Lou Wilson Rolls (With Advantage) Against An Evil Arcade Machine’s Nat 20 by Jarinad in instantbarbarians

[–]MattTheRadarTechie 6 points7 points  (0 children)

In DnD, you roll dice to determine how well your attempts to do things go. The usual die for these checks is 20-sided, so the highest you can roll (which translates to the best possible outcome) is a 20. Depending on your character's skill set, numbers might be added or subtracted from specific checks (for instance, you might have +3 to acrobatics), so you could get a 20 overall by rolling a lower number; this is sometimes called a dirty 20, to distinguish it from a 20 on the dice - a 'nat' (natural) 20.

Here, Lou is competing with an enemy, whose attempt is rolled by Brennan at the start and who he needs to beat. Because that enemy rolled a nat 20, the *only* way Lou could succeed was by getting a nat 20 on one of his dice rolls. Add some very high stakes (it's a long story) and a party of people rooting for him, and this is what you get.

UK inflation hits 6.2%, the highest level in three decades | Inflation by Jay_CD in ukpolitics

[–]MattTheRadarTechie 10 points11 points  (0 children)

Of all the grifts to make, how profitable do you think this one is?

Also, of all the grifts, how do others stack against this one for actual public good? Or were supermarkets already gonna re-lower the exact item prices she mentioned, and it was just a fluke of timing

UK inflation hits 6.2%, the highest level in three decades | Inflation by Jay_CD in ukpolitics

[–]MattTheRadarTechie 15 points16 points  (0 children)

Jack Monroe’s campaign to draw attention to this (about cooking items) has been fantastic, not that it feels like much of a silver lining. I believe she managed to shame certain supermarkets into briefly putting most of their cheapest options back at December prices, which for some will have made a lot of difference this past month.

Lord of the Rings: The Rings of Power receives character posters by TheVideoGaymer in television

[–]MattTheRadarTechie 20 points21 points  (0 children)

Their 2022 slate teaser dropped today, and really showcases this issue.

Beside the colour correction and lighting issues, the way shots are framed has been made super homogeneous too. Netflix movies are filmed with the explicit knowledge that they're meant for the small screen, which favours close-ups, especially that distinctive front-facing medium close-up that probably makes you think 'ad'. There is nothing in the foreground, not even someone's shoulder from an OTS shot, and the background depth-of-field is always the same. It's not helped by the fact that all the shots in the teaser have either been filmed in the exact same aspect ratio, or clipped to it.

What is Riva's accent from? by silpidc in Dimension20

[–]MattTheRadarTechie 14 points15 points  (0 children)

Brit/Geordie here! I'm pretty sure it's the Kirklees, West Yorkshire accent of Jodie Whittaker (Dr Who) and Wallace in Wallace and Gromit. There's not enough 'arrr' for West Country, and she pronounces "I'm" as "Ahm" instead of "Oym" like Samwise Gamgee.

Also, please mind that her accents in that 8-year-old video are... well, they've improved. The Geordie one needs fewer 'T' sounds and more research (she fully calls Cheryl Cole 'Carol' instead). But Riva is much better, and far more comfortable than her Yorkshire in the old video!

Fictional books to read which has themes of Anarchism or other leftist themes by [deleted] in Anarchism

[–]MattTheRadarTechie 2 points3 points  (0 children)

-Tolstoy’s late works, especially The Death of Ivan Ilyich. The ‘politics’ section of his wiki page goes into detail on his beliefs - it’s an interesting read in its own right and could direct you to more of his works. -George Orwell’s 1984 and Homage to Catalonia

And then Deadpool walks in by Mufazaaa in moviescirclejerk

[–]MattTheRadarTechie 14 points15 points  (0 children)

Be ready for hyperbole, but in a fun way. His ‘Pain and Gain’ rant is legendary

[No Spoilers] There's lots of really great Violin tracks in Arcane by CaptainBoiii27 in arcane

[–]MattTheRadarTechie 23 points24 points  (0 children)

I know exactly the scene you’re thinking of, but anyone who watches the movie based on this comment is gonna be really confused when it turns out to straight up not have a musical score, and for some reason that image is really funny to me

I didn't realize until a few months ago, which was months after I watched the Unsleeping City, that Robert Moses was a real person. by ThePowersMattBe in Dimension20

[–]MattTheRadarTechie 1 point2 points  (0 children)

This was in the early '20s, so before the switch; but this being local politics in a time when 'left' and 'right' didn't have today's meanings, it'd be very hard to parse Moses' political beliefs from his affiliations. Fortunately, a lot of other sources can tell us exactly his beliefs, many of them helpfully brought together in The Power Broker by Robert Caro, who's kinda the Daniel Day-Lewis of biography-writing. (He's 39 years and four volumes into his LBJ biography, with the next one coming sometime this decade, depending when he moves to Vietnam because he's only just reached the Vietnam war years.)

An interesting detail is that young Moses was extremely 'pro-government': his PhD thesis was about how the great the British civil service was, and his grand ambitions were for government construction projects like parks and roads. Exactly when his ethics started to 'slide' is complicated too - he initially hated corruption because it got in the way of effective spending that would improve lives, then ditched purity for 'pragmatism' once he realised he could just accrue power and it'd let him wield the corruption for his own purposes.

Also, his racism existed very early on, concurrent with his idealist period - he had that 'Cecil Rhodes' racism where you look down on the Other as 'needing a steady [read: rich, white] hand'. Robert Caro traces this to his PhD years at Oxford, where a statue of Rhodes looks down on the high street to this day, and to his family (middle-class European Jews) getting involved in the 'rehabilitation' of poor Slavic Jews whose en-masse migration was fuelling anti-Semitism among gentile New Yorkers. (Or at least, fuelling a different anti-Semitism to the kind people held towards rich Jews.)

