Parry and Spar, or is it... Reluctant Admiral 4.2 Fulkerson(J) vs Moore (A)

[larryfulkerson]

Off the coast of the home islands one of my hunters becomes the prey. D'oh.

[larryfulkerson]

ORIGINAL: moore4807
I was reading on another AAR, where someone made a comment about "imposter" AAR's where people were trying to "style" thier AAR's like the one I was reading.

Talking about style.....most of the AAR's I've seen so far read like novels ( with very few pictures ) with massive listing(s) of combat
results etc. I'm trying to make our AAR read like a comic book with a picture on every panel. I love pictures and I'm guessing I'm not
alone in this. I especially like moving pictures, like movies. I haven't figured out how to make the smaller movies and post them
here or else we'd have them too. I HAVE figured out how to do GIF animations however and I'm always on the lookout to be able to
use the technique in our AAR.

ORIGINAL: moore4807
My response is Ummm- DUH! Isn't imitation the sincerest form of flattery? I have my favorite AAR's and have used comments and knowledge gained from them to improve my skills in this AAR. I always try to give credit where its due, and I faithfully read between 5-10 other AAR's here. Now I wasn't called out or named as doing this - but it struck me as weird since I'm a newbie AAR player, ego wise wouldn't you want someone to like what you do enough to copy your "style"?

I agree. There's so little degrees of freedom in doing an AAR that invariably some overlap in "style" is going to take place. I hope
our AAR is a little bit different.

[larryfulkerson]

SS KXIII receives 4 (four) hits from one of my PB's. I'm hoping that's enough to make him go home to repair. I need less Allied subs.

[larryfulkerson]

I thought I'd "waste" one of my bombardment attacks to (1) see if I could bombard a non-base hex ( yes ) and (2) try to discourage our
little green friend while he's trying to sneak into Zambo. I've since unloaded an INF unit in Zambo to give him a welcoming message
from the empiror so I say let him keep on keeping on.

[larryfulkerson]

Here's me doing a landing at "Me rack" on the northern end of Java. I'm trying to get an advance going from both ends of the
island so that everybody meets in the middle. I've got air cover from the ends but nothing in the middle right now you see.

[larryfulkerson]

I turned off the bombardment contributions from the INF units and so this is just the arty tubes in action. It's too slow this way to suit me
but I want to avoid the high losses the INF units get. Solution: more beat-down from planes and / or some ship-to-shore stuff.

[larryfulkerson]

Here's what happened on the ground at Cebu. I'm wondering if the defenders are ready for another direct assault??? I'd really rather
have higher odds on the attack however. Maybe some more ship-to-shore action to soften them up some more.

[larryfulkerson]

I'd like to try a DA next turn but my guys are out of supplies and I hate fighting a war that way. You gotta set traps to catch the birds
and even then they are only good for maybe 1 3/4 bites before you gotta grab another one. Worms are nutritious and taste like
peanut butter but the thought of eating them is discouraging.

[larryfulkerson]

I lost some more people to an Allied bombardment attack. I'd do some counter-battery stuff but my boys are out of supplies. I should
have checked that before we left the port to come here. D'oh. Live and learn.

[larryfulkerson]

Here's what happened at location code named Wo Wo. He attacks me but he gets the losses. That gives me an idea.......why don't I do
my own bombardment. Stay tuned for tomorrow's report on Wo Wo.

[larryfulkerson]

I'm steadily working through my moves and it occured to me that I use the "absolute" threat setting a lot on my TF's. Anybody else do
that? Jim and I noticed that the "normal" or "low" setting tends to give the TF commander more leeway in his decision making loop
than we desire. I realize that this is just a game and everything and that some leeway is realistic and so on but I'd really like my computer
warriors to do what I tell them. Jim's TF commander refused to engage my two DD's and I sank all his AK's within binocular range of his
CA's and DD's and if Jim could replace the commander on the spot he would have. Can we do a sort of informal poll on what setting is
most popular? Why don't some of you readers post something about what setting you use and your reasoning. Thanks ahead of time.

[larryfulkerson]

The little sub symbol on the map is there to tell us that a sub is in that hex but does it necessarily point to the approx. position of the
sub or can it be anywhere in the hex? Depending upon how many other ships are in the hex I've seen it in the upper right and the
lower left, etc. and I'm guessing that it doesn't actually tell you where the sub is. So if I'm arranging the ASW to "cover" that sub is
somewhere in that hex good enough or does it actually have to "cover" the sub symbol? I can't tell whether or not the game engine
is havng the ASW "find" the sub depending on the graphical solution(s) or not. Hence my question.

[moore4807]

Larry,

I've been hacked! Some rotten S.O.B got past my firewalls and Norton 360 Premier antivirus! A nonremovable screen appears using the FBI's header "alleging" I was viewing porn on my computer and the Federal Bureau of Investigation will "accept" a fine of $200 to free my computer in one to 48 hours using ONLY Greendot something or other payment method. . . Ya like sure, if it wasnt written so badly and a government agency would use a private credit card firm to process payment .

