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Lectryk

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  1. Thanks
    Lectryk reacted to IndianaJoe3 in Buying a Skill as a Power   
    I'm not seeing the same problem. I select the Lockpicking skill under the Powers tab, and Invisible Power Effics is listed as available. 
     

  2. Like
    Lectryk reacted to Cancer in Political Discussion Thread (With Rules)   
    I still like this general concept
  3. Like
    Lectryk reacted to Lord Liaden in Political Discussion Thread (With Rules)   
    I'm afraid I don't see the relevance of your comparison. Nobody in this video is from China. The Chinese system isn't under discussion. The United States is not supposed to be an authoritarian regime engaging in clandestine oppression, it's the wealthiest country in the world, supposedly the land of opportunity. These people are reacting to information that's freely available, from the perspective of their own experiences. The average cost of American health care, and the average lifespan of Americans, compared to all the other countries on that list, are objective statistical facts. The systems these global citizens live under have functioned for decades, in many cases generations. You don't need to be an expert on America to recognize these profound disparities, and that with America's vaunted wealth and resources it doesn't have to be that way. These people are collective proof that it doesn't have to be that way.
  4. Like
    Lectryk got a reaction from Sociotard in Political Discussion Thread (With Rules)   
    Um, no.  Not at all.  Treason has a very defined meaning under the law.  Expressing an opinion, no matter how misguided you may feel it is, or how much you disagree with, isn't treason.  It may be argued to be a lot of things (misstated, misguided, incendiary, etc) but it is nowhere near treason.   
     
  5. Like
    Lectryk got a reaction from Lord Liaden in Political Discussion Thread (With Rules)   
    Um, no.  Not at all.  Treason has a very defined meaning under the law.  Expressing an opinion, no matter how misguided you may feel it is, or how much you disagree with, isn't treason.  It may be argued to be a lot of things (misstated, misguided, incendiary, etc) but it is nowhere near treason.   
     
  6. Thanks
    Lectryk reacted to pawsplay in Political Discussion Thread (With Rules)   
    Nonetheless the Joint Chiefs issued a statement on orderly succession, it would have happened.
  7. Thanks
    Lectryk got a reaction from archer in Political Discussion Thread (With Rules)   
    Is this what you're looking for?  https://www.bop.gov/about/statistics/statistics_inmate_offenses.jsp
  8. Thanks
    Lectryk got a reaction from Hotspur in Political Discussion Thread (With Rules)   
    Is this what you're looking for?  https://www.bop.gov/about/statistics/statistics_inmate_offenses.jsp
  9. Like
    Lectryk got a reaction from Lawnmower Boy in Political Discussion Thread (With Rules)   
    I'd hope Bowers is planning to use the notoriety bump this will give his career, given Trump's history of non-payment/litigation around payment of his debts. 
  10. Haha
    Lectryk reacted to Pattern Ghost in Political Discussion Thread (With Rules)   
    I'm guessing the highest bidders.
  11. Thanks
    Lectryk got a reaction from TrickstaPriest in Political Discussion Thread (With Rules)   
    Former governor of Michigan, please.  Those of us from Michigan on the list might be the only ones who care, but Snyder is out.
     
    As a side note, I don't think his policies would have gotten him targeted in a kidnapping plot (if he had reacted to Covid the way I expect he would have, given his other stances on public health v the economy in the past).  With that article posted up-thread about misogyny, I wonder how much of that plot was motivated by 'Us guys have to save Michigan from the crazy woman' who happens to be a Democrat, how much was anti-Democrat in general, and how much was all government is bad.
  12. Thanks
    Lectryk got a reaction from Sociotard in Political Discussion Thread (With Rules)   
    Former governor of Michigan, please.  Those of us from Michigan on the list might be the only ones who care, but Snyder is out.
     
    As a side note, I don't think his policies would have gotten him targeted in a kidnapping plot (if he had reacted to Covid the way I expect he would have, given his other stances on public health v the economy in the past).  With that article posted up-thread about misogyny, I wonder how much of that plot was motivated by 'Us guys have to save Michigan from the crazy woman' who happens to be a Democrat, how much was anti-Democrat in general, and how much was all government is bad.
  13. Like
    Lectryk got a reaction from TrickstaPriest in Political Discussion Thread (With Rules)   
    Probably a better investment than the ~60 billion dollars in the F22/weapons welfare boondoggle.  At least this 9 billion will maybe have an impact on education, health, economically, etc on those communities, and not just the corporations winning the contracts.
     
