voted. bitches.

Also voted for ya flip.

Thanks again everyone! The support is sincerely appreciated.

Spatula, the best thing you can do is just keep sending shit out. Hopes springs eternal (at least as long as you've got unread submissions). You never know what someone's going to relate to. The two stories I thought were the best shit I'd ever written are still unpublished and languishing with 42 and 30+ rejections. Meanwhile the last two stories that have gotten published were almost after thoughts. I didn't think they were quite ready but I sent them out just to test the waters, see if I could fish for comments. Teeter got rejected a only handful of times before I received a personal comment about the ending that really made something click. I re-wrote the end. The next submission was to Bartleby Snopes (a decently well known online mag) and they accepted it.

The story before Teeter, I wrote in one afternoon, disliked it, sent it to one little journal for no good reason and they published it. The whole process is arbitrary, annoying and more often than not disheartening.

Got a few rounds in with Cactus tonight. Good times shooting bitches in the face.

My new iPhone wallpaper:

Anyone else ever have this happen? I was playing some Rush last night, (the last couple of rounds with Spatch), and I had a really great round the last round I played. I got something like 7 awards, 3 of which were awards I'd never won before, unlocked a weapon, got something like 8000 point, and got 2 trophies.

After that round, I decided to call it a night. I saw my stats, awards, etc. and I sat at the screen until it started asking me to hit X to join the next game. I hit start and went to exit game. I wanted to check my stats before I went to bed, so I opened "My Stats" from the main menu, and there were no stats at all there. It was like I had never played. So I restarted the game, went back into My Stats, and I still have stats, but none of the stats/awards/unlocks that I earned that round were there. I still have my trophies, of course, but not the unlocks that resulted in those trophies, and they are the only things I have to show for that round. The points I will earn again, not a huge deal, but I am kinda pissed about the unique awards I am now missing, as I don't know if I'll be able to earn them again, and one speicfic one I don't even feel like trying again (Killstreak of 5 with the UMP SA), as it was a bitch.

I checked my stats again this morning to make sure it wasn't some kind of gilitch like their servers hadn't updated yet, but all my stuff is still missing.

Happens ALL the time. Don't worry about it. Use the stat site that we all do instead:

http://bfbcs.com/stats_ps3/Cactuskind

Your stats will return in game, you haven't lost anything.

I've had it happen less lately but yeah, it was really disconcerting the first few times it happened.

Whoever was in our squad that was flying the chopper was a nice, aggressive player and it was appreciated. Our team just wasn't getting to the objectives. I was floored that I armed nearly all of those objectives on Valparaiso and I jumped in with less than half the tickets left on the first set. Those blueberries just didn't go for it! Meanwhile, I'm sneaking behind enemy lines, blowing campers away with a shotgun, arming, setting a mortar strike, and yum-yum - more kills!

If you said anything on the mic before you left, Cactus, I didn't catch it because I muted the squad so my wife and I could chat about our upcoming move while I was playing. Plus, no one was talking and I felt like I was talking to myself. I try not to do that because I know even if no one is talking they can likely hear me and what I'm saying about enemy positions could be helpful but I've noticed a serious lack of mic chatter since BF3 overall and it's not uncommon at all to be in silent random squads all night.

I did say I was calling it a night and then said bye, but I figured something like that was going on, since I was met with silence. No biggie.

Sorry if I'm not talking enough. I didn't play much when you guys were really into this, and I've been playing with mostly silent randoms the majority of the time, so sometimes I feel like I don't even know the right things to say.

I'd like to get back into this... My battlefield train got derailed by Skyrim. That game sucks your life away. The silence is pretty much the norm unless you play with the DVDTalkers and their friends. I'm in the same situation with jumping in late and playing mostly with randoms when I started. In my opinion the game is WAY more fun when you're in a good squad that's communicating. It gets super aggravating when you feel like you're the only one playing objectives.

I noticed this game just showed up on the PSN as a digital download... maybe there will be an influx of new players. Not sure if that would be good or bad though.

