Hello, u/crimsom was spot on. The surge protector I was using was not providing constant powerflow. Plugged directly into the wall and the problems disappeared. 
M15R5 I tend to play hearthstone while I listen to prerecorded lectures. I had YouTube and hearthstone playing, as usual, and my screen became extremely saturated and gameplay slowed down. It then got dimmer and the gameplay smoothed out,only for it to become saturated and slow again.  I thought it might be an Nvidia issue so I manually designated my graphics card for hearthstone, but it didn't help. Restarting and shutting down the laptop also doesn't help. I have had a few instances where the backflight flickers on and off when I put the laptop to sleep. I can tell it wakes itself up repeatedly bevlcause my Bluetooth speakers, which are connected to only the laptop, will come on and off. My keyboard backlight also goes off when the laptop wakes from sleep. I'm not sure if it's a related issue to the one I have above, but if it is, it might be a power issue. Please help. I bought this laptop in July 2021, really hoping it will last throughout my graduate studies.
m15 R5, massive slowdown at high performance