? I decided to think over these questions from my point of view. You can discuss skirmishes, pushes, defenses, strategies and farming as much as you want – but to me, there are two answers – stuns and blinks. Why is this the case?

1. Stun

Lets go back in time for about 2-3 years, when me and a lot of other (russian) DotA-players assembled at blizzard.ru. At that time local players invented the “mass stun” strategy, something like Centaur+Maiden+Sven+Silencer(when he had golems)+Panda(no stun but clap owned). Those guys just calculated the damage from stuns, taking away hero resistance, and understood that at lvl 7 no hero can survive, which means that it owns! At that time nobody understood why it worked so good, stun is not only damage and the possibility for another hero to stun, but it also gives you time for physical damage output – by just attacking.

At present this is obvious, and this is strong. Even the shortest stuns(0.5 sec for example) you can strike one more time and strafe to make 1-2 more strikes. So – as the longer the stun is, the more strikes and more strafes you can make. A hero with 600 range that begins attacking his target at melee range can do a lot of damage before the target runs away. Of course, this depends on move speed of both heroes, animation of the attacker, both heroes items and other factors, but the fact remains certain – ranged heroes with stun can do a lot of damage after the stun finishes – strafing and striking again. Why VP (not only VP now) usually win their lanes is because we had this knowledge – we were the first to learn how to do this, we abused it early and still abuse it now. Some teams shared our experience, MYM was even using "our"strategies. The benefit of stun is that while target is stunned u can strike it, and most of damage in DotA before 5x5 battles begin is done by hands(except some Power Nukers like Zeus, Lina, Lion and few more),so in any 1x2, 2x2 battle stun damage does not do much effect – its duration is much more important.

2. Blink

Accordingly– the best counter to stun is blink. Blink can save you from almost anything that can be a threat to you in DotA - there are a lot of different spells in DotA except stuns, and most of them can be avoided using blink. Blink is a counter to any of your rivals plans, if your enemy does not have blink, and you do - it becomes really imbalanced.

So,it is consistent that heroes that have blink as a skill are extremely powerful – they don’t have to waste 2150 and slot to buy dagger and even more abnormal and strange is that those heroes have powerful spells - by these heroes I mean Queen of Pain and Priestess of the Moon(also Puck red.). There are a lot of heroes that neither have nukes nor blink – and I don’t see what use you can make of them. Also any hero only with a nuke – Death Prophet for example – is a lot worse than hero with blink and at least one useful spell.

Another example of not so standard hero, that can be useful and even strong enough in some situations – morphling – owner of strange blink with high mana cost and big cd. It damages, but still is much less handy that QOP’s blink or POTM’s jump. But, even this strange hero comparing to DP is better –because he does have blink, though crappy one. It allows not only to escape, but to chase, that is very important too…

Antimage is rarely used in clan wars or tournaments - partly because people don’t want to generate new ideas and strategies, and because at present we play APXL mode that is a bit unfair for some heroes. AM just needs a lineup that can make some of the enemy heroes run – when that happens it's only the matter of time for Magina to kill them. Unfortunately, in APXL such heroes often get banned, or the opponent picks them – I mean different aoe-stunners-damagers, like zeus and warlock.

At Dota-Allstars.com people asked; why did MYM ban QOP and POTM when we(VP) had first pick in finals – while everybody knows, that MYM does have players that can play both of those heroes very well. The answer is obvious – they did not want us to pick either of these overpowered heroes. We, in our turn, were surprised by ourselves, how we didn't ban PotM when MYM had first pick.

Akasha can be a subject for separate discussion, because her blink, along with other her spells,makes her a really unique hero, so unique, that frankly speaking, she needs a lot of nerfing.

The only thing that absolutely counters blink dagger is hex, if we talk about the blink skill – hex and silence. Heroes with silence are almost useless (while puck is banned),heroes with hex are not any good either. Rhasta is strange hero, too little hp while his spells force him to be in the middle of the combat,and attempts to pick Lion – all of you have seen them, all of them were unsuccessful, neither our, nor MYM and KS. Maybe we did something wrong, but its more likely he is not strong enough for serious games.

At present time 90% of all heroes buy blink. Only those that don’t have to use a lot of skills during the fight don't need it, they just cast their spells at the start of the battle and after that they aren't as useful anymore, it doesn't matter for their team if they are dead or alive - warlock is a good example, he can play without blink dagger. A team with 5 blinks is almost always stronger than one with 3 blinks.