My biggest worry is they got to my e-mail list and are spamming it too. Use caution opening any e-mails from me until I get this sorted out.
So until I can clear up this mess - I'm down and out. I'm using my wife's computer to access this site since I cannot use my computer at all right now.


In reply to your question above - I believe the sub location is not "where" the symbol is in the hex. The hex has designated areas where you would look ie; lower left for enemy troops lower right for your troops then as the symbols fill in the move to a preferred open hex side. It's 46 miles across for each hex, so anywhere in those approx 196 sq miles you will find your huckleberry!

Thanks
Jim

[larryfulkerson]

ORIGINAL: moore4807
Larry,

I've been hacked! Some rotten S.O.B got past my firewalls and Norton 360 Premier antivirus! A nonremovable screen appears using the FBI's header "alleging" I was viewing porn on my computer and the Federal Bureau of Investigation will "accept" a fine of $200 to free my computer in one to 48 hours using ONLY Greendot something or other payment method. . . Ya like sure, if it wasnt written so badly and a government agency would use a private credit card firm to process payment .

First of all lemme say that I'm sorry you got hacked. If something like that happened to me I'm pretty sure I would have to take it to a
computer repair shop to get the virus removed. This might be a good opportunity to upgrade your operating system to Windows 7
if you haven't already upgraded.

ORIGINAL: moore4807
My biggest worry is they got to my e-mail list and are spamming it too. Use caution opening any e-mails from me until I get this sorted out.

I haven't received any suspecious emails from you yet so maybe we're in the clear on this count. Although there might be a built-in
time delay or something.

ORIGINAL: moore4807
So until I can clear up this mess - I'm down and out. I'm using my wife's computer to access this site since I cannot use my computer at all right now.

I think it's a good idea to leave your computer turned off until you can get it "repaired" and I commend you for that. Can I worry out
loud by saying it might be a good idea to scan your wife's computer for viri as well?

ORIGINAL: moore4807
In reply to your question above - I believe the sub location is not "where" the symbol is in the hex. The hex has designated areas where you would look ie; lower left for enemy troops lower right for your troops then as the symbols fill in the move to a preferred open hex side. It's 46 miles across for each hex, so anywhere in those approx 196 sq miles you will find your huckleberry!

Thanks
Jim

Thank you for this answer.......it confirms my suspecions about the game engine and the placement of symbols.

Um.........so um.......the voices in my head say that this might be the guy who wrote the virus that is contaminating your computer. He
was released from Guantanimo Bay n 2012 and has had plenty of time to write viri like the one infecting your computer. I'm just
saying out loud in a sitarical way that this might be the guy. I'll do just about anything to boost AAR hits.



sources: Sources for above stipulation

[moore4807]

Larry,
After a little over 6 hours, it appears Symantec and I have cleared the virus... We have not found the file by sweeping but there were two programs installed on 9/27/12 that did not appear to be related to any program on my computer...copied them to Symantec & deleted both of those - ran a full scan that found 8 tracking cookies ... FBI screen is gone for now. The files did not seem to affect my e-mail, but use caution if one looks "different" or generates a warning - Delete it!

I should have your turn back to you tonight.

Thanks
Jim

[witpqs]

ORIGINAL: moore4807

Larry,
After a little over 6 hours, it appears Symantec and I have cleared the virus... We have not found the file by sweeping but there were two programs installed on 9/27/12 that did not appear to be related to any program on my computer...copied them to Symantec & deleted both of those - ran a full scan that found 8 tracking cookies ... FBI screen is gone for now. The files did not seem to affect my e-mail, but use caution if one looks "different" or generates a warning - Delete it!

I should have your turn back to you tonight.

Thanks
Jim

Sorry that happened to you, I hate the B*stards that do that sort of thing.

Symantec stuff is not one of the better ones today. They are all fallible for various reasons, among them being what are called 'zero-day exploits'. There are weaknesses (often downright bugs) discovered in code that are privately communicated to the software companies so they can fix them. Unfortunately, some are discovered by the bad guys first, and only discovered by the good guys because the bad guys are already using them. That's where the term 'zero-day exploit' comes from - they are already being used by bad guys in the wild on the day of their discovery by good guys. That means that sometimes your anti-virus, etc CAN'T know about a thing because the people who wrote that anti-virus don't know about it yet. There are other ways they try to protect you, but nothing works all the time.

A major problem is those discovered vulnerabilities that I mentioned. Browsers obviously can allow you to get infected, but so can Java (and there have been some bad Java exploits found recently), Adobe Reader, Flash Player, and so many others. Keep all of your software up to date. Using the auto-updaters like Microsoft has for Windows and their other software, Adobe has for their software, Oracle for Java, and so on is a great idea and pretty much essential these days!

