OOTS #1121 - The Discussion Thread

[GreatWyrmGold]

"I shouldn't have said 'no time jumps'."
Don't you just love when your own cleverness gets the better of you? It's like trying to trick a genie into giving you more wishes, except with more soap and theology.

Also, the controlled detonation line reminds me that Durkon has pulled this scam before...

I'm not sure it's a comparable situation. Past!Durkon had no idea that Nale would be attacking; he was just on the balcony because tea time happened to be at the right time. But now, Durkon's had nothing but time to plan.
Also, I'd be surprised if a snake-vampire brought tea to Durkon's mom.

I wonder what is Durkon thinking? How is it supposed to help with this last memory if the vampire already knows of the possibility of him misleading with a memory?

That is the nature of mind-games. Most of the time, you know the other guy is plotting something. You just need to figure out what, and how their visible moves build to that. But the other guy knows you know, and is constructing those visible moves to make you think what he wants you to think, so he does what he wants you to do.
What is Durkon thinking? That requires knowing what he's trying to do, which requires us to essentially do the same thing Durkon* is doing. We know his ultimate goal (prevent Hel from destroying the world), and we know what he can do (show memories to Durkon*), we just need to connect the dots.
It has been well-established that Durkon cannot do anything to affect Durkon*'s ability to fight; not only is he limited to being a glorified VHS player crossed with Statler & Waldorf, he has been forbidden from showing any potentially-misleading memories. That leaves only Durkon*'s will to fight, or at least his will to do something which could prevent the Order from saving the day. What could this be?
There are several potential avenues of attack. Durkon could make Durkon* question his motivation, his trust in Hel or the spawn, his confidence in something-or-other, etc. The trick is going to be giving Durkon* a revelation strong enough that he can't just dismiss it as "some trick," something that will linger in the back of his mind no matter how he tries to forget it.
That probably means something that hits deep at the core of who Durkon* is and what he wants himself to be. Given that he's a servant of Hel even more thoroughly than your average living cleric, I'm tentatively guessing that it'll have something to do with that. Of course, I'm not sure how hard it'd be for anything a Thor-lover says about her to be dismissed (Hel presumably hasn't pretended that all the mortals hate the incumbents and are eagerly awaiting a chance for Hel to whisk them away), so I'm not too confident about that.
Once we get more than one panel of Durkon's plan, we might be able to start making better plans.

But it's really the internal conflict that's important and determinative.

As it should always be. Though perhaps not always so...literally.

Second, a vampire also gets +2 WIS.

Beat me to it!
Though on a serious note, conflating Wisdom with wisdom is as foolish as conflating Intelligence with intelligence.

Doesn't he? "I count 'able to be picked by a rogue' as a pretty big defect" was his line, after all.

That's not a long history. That's a single instance.