New comic is up.
Technical difficulties forced Rawhide to post the comic for me, hence the delay in getting this thread up.
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New comic is up.
Technical difficulties forced Rawhide to post the comic for me, hence the delay in getting this thread up.
So, Tarquin wasn't affected at all.
Awesome. Great tactical use of friendly fire there:smalltongue:. It's a feature indeed.
Simply hilarious, nice and unexpected counter fron Belkar to the suggestion.
Sofa!
Nale should have cast Charm Person instead of Suggestion. Then Belkar would at least regard him as an ally.
How is it that Z'zdtri can't cast spells while deafened, but Nale can?
If Nale is deaf, how can he hear Belkar say "WHAT?"
Why is a succubus, an ancient being of pure evil, in love with a mortal? Sabine is a shapeshifter, she only appears fair in form because she wants to.
Great strip, I'm sure everything is going down the Order's plan, deaf evil hobbit of death! Brilliant!
Beautiful! It took me a while to figure out why Belkar was deaf. Once it hit me, I laughed all over again. This comic is full of win.
Though, I'm thinking the Suggestion spell would have fizzled even if Belkar could hear. From the SRD: "Asking the creature to do some obviously harmful act automatically negates the effect of the spell." Even if Belkar would normally love to stick a dagger into jsut about anybody, including the dwarf, I think that in the middle of battle putting a knife into your ally would qualify as "obviously harmful".
Regarding another poster's question on why Nale can cast deaf and the other caster's spell fizzled: You can cast while deaf, but spells with verbal components have a 20% chance of failing. So they can both cast, but they will screw up a fifth of their spells.
Brilliance. Sheer brilliance. I . . . I am in awe.
Awesome comic as always Mr. Giant, even with Tarquin not affected, the Order seems to have the upperhand :smalltongue:
And most awesome detail ever letting Belkar getting affected by the Holy Word spell :smallbiggrin::smalltongue:
Well, whatever happens, any last shred of respect Tarquin had for Nale is gone after this fiasco.
And I'm amazed Nale is left standing after all this damage. Traps, arrows, Belkar- quite painful...
I'm finding the fact that the order's plan is working to be completely and utterly satisfying. Now we just have to wait for Xykon to show up and ruin everything again.
Belkar is deafened, eh? I didn't quite realize that Holy Word continues to affect those entering AoE (?). Thought it would just blast the Linear Guild and let our resident evil (get it?) character enter the AoE unharmed.
Still, one little diversion really screwed LG up. Impressive.:smallsmile:
That would require him to be thinking clearly (he ain't, his plan is in shambles) and b) realise he is deaf (he doesn't, not yet).
The chances of the spell sizzling are just that: chances (20%?). Nale got lucky.
He didn't; he is reiterating the order after it got ignored. "Clean up your room"..."I SAID: Clean up your room!" is a classic way to repeat a command.
They share common interest on top of which they built their relationship.
Grey Wolf
This has me wondering, where's Elan? Durkon came from the walls, Belkar from the ceiling, hopefully Elan will rise up out of the floor as that would be awesome.
I hope Durkon will be okay against Tarquin alone :smalleek:
Interesting parting words from Sabine there.
And Roy puts the int to work again. It's great, before Thog he hasn't had a real chance to do that in battle in realtime years.
///Deafness gives a spell failure chance not automatic failure- Nale rolled better than the Drow.
He can't, but he can tell that Belkar isn't obeying the suggestion and attacking Durkon.Quote:
If Nale is deaf, how can he hear Belkar say "WHAT?"
Because she's not supposed to.Quote:
Why is a succubus, an ancient being of pure evil, in love with a mortal?
Okay, I admit... I felt a little sad for Sabine when she faded away, declaring her love to Nale - and the deafened bastard kept going "WHAT?!" :smallfrown:
Other than that, looks like the Linear Guild is pretty thoroughly screwed at the moment. Loved the friendly fire.