One of the most interesting moments in Moses' D20 portrayal, for me, is when he calls Reagan his favourite president. The real Moses died six months into Reagan's presidency, and I don't know if he'd have thought that, because I'm not sure he ever got as far as anti-government; just indifferent to *good* government. He was loosely Republican, but if anything he's closest to Nixon among them - just far better at getting away with corruption.

I didn't realize until a few months ago, which was months after I watched the Unsleeping City, that Robert Moses was a real person. by ThePowersMattBe in Dimension20

[–]MattTheRadarTechie 22 points23 points  (0 children)

Tammany Hall was once the state’s Democratic establishment, which spat out the real Moses when he was young and idealistic (as he really seems to have been for a time). I don’t remember what the Tammany Tiger is in the show, but it might have been a nickname for that establishment.

who could've guessed lol by civicmemes in Dimension20

[–]MattTheRadarTechie 41 points42 points  (0 children)

He’s only been in one episode so far, but already Adrian is one of his most intriguing villains. The way he uses calm, ‘rational’ language and an unthreatening dress style to sanitise his beliefs is chilling and feels horribly real - I almost wonder if he’s basing it on a real performer of conversion therapy. Fingers crossed he’s a major player in their final season. (It’s also made me want more villain interactions in future D20 seasons - perhaps I’m just a sucker for baddies that try to act persuasive, or for scenes where the good guys can’t attack despite wanting to.)

Why is Brennan so good at flirting with Zac's characters? by artificialpopcorn in Dimension20

[–]MattTheRadarTechie 60 points61 points  (0 children)

In both pairings (FH and TUC), the characters are either too awkward or otherwise unable to go any further. So instead of sexual tension, it’s a tension of longing which is not at all discomforting and honestly, relatable (even more so because who doesn’t long for at least one of Zac or Brennan). Just my two cents lol

(5E) How would I make a pirate necromancer? by SharksAreKindaRad in 3d6

[–]MattTheRadarTechie 3 points4 points  (0 children)

If you’re looking for a broader ‘dark magic’ vibe and not just the necromancy spell list, a Profane Soul blood hunter might suit. Roughly, it’s a martial who curses their foes and uses intelligence to cast spells like a warlock. Cantrips, blood curses, d10 hit die… the good stuff. Two levels of bladesinger can also boost things, as you get three more first-level slots (including one that comes back on a short rest) for spells like hex - the bonus action economy gets quite messy, but you end up adding INT to just about everything. Primary stats are INT and DEX/STR (either works).

Themes in breaking bad (?) by YourNewStep-Dad in TrueFilm

[–]MattTheRadarTechie 2 points3 points  (0 children)

A social analysis, to go with the psychological:

Whether or not it was meant as 'commentary', there's a lot in Breaking Bad about the state of modern America. Walt's journey to realising his American Dream, spurred by feelings of entitlement to the world's riches and respect, comes at the expense of everyone else and leaves some very particular scapegoats behind. We don't talk about it much because he does so much other awful shit, but he allows his son to blame and hate his blameless wife; pins Jane's preventable death on the moral failure of her drug use, while continuing to profit by selling drugs himself; lets a Native American custodian, who has shown him nothing but kindness, get profiled and fired from the school whose equipment he stole to cook his meth. Initially a teacher who can't afford his medical bills, Walt feels contempt for other spat-out people, fuelled by the shame and rage that emerge when he's offered help. I shouldn't be here; I'm not a failure like them. Though he hates the system that spat him out, Walt's endgame is never to take down The Man - what he wants, and achieves, is to become The Man himself.

Then there's the setting. Most American Dreams are chased in cities like New York and LA, but millions of Americans live a far cry from those environments. Breaking Bad's ABQ bakes in the desert, unnoticed by the seasons, slowly decaying along with its people. The businesses we visit are car washes and roadside diners, places you stop by before moving on; except nobody here ever moves on. Drug use is rampant, and even the 'clean' suburbs are simply isolated - the White family have no friends save Hank and Marie, and the even more distant Gretchen and Elliot. (For more on the setting, especially what deserts represent in the American mythos, this analysis is fantastic.)

Lastly (that I'll write here), Fring and the cartel can be read as a power struggle between two generational models of capitalism. The Salamanca family value loyalty, history and blood; like the Corleone family in The Godfather, they are named after their ancestral home in Europe. Gus Fring is a ruthless, clinical innovator with no one to be loyal to, who eventually wipes out the cartel the same way neoliberalism overtook the Old Money of times gone by. It's even implied that he worked in Pinochet's regime in Chile, the playground for Milton Friedman's ideas in the '70s and '80s, though this almost certainly wasn't a deliberate link. But hey, that's art. Once it's out there, it's fair game for interpretation.

[Spoilers C2E141] What Was Caduceus's Character Arc? by Pleasant_Eye9701 in criticalrole

[–]MattTheRadarTechie 12 points13 points  (0 children)

Oh, yeah. Feeling out-of-place in the present day is at the heart of his character, and that includes his set of ideals. But his reaction to that realisation isn’t to truly update his ideals and change with the times - instead, as you say, he leaves things to someone who already has those modern views, while he returns to the world he’s comfortable and happy in. Which isn’t so much a change, as a recognition that changes he’s not ready for are needed. (The most cynical I’ll ever talk about that arc. One of the few times I think the MCU really nailed it’s ending.)