    I know I'd like to have gig speed to my house .  
  14. Like
    Lectryk reacted to Duke Bushido in Western Hero 6th edition   
    Ah; well then: my apologies for the confusion; let me see if I can make a bit more sense out of it:
     
    The idea that the "good guy" can't draw first because he is the good guy is a romantic fictionalization: that is to say, it's a fond remembrance of a time that never was.  It doesn't even hold up to scrutiny: in even a legal duel (those few places that actually allowed them, mind you), _someone_ is going to draw first, whether it's the good guy or the bad guy.  The rules even state that when X thing happens, you fire / turn and fire / whatever the rules for that duel happen to be.
     
    Moving outside of duels, a bad guy looking to get the jump on someone will have his weapon out first.  We except that.  But a good guy looking to get the drop on someone will have his gun out first, lawman, hero, or no.  In general, we accept that, too, but for some reason, there was an era in our fiction where "that just wasn't done."   Fortunately, it was not pervasive in our fiction-- even for those genres where it was periodically done.
     
    How many times in Gunsmoke did Matt Dillon stiff-walk out into the open to meet a bad guy, or to stall a bad guy, yet someone else was covering him with a rifle?  That is to say, aiming at the bad guy.  We never once thought "why, that dirty Matt Dillon!  And he calls himself a lawman!"   We knew that it made sense, and that it was solid plan to give himself every advantage he could.   For what it's worth, I was never a big Gunsmoke fan, in spite of being a huge fan of westerns.
     
    I will say I won't judge the way your play your games.  Seriously: have fun the way you want; that's why you bought it, right?  It makes no nevermind to me if someone absolutely _mandates_ that whoever shot first is the bad guy (in fact, you might come up with some interesting mechanic for sliding reputation up and down from "hero" to "scoundrel" based on who shot who and when.  If so, I'd actually kind of like to hear about it).
     
    Defining a genre by one TV show and two movies is a bit bold though  (Particularly considering that someone else doing the same thing may have picked Wagon Train, and that was....   well, it's not one I'd pick myself).  As far as what does that leave?  Well, all the other Clint Eastwood movies, including those where he shoot pretty much _everyone_ by drawing first or walking around with his guns already drawn.  Is he the good guy?  Yes; in most of them, he is.  Is he a good _person_?  No; not at all.  Still, the town is glad he has cleaned out the villains, thanks him, asks him to move on because he might be worse in the long run, and he rides off into what ever quaint Italian villa is just over the next rise.
     
    What does removing any three examples of the genre leave?   American history, fairly-well documented, and biased in almost any direction you want, depending on what does or doesn't get included, thirty years of television, fifty years of movies, an untold number of dime adventures, pulps, editorials, wild west shows, comic book series, real tales of real heroes (few) and real outlaws (who tended to found in both camps) that lived and died in places we can still visit, and novels that started printing during the era and continued to be published until this day (though to be fair, about half the newer ones are borderline pornography).  Louis L'Amor is not the only person to have built his writing career around the western genre.
     
    As painful as this is to say, Little House on the Prairie was a Western, and, while I haven't thought deeply about it, I can't remember a single gunfight.
     
    White Hattery _did_ happen in westerns, and predominantly in westerns of a particular production period, and targeted for a particular audience (television usually, but not always).  But it did not define the genre.   Well, actually, it pretty much defined the entire Singing Cowboy sub-genre, which started with white hats (and clothes festooned with rhinestone wagon wheels) and just sort of stayed there.  The Lone Ranger (not that thing with Johnny Depp; the old novels and movie serials, and even the 70s Saturday Morning Cartoon) was _definitely_ White Hat stuff, and while it was part of the fiction and thus part of the culture, it didn't define the entire genre anymore than did Gunsmoke, Fistful of Dollars, and True Grit (frankly, I liked Rooster Cogburn better), but even in True Grit, there was not White Hattery.  Remember the final showdown?  Ned makes Rooster lose his temper and he charges into the outlaws, killing the Parmalee (sp?) brothers and a couple of others?  Rooster shot first.  Remember that LeBeouf had Ned covered with a rifle the entire fight?  When Ned drew down on Rooster, pinned under his own horse, was it noble White Hat Rooster Cogburn that saved the day, with his own incredible skills and his True Grit?
     