Not concerned about whether you're "talking enough." But if you're asking what one would even talk about (aside from friendly chit-chat), I tend to let people know where I was killed and where the enemy is unless they're already being ripped to pieces in my killcam, if someone's arming or close to the objective, set up strategies for how to sneak a squad in or out, where I'm taking fire from, to ask for ammo or med packs or let someone know they need food, selecting the next objective to tackle as a squad in conquest (above and beyond marking an objective), and of course, to complain about getting knifed by the same Level 50 guy over and over.

The big move is on Saturday and if you see me online this week please pop on to say 'hi' and stab wookiees with me as I'm likely taking a rare and much-needed break from packing boxes and working on finals.

Picked up the official Sony PS3 headset last week. We decided to plunk down the cash on them (not cheap, yikes!) because at our new place the living room will be below our bedroom and I don't want to wake up my wife if I'm up late blowing stuff up. Plus, it looks like the couch will be slightly farther away from the TV than it is now and my current headset, a USB-corded Plantronics DSP-500, likely won't reach (too bad; it's a great headset!). So far, so good. The noise cancelling effect is cool though I literally can't hear a word my wife is saying without muting the headphones. I do like how quickly I can mute the mic so we can chat at home without bugging you all.

Good luck on the move and finals. I've enjoyed the same headset myself. Definitely a big fan of the easy muting. I also like how easy it is to increase chat volume while decreasing game volume or vice versa depending on the situation.

The PS3 is in the new townhome and the TV, receiver, and speakers are still in the old apartment. Not sure when I'll get back on as this week is finals week and spending a couple hours getting the entertainment system hooked together really isn't the biggest priority. I might be on again in the middle of next week. In the meantime, if you have any interesting games you should post about them here so I don't go through withdrawal all alone.

I've been absurdly busy getting ready for a move across the country to the civilized half of Pennsylvania. I'll actually be living across the river in New Jersey, and because it's only 2 years (probably), we're downsizing from house to apartment. So we've been hustling to get rid of all kinds of stuff.

Will definitely be back on the battlefields next month, and maybe a bit before.

So let me get this straight.

Not only are you moving to the asshole side of PA, but you're going to live in the Jersey suburbs of the asshole side of PA. Were you actively in search of inner circles of hell?

No, I'm trying to track down Nic's biological father.

My job will be right across the bridge from Jersey, so it was pretty much my only choice. Believe me, I'm not excited about it.

ugh Jersey. smell ya later.

Can't be worse than Kabul.

I hear Camden's nice this time of year.

I know there's a decidely anti-sniper stance among the group here, but anyone got any tips (good locations, etc.) on how I might reach a killstreak of 5 with the M95 SPECACT? It's the last award I need for the Recon SPECACT trophy (got all the other SPECACT trophies).

The other killstreaks I got eventually thru just playing, but those were easier because if someone got close, it was a lot easier to gun them down. The M95 has one shot with a signifcant time to load the next shot into the chamber, and no onscreen recticle for no-scope shots.

Highest killstreak I've reached is probably 3. And usually once you start shooting it doesn't take other snipers very long to figure out where you are and pick you off. Plus I kinda suck at sniping. I pretty much have to find someone standing perfectly still for me to be able to take them out.

The snipers who kill me a few times in a row, even earn a nemesis pin on me, tend to hide in of three places:
1. The top of a tree that looks like a dozen others on the same map.
2. The interior of a building that looks like a dozen others on the same map.
3. The inside of a bush that looks like a hundred others on the same map.

See if you can find those places and do some damage. When I snipe with my VSS, I use magnum ammo and the ammo upgrade to get more ammo since it goes so fast. It's part preference, part skill, and part whether a map seems built for it or not, but there are some maps I just don't snipe on (Arica Harbor, Laguna Presa, Nelson Bay, Panama Canal, Port Valdez) and some I do (Atacama Desert, Harvest Day, Heavy Metal, Laguna Alta, Oasis, White Pass). That said, one can snipe from any map pretty well if they're okay with only taking 1-3 kills and then moving to a new spot before someone who knows the map pretty well comes up and knifes them. You'd probably get a ton of sniper kills if you were Defending on a Rush map like Oasis, Laguna Presa, or Valaparaiso.

Think I might shoot some bitches in the face tonight.

Thanks again Spatch! Your tips are way better than the ones I was finding on the trophy hunting sites. Played some Rush on Oasis picked a nice second floor hiding spot, and had it in a few minutes!