OOTS #732 - The Discussion Thread

[Kumo]

And if you don't bump into the topic too hard, you should be fine. I've accidentally crossed the acceptable religion line...twice now, but because it was never blatant, and always related to gaming, I'm still at 0 points (I think you can accumulate 300 before banning, but can get insta-banned for what basically boils down to being cruel to people.), the rules of this forum are fairly forgiving. If anything, a low post count is just an indication you haven't had time to rack up the minor offenses yet.

Yeah, at three hundred the account is submitted for review for banning.

On topic:It looks like you might have to present your papers on your way out, too, though with the camel facing towards the city i could be wrong

[Darcy]

Durkon, he gets it in!

Glad to see him again

[Teleporker]

First it was the "mechanical defect" in Azure city's prison, and now the "I was sent into human lands" line.

Durkon should do more of these truth manipulation lines more often. It totally rocks when he does it!

[dps]

I think they're called 'Orisons'. Also more Durkon is always appreciated.

Nay, the family name of the Roy in the comic is Greenhilt. Roy Orbison is a totally different guy.

[dps]

Oh, 2 things are really getting on my nerves:

First, next person who askes "how did they get in without papers", I'm going to find out you RL identity, and come to your house and eat all your food. Read the dang thread before you post in it! That question has been asked and answered at least 4 times in this thread, and several times in the discussion thread for the previous strip.

Second, there's NO BREAKING OF THE 4TH WALL IN STRIP #732! Breaking the 4th wall occurs when a character directly addresses the audience or readers. In this strip, when Durkon speaks, he's either talking to the cat, himself, the innkeeper, or the guard---not the readers.

[Darcy]

it's kind of meta, but theoretically, the rules of D&D are a part of their universe and do exist on "their" side of the wall as well as ours.

[Lateral]

Hah... metahumor. Suck on it, all-those-people-who-said-the-strip-was-getting-boring!

[Agi Hammerthief]

Second, there's NO BREAKING OF THE 4TH WALL IN STRIP #732! Breaking the 4th wall occurs when a character directly addresses the audience or readers. In this strip, when Durkon speaks, he's either talking to the cat, himself, the innkeeper, or the guard---not the readers.

so its not broken, only slightly scratched?

[sihnfahl]

Second, there's NO BREAKING OF THE 4TH WALL IN STRIP #732!

So Durkon saying that he'll be in the city until the end of the current plotline, and informing the guard that that'll be about 30 strips, not 20, isn't indirectly breaking the fourth wall?

[Niveus Candidus]

My players wanted to exit the City of Greyhawk at one point and wanted to use stone shape. I didn't permit it through the city wall on the grounds that the wall was too thick. Typical city walls of that era were on the order of 20' thick. The City of Greyhawk box set specifically stated theirs were 18' thick. The spell (3.5 ed, not going back to look up what it was in 2ed) states that it can affect 10 cu ft + 1 cu ft per level. Durkon is 15ish (or less, I forget and I'm not looking it up atm) so thats 25 cu ft. Since I doubt he can squeeze through a 1 cu ft square, I'll assume a 2'x2' square to crawl through. Thats 4 cu ft for each foot of depth through the wall and he runs out of spell after about 6'.

So.....those are some mighty thin city walls

I believe your math is wrong. A cubic foot contains 1728 cubic inches. We’ll use an assumed level of 15 for Dwarfy McBearded Face here for the 25 cubic feet with the spell. That’s 43200 cubic inches of spell to play with. A hole 36” wide, 36” tall and a whopping 24” deep would be large enough for a dwarf (And most humans) to move through and require the melding of 31104 cubic inches of stone; 18 cubic feet. Shorty McRoundfur has spell to spare.

Did I miss a math class?

[Boci]

So Durkon saying that he'll be in the city until the end of the current plotline, and informing the guard that that'll be about 30 strips, not 20, isn't indirectly breaking the fourth wall?

I believe dps is saying that that is just Durkon using metaknowledge. If he turned to the audience and said "Sorry folks, you won't see the others for 20 strips" that would be breaking the 4th wall (and using metaknowledge).

[Doug Lampert]

If everyone has paperwork, then there should be a database, since no bureaucrat can resist all that extra filing. Perhaps they will look Girard up?

"Database? What's that? There's 48 file cabinets, one for each month for the last 2 years (all the time this empire has existed) + 236 holding the records issued at the time of the takeover."