    No.  It was LeBeof, a sniper stationed in the hills above.  A sniper, and a U.S. Marshall, if I recall correctly.  For what it's worth, even as crotchety a curmudgeon as Cogburn was in the movie, he was still a much higher-caliber human being than he was presented as in the novel upon which it was based.  So who is the "right Rooster?"
     
     
    Anyway-- the point I was making was that one or two tropes cannot define _any_ genre, and in particular, three examples from what was, for decades, the single largest genre of fiction in this nation, cannot hope to fare any better as being defining pieces of what the genre is all about, and should or should not contain.
     
     
    Christopher's got his hands full with this project-- not because of everything that this book "should contain," but in just making sure he can present it without a poison bias in any particular direction.  That's not going to be easy.  If I wore a hat more often, I'd take it off to him. 
     
    Same with my hair.
     
     
    D
     
     
  15. Like
    Lectryk reacted to Christopher R Taylor in Western Hero 6th edition   
    It has to do with a misunderstanding of the duel.  That's all the showdowns in the streets were, the old fashioned duel.  You know, pistols at dawn, seconds setting up the conditions, etc.  That's what the showdown was, and the whole "don't draw first, etc" thing came from confusion about how that worked.  And by the classic wild west period, the Code Duello was kind of over with, although the concepts of honor and how to deal with each other were real.
     
    I mean, there were still real psychos out there who'd do anything without any rules but most people were pretty lawful and were disliked or shunned if they broke the unwritten codes.  One of the biggest mistakes of modern man is to impose our worldview on the past.
  16. Like
    Lectryk reacted to Duke Bushido in Western Hero 6th edition   
    That, and honestly:
     
    It's perfectly _normal_ -- today or any other time-- for an officer to approach a dangerous situation or a known criminal with his gun _already drawn_.  I'm not talking about "well, guess I'd better walk inside, draw my gun, and tell him he's under arrest," but draw the weapon while getting out of the car, walk ten yards of sidewalk, turn up to the bar, go inside and yell "Police!  Johnny Villain, you're under arrest!"
     
    It was no different then.  The whole idea of "well the good guy can't draw until the bad guys" isn't just some strange of modern white-hattery, it's asininely out of step with the sensibilities of _any_ era.
     
    As Spence suggested, the biggest reason it existed in the TV shows was simply "Good Lord!  Look at his blazing draw speed!"   This "look how fast he can draw" nonsense reached its zenith, I think, with the short-lived Butch and Sundance, where the camera would cut-- well, the film was cut-- from Sundance kicked back in a booth at a restaurant then "click" laid back, feet on the table, eighteen-inch competition pistol, arm at full extension---    
     
    But that's really off track.  Point is:  never happened, anywhere, period, with regard to a lawman, or even a private citizen investigating trouble.  
     
    Two guys arguing in a bar?  Well then, _that_ may matter who drew first, but the lawman thing?  Nonsense.
     
     
  17. Like
    Lectryk reacted to Spence in Western Hero 6th edition   
    Actually it is, 1950's/60's/70's modern legalisms maybe.  I grew up on the old westerns when they were prime time shows.  And while Gunsmoke did have a tendency to make Dodge City "modern", it was a minority among the many western TV series and movies.  When the White Hat Sheriff (or Marshall or Hero Drifter or etc.) gunned down the Black Hat gunslinger (or evil banker or evil etc.), it was celebrated and in a lot of them the closing scene had them wearing the badge.  Yes, Gunsmoke did add in some modern (at the time) sensibilities.  But many more simply went with good verses evil unless they wanted the threat of Jail/Prison/Hanging to be the dramatic theme that week.  But, taking one series as the end all "how westerns are done" only ignores all the others.
     
    For the non-TV side of things, the real world law didn't actually impose a lot of that in the 1880's-1910's outside of the "heavily" populated cities of the coasts.  And even there, not as much as you would think. 
     
