MitD VI: The Undiscovered Creature (Please Read the First Post)

[miri]

Well, given Rich's connections at Dragon Magazine, it's possible that he had access to the brainstealer dragon before it was released, but that's a pretty big mark against it. I'd still be curious to see the stats, though.

Environment: Underground
Challenge Ratings: Wyrmling 4; very young 6; young 9; juvenile 10; young adult 12; adult 14; mature adult 16; old 17; very old 20; ancient 21; wyrm 23; great wyrm 25
Alignment: Always lawful evil

Size changes from Medium (wyrmling) to Large (very young) to Huge (young adult) to Gargantuan (old) to Colossal (great wyrm).

Pros (imo) for mature adults:
- Frightful Presence (28);
- AC 33;
- DR 10/magic;
- 5th effective manifester level;
- Str 29;
- Int 21.
The cons (again, imo):
- as very young gain Suggestion and Telepaty;
- as juvenile gain Levitate;
- SR 26;
- Wis 20.
First two cons are debatable as he may be unable to use his SLAs for some reason.

Ancient Brainstealer Dragons gain Astral Projection, great wyrms gain Plane Shift. But their size, SR and Wis scores grow as well, naturally.

[Grey_Wolf_c]

Challenge Ratings: Wyrmling 4; very young 6; young 9; juvenile 10; young adult 12; adult 14; mature adult 16; old 17; very old 20; ancient 21; wyrm 23; great wyrm 25

At 14, an adult is not a challenge for the OotS. He'd need be at least old...

Size changes from Medium (wyrmling) to Large (very young) to Huge (young adult) to Gargantuan (old) to Colossal (great wyrm).

Similarly to the above, adult is already too big, and he'd need be very young to fit in the box.

Pros (imo) for mature adults:
- Frightful Presence (28);
- DR 10/magic;
- Str 29;

Frightful presence doesn't match the circus' reactions. DR X/magic is absolutely irrelevant, since Miko and Belkar both used magic weapons against MitD. Strength 29 I could accept, but a mature adult has the problems I mentioned above, and I assume anything smaller quickly becomes weaker than Roy.

The cons (again, imo):
- as very young gain Suggestion and Telepaty;
- as juvenile gain Levitate;
- Wis 20.
First two cons are debatable as he may be unable to use his SLAs for some reason.

Interestingly, I don't think any of those are cons at all. To suggest anything, you need to have thoughts of your own, so I can give MitD a pass. Telepathy explains his knowledge of the ritual (picked RC's thoughts on the issue). Levitate explains RC lifting the cage, if we posit that MitD wasn't aware he was levitating.

Wisdom 20 is a bit of a con, but any monster high enough level to be a danger is going to have about that WIS score anyway.

Grey Wolf

[miri]

Grey Wolf, I was not advocating in favour of it. DaggerPen requested it's stat block. I did not remember whether it is acceptable to post stat blocks from DM and did not want to take the risk of posting actual stat block.

UPD: and thus the only reason I write about some of the cons being debatable, for example, is to stay consistent within my post.
Also, English is not even my second language, apologies for any inconveniences it may have caused.

[DaggerPen]

Thanks, Miri! Yeah, that'd be stretching for FBS even if it hadn't been published during a questionable time period. So that's a no for the Brainstealer Dragon, I think, though I'd like to add it to the non-FBS list of suggestions just so that it'll be there in case anyone else wonders.

Welp, back to the cutting board, eh? XD

[Sunken Valley]

Question.

Do we have any evidence that Belkar and Miko were using magic weapons at the time they attacked Mitd? I can't see any (the oracle mentions Belkar's daggers 4 months after the fight with Mitd).

[Kish]

It would be amazing if adventurers of their level were using nonmagical weapons.

[Grey_Wolf_c]

Question.

Do we have any evidence that Belkar and Miko were using magic weapons at the time they attacked Mitd? I can't see any (the oracle mentions Belkar's daggers 4 months after the fight with Mitd).

Miko had a full compliment of magic items (some of which lost their magical properties when she fell). I am not sure if we have direct evidence that the katana was magical, but I'd say the circumstantial evidence is strong.

Belkar we know has magical daggers, and there is no evidence he got new weapons between the battle and the Oracle. In this case, I'd say that Okham's razor is on the side of the parsimonious assumption that his daggers haven't changed.

Grey Wolf

[rodneyAnonymous]

Belkar we know has magical daggers... (emphasis added)

I don't think that's true. The only evidence is that the oracle said Belkar used him as a "magical dagger repository", right? That sentence could be parsed so the "magical" modifies "repository", not "daggers". That is, the oracle may have meant he is a magical repository for (mundane) daggers.

Belkar probably uses magic daggers, but not certainly.