"What order are they in? The order the clerks submitted them to be filed in of course? That's assuming that no one has taken them out to look at them and been careless about putting them back. What other order would we use?"

"How do you find an entry? Well, you know what month it was given in, so search the cabinet for that month. For paperwork at the founding of the current order it's supposed to be organized by area of residence, but a lot are out of order because people move and a lot of people actually registered at work rather than at home."

It is difficult for many nowadays to imagine just how BAD the filing could get without computers. Go back before things like the Dewey decimal system and they could be far far worse than that. Go back to prior to spellings being standardized and even alphebetization is impractical.

[LuPuWei]

Nah, those trees aren't epileptic enough. Obviously Mr. Scruffy is

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Roy's dad, Zz'dri, or a heretofore unknown cat-based deity.

Obviously.

No, Mr Scruffy is

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The MitD's father!

[Niveus Candidus]

"How do you find an entry?

Magic? Have we considered magic?

[Doug Lampert]

Re. wall thickness: Medieval walls tended to be thick because they were what kept besiegers out of a city and you didn't want the enemy to be able to knock them down with catapults. In a world where any serious invading force would have enough air power at least to drop someone inside the city to unlock the gate, this is probably much less of a concern, and there's no incentive to make them so expensively thick.

Close but not quite IMAO. Pre-cannon seige engines other than those used in contact with the walls were VERY poor at actual destruction of walls. The target for such things was the great mass of wooden topworks that almost all walls had providing cover for those on them. (And that most moderns don't know about since even where the walls have survived the wood has been gone for centuries.)

Additionally, as was the case once canon came in, any missile based attack on the walls themselves would have been countered with lower, more gently sloped walls. Vertical stone walls are EXTREMELY vulnerable to bombardment once you get a decent bombardement weapon.

What killed walls pre-canon was undermining, which thickness is pretty well the only defense against. And undermining takes a LONG time, it isn't going to happen very often in D&D land unless the attackers have a tunneling monster on their side, in which case the wall is pointless. So either way, no reason to build it thick.

[Zea mays]

Obviously Durkon will retrieve Haley's bow and dagger. But will he salvage Belkar's drink as well?

Dun Dun duuuuun.....

PS: time for the Durkon development I've been waiting for!

Sadly, it is evident in panel 5 that Belkar's delicious cup of orange juice has been spilled on the floor.

[Siosilvar]

I believe your math is wrong. A cubic foot contains 1728 cubic inches. We’ll use an assumed level of 15 for Dwarfy McBearded Face here for the 25 cubic feet with the spell. That’s 43200 cubic inches of spell to play with. A hole 36” wide, 36” tall and a whopping 24” deep would be large enough for a dwarf (And most humans) to move through and require the melding of 31104 cubic inches of stone; 18 cubic feet. Shorty McRoundfur has spell to spare.

Did I miss a math class?

You missed a historical 18-foot-wide wall. Potentially; we don't know how wide this wall is (though it's probably around 4 feet thick or less if drawn to scale).

[ekedolphin]

Y'know, if Durkon

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had done this well of a job explaining his mission in On the Origin of PC's,

perhaps the several years before he met Roy would've turned out a lot differently.

[Doug Lampert]

You missed a historical 18-foot-wide wall. Potentially; we don't know how wide this wall is (though it's probably around 4 feet thick or less if drawn to scale).

Any serious fortification outer wall is thick enough AT THE TOP to have multiple ranks stand in formation. You may need to use it as a road to move men in action, and you need to be able to form up to hold off attackers when they bring up a tower or whatever.

The major actual defense for the fighters is the topworks and parapet, but the main thickness of the top of the wall is almost sure to be 10' thick or more at the top. That's not for structural strength, it's just to do the basic job of holding defenders.

Consider how thick the great wall of china is, and they weren't really worried about siege engines or anything when they built that. It's simply that 10' or more is needed to be a functional fortification wall.

Adding to that, even allegedly vertical stone fortifications have walls with some batter (backward slope), and are likely to be substantially thicker at the base than at the top.

18' at the base strikes me as on the thin side for a real city wall. But as was mentioned in earlier posts D&D walls MAY be much thinner (you can use much cheaper wooden scafolding to hold the fighters when the wall isn't a really serious military barrier anyway).

