tcpip | 09F9:1102:9D74:E35B:D841:56C5:6356:88C0

09F9:1102:9D74:E35B:D841:56C5:6356:88C0

First, culinary news. KFC challenges little English pub for holding a "Family Feast" (via

ktwhoopi. I knew it! Cocktails are good for you (via

wildilocks.

Last Sunday's AD&D game was a disaster. In our prelim scenario one PC wasted a conviniently placed "genie in a bottle" wish spell on their own advancement after a number of PCs had been level-drained from a wraith. Following this the DM run us through G1: Steading of the Hill Giant Chief, but changed the plot and setting in significant ways that simply made no sense at all. Fortunately tonight

calisi will run the second session of Covenant, which is proving to be most engaging.

Went to Splodge! on Monday with

caseopaya,

severina_242,

_zombiemonkey,

recumbenteer and L. to see Logan's Run.Silly film, but a good way to spend an eve.

This Sunday the Unitarian Extension Movement is hosting a forum on climate change with Dr. Peter Cristoff from the Australian Conservation Foundation, Gavin McFadzean of the World Wildlife Fund and Dr. Michael O'Connell from the Alternative Technology Association.

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Use Blackle instead of google. Read the 'About' for why</>

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You don't have permission to access / on this server.

Additionally, a 403 Forbidden error was encountered while trying to use an ErrorDocument to handle the request.

Slashdotted?

Yeah, possibly.

Just edited the link out until I find out what's going on. Basically it was google with a black screen and grey text and a nice calculation on how much power that would save globally.

Ah one of those pages.

Except it uses more power to display a black screen on a TFT / LCD monitor than a white screen. If we were all still using CRTs it might have made a difference...

(The logic goes like this: On an LCD, White is it allowing all light through, so you aren't driving any of the 3 blocking display elements. To display black, you must block out all the light from the backlight, so you have to drive all three of the display elements at full power)

Good point. So Google on a LCD and Blackle on a CRT.

Oh, this just fell in my in-box. Thought you'd like it... a lot..

http://physicsweb.org/articles/news/11/4/14

As Professor O'Blivion put it, "Television is reality, and reality is less than television".

Hmmm... A search in slashdot doesn't come up with anything. Odd.

Last Sunday's AD&D game was a disaster. In our prelim scenario one PC wasted a conviniently placed "genie in a bottle" wish spell on their own advancement after a number of PCs had been level-drained from a wraith.

Yep, they'll do that!

Problem is we're now seriously underpowered for the ventures that lie ahead. Doomed, I tell you! Doomed!

Couple of years back in Rey's D&D game, we were looking for an oracle, a tree that would answer one and only one question. As soon as we got there:

NEIL THE INCOMPETENT PALADIN: So you're the tree that answers one question, right?

TREE: Yes.

NEIL: So, [quest-related question]?

TREE: [silence]

EVERYBODY ELSE: [glares at Neil]

We had Stean. Floating skull of Thanatos, a major nasty critter. Offers to answer three questions truthfully.

Q1. "Are you the Skull of Thanatos?"
Q2. "Wait a minute! Do I only get three questions?"
Q3. "Those don't count, do they?"

I personally prefer this Oracle:

http://www.giantitp.com/comics/oots0331.html

And in the latest issues it seems that they are all slowly coming true.

Damn it's been good of late.

Hell yeah! It's been awesome!

Did you read #450???? Belkar with the Eye Of Fear & Flame? Damn that was hilarious!

[P.S. I have all 3 OOTS trade paperbacks if you wanna borrow them. They have extra comics in them]

Belkar with the Eye Of Fear & Flame?

I know it made me think of the Skull of Thanatos.

Stean's great trick after he asked it the three questions was to hit the floating skull with a club. It responded with lightning bolts from its eye sockets.

They have extra comics in them

Hmmm.. I may have read some via

zen_cat, but yeah, I'll borrow them..

Its astonishing how PCs will still fall for the dodgiest cliches sometimes.

Stean managed to raise dying stupidly to an art form. He is to this day the only person I know who managed to lose his character twice in one round.

Um... How?