So,to counter blink which costs 2150 or only 60 mana if u have it as a skill – you need to buy guinsoo, which costs 3 times more! Balance? At least mana cost should be risen significantly.

Our team was the first to use mass-stuns and mass-blinks, it was the main reason we dominated half a year back, and it is the reason why we can’t win so easy now. Of course we have high-skilled players, and a good roster,but we are not cyborgs and not from Mars, currently there are guys that play on the same level. They shared our experience, and can now give us a battle, of course I speak about MYM first and foremost, but if nothing will change at competitive scene there will be about 10 more teams to conquer in near future.

3. Some observations

In the end I’d like to say few words about nukes. Heroes, that only nuke,without invis/stun/blink are useless with the only exception of zeus.All other nukers have stun or blink or both of them, sometimes invisibility - but invis is much less useful nowadays too. With the exception of NA of course, but he also has stun and the weapon of heavy harassment – mana burn. All other spell casters are never picked!

Today some guys asked me, what will be the new hype after mass-stuns and blink? A long time ago it was the mass-ults strategy (Faceless,Timestop/Magnus, Reverse Polarity) , later push-strategies (Chen,Syllabear), what will be the next big thing? And my answer is –nothing! Nothing will own, because if DotA doesn't change significantly– I mean changing the fact of blink and stun in DotA, which is already so familiar to us – there will be no better tactic, stun/blink/nuke will be the future of DotA for a long time.

Hope you enjoyed this article!

------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Here is the reply by MYM.Maelk

While I agree with NS that Kelens Dagger of Escape needs a severe nerf, I don't think it neccesarily hurts the... wait for it... metagames(!) developement.

It is all about someone figuring out that a hero works especially well against the current... wait for it... metagame(!) thus slowly changing it by being a new pick to take into consideration. Within the past months Magnataur, Centaur Warchief, Nerubian Assassin, Stone Giant and Moon Rider has seen alot of play, basically taking over from where Faceless Void, Rogue Knight, Shadow Fiend and Sand King left off. While the latter is still being picked, one has to agree that their effectiveness has decreased a lot and aren't valued as dearly as earlier.

I predict that heroes such as Treant Protector will start to see a lot of use (Notice the Asian scene) as he somewhat eliminates the usage of blink if you have enough damage to put into the Overgrowth. He has, by far, the best multiple disable and does in my opinion exceed Magnataur in 5v5 combat. His weaknesses are obvious, though. Also, Faceless Void will be on a fast comeback and teams will wonder why they ever stopped using him. He still has a build in blink, works exceptionally well lategame, is a direct counter to Moon Rider and his ultimate also nullifies the usage of blink unless the opponent has really fast reactiontime.

Another thing that I see happening is teams playing the smart-card and starts pushing more than earlier. Despite the ton of heroes able to counter creep-pushing (Chen, Furion, Sylla), there are other variants and also a lot of ways to disguise a pushing-strategy. You don't even need any actually tankability and damage in form of creeps if your opponent is severely crippled in the 5v5/AoE-department. Mekanasm counters what little AoE they may have and while the enemy might pick one off using their single target spells, their entire team will fall going up against massive AoE-usage.

Although it is hard to think outside the box, because it is, with the obvious strengths of the currently usable heroes, I think it is time for mediocre teams (as well as certain topteams) to make up strategies and playstyles of their own to really succeed. Victory surpasses anything, even being creative, and it is hard for teams to imagine that you can let the opponent away with having a wide array of the popular stun heroes or leave both Warlock, Magnataur, Beastmaster and PotM in the pool. It takes practice and almost always more coordination than the opponents, going for the standard picks, but in the end I think it pays off.

A thing to keep in mind when letting a lot of the most popular heroes in the pool go to the opponent, is that these popular heroes often depends on being solo-lane. When is the last time you saw a Queen of Pain having a lane-buddy? Priestess of the Moon can work, yes, but it isn't neccesarily strong as her manapool is very limited and she relies heavily on hitting her arrow. Warlock is a pain when babysitting their lategame, but also means he won't get any items himself and certainly never the feared Book o Necromicon (3). Magnataur doesn't oppose a threat on any lane before hitting level 6, he, too, needs fast levelling and the option to farm a fast blink dagger as he is easily avoidable without one.

Teams could build up strategies revolving certain heroes like Magnataur or Treant Protector, with massive 5v5 input while the opponent is stuck without being able to use blink, using Crystal Maiden, Enigma, Juggernaut, Moon Rider, Lich - The list goes on - And could beat just about anything as long as they make sure not to fall behind in lategame.