[Kish]

The statement, "he made me his magical dagger repository" meaning the Oracle being magical would only make sense if the Oracle was stating that Belkar made him magical.

[rodneyAnonymous]

No, it works if Belkar just made him his repository. Try replacing "magical" with some other adjective, such as "orange".

[Grey_Wolf_c]

No, it works if Belkar just made him his repository. Try replacing "magical" with some other adjective, such as "orange".

Nope, it still doesn't work. The Oracle wasn't made magical (or orange) by the stabbing, and he wasn't made a magical (or orange) repository by the stabbing. Magical in the context can only be referencing daggers.

At any rate, this is not the place to discuss it. Take it to geekery, where I suspect it might be in the FAQ.

GW

[rodneyAnonymous]

"He made me his orange dagger repository" = he made me his dagger repository. Whether the daggers or the repository is orange is ambiguous.

The Class and Level Geekery thread cites evidence that he has three or more daggers, but not that they are magic.

[Grey_Wolf_c]

"He made me his orange dagger repository" = he made me his dagger repository. Whether the daggers or the repository is orange is ambiguous.

Linguistically, maybe, although I disagree with the nitpick even at that level. More importantly, since stabbing someone doesn't make the Oracle into a magical repository, just into a mundane one, the ambiguities of the English language are clarified by the meaning of the actual words. Unless you explain to me how the stabbing made the Oracle a magical repository (is he suddenly bigger on the inside?), the weirdness of the English language is not of relevance.

GW

[rodneyAnonymous]

Unless you explain to me how the stabbing made the Oracle a magical repository...

No, I am denying that claim. I mean Belkar made the oracle his dagger repository, and the oracle is already magical. Like "made me his orange dagger repository" doesn't mean he made him orange.

[AgentPaper]

Linguistically, maybe, although I disagree with the nitpick even at that level. More importantly, since stabbing someone doesn't make the Oracle into a magical repository, just into a mundane one, the ambiguities of the English language are clarified by the meaning of the actual words. Unless you explain to me how the stabbing made the Oracle a magical repository (is he suddenly bigger on the inside?), the weirdness of the English language is not of relevance.

GW

I can understand what he's getting at, and it could work out technically, but it's so obtuse and misleading that I can't see Rich meaning it that way unless he was purposefully trying to hide that Belkar's daggers aren't magical. And really I can't even believe that very much, since if it was true, he'd be doing a pretty poor job at it. Much easier to simply never mention whether nor not Belkar's daggers were magical, and let everyone assume they were.

For the purposes of this discussion, I think it's safe to assume that Belkar and Miko's weapons were magical in both cases, short of any evidence to the contrary.

[Bulldog Psion]

Still, it seems probably to me that he was speaking of "magical daggers" not a "magical repository for daggers."

[rodneyAnonymous]

"Seems"... "probably"... "assume"... no, I think it is not obvious that it's meant one way or the other, nor that parsing it differently is obtuse.

[AgentPaper]

"Seems"... "probably"... "assume"... no, I think it is not obvious that it's meant one way or the other, nor that parsing it differently is obtuse.

Well you're free to have that as your own headcanon, but I can say you're not doing a very good job of convincing me, or anyone else by the looks of it.

[Bulldog Psion]

"Seems"... "probably"... "assume"... no, I think it is not obvious that it's meant one way or the other, nor that parsing it differently is obtuse.

"He made me his boxing glove repository. He made me his large-caliber bullet repository. He made me his steak knife repository."

In each of these cases, is it likely that a "boxing repository", a "large-caliber repository", or a "steak repository" is being spoken of, even though the sentence could technically be parsed thus?

I'm going to hold out for "repository for magic daggers" to be the clearest and overwhelmingly most likely interpretation of the Oracle's statement.

[rodneyAnonymous]

^^ You and others have used less-than-100%-sure words to describe whether or not Belkar's daggers are magic, which is my point, so I'd say the "convincing job" was just fine.

^ Those adjectives, unlike "magical", all clearly modify the other noun.

I agree that it's more likely, but saying it's certain when it's not is weird.

[Jay R]

Miko had a full compliment of magic items ...

Gosh, what lovely magic items!

(I'm sorry, I couldn't help myself.)

[SavageWombat]

Gosh, what lovely magic items!

Roy certainly appreciated them, at least at first.

[Grey_Wolf_c]

No, I am denying that claim.

Nope, that was your claim:

That sentence could be parsed so the "magical" modifies "repository", not "daggers".

Now you have change your non-argument to:

I mean Belkar made the oracle his dagger repository, and the oracle is already magical.

He is clairvoyant, not magical.

But yeah, whatever. Consensus is clear enough for me.

