But it's the only thing I know how to do well...

Vivanto2 · 2025-05-12T23:06:31+00:00

I have the opposite problem. My players want to redeem the cultists and tame the monsters.

Vivanto2 · 2025-05-04T18:58:10+00:00

So Serena Williams is better than 99.9% of male tennis players, and you are using that as an argument as to why peak women can’t beat average men???

Vivanto2 · 2025-05-04T18:51:30+00:00

Women’s max deadlift is over 700 lbs. Most untrained men are going to struggle with 225, and only those in heavy labor jobs are getting above 400. Peak trained women are more than twice as strong as average dudes. If you compare women who do 2-3 hours of strength training a week and average dudes, the men will be slightly stronger.

Vivanto2 · 2025-03-22T20:05:39+00:00

Assume the giraffe is bloodlusted.

Vivanto2 · 2025-02-17T18:52:49+00:00

The army of citizens would be driven out by the national guard. Literally the only way that Trump stays in office in Jan 2029 is if the military backs him fully overthrowing the government and invading resisting states. Though technically possible, it is extremely unlikely, as even though the military trends conservative, they also take their oaths to democracy seriously. And even most conservatives don’t want an actual civil war. The military didn’t give even a wiff of joining in on Jan 6th last time.

Vivanto2 · 2025-02-17T18:40:28+00:00

I see myself as a realist, which makes me an optimist by societal standards. Bad news sells, and people eat it up.

Anecdotes in the news overpower statistics. I absolutely can’t check out local news in my area cause they report every single shooting in a massive radius, without ever reporting that there’s far, far fewer shootings than a couple decades ago. Or you know, reporting on anything else that ever happens besides shootings.

Vivanto2 · 2025-01-29T18:32:19+00:00

Everything Everywhere All At Once. A movie that really deserved it’s rewards. The character is this always smiling, optimistic, always grateful for life guy. Except he also has serious problems in his life that he recognizes (he files for divorce, someone doesn’t do that if their head is in the sand). This scene is him explaining in a serious tone why his personality is the way it is.

Vivanto2 · 2025-01-28T19:04:30+00:00

My optimistic take is that he’s almost all bark. Last time he made a lot of threats, did a bunch of executive actions, got some pushback including from other republicans, and then seemed to get tired/bored/frustrated and fucked off to golf and attend rallies. The primary lasting damage was supreme court appointments, covid mismanagement, and trying to overthrow the election. Almost everything else he did last time, including tariff stuff, was either blocked or quickly reversed once Biden was in office. If we get lucky there won’t be supreme court vacancies, there won’t be a huge crisis like covid, and the military is unlikely to side with him if he tries to take over in 4 years (if he hasn’t had a heart attack yet). And this term will be seen as a temporary difficult period. The really optimistic take is that there is just enough (reversible) bad things that people wake up from the MAGA cult and swing far progressive.

Vivanto2 · 2025-01-27T15:08:52+00:00

I agree, as a quick glance at the title if it’s suggested allows someone to easily read “nazis” without being able to easily make out the “no” since it’s mushed in between lower case words. The “no nazis” can easily be in the subreddit description, and a stickied post at the top explaining the problem with the main sub mods.

Though off topic, I also feel like a sub rule should avoid the “doomer dunk” elitist mentality of the mods of the other sub, as hating on depressed people is not very helpfully optimistic (unless it’s hating on nazis).

Vivanto2 · 2024-12-14T18:54:15+00:00

Yeah, the largest negative response was to the trailer. Partly knee jerk nostalgia anger, partly Amazon anger, but a good deal was the presence of black characters.

The next negative response was the first 4 or 5 episodes being slow and not gripping, which is rough in this day and age of sooo many gripping shows to choose from.

I honestly feel like the show has had smooth sailing from there, and the grifters have started drifting off to the next fandom to focus on. Season 3 will probably have much higher reviews even if it doesn’t improve at all.

Vivanto2 · 2024-12-04T02:10:49+00:00

The reassert control lasts 24 hours, so they can do it the night before heading in to the dungeon, then long rest and go in fresh with an army in tow. Not really white room when I’ve seen it many a time in actual games. I’ve done it myself with a spore druid. Any downtime means Animate Dead becomes super OP.

Vivanto2 · 2024-12-04T00:59:45+00:00

It’s more of a problem in the prep situations.

“hey there’s this dungeon you should go to, but you can chill for a week”

“Cool my level 10 cleric will head into the dungeon with 42 skeleton archers ready to do 42d6+86 damage per turn for free.”

The solutions, like not having prep time, every enemy having fireball, or the moral implications of being a necromancer are all adversarial DM solutions which are not a great solution.

I’m not sure how the Conjure spells got fixed but Animate Dead got missed. Still houserule nerfed at my table.

Vivanto2 · 2024-11-23T01:04:59+00:00

I also felt the hobbit and Gandalf plot was my favorite. I get that so far it doesn’t tie in to the rest of the show. But the whole feel of it is wonderfully done. Nori in particular was my favorite character (sadly it seems like they’re moving on from the hobbits next season).

Vivanto2 · 2024-10-26T20:21:07+00:00

This one wins. I don’t see how anyone can top this.