The banning process is often more important than anything, if done right, but most teams simply removes heroes they find imbalanced and hard to play against instead of looking at what suits their playstyle and opposes the biggest threat to their winning chances. Bristleback is rarely the reason teams lose. 3 games have I seen Bristleback win, all played by my own team, and every single game Shadow Priest was the reason to his success, not the Bristleback itself. At the same time, Shadow Priest is an obvious counter-pick to Bristleback, should a team ever option to actually pick him. They go as a pair.

The reason we, in MYM, are always removing heroes such as Bristleback, Spectre, Terrorblade, Syllabear, Moon Rider and so forth, is because we play on a level where we feel we can only lose if the opponents gets to farm up one of these major lategame threats. Had there been more competition at our level, and we felt pressured to make up new and unforseen strategies, our bans would be completely different. Notice how we never ban any of these heroes against Virtus Pro - We simply have more important things to worry about.

To sum it up: I encourage teams to be themselves - Find out what suits them best and try your way with different things that works for you. Watching a replay from one of the topteams, then copying their picks, won't neccesarily mean you are better off than by using your own style. A lot, if not all, strategies can work if practiced enough. An example of this is tN from Russia who used a Strength Morpling to lane with Lina and a Sylla/Viper lane using the bear exceptionally well through scouting. I will go as far as saying they gave us the most resistance throughout the groupstage despite the other teams using the cookie-cutter strategies of today including such teams as sBack and OKHO if I am not mistaken.

DotA 6.50b is out!!

2008-02-08T07:32:00.000-08:00

Here is the change log:

6.50b Changelog
===============
* Fixed a bunch of bugs reported


6.50 Changelog
==============

Hero Changes:
-------------
* Removed manacost on Mana Shield activation
* Changed Leap's cooldown to scale with levels
* Improved Juggernaut's movement speed
* Implemented a better silencing mechanism in the Black Hole area to prevent spell execution regardless of cast animation time
* Lowered Drow Ranger's Agility gain per level
* Changed Drow Ranger's Marksmanship ultimate
* Increased Morphling's base damage
* Macropyre's cooldown no longer increases per level
* Added an extra bounce to Chain Frost
* Reduced Sprint's damage amplification
* Increased Maledict's area of effect by 15
* Changed Spectre's Dispersion
* Redesigned Visage
* Improved casting range on Acid Spray
* Changed how Song of the Siren levels up
* Reduced cooldown on high level Shapeshift
* Improved armor on Enigma's Eidolons
* Reduced Expulsion's cooldown and manacost
* Improved Keeper of the Light's attack animation
* Improved Scattershot's damage range from 10-35 to 20-35
* Improved Alchemist's base Intelligence and growth
* Slightly improved Psi Blades' spill width and range
* Improved Chemical Rage
* Increased Phantom Lancer's Strength gain
* Increased cooldown on Psionic Trap from 7 to 14 seconds
* Improved lifesteal on level 2 and 3 Insatiable Hunger
* Reduced Replicate's manacost and cooldown
* Improved Troll's base movement speed
* Decreased Rampage's movement speed bonus and cooldown
* Improved Spirit Bear's Demolish
* Increased Lightning Storm's cooldown by 2 seconds
* Reduced cooldown on level 4 Metamorphosis from 135 to 110 seconds
* Reduced Lina's movement speed by 5
* Improved Sand Storm
* Reduced the slow on Epicenter
* Improved range on Drow Ranger's Trueshot Aura
* Improved cooldown progression on Insatiable Hunger
* Reduced Sven's base armor
* Improved Enigma's movement speed
* Modified initial projectile speed and effect on Paralyzing Casks
* Improved Enfeeble
* Improved Auto Fire's area of effect and duration
* Reduced Queen of Pain's Blink range at early levels
* Improved Earthshaker's movement speed
* Zombies now give a bit less bounty
* Reduced Gravechill's cooldown a bit
* Increased Primal Roar's cooldown a little bit
* Eclipse's damage is based on Lucent Beam level and doesn't ministun
* Lucent Beam ministun duration increases per level (0.6 level 4 up from a constant 0.01)
* Lowered Eclipse's manacost and gave it constant cooldown progression
* Increased Lucent Beam's casting range and lowered manacost slightly
* Improved cast range on Expulsion and Fire Storm
* Improved Ravage a little (it became slightly less effective with the Impale recodes)
* Reverse Polarity's cooldown is now the same on all levels
* Changes Queen of Pain's blink cooldown from 12/9/7/5 to 12/10/8/6 seconds
* Removed true sight from Spin Web
* Added some extra movement bonus on higher level Spin Web
* Improved Keeper of the Light's movement speed
* Improved Storm Spirit's base armor
* Lowered Mirror Image's cooldown slightly
* Improved slow on Drunken Haze
* Improved movement bonus on Witchcraft
* Lowered Searing Arrows' cooldown
* Improved Reaper's Scythe's leveling a bit
* Changed Purification's damage type to Pure
* Lowered Axe's starting Agility and increased his starting Strength
* Lowered Death Coil's cooldown
* Improved Undying's base armor
* Improved Meepo's base Strength
* Rebalanced Pit of Malice
* Increased AOE on Firestorm
* Reduced the search area for Omnislash
* Changed Bloodrage's stats a bit
* Lowered level 1 Mana Void's manacost
* Lowered Exorcism's damage return threshold and cooldown
* Restored Bone Fletcher's old Wind Walk speed bonus
* Lowered Geminate's attack cooldown
* Slightly improved how Medusa's Purge levels