And so the Order's ambush continues to be successful. :biggrin:
...the only one I'm worried for right now is Durkon. :smalleek:
What spell is Z'zdtri trying to cast ? Ghostwind ?
Also, how long will that banishment last ?
It strikes me that Sabine's banishment is far more important than we thought when discussing 859. It's not that the Guild loses a powerful member, not at all.
It's that she's trying to keep an eye out for sign's of double-crossing by Tarquin, and ensuring Nale's dominance is maintained. I think they're going to be having even more problems now.
I love how Belkar was put in range on purpose. :smallbiggrin: When I saw the name of the comic, at first I thought it was referring to someone in the LG. The real meaning is better.
Hah, Nale's panicking now that Sabine's been banished. He's not thinking straight. That'll be to the Order's advantage.
Wow, so many questions answered, and for once a plan that seems to work.
This was a fun comic. As ever, a big piece of why I love this strip is that the tactical battle scenes are clever and creative, never stale. Belkar's deafness preventing from some types of mental control is a great touch.
I'm pleased to be the first one to glance meaningfully towards the implications of the one member of the Linear Guild who can find traps (that we know of) being banished. Although this seems like a very good time to go for the kill, if it doesn't work out, OOTS has arguably gained an entire day if they retreat into the dungeon. (Ok, some of the traps are easy to see now, but.... are you completely confident that all of them will be?)
On the pure speculation, I feel like if Tarquin retreats to the entrance to call for backup, the +5 shoe of Lichdom is going to drop.
Also, doesn't Sabine's banishment give anyone else the feeling that Nale's days are done? I'm not sure anyone left is going to want him alive. Tarquin's losing patience already.
Anyone else find Sabine's "forever" remark kinda creepy?
And Tarquin doesn't "even know about the rest." So he might not even be sure of Malack and Kilkil's levels (since Holy Word only has a save for the banishment part). Interesting.
This trap is working unusually well... how many pages before something goes wrong?
Since Holy Word had an effect on Belkar, who was hiding in a trapdoor, I suppose that even Malack, who is trapped behind a huge wall, could have been affected. This could result in some trick developments. What do you guys think?
And, also, poor Sabine.
Naah, who am I kidding?
Amazing work from Roy, he took care of so many possible problems. Still, I wonder how is Roy going to deal with Tarquin, afterall he is still the strongest threat.
And it remains a mystery if Holy word affected Qarr.
This has to be my third favorite, ever, just for working in that punch line so well. I'm amazed such a common saying hasn't been used before. Just waiting for the perfect opportunity.
And I finally clued in, Tarquin isn't full attacking Durkon as a first reaction, because he made a promise to Malack.
Z'zdtri's trying to cast Gust of Wind, but is deaf and missed the roll, so it got mispronounced and fizzled. At first I thought Z'zdtri suddenly had an accent, but when I realized that it was indicating the reason for failure I became even more impressed with the level of detail Rich provides. Incredible!
The banishment last 24 hours. And then the banishee still needs to find a way back - they don't automatically return. As far as I know, Sabine can pretty much go back and forth at will, but she could get delayed somehow. But it's at least 24 hours.
Oh Roy, don't ever change.
It doesn't, Belkar was within the AoE when Durkon cast it. The description of Holy Word specifically says that the targets don't need to actually hear the spell to be affected.Quote:
Originally Posted by Agnostick
Great strip! It's nice to see the Order kicking some butt for once, and using some clever strategy to boot. I also can't help but notice Kilkil is nowhere to be seen here, and while I doubt he's dead, he is almost certainly down for the count.
So Belkar is exactly one level higher than Durkon. Good stuff for the Class and Level Geekery thread.
What about the mummies? Blasted to smithereens by the Holy Word? What's the math on that, now that we've seen Durkon's caster level (sort of).
Belkar is using the "foot massage" technique on Nale...the same one he used on Eagle-Eyed Pete.
Tarquin vs. Durkon...should be a short fight, if it's allowed to go on 1v1.
