Interesting Links for 09-06-2019
Jun. 9th, 2019 01:43 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
andrewducker- California Considering a Ban on Realtime Police Body Camera Facial Recognition
- (tags:faces police California usa )
- Charlie Stross on The Millenial Joker Origin Story
- (tags:batman jobs comics origins )
- Torture Should Not Work in Dungeons & Dragons
- (tags:torture games dungeonsanddragons viaSupergee )
- The trailer for "Ophelia" looks awesome
- (tags:shakespeare women hamlet trailer )
- A third of people are sensitive to artificial fragrances. 9% of us have had to take time off (or lose a job) in the last year because of it
- (tags:smell jobs health )
- Commons committee finds UK welfare approach counterproductive and pointlessly cruel. Government ignores it.
- (tags:welfare uk OhForFucksSake )
- ASCII fluid dynamics
- (tags:ascii text video fluid physics )
- An open letter to pretty much every linguistic Voynich theorist ever
- (tags:language epicfail )
- The Kelly Criterion - how should you bet in a given situation?
- (tags:gambling )
- Have a bunch of pretty images (pulled from Reddit)
- (tags:photos reddit pretty )
- Michael Sheen Inspired By Good Omens Fanfic For Aziraphale's Love Of Crowley
- (tags:books tv neilgaiman terrypratchett fanfic )
- NYC Burger King has been passing off beef as (vegan) Impossible Whoppers
- (tags:meat food OhForFucksSake )
- Clearing Up Some Misconceptions about Neurodiversity
- (tags:neurodiversity )
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Torture Should Not Work in Dungeons & Dragons
Date: 2019-06-09 01:20 pm (UTC)I have -- hopefully along with most sensible people -- subscribed to the "torture is both evil AND counterproductive" school of thought, so we agree there.
But firstly, I deleted a longer reply here, it seems like it's not so much that it CAN'T work (cross-checking answers to confirm which ones are true is not THAT complicated if you manage to force some answers out of people), as that interrogators seem to invariably succumb to lying to themselves, on purpose or deliberately. The CIA get accolades and funding for showing there IS a terrorist threat. They get nothing but blame and budget cuts for torturing someone and finding out there ISN'T.
Secondly, I don't know how much of this crosses over to DnD. A lot of DnD is more like a movie -- it's not what works in real life, it's sometimes what works in the game, but it's a lot the sort of story people expect to tell.
The article describes all the reasons it might be an effective strategy. But I don't actually believe it. All the pros and cons of opposed rolls affect any number of other things that heroes might or might not do, like bluffing someone or sneaking past someone. But really, if the players and GM want to make it work, they'll find a fudge that does. And if they don't, they'll avoid it.
I think more important is to just say, "we don't want to play that sort of game".
And really, if the heroes are supposed to be able to find the lair, assume they can get a different way: the minions are not usually massively organised, assume, they'll fold early if the PCs shout at them enough, or the PCs will find a clue on them, or whatever. Or if you have to, just fade to black with an intimidation roll.
There's lots of other things in DnD that glossed over because it's unpleasant to think about.
Like, he says he's often seen this problem, but I haven't heard other people complaining about it -- at least, not from a point of view of "it just makes too much sense", only from "my players seem weirdly interested in this".
FWIW, my latest group did get a bit into playing evil-ish characters. I think that's risky, but works with the right attitude. Like reading a book about bad people, where you're interested in them, but don't have an interest in being them.
fragranced products
Date: 2019-06-09 02:36 pm (UTC)This feels relevant because a non-trivial number of people will insist that essential oils can't be causing a problem "because it's natural." Presenting this as "artificial fragrance is a problem" might lead people to replace it with natural fragrances, in products that could better be made fragrance-free.
Re: fragranced products
Date: 2019-06-09 02:41 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2019-06-16 05:44 am (UTC)1. All these people are very clean.
2. Shakespeare wrote better dialogue.
no subject
Date: 2019-06-16 05:45 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2019-06-16 06:08 am (UTC)(Don't seem able to edit the typo in my original comment - annoying!)
no subject
Date: 2019-06-16 06:09 am (UTC)(You can't edit comments once they've been replied to)