The Goliath guide

First there was the Big Alpha infographic. Now, there's the Goliath infographic:

This new infographic puts into perspective just how powerful a real-life Goliath would be. Except it doesn't really, because it uses imperial units. So for those of you not in the United States, Myanmar, or Liberia,* here's a quick 'translation' of the units to the metric system so that you can fully grasp the magnitude of Goliath's feats.

Height (1 metre ≈ 3.281 feet)

Goliath = 22.5' ≈ 6.858 m
Hunter = 6.5' ≈ 1.981 m

6.5' seems a bit tall for the hunters, especially given that the average height of a male, aged 20-29 in the U.S. is only 5'10''.

Perhaps in the future people will have evolved to become taller, or be genetically augmented in a Space Marine manner.




Leap Smash (Distance) (1 metre ≈ 3.281 feet)

Goliath = 52' ≈ 15.850 m

52' divided by 8 is actually 6.5'

Red kangaroos (Macropus rufus) can jump as far as 9 m (= 29.528') in a single hop, which means Goliath can only leap ~1.761 times that of a kangaroo. Not quite as impressive.


Bite Force (1 newton ≈ 0.225 pounds force)

The bite force of a Nile crocodile (Crocodylus niloticus) is 22 kN (≈ 5000 lbf), while that of a saltwater crocodile (Crocodylus porosus) is 16 kN (≈ 3700 lbf). The data here are a little dubious, as salties are meant to have the highest recorded bite force in a laboratory environment, and the conversions have been rounded up.

However if we take the average for the two crocodile species, we get 19 kN, so Goliath's bite force would be approximately 247 kN, or 56550 lbf!



Weight (1 metric tonne ≈ 1.102 U.S. ton**)

Goliath = 9.6 tons ≈ 8.709 t
Killer whale = 9 tons ≈ 8.165 t

Killer whales (Orcinus orca) are not actually whales, and instead belong to the dolphin family. The recorded weight of largest known male killer whale was ~ 10 t, or 11.023 tons. So Goliath is comparable in size to a large dolphin.

Speed (1 metre/ second ≈ 3.208 feet/ second)

Hunter = 23 ft/s ≈ 7.014 m/s

The fastest recorded speed for a human is 12.420 m/s (= 40.748 ft/s). This was achieved by Jamaican sprinter Usain Bolt during a 100 m (= 328.084') sprint event held in 2009.

The average walking speed of a human is 1.4 m/s, or 4.593 ft/s.

At a leisurely stroll (1.4 m/s), it would take approximately 17.853 seconds to clear the 24.994 m (= 82') radius of Goliath's flame breath. Therefore minimal chance of survival. At the hunter's speed of 7.014 m/s, it would take 3.563 s to escape, slightly better odds of surviving. At the record speed of 12.420 m/s, it would only take 2.012 s to escape Goliath's bad breath.

Since we don't know how fast Goliath can run, it is difficult to determine exact chances of surviving a flame breath by simply turning tail, and running. Having fire resistant armour, and a nearby medic, would no doubt greatly increase your chances of survival.


Distance (again, sort of) (1 metre ≈ 3.281 feet)

Goliath can lob a projectile 167' (= 50.902 m), which is pretty impressive.

While a majority of pine tree species reach heights of only 15–45 m (= 49.216–147.638'), the tallest ponderosa pine (Pinus pnderosa) has been measured to be 81.770 m (= 268.274') tall. So climbing to the top of this would put you well out of range of Goliath's missiles.

Conclusion

Goliath is pretty mean, but not as mean as the initial figures made him out to be. Still you probably wouldn't want to run into him in a dark alley Shear forest on your own.

I'm really hoping Turtle Rock and 2K release similar infographics for the remaining roster of monsters, as well as some more background stories for the hunters. Actually an infographic detailing the various flora, fauna, and environments of Shear would be great too.

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* These countries have yet to officially adopt the metric system, with the United States being the only industrialised country to not yet have adopted the metric system.

** Also known as a short ton.

The brain of a serial killer infographic

A friend of mine recently posted this on Facebook. While I was reading though it my, wife looked over my shoulder and asked if I could email it to her. She now wants to read the 'book.' 