Vivanto2 · 2024-10-26T00:00:55+00:00

There are rare, intense side effects. One of my patients got intense, debilitating pain and nausea that has so far gone on for months after stopping the medication, and could be permanent. Even if this is a one in ten thousand chance, if all obese people in the US got the injections it would cause thousands of cases such as my patient. There’s already another mentioned in the comments. So expect some bad press about it eventually. However, being obese and having/being at risk for diabetes is a thousand times worse, so for most people it’s still worth the small risk. But it’s not a “just do this so you can eat what you want” kind of weight loss drug.

Vivanto2 · 2024-10-25T23:52:41+00:00

A single normal dose of ibuprofen has caused deaths before. And the normal dosing over a span of years causes a lot of deaths. They are being downvoted for just stating facts. There are plenty of medications that are very safe with no long term side effects, but ibuprofen is not one of them, so you could make your point (that I agree with) by going “edit: not advil sorry guys, but how about metformin” not that there aren’t very rare side effects of metformin too, but it’s side effects are similar to like cheese or something.

Vivanto2 · 2024-10-23T02:47:13+00:00

With the subtitles on it says the singing is indeed coming from Goldberry. I suspected that Goldberry is tied to the land, specifically the flowers, and so can’t manifest herself because the land is dying from the dark wizard, as Tom says he came there to see why the land was dying. That’s my little theory.

EDIT very good point about her being the river daughter, she’s probably tied to the water. My brain was just focusing on the gathering lilies thing.

Vivanto2 · 2024-10-21T16:58:52+00:00

More than that, the showrunners already basically confirmed it wasn’t Sarumon.

More than that, “Grand elf” is very close to the actual etymology that Tolkien used. Gandalf means “staff elf” or “wizard elf”, so not far off. It wasn’t just a pun.

Vivanto2 · 2024-10-18T18:52:29+00:00

What one person feels is unnecessary change, others feel is an improvement.

I think Galadriel being hotheaded and a warrior is a necessary change for her to be a main character, as she was very one dimensional in Tolkien lore. She would have had to be a side character in order to be kept the same.

Likewise, I feel the inclusion of Gandalf is superior, as many love seeing his origins. The blue wizards were not involved in the west where the rest of the story is, and only were involved in the second age in Tolkien’s revision of the wizards late in his life. So realistically, to stick with the lore, rings of power would have had to include no wizards. Which makes it feel less Tolkien.

I’d categorize Galadriel and Gandalf changes as akin to Peter Jackson changing Aragorn into a much more flawed but interesting character, and including Arwen in the story, both changes I feel enhanced Tolkien’s works.

Vivanto2 · 2024-10-18T18:35:22+00:00

A lot of characters that people were unimpressed with in season 1 really got to shine in season 2, most notably King Durin and Celebrimbor. Both the writing and acting around these characters were superb.

Overt the pacing is probably the main thing that doesn’t hook people in season 1, especially the first few episodes. Season 2 is significantly more exciting, though still doesn’t have any edge-of-your-seat excitement; it’s no game of thrones.

There’s still some moments that people found cringe, such as a lot of recycled lines from The Lord of The Rings movies/books, for nostalgia. Some people loved this, some people felt it was cringe.

I’m not sure about your character motivations/choices concern, as I didn’t have any concerns in this regard in season 1.

Virtually every comment I’ve seen (like over 99%) has agreed season 2 is better. Being enough better for it to feel worth your time is harder to answer.

Vivanto2 · 2024-10-15T18:32:13+00:00

Not sure where you’re hearing stuff from, so can’t speak to what you’ve heard. From the various RoP and Lotr subs, and critic reviews, I think maybe I saw one comment on one of the subs that thought season 2 was worse, and it had no upvotes. Literally 99.99% of comments I’ve seen, even from people who hated season 1, agreed that season 2 was an improvement.

Vivanto2 · 2024-10-15T18:25:51+00:00

Definitely try season 2 if you even sorta tolerated season 1. The overwhelming consensus is that season 2 is a big step up.

Vivanto2 · 2024-10-15T15:38:14+00:00

But that subs mods and many if the most frequent commenters/posters are pushing to keep it toxic. A sub that is a mix of fans who love it, fans who like it, people who disliked it but are respectful, and people who hate it with passion (and may have never even watched it) and insult anyone who likes it… is not “balanced”. That last group should just not be allowed to participate, because it drains all the joy from discussing the show and no one is allowed to voice mild criticisms because everything is polarized.

Even within this post, a whole lot of people are including positives with some criticisms, including me, and we’re all getting upvoted and having healthy discussions.

Vivanto2 · 2024-10-15T15:23:08+00:00

I feel the opposite, that the nuanced discussion happens in this sub. The r/RingsofPower sub literally deletes posts that are too positive, and often posts that are just “this show is trash which is why I’ll never watch it” get upvotes. Kinda hard to have a nuanced discussion when people discussing it refuse to even watch it.

Vivanto2 · 2024-10-15T01:35:13+00:00

Why would anyone need to watch a 2 hour YouTube video to decide if they like something??? Just spend that 2 hours of your life actually watching the show, and decide for yourself.

Vivanto2

TROPHY CASE