Item Changes:
-------------
* Redesigned Eul's Scepter of Divinity
* Redesigned Orchid Malevolence
* Redesigned Guinsoo's Scythe of Vyse
* Added cooldown to Bottle usage and reduced its sell cost
* Bottle is in full state at all the side shops once again
* Changed how Dagger of Escape works. It cannot be activated if you took damage in the last 3 seconds.
* Added Hyperstone to the Goblin Shop
* Changed Unholy Rage's lifesteal type to be the same as regular lifesteal
* Reduced price on Ultimate Orb
* Added Ring of Health to the Goblin Shop
* Added Quarterstaff to the Goblin Shops
* Increased Perseverance's damage from 7 to 10
* Added Javelin to the Goblin Shops
* Removed the stack restriction on Shiva's Guard
* Improved Vanguard a little
* Changed Lothar's Edge's recipe and stats
* Reduced Vladmir's Offering recipe cost
* Reduced Linken's Sphere's cooldown
* Removed stacking restriction from Bloodstone and improved its stats
* Improved Helm of the Dominator damage from 10 to 20
* Improved Oblivion Staff mana regen by 25%
* Quarterstaff price reduced
* Hand of Midas can now target level 6 Neutrals (Satyr Hellcaller and Dark Troll Warlord)
* Reduced Void Stone's cost by 25 gold
* Improved casting range per level of Dagon upgrade
* Improved Sange and Yasha
* Removed Flying Courier Mana and gave it a Mana base upgrade ability
* Wards now require 5 mana to be placed
* Reduced animation time and cooldown on Manta Style
* Ring of Health's regeneration increased by 1

Neutral Related:
----------------
* Change some of the Scourge's top left forest area
* Changed the locations and distribution of neutral creep camp groups
* Fixed neutral spawn times in various modes
* Reworked the trees and pathing near the small Sentinel creep camp
* Increased neutral creep Centaur's aura by 5%
* Added an Alpha Wolf with a command aura in the wolves' creep camp
* Added a new creep camp group (1 Ghost with Frost Attack + 2 Fel Beasts)
* Added a new ancient creep camp group (Jungle Stalkers)
* Added a new creep camp group (1 Enraged Wildken with Tornado + 2 Wildkins)
* Added a new creep camp group (1 Dark Troll Warlord with Raise Dead and 1.5 sec Ensnare + 2 Dark Trolls)
* Changed the Furbolg's Stomp to a Clap
* Improved Satyr Hellcaller's Unholy Aura
* Neutral Ogre no longer autocast Frost Armor  
* Changed the location of some of the Scourge creep camps
* Redid neutral creep spawner code for some optimizations