What motivated me to write this post is actually another facet of the issue - cleaning the PC afterward. The big problem is knowing when you have found and killed the culprit. In short, you pretty much can't. The only way to be sure is to, as they say, nuke it from orbit. Keep regular backups and that process is easier. Note that you can still make backups of your data from a suspect system. It's the software that you don't trust at that point. re-load Windows (yes I know how much that sucks!), re-load the software that you use. Make sure it all gets back up to date. That's the best approach.

What I suggest is a whole lot of trouble to do. Let me ask you this: do you do online banking from that PC? How much do you trust it right now?

[Ingtar]

ESET NOD-32. It even has a gaming mode. They seem to be not big enough to be a target and excellent at coverage.

[btbw]

http://www.2-spyware.com/remove-fbi-gre ... virus.html
find bootable CD with antivirus and own operating system for boot from it and clean your HDD.
Im using DrWeb LiveCD.
For future use try Avira Antivir (it free) and Comodo Firewall. Also run LiveCd with AV check each month or after any sense you got virus.
Be safe.

[moore4807]

ORIGINAL: witpqs

Sorry that happened to you, I hate the B*stards that do that sort of thing.

Thanks witpqs, I consider myself a midrange experienced computer person - I am much better at hardware/configurations than software...

Symantec stuff is not one of the better ones today. They are all fallible for various reasons, among them being what are called 'zero-day exploits'. There are weaknesses (often downright bugs) discovered in code that are privately communicated to the software companies so they can fix them. Unfortunately, some are discovered by the bad guys first, and only discovered by the good guys because the bad guys are already using them. That's where the term 'zero-day exploit' comes from - they are already being used by bad guys in the wild on the day of their discovery by good guys. That means that sometimes your anti-virus, etc CAN'T know about a thing because the people who wrote that anti-virus don't know about it yet. There are other ways they try to protect you, but nothing works all the time.

You are exactly correct, however in my experience one of the best defenses is not so much "names" of antivirus, but is how they are applied. 90% of antivirus users, make NO changes to the out-of-the-box configuration, which makes it very easy for hackers to circumvent.
I use the Norton 360 Premier as my primary antivirus because the simple fact is tracking of code changes is something that Symantec is excellent at. The time it took to track the code changes from my weekly backup was less than an hour, GETTING to the Norton was difficult because the hack program didnt allow a complete boot up of Windows... That was a new one to the Symantec tech.

A major problem is those discovered vulnerabilities that I mentioned. Browsers obviously can allow you to get infected, but so can Java (and there have been some bad Java exploits found recently), Adobe Reader, Flash Player, and so many others. Keep all of your software up to date. Using the auto-updaters like Microsoft has for Windows and their other software, Adobe has for their software, Oracle for Java, and so on is a great idea and pretty much essential these days!

You obviously have some experience in the field! Yes I do! As I said above I have Norton 360 Premier, and I have PC Pitstop's antivirus as my redundant backup. How it got past those AND Windows defender, is what I'm scratching my head at. . .

What motivated me to write this post is actually another facet of the issue - cleaning the PC afterward. The big problem is knowing when you have found and killed the culprit. In short, you pretty much can't. The only way to be sure is to, as they say, nuke it from orbit. Keep regular backups and that process is easier. Note that you can still make backups of your data from a suspect system. It's the software that you don't trust at that point. re-load Windows (yes I know how much that sucks!), re-load the software that you use. Make sure it all gets back up to date. That's the best approach.

GOOD POINT, and the $64K question...[&:] According to the Tech, and what I did, was restore the computer to 9/23/12 (last backup date). After that we did a line by line search using Norton of EACH change to the startup and then the code line changes from 9/23/12. (ugghhh!) Thats where we found the changes on the 27th. Once we copied them & emailed them to Symantec - we deleted them and rebooted the system twice. After the reboots it stayed clean. I'm putting my faith into my external HDD (which has its own security access hardware) where I store my backups... Otherwise I'm as dumb as any other user... [:D]

What I suggest is a whole lot of trouble to do. Let me ask you this: do you do online banking from that PC? How much do you trust it right now?

Yes I do online banking from this computer, but through a blind IP address - I have to log in twice to two different https. sites, instead of a straight login. I thought of a keylogging program might be a part of the hack, but cannot find any known traces/filters for one.

Great suggestions and thanks for your post, witpqs, I'll go with this for right now, because I have turns backed up on both games... But be ready to tell me you told me so! [:D][:D][:D]

[larryfulkerson]

ORIGINAL: moore4807
Larry,
After a little over 6 hours, it appears Symantec and I have cleared the virus...

Good deal. Way to go.

ORIGINAL: moore4807
I should have your turn back to you tonight.

What a trooper. Thanks for your efforts.