So does this mean that Nale, Belkar, and - assuming he wasn't blinded - Zz'dtri are all exactly equal in level to Durkon? As for Elan's role in this, he does have some illusion magic, and the traps were meant to be supplemented by illusions. I wonder if he can cast anything complex enough to be of any use in that regard.
Geez that's a lot of damage you took there, Nale.
Have Belkar's Favored Enemies ever been stated? I'd think Human would be a pretty good choice for a psychopath in a world mostly dominated by humans.
:rolls on floor laughing his head off:
This is the best strip in a LONG time. This is laugh-out-loud funny. AWESOME!
As expected, Mr. Batman-utility-belt Tarquin is too high level to be affected by the Word. The man's a defensive player all the way, and looks like he always has a backup plan .
And now we know that Sabine missed her saving throw and was banished.
Many questions answered and a funny strip to boost! And, for one brief shining moment, the heroes aren't losing!
Respectfully,
Brian P.
The drow is trying to cast "Masked Debt Gourd," he just rolled really poorly on the mispronunciation chance.
According to the Thread, that would pin Durkon at a minimum of 15th-level, meaning that he's leveled up twice between #556 and now.
Checked Twitter and Lo! An update.
Awesome. Great planning by Roy. Love the way that the 'Suggestion' spell backfired so nicely!
Now for V to *pop* out and Fireball...
Oh wow, that was a fun read. A few more pages of this and people will start whining how the Order never loses and how they should get to the plot already. :smallbiggrin:
Deafened means you get an automatic 20% failure chance applied to spells with verbal components.
Nale does not hear Belkar say what. He's repeating himself about attacking the dwarf because Belkar continued to attack Nale.
Because Sabine might not merely be a stereotype?
Belkar's use in this one is absolutely perfect. Definitely with Roy on this being a feature and not a bug.
That was simply a genius move. I wonder if Roy's sentence at the end is true and this was planned, or if it was unforeseen, but just happened to work in their favour :smalltongue:
Anyway, great comic!
Okay, that is just beautiful. Banished Sabine, deafened Z & Nale, and paralyzed or worse the kobold. So it's basically the Order vs Tarquin and a non-casting Nale, with the occasional spell from a caster getting through. I think they can handle that fairly well, if Roy planned the next few rounds as well as he did thus far.
That Belkar is also deafened is just icing on the cake. ^.^
(Oh, and Z is trying to cast Gust of Wind, as Nale ordered before the holy word.)
Hahahahahaha bellyache from laughing, this was priceless!
For an uncannily crafty and rarely rattled tactical genius, Tarquin does a lot of the verbal explanations to the guy he knows is deaf, there. Or should know. Or figure out immediately.
so worth wait.. My co workers are most likely wondering why i can't stop giggling.
Oh yeah, definitely. After the banishment scene, I was reading the comic with that very anticipation. Nale's schtick has largely played itself out, the dude is clearly outclassed both by the good guys and the more competent baddie on his own team (in name only), and is currently running around like a chicken with his head cut off as the one person who was really watching out for his back has been taken away with some frankly ominous parting words. One way or another, I suspect he's gonna be taken out of commission by the time the arc's done.
Yes! It feels good to see the Order winning! Everything's coming up Milhouse.
Is Haley targeting Nale purely by the sound of his voice? (Presumably she can't see through the smoke) What are the rules for doing that in D&D?
So he wasn't affected after all, guess that means I retract my earlier comment.
I don't get Roy's punchline, anyone cares to explain?
Interesting... Belkar has clearly been affected by (i.e. failed his will save against) Nale's Suggestion, but cannot *hear* the suggestion given to him(different capitalisations deliberate).
The rules don't say that a target would be immune to Suggestion by being deaf, but it's kinda funny that they aren't.
Another no-sell from Tarquin. What a surprise.
Suppose it'll make his defeat all the sweeter. If that even happens at this rate.