Bug Fixes:
-----------
* Recoded impale based effects completely, fixing various ramp bugs, stacking issues and a lot of rare problems. (Burrowstrike, Impale (Lion), Impale (Nerubian Assassin), Ravage)
* Fixed Land Mines to properly detect floating heroes
* Fixed a problem with Huskar's Burning Spears that would cause him to swing incorrectly when the enemy is moving
* Fixed some bugs with Wild Axes
* Fixed some color issues on the load screen (kunkka)
* Couriers can no longer use Scroll of Town Portal to make buildings invulnerable
* Fixed Dark Rift from initiating cooldown when cast incorrectly
* Fixed a bug introduced in the recent Aghanim's Scepter changes on Crystal Maiden
* Fixed Last Word triggering off of Linken's Sphere's usage
* Fixed Berserker Rage triggering Essence Aura
* Insatiable Hunger, God's Strength and Rampage are no longer removed by Cyclone
* Fixed Javelin's odds being slightly off
* Fixed an issue with the Cheese drop from Roshan
* Fixed an issue with Forest Troll High Priest's pathing scale
* Fixed some text display problems when viewing replays (thanks DonTomaso)
* Fixed a very minor bug with Elder Form's duration
* Fixed Armlet of Mordiggian's recipe cooldown
* Fixed typo on Psi Blades
* Fixed some creep death time discrepancies (188461)
* Fixed a very minor bug with the damage mechanism on Shukuchi
* Fixed a display bug with Mode Random
* Fixed a possible abuse with Helm of the Dominator
* Fixed Overload from using its charge when attacking an allied unit
* Fixed Last Word from turning off Electric Rave

Others:
-------
* Remade Invoker as promised in 6.49
* Added a new game mode -singledraft or -sd (swiss)
* Improved Sentinel creep pathing on top Sentinel lane
* Adjusted starting gold between all game modes like ap/xl/rd/sd to be the same (all the same as xl) and for randoms to be like ar. Gold is now give at the start and income starts with the first creep wave.
* Income is now distributed in 1 gold intervals instead of in 8 gold intervals (same total gold)
* Added a new experimental command -ah
* Added a new system to detect replays used in -ah and other future applications (thanks PandaMine)
* Changed how the secondary shops work. You can now see their location and click them while in fog.
* Added new visual effect for Orchid Malevolence's Soul Burn (JetFango)
* -roll now shows the range the person entered (188889)
* Added a new command -clear to clear game messages from your screen
* Reduced model size and changed the look of the non-ancient Golems
* Added a new command -apm to show your actions per minute
* Couriers can now disassemble items (161180)
* Added text descriptions for power ups (68307)
* Delayed the creep spawn time by 30 seconds in -vr
* Made "Helm of Iron Will" item name consistent between recipes and core, using Helm instead of Helmet.
* Centered swap request notice is given to a player (182779)
* Added -afk that displays how long each player has been idle for
* Added a conditionally available -kickafk command to boot players that have been idle for more than 10 minutes (171984)
* Necronomicon icon now changes per level (190183)
* Changed durations of some power ups (Haste 45->30, Illusion 60->75, Regen 45->30)
* Moon Wells now gather water during night and get drained during day. This has no gameplay impact (60920)
* Added new tooltip text on items showing if they can be disassembled
* Improved tooltip for observer wards to detail the stock mechanics
* Added a new command -courier that toggles idle courier icon on and off (Ro-Coco)
* Added a new command -swapall to request to swap for any hero (175040)
* Improved Shackles caster effect
* Added an additional constant (7) Mana regeneration to Fountains
* Removed replenish interval from buying Clarity Potion (like tangos now)
* Changed Heartstopper pure damage type to HP loss (not a nerf or a buff, just works with things like dagger in a more desirable way)
* Improved Electric Rave icon (169997)
* Improved Luna's orb warning message (113338)

A lot of work has been done on developing a system for seamlessly translating DotA to other languages. Thanks to Danat for his help and support on it and to the new translators that have signed up. Once the initial language translation is complete, I will make a post to recruit people that wish to translate into other languages.

Thanks to the following beta testers for their help:
2MT, 4nTr4xX, Aoen, Akuryou, ArcheKleine, AtroCty, Beary, BeastPete, Blaow, Burning-Legions, Calf85, Capnrawr, Cascaderro, chiwhisox, Clogon, Cornerstone, Damican, DarkCloud, DarkMist, DBX_5TM, Dimitrii, Disrup3, EastyMoryan, esby, Eldorquo, EnderX, Evil-Zergling, Exetasi, Exy, Fellower_of_Odin, Firewyrm, frlolg, FzeroXx, gorzerk, Grunthor, Guvoverthere07, HunterX2, IEatDeadPeoples, Infrisios, Jmesch04, Ki-HunterKiller, kugelkind, landonmullet, Loki57, LulaLula, Mago-Merlino, Malakal, McGrady, Minotaar, Moimucus, Nova, PharadoX, phssy_galore, ptdprac, PudgeIsAPirate, Quicksilva, Redial2, Rifleman00, Rigor_Mortis, Ro-Coco, Rubadub, Severas, sketch-e, Sledgehmr, Slopy, spielkind, sSerenity, StokesII, Tarano, Terrorblaze, Thermald, The_Intimidator, TimeToParty, tinfoiltank, Tinker, Tomahawk_Chop, Trozz_, Truxton, Tuwl, u-nL-ike, unHOLYdoNUTS, vigi-, Volcove, whifrA, Wretch, the_white_mage, Y0UR, Zagruss, Zarent, Zethal

