How to fix Windows XP after using McAfee

McAfee borked your computer?

Install Free AVG. McAfee has been rubbish for a long time. I've personally seen it let through some nasty malware recently.
First, you'll need to fix your PC though.

Dragon Coast: light vs dark

Dragon Coast continued last night, and we started with a long discussion on mechanics of light (Pathfinder RPG rules). Some of the interactions between light and darkness spells aren't particularly well explained, but we came to an agreement on the topic before starting the session. Which was lucky, because the characters were affected by magical darkness for most of it. Well, not that lucky, as none of them actually used any significant light spells to counter it, so we didn't need our revised light/dark interaction mechanics.
Generally darkness spell effects are pretty weird, and even using the usual "it's just magic" explanation, it's hard to relate these to the real world. I think we agreed at one point that darkness spells used some sort of anti-photons to produce their effects. We shied away from the whole anti-photon hits a photon interaction discussion. In the end, it's just game mechanics, and doesn't matter.
Rule clarifications are:

• dark/light spell effects suppress any light/dark spells of lower levels in their area of effect
• dark/light spell effects and light/dark spell effects of the same level suppress eachother in their overlapping areas of effect, leaving any lower level and natural light or darkness spell effects in effect.
• dark/light spells can be used to counter or dispell light/dark spells of equal or lower level at time of casting.

Also

• standard ride checks apply when using a Phantom Steed (spell) except for "Control Mount in battle" as it wouldn't get spooked by battle, and "Fight with a combat-trained mount" as it isn't combat trained.

Also,  First Character Death. Thanks Taedor.

Flash Fiction: Colourblind

Pick of the month : Colourblind byDr. Michael Schaper.

Dragon Coast campaign restarts

The Dragon Coast campaign I'm running restarted on Tuesday night. The session notes are up. We're still missing a character, but hopefully he'll start this week.
Naturally the first encounter was complex and difficult to manage, but we seemed to get through it smoothly enough, with the PCs kicking ass.

iPad Shenanigans

Damn it. Delayed again. Resetting the clock.
Q and Data have one already.
Details May 10.

Singularity's Ring

I just finished reading Singularity's Ring by Paul Melko.
This is Melko's first novel and it's a very good read. The central character is a pod of five people semi-joined in their consciousness. As the individuals are engineered for their abilities, it makes it important to the story that they are quite different with varied abilities. This is reminicent of a D&D game where you have to carefully balance a party to be equipped to deal with anything existence can throw at you, and certainly produces good character separation and definition.
There were some really good new ideas in the novel, I enjoyed the use of the Singularity in the novel, although it was really just used to form the environment/world rather than affecting the plot. The way that pans out is cool, but I won't spoil it, although I thought it was predictable.

iPad AU Bend Over Pricing Factor

Apple has to release pricing for the iPad in AU soon. I'm guessing this friday or soon afterwards. The big question is "What will the Bend Over Pricing Factor be?". Looking at the $USD 700 iPad, converted to AU is around $AUD 780, add GST to AUD $856, add some token bulk shipping cost, and lets call $AUD 895 a zero Bend Over Factor. I reckon the BOF could be as high as 30%, which would be $AUD 1160 or so. If the BOF is significant, I'll just look into getting a friend in the US to send me one. Come on Apple, don't make us bend over.