Two halls on either side of a path. One with a large pile of treasure in the middle of the room, the other with an exit. "Ahh, that's probably a trap", we sensible venturer's declare. Ignoring us, Stean's character goes over to the pile of treasure, as we notice his movements we start preparing spells. Suddenly wraiths appear and strike him down! And as a half-powered wraith begins to rise from his corpus the fireball hits....

What was it about the G1 plot and setting change that really didn't work for you? I gather this was the one making it Welsh giants, yes?

Yeah, it was fine the giants being Welsh and all (and in the mountains). But the GM decided that he wanted a stand-up face-to-face medieval battle, complete with personal challenges, in contrast to the commando mission that G1 is (very well, imo) designed for.

So apart from the fact that it became an excuse to slaughter the first and second level henchmen he allocated to us (which he generated by hand, no less), and the fact the entire plot of stealthy invasion of a base was no longer in play, the giants (being chaotic evil) were not being played according to the rather minimal characterisation that was given to them.

So in a nutshell, it didn't work as a story. I was very annoyed and frustrated by the experience. Indeed, it was possibly the worst gaming experience (as opposed to player-social contract experience) that I've been in.

This seems almost OT, but I was also amazed by the fact that Cadbury have trademarked such an ordinary phrase as 'the color purple' or 'colour'... I've forgotten. Maybe if we spell in wrongly we'll get away with it ;)

Trademarks only apply within specific contexts (IIRC the test is 'likelihood of confusion'). So for instance, "McDonald's Burger Shack" is probably violating a well-known company's trademarks, but "McDonald's Sewing Supplies" wouldn't be.

In this case, the trademark would only have applied to using purple in connection with chocolate - but last I heard, Cadbury had lost in court anyway, although they were appealing.

It would seem that they were trying make a case for "acquired distinctiveness", which is pretty moot.

For intellectual property claims that will make your hair stand on end, check out the following:

http://cyber.law.harvard.edu/people/tfisher/iphistory.pdf

Although there is good money in it...

http://www.highbeam.com/doc/1G1-56223451.html

A while back, I learned of a company that had filed two patients (which I believe had been tested in court). Patent A covered widgets having material properties within a certain range, as measured by a certain process.

Patent B covered the measurement process.

So even if you just wanted to make sure you weren't infringing A, you had to license B...

ohh yippie, i get in yr journal *happy dances*

gonna put that cocktail one in my journal!

gonna put that cocktail one in my journal!

So the knowledge spreads. *nods*

I'd love to know more about the game of Covenant you're playing! Particularly anything particularly cool or that you had problems with.

Thanks for taking it for a spin!

Goodness, it's the designer himself...

Something which perhaps unintended thematically is that the characters ended up heading towards what could be called an "evil" alignment.

After all, if we're part of a secret conspiracy dedicated to acquiring power in preparation for the apocalypse, the possibility of Mother Theresa types is a little slim. If one's belief system is destroyed, that's probably going to accelerate the issue.

Our group is pretty familiar with "rules-lite-narrativism", so the game system wasn't much of a problem to work with. Personally, I prefer more sim and crunch, but that's just me.

I am not overly fond of the "golden rule" regarding narration, but it has played out well. I very much liked the advice for handling scenes and the directors advice section.

Thanks for writing it! We still have a few more sessions to go...

Brought to you via the magic of Technorati's link tracking (if you wondered how I arrived here).

Yeah, you'll see a few characters with harsh attitudes, it does tend to favour anti-heroes at start of play. It's one of the reasons the Self region of the crucible is important, it hopefully softens their edges a bit and makes them question why a bit more as events unfold... I might write up a blog post on that, as it's worth more discussion.

Anyway, glad you're enjoying! Let me know how it turns out.

Will keep you posted on the game... I'll see how much of the Self region I can promote with my mobster ;-)

You know it makes me more than a little annoyed that fast food/big food companies get to trademark common expression for food- like family feast or old-fashioned for apple pie.

I think you are not alone in this opinion.

Company is always appreciated, but it would be nice if we could gather over more congenial opinions.

greetings, comrade. you were asking, a little while ago, about the greens, nader, and 100% raxation. this thread starts out with some of just that:

http://community.livejournal.com/libertarianism/2037703.html

happy socializing! :D

That's a marginal rate, not a 100% tax.

In any case, as previously mentioned often a 100% tax can improve productivity (such as on site rental value).

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