Class and Level Geekery XV - What's the Damage of a Thrown Pineapple?

[zimmerwald1915]

I'm not sure how canon it is, but Roy actually did read a manual of gainful exercise in SSDT. It's mentioned in his inventory here, after all.

Well hell. Good!

[danielxcutter]

You know, that actually might explain how all of his stats are so high... maybe they weren't until he read all those inherent bonus manuals.

[danielxcutter]

I find it...unlikely...that he's read any Dexterity books while traveling with Haley, Charisma books while traveling with Elan, Intelligence books while traveling with Vaarsuvius, or Wisdom books while traveling with Durkon.

Snips, Snails, and Dragon Tales certainly doesn't treat it as "the leader automatically gets this, no matter what kind of book it is." Nor does the online comic suggest such a lopsided manner of loot distribution.

I was talking about his physical stats, to be specific; I'm fairly sure his mental stats were already as high as they are now.

It certainly does explain how his Strength is so high, though, as mentioned by earlier posters. Personally I think Roy was just estimating about the Frost Giant Berserker's Strength being the same as his, plus if she's an elite frost giant with Barbarian levels she probably has a higher Strength score than the average frost giant(Str 29) even without Raging... but eh.

Actually I'm not sure if she even had levels in Barbarian; nothing strongly proves that she was Raging and "strongest warrior" could easily mean a level or two of Fighter, so... I dunno.

Oh, by the way, if Roy was 15th-level when fighting Greg at the Godsmoot, the first attack he made after awakening his sword's Legacy powers was done while jumping down at Greg; Greg tries to cast Slay Living; Roy uses the Spellsplinter Maneuver to make an AoO against Greg, disrupting the spell, then unleashes a full attack on him? Is that right? Or am I forgetting something?

[Gift Jeraff]

Rich refers to Malack as a lizardfolk in the Book 5 commentary:

Spoiler

Show

Leapin’ Lizards!
With the Western Continent, I had an opportunity to do a little worldbuilding. Normally, I deliberately keep the setting pretty generic; I think that way, the story works better as a commentary on the entire fantasy genre (not to mention the game it was originally based on). But I also wanted to make sure this region was memorable the way Azure City was. I decided that the Western Continent would be a place where the reptilian races—lizardfolk, kobolds, etc.—were as common as the regular demihumans were elsewhere. I especially wanted to emphasize the idea that here, they weren’t barbaric tribes for the heroes to wipe out, but were part of whatever passed for a society. To that end, I introduce several reptilian characters in this book.

The most important one was Malack, the lizardfolk priest of Nergal that befriends Durkon. The pair immediately hit it off, perhaps owing to Durkon’s isolation from others of his kind. He has no dwarves with which to bond, so he is naturally drawn to someone sharing his character class instead. Malack, for his part, seems like the calm straight man to Tarquin’s theatrical antics. Even in the next chapter when we start to see Tarquin’s darker side, Malack appears to hold himself apart from such vile instincts. As we’ll see later in the book, though, he has just as much blood on his hands when it comes to the empire.

Which is not to say that Durkon is completely blameless in how things went down. Like Elan did with his father, Durkon turned a blind eye earlier in the book to the possibility of Malack’s involvement in the Empire of Blood’s crimes, choosing to believe that same mask of civility over Haley’s salient objections. The fact is that if Malack is guilty of benefitting from the empire’s brutality because he collects the blood, he is no less guilty of benefitting when he collects their tithes and taxes. Even if Malack was a mortal lizardfolk, he would still be profiting from the misery of the populace. It is not to Durkon’s credit that he didn’t question this until Malack’s undead status was revealed.

[danielxcutter]

Huh, that's interesting. Hmm... I don't seem to remember any lizardfolk subraces with snake tails instead of legs; does anyone else know?

[Quartz]

Sure we know that Minrah can cast Searing Light and Remove Blindness but do we know that Minrah is actually a cleric of Thor and does not have some prestige class that grants divine magic? Indeed, could she be a paladin?

[Gift Jeraff]

"I was a guard before I was a cleric."

[Peelee]

Sure we know Minrah is short and hangs out in the North but do we know that Minrah is actually a dwarf and does, not have some Flaw that grants extreme shortness? Indeed, could she be an elf?

[Grey_Wolf_c]

Sure we know Minrah is short and hangs out in the North but do we know that Minrah is actually a dwarf and does, not have some Flaw that grants extreme shortness? Indeed, could she be an elf?

New headcanon: Minrah, the dungeonbred elf Paladin of a (really minor) elf goddess.

Grey Wolf

[Peelee]

New headcanon: Minrah, the dungeonbred elf Paladin of a (really minor) elf goddess.

Grey Wolf

She is the most complex character in the strip. An impressive feat, that.

[Quartz]

"I was a guard before I was a cleric."

Thank you.

[Ephemera]

Yay, Minrah is coming back to life. I say "yay" not for story reason but purely for geekery ones--now that we've statted her, there is a new chance that we'll get more information for her statblock...

[LeSwordfish]

Hey, another thread offhandedly mentioned that O-Chul's Constitution compares favourably to that of a giant. I was curious about this and looked it up, but the only citation I can find just lists "War and XPs" as the source. Does that mean it's mentioned in book-only content? If not, is there maths I can see somewhere for how this is known/how he achieved this? I'm curious, is all.

[zimmerwald1915]

Hey, another thread offhandedly mentioned that O-Chul's Constitution compares favourably to that of a giant. I was curious about this and looked it up, but the only citation I can find just lists "War and XPs" as the source. Does that mean it's mentioned in book-only content? If not, is there maths I can see somewhere for how this is known/how he achieved this? I'm curious, is all.

The citation is to author commentary which characterizes O-Chul's Constitution score as "in the mid-twenties."

[LeSwordfish]

Oh crikey, okay. I'll have to check that out.

(I was hoping that someone had added up all his Acid-breathing-shark damage etc or something, but this makes more sense).

[zimmerwald1915]

Oh crikey, okay. I'll have to check that out.

(I was hoping that someone had added up all his