My little movie review: Malena

2008-02-05T07:25:00.000-08:00

I still remember throughout the 10 weeks of shitty industrial training, the only happy moment is watching movies. I have watched the whole 2 or more season of LV CIS and most importantly I watched this movie, Malena.

When you first look at this movie, you think it is just some kind of cheap lousy movie which are going to use sex to lure its audience (like Ang Lee stupid "lust.cautious"). In truth, this movie is more than meet the eyes. It have deeper meaning buried inside the sexual fantasy of a little boy.

It showed us the curse of a beautiful and sexy women. The suffering of the wartime. The will to adapt and change in order to survive. It told a story of the loneliness and helplessness, the sorrow and the shame.

I recommend you all to watch and enjoy.

The movie poster

By the most sexy actress after Angelina Jolie, Monica Belucci

Dota 6.49c ai is out

2008-02-05T07:06:00.000-08:00

For those of you who want to try dota yet don't want other people to call you noob. You can play with ai. I assure you the ai is good.

AMARAN DARIPADA KERAJAAN:
Main Dota membahayakan kesihatan.
Dilarang dimain oleh orang yang kurang daripada 8 jam tidur.

Young and pretty lady wishes to marry a rich guy. Fantastic reply from a financial person

2007-12-01T20:46:00.000-08:00

A young and pretty lady posted this on a popular forum:

Title: What should I do to marry a rich guy?

I'm going to be honest of what I'm going to say here. I'm 25 this year. I'm very pretty, have style and good taste. I wish to marry a guy with $500k annual salary or above. You might say that I'm greedy, but an annual salary of $1M is considered only as middle class in New York . My requirement is not high. Is there anyone in this forum who has an income of $500k annual salary? Are you all married? I wanted to ask: what should I do to marry rich persons like you? Among those I've dated, the richest is $250k annual income, and it seems that this is my upper limit. If someone is going to move into high cost residential area on the west of New York City Garden ( ? ) , $250k annual income is not enough.

I'm here humbly to ask a few questions:

1) Where do most rich bachelors hang out? (Please list down the names and addresses of bars, restaurant, gym)

2) Which age group should I target?

3) Why most wives of the riches is only average-looking? I＊ve met a few girls who doesn＊t have looks and are not interesting, but they are able to marry rich guys

4) How do you decide who can be your wife, and who can only be your girlfriend? (my target now is to get married)

Ms. Pretty

Here's a reply from a Wall Street Financial guy:

Dear Ms. Pretty,

I have read your post with great interest. Guess there are lots of girls out there who have similar questions like yours. Please allow me to analyze your situation as a professional investor. My annual income is more than $500k, which meets your requirement, so I hope everyone believes that I'm not wasting time here.

From the standpoint of a business person, it is a bad decision to marry you. The answer is very simple, so let me explain. Put the details aside, what you＊re trying to do is an exchange of beauty and money: Person A provides beauty, and Person B pays for it, fair and square. However, there's a deadly problem here, your beauty will fade, but my money will not be gone without any good reason. The fact is, my income might increase from year to year, but you can't be prettier year after year. Hence from the viewpoint of economics, I am an appreciation asset, and you are a depreciation asset. It's not just normal depreciation, but exponential depreciation. If that is your only asset, your value will be much worried 10 years later

By the terms we use in Wall Street, every trading has a position, dating with you is also a "trading position". If the trade value dropped we will sell it and it is not a good idea to keep it for long term, same goes with the marriage that you wanted. It might be cruel to say this, but in order to make a wiser decision any assets with great depreciation value will be sold or "leased". Anyone with over $500k annual income is not a fool; we would only date you, but will not marry you. I would advice that you forget looking for any clues to marry a rich guy. And by the way, you could make yourself to become a rich person with $500k annual income. This has better chance than finding a rich fool.

Hope this reply helps. If you are interested in "leasing" services, do contact me
signed, J.P. Morgan