That said, the Azure city wall appeared to be about 10' across at the top based on the combat scenes. That would not be atypical in our world, and the EoB wall doesn't show any real signs of the sort of wooden works that would be needed for an 24" wall to work.

[dps]

I believe dps is saying that that is just Durkon using metaknowledge. If he turned to the audience and said "Sorry folks, you won't see the others for 20 strips" that would be breaking the 4th wall (and using metaknowledge).

Yes, that's correct.

[tomandtish]

Oh, 2 things are really getting on my nerves:


Second, there's NO BREAKING OF THE 4TH WALL IN STRIP #732! Breaking the 4th wall occurs when a character directly addresses the audience or readers. In this strip, when Durkon speaks, he's either talking to the cat, himself, the innkeeper, or the guard---not the readers.

From WordIQ.com: The term breaking the fourth wall is used in film, theater, television, and literary works; it refers to a character directly addressing an audience, or actively acknowledging (through breaking character or through dialogue) that the characters and action going on is not real.

Definitions vary. I have found definitions that state it is directly addressing the audience (and only this). But I have also found plenty of definitions (like the one above) that indicate it is an acknowledgement that this is not reality. In this case, Durkon and the guard are acknowledging they are in a comic (by referring to plotline and strips). They are therefore breaking the 4th wall.

Of course, your mileage may vary. TV Tropes sticks more closely to your definition, and calls what they are doing in this particular strip Medium Awareness (they acknowledge that they are in a comic without directly addressing the audience). However, many of the OOTS examples they have in their 4th wall examples would be like this as well, so…

Anyway, I tend to use the broad definition. If the characters acknowledge (directly or indirectly) that they are not real, they have broken the 4th wall.

[ChowGuy]

So Durkon saying that he'll be in the city until the end of the current plotline, and informing the guard that that'll be about 30 strips, not 20, isn't indirectly breaking the fourth wall?

Nope, that's merely Durkon acknowleginging his awareness of the nature of his world (ie, that he's a a comic strip) That's hardly a new development, nor is it the most blatant example.

Or to put it another way: What is the "fourth wall" of which you speak?

[Niveus Candidus]

18 FEET thick! Wow, now that's interesting. That would mean High Priest Dworf l'Doorf, the Dwarf of the Bearded Chapterhouse Dawfinsons United would either need to cast the spell 3 times, or be caster level 62!

[AratanAenor]

My players wanted to exit the City of Greyhawk at one point and wanted to use stone shape. I didn't permit it through the city wall on the grounds that the wall was too thick. Typical city walls of that era were on the order of 20' thick. The City of Greyhawk box set specifically stated theirs were 18' thick. The spell (3.5 ed, not going back to look up what it was in 2ed) states that it can affect 10 cu ft + 1 cu ft per level. Durkon is 15ish (or less, I forget and I'm not looking it up atm) so thats 25 cu ft. Since I doubt he can squeeze through a 1 cu ft square, I'll assume a 2'x2' square to crawl through. Thats 4 cu ft for each foot of depth through the wall and he runs out of spell after about 6'.

So.....those are some mighty thin city walls

Well, the hole he created looks rather small, he would have needed to cast additional stone shapes to make it wider. It only shows the first casting.

[Lukraak]

I wonder what would cause your entry to be denied?

Reason for entering "Starting a revolution for freedom and and goodness"

[Defiant]

Oh my god...

Rich broke both the third and the fourth walls!

[factotum]

Well, the hole he created looks rather small, he would have needed to cast additional stone shapes to make it wider. It only shows the first casting.

Why would he have prepared multiple copies of Stone Shape? He had already got all his spells for the day when he found out the problem, remember.

The wall definitely doesn't look to be very thick--when Durkon casts Stone Shape on it you can see a differently-coloured area that looks like it might be the other side of the wall; if it IS, then that wall is about two feet thick at the base!

[Beanie]

"I be done 'cept fer tha cantrips anyway."

Who wants to bet he's going to end up in a situation where he needs a cantrip?

[Ave]

STONE. SHAPE.

He just used it to leave... seriously...

If they used stone shape to get in, they should have known there are papers needed at the gate and they wanted to avoid the trouble.

[Agi Hammerthief]

"I be done 'cept fer tha cantrips anyway."

Who wants to bet he's going to end up in a situation where he needs a cantrip?

chances are 50/50 it's a thowaway gag with the catnips or a Chekows Gnu