I'm not sure if I should be worried about my wife's intentions, or if she is worried about my intentions.

Source: NowSourcing

Evovle's Big Alpha Infographic

Evovle's 'Big Alpha' event has come and gone, and from this infographic it looks as though it was a huge success:

These were the dates that the Big Alpha ran for.

At the moment it seems that playing as a hunter means you have a 56.75% chance of winning a game, versus only a a 42.25% chance if you play as a monster.

That seems to be a pretty balanced outcome. Given that most players would have been familiar with a 'hunting style,' it's not surprising that the hunters fared better. 

What will be interesting to see is how these figures change after a few more balancing tweaks, and after the games official release. I'm fairly certain some players (see below) will opt to become specialised monster players, honing their skills at evading hunters, optimising evolutionary progressions, and learning which abilities to use in particular environments and scenarios.

These figures really intrigue me. Assuming that every match had five players, four hunters and a compulsory monster, it's interesting to note that the Assault and Monster classes were the most favoured. I'm guessing the Assault class was popular because of flamethrowers, miniguns, and lightning guns. I mean who doesn't like flamethrowers, miniguns, and lightning guns?

Well me actually. Personally (and if South Africa hadn't been excluded from the Big Alpha), I would have chosen to play as either Griffin (Trapper) or Lazarus (Medic). Obviously harpoon guns, silenced sniper rifles, personal cloaking devices, and "slightly illegal" devices that effectively make your character a necromancer aren't as sexy as flamethrowers and lightning guns. Whatever.

That's a lot of rounds played. Just imagine how many more rounds there could have been had so many PlayStation 4 players not experienced issues.

It seems a lot of people like to watch with approximately 5 viewers per round played.

It definitely seems like a lot of people like to watch. Creepy bastards.

Were these just regular players, or was there a developer involved?  

If you like gaming orientated infographics here are a couple for Call of Duty and Diablo III.

Know your sh1t!

Yesterday my brother-in law sent me the following infographic about 'poop.' I'm not sure if he's genuinely concerned about my health, or if this is his idea of toilet humour.

There's also family-friendly version of this infographic if you want to share it with children, or people who may take offence to the word 'shit.' 

Hier werden Schweinswale!

Want to learn how to name animals in German?

No - Navigate away from this page
Yes - Carry on reading...

Source: Babbel

Preferred camera gear of the pros

I came across this story about Hastolomegapixeles recently released infographic across at PetaPixel. The infographic displays which camera manufacturers and bodies are used by World Press Photo award winners.

What I find most interesting is Canon's absolute dominance, with 58%* of the winning shots having been taken with a Canon, most notably the winning photograph by John Stanmeyer, compared to Nikon's mere 28%. Interestingly the top three camera bodies were all manufactured by Canon, with the EOS 5D Mk II proving to still be as popular as it's successor, the EOS 5D Mk III, despite the Mk II being six years old. Canon's flagship professional DSLR, the EOS 1D X took the top spot, while the Nikon equivalent, the D4, took fourth place.

Clearly the pros prefer to use traditional SLR cameras as opposed to their mirrorless, medium format, or compact cameras counterparts. Surprisingly though, 2% are still relying on film [pelicula] cameras to capture their award-winning photographs. While this is a very small percentage, it shows that film still has a place in the world of modern photography other than being abused by hipsters.

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* This percentage doesn't take into account the 13 'unknown' [sin datos] bodies, or about 23.2% of the data. If these unknowns are included, then the percentages would be: Canon 44.6%, Nikon 21.4%, Leica 5.4%, Sony 3.6%, Mamiya 1.8%. Either way Canon is about twice as popular as Nikon.

Beer versus coffee

Here's a neat infographic featuring two of my favourite beverages; beer and coffee:

Source: I Love Coffee

I'd imagine you could substitute 'beer' in the above infographic for any other alcoholic beverage, since it's the alcohol content of the beer that makes it a 'creative juice.' In which case, why not kick of a productive day with an Irish coffee!

It has begun...