Grey Wolf

[rodneyAnonymous]

No, really, that is not and was never my claim at all. Didn't change it, just rephrased it.

Also true/false is not determined by consensus. The world was never flat regardless of how many people thought so.

Whatever, though. I thought the standard of rigor was higher, and "nitpicking" (you say tomato, I say "meticulous attention to detail") was welcome. Won't make that mistake again.

[KillItWithFire]

No, really, that is not and was never my claim at all. Didn't change it, just rephrased it.

Also true/false is not determined by consensus. The world was never flat regardless of how many people thought so.

Whatever, though. I thought the standard of rigor was higher, and "nitpicking" (you say tomato, I say "meticulous attention to detail") was welcome. Won't make that mistake again.

That really only applies to things that don't care about interpretation. The only thing that determines what is true here is what the giant, and by extension the oracle, meant by the phrasing he choose. What you get when you pick the sentence apart with a fine-tooth comb means zilch if it isn't what the speaker originally meant.

EDIT: We also aren't representing the truth, we are representing a consensus.

[AgentPaper]

Whatever, though. I thought the standard of rigor was higher, and "nitpicking" (you say tomato, I say "meticulous attention to detail") was welcome. Won't make that mistake again.

Now now, no need to get passive aggressive. Nobody here is mad at you for bringing it up*. Don't mistake disagreement with dislike.

* Continuing to beat the same dead horse, on the other hand, may work out differently...

[DaggerPen]

Just a general organizational question - is there a reason that The Escape and Tower Scene are in the "other info" section, rather than in with the MitD's ability section? I keep going to look for them under abilities, then remembering that they're in Section 1B. Since they discuss abilities of the MitD, it seems strange to me that they aren't under the Abilities section.

[Grey_Wolf_c]

Just a general organizational question - is there a reason that The Escape and Tower Scene are in the "other info" section, rather than in with the MitD's ability section? I keep going to look for them under abilities, then remembering that they're in Section 1B. Since they discuss abilities of the MitD, it seems strange to me that they aren't under the Abilities section.

The original reason was that they are supposed to refer to whole scenes, rather than just MitD, so they aren't really MitD abilities, even if the info in them centers in MitD. They are also mostly not my words: they started as straight copy-paste of other poster's work. This last part is now not as clear cut, since I have been tinkering with the Escape one ever since.

I have thought of combining the "Other Info" section with the FAQ, actually. The first section feels quite underused.

Grey Wolf

[CloakedDancer]

The original reason was that they are supposed to refer to whole scenes, rather than just MitD, so they aren't really MitD abilities, even if the info in them centers in MitD. They are also mostly not my words: they started as straight copy-paste of other poster's work. This last part is now not as clear cut, since I have been tinkering with the Escape one ever since.

I have thought of combining the "Other Info" section with the FAQ, actually. The first section feels quite underused.

Grey Wolf

From an organizational standpoint, section 1B feels like an incomplete listing of the big scenes that FBS refers to. Perhaps a section in the first post noting the acronym and describing the scenes would help new posters better understand what is meant by the term?

I also feel that the legal information would be more at home in either post 5A or post 3C. It feels very lonely in 1B. I'd guess the reason it is in the first post is because you consider it to be a very important subject. However, since the first post is so small you could always move other information there to make it feel less lonely. Perhaps the entirety of post five?

Just my thoughts, since I was doing some editing this morning anyways and don't have any good thoughts on the actual monster of which we speak.

[Grey_Wolf_c]

From an organizational standpoint, section 1B feels like an incomplete listing of the big scenes that FBS refers to. Perhaps a section in the first post noting the acronym and describing the scenes would help new posters better understand what is meant by the term?

I also feel that the legal information would be more at home in either post 5A or post 3C. It feels very lonely in 1B. I'd guess the reason it is in the first post is because you consider it to be a very important subject. However, since the first post is so small you could always move other information there to make it feel less lonely. Perhaps the entirety of post five?

Just my thoughts, since I was doing some editing this morning anyways and don't have any good thoughts on the actual monster of which we speak.

I'm always happy to hear ideas on how to improve first post. Feel free to throw them out, and I'll mull them over (don't expect any major reworks until page 30, of course).

Re: legal section: it used to be important. Then the topic of copyright got me scrubbed (elsewhere), so no longer is. But point taken, I really do need to rethink section 1.

Maybe turning it into "Big MitD Scenes" is the way forward. It might duplicate the information elsewhere (like, say, adding the "Xykon mentally dominates MitD" as one of the Big Scenes would mean copying over the info from "Mental Resistance" in section 3), but it is true that it would make it easier from people coming into the thread, and in the end that is a big part of the purpose of the first post.

Grey Wolf