    In Gunsmoke, Marshall Dillon didn't always wait for the other guy to draw first because of the "law".  The show had the character wait and then win with his blazing speed because it was more dramatic and presented the good guys in the best light.  But it was a TV show made in the 50's/60's/early 70's and just like F.B.I. and Dragnet it portrayed them as squeaky clean to a version 50's/60's TV moral standards where the law are Good Guys with capitol letters.  Were there movies made then that were not flattering to law enforcement?  Yes, but to air on network TV in prime time you had better not.  In the 50's and 60's most TV shows had TV couples in separate beds on the set because the networks wanted to avoid issues with the various "morality in TV" laws/rules.  Were there TV shows in the time that showed a couple in the same bed?  Yes.  But they were outliers and risked or received backlash that the studios preferred to avoid.
     
    But whether a lawman has to wait or not will in no way alter whether you are adding in drama and roleplay or just rolling dice.  A PC that plays a principled lawman that would never draw first and risks the Badguy Brothers gunning him down is just as viable as a PC lawman that give a warning to them but draws first because he is outnumbered or the PC lawman that ambushes the dreaded Hole in the Wall gang because it is only him and his trusty deputy and ten of them. 
     
    Whether the encounter is played out in heroic drama or just a die rolling exercise has nothing to do with the imposing more modern legal rules as much as the people playing it out. 
     
    But you can do what ever you wish and I will not tell you otherwise. 
  18. Like
    Lectryk got a reaction from TrickstaPriest in Political Discussion Thread (With Rules)   
    There is too big a gap in elector votes, covering too many states, for the Supreme Court to weigh in and change the election.  The only cases that might stick only affect one state's vote totals (last I looked, anyway).
     
    Electoral College shenanigans around appointment/assignment of electors is where you have to worry. 
  19. Like
    Lectryk got a reaction from Pariah in Political Discussion Thread (With Rules)   
    I agree with others about the slog we still face until the 20th, but...
     
     
  20. Like
    Lectryk got a reaction from Hermit in Political Discussion Thread (With Rules)   
    The Republicans like to be in the minority/spoiler position - paralyzing legislation while not taking blame (cf the entire Obama administration).  If Trump loses the election, it'll put them back in their sweet spot and allow them to mend some of the fences Trump kicked over, while continuing to block any/all legislation to change anything the Dems propose.  
     
    Then they'll be in a strong position in 2024 running against Harris.
  21. Thanks
    Lectryk got a reaction from Ternaugh in Political Discussion Thread (With Rules)   
    Warnings from this site should come with a social media veracity warning - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Judicial_Watch 
    Activities and controversies[edit]
    Judicial Watch’s main targets have been Democrats, particularly Bill and Hillary Clinton and the Obama administration.[17]
     
     
     
  22. Thanks
    Lectryk got a reaction from Matt the Bruins in Political Discussion Thread (With Rules)   
    Warnings from this site should come with a social media veracity warning - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Judicial_Watch 
    Activities and controversies[edit]
    Judicial Watch’s main targets have been Democrats, particularly Bill and Hillary Clinton and the Obama administration.[17]
     
     
     
  23. Thanks
    Lectryk got a reaction from Cygnia in Political Discussion Thread (With Rules)   
    Warnings from this site should come with a social media veracity warning - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Judicial_Watch 
    Activities and controversies[edit]
    Judicial Watch’s main targets have been Democrats, particularly Bill and Hillary Clinton and the Obama administration.[17]
     
     
     
  24. Thanks
    Lectryk got a reaction from Old Man in Political Discussion Thread (With Rules)   
    Warnings from this site should come with a social media veracity warning - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Judicial_Watch 
    Activities and controversies[edit]
    Judicial Watch’s main targets have been Democrats, particularly Bill and Hillary Clinton and the Obama administration.[17]
     
     
     
  25. Like
    Lectryk reacted to Lord Liaden in Political Discussion Thread (With Rules)   
    I have to disagree. This election isn't just a referendum on the President, and on the GOP, but on "Trumpism," his entire approach to politics that has so corrupted the American government and divided the American people. Trump and the Republican incumbents have to be so thoroughly trounced that it's clear the great majority of Americans repudiate Trumpism. Nothing less will quiet all but their most fanatical followers, and reassure the rest of the world that the last four years don't represent what America stands for. Otherwise there will be no domestic peace going forward, and the standing of the USA in the world may never recover.
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