I finally got around to finishing Diablo II: Lord of Destruction last week, more than a decade after its original release. To be honest, I don't really remember what the outcome of the game was. Other than the fact that the loot dropped by Baal was pretty useless, I barely remember the closing cinematic. Come to think of it, was there even one?

So this weekend I decided to get started on Diablo III. I'd watched the opening cinematic for Diablo III when I installed the system updated, but I decided to watch it again for inspiration before creating my character. It's mind-blowing how much more realistic the Diablo III characters, Leah and Deckard Cain are drawn, when compared to Marius and The Dark Wanderer of Diablo II. Even more amazing is just how good the controls for Diablo III are mapped to the PlayStation 3's DualShock controller. It feels as though the game was developed specifically to be played on a current generation console. Initially I was a little sceptical of how the mouse and keyboard controls would recreated for console controllers, and I'm relieved to say that this was actually done exceptionally well.

For now the only advantage of using a mouse comes in the form of being able to left-click (or right-click, depending on what action you've assigned) on the monster I wish to attack, and by holding the mouse button, my character would continue to attack the enemy until it died. I find selecting which monster I want to attack with the controller a little more hap-hazard, and continually having to mash 'X' to attack is beginning to get a little frustrating. That said, I haven't tried holding 'X' while attacking, so that could be easily solved. But while attacking with the mouse in Diablo II, I never accidentally looted chests, used shrines, or opened doors. All of which have happened to me so far while playing Diablo III on a console. While no biggie, I have also unintentionally dropped chandeliers while fighting one monster, and waiting for another to step under said chandelier. Perhaps the 'loot/ use/ break/ open' action button is the one thing I would change, and have it assigned to another button. Since I've only played a few hours, maybe I'm doing it wrong.

Based partly on the results from the Diablo III character class poll (thanks to the person who voted), the fact that Act V of Diablo II: Lord of Destruction is set on the foothills of Mount Arreat, in the heart of the Barbarian homeland, and that I have never played using the Barbarian, I created a Barbarian class character.

Despite not having spent much time playing Diablo III, and apart from the few quibbles above, I've enjoyed every other aspect of the game so far, and am looking forward to spending many more hours exploring the world of Sanctuary, slaying beats and monster, while searching for better loot, and levelling up my character.

Lastly, here's a link to a cool infographic that Blizzard put together for the one year anniversary since the release of Diablo III.

What is your country best at?

Dog House Diaries compiled the following map of the world, showing which 'commodity' each country is the global leader of. Here's the list of sources if you want to see which countries save the most energy (Republic of Congo), or are the happiest (Costa Rica), or are the most corrupt (Turkmenistan).

Source: Dog House Diaries (bigger)

How to take Instagram-like photos using vintage cameras

The folks over at 1000memories (which is shutting down at the end of the month) created the following infographic to show how to create Instagram-like effects, using good old-fashioned film cameras. Helena Price's article behind the process of making the figure is really interesting too.

Source: 1000memories

Around the World in 80 Beers

Following on from the maps of the United States' favourite alcoholic beverages and how to say 'beer' in Europe, here's a map by PureTravel entitled 'Around the World in 80 Beers.'

 Larger version, and close up of each continent available at PureTravel

While I haven't nearly as many countries as I would have liked to, I have had the fortune of drinking several of these (as well as other local brews) on my travels.

How to say 'beer' in Europe

Here's a map by Feòrag NicBhrìde showing the various word(s) for 'beer' in the local language(s) for the whole of Europe. You can also download it as a PDF or PNG file.

I'll definitely be consulting this before my next trip to Europe.

Happy 4th of July!

Especially for the American readers:

Source: Thrillist - Red, White and Booze

My American geographical knowledge isn't the best, but I will definitely keep this map in mind for my intended trip to New York, Boston and Los Angeles later this year.

Facts about Animal Hearts

The National Wildlife Federation shared an infographic about animal hearts on their website. The Oatmeal shared it on Facebook, crashing the NWF's website. Good thing the NWF shared it on Pinterest too.

Source: Uploaded by user via National Wildlife Federation on Pinterest

As the Oatmeal put it, "Happy aortic-squishy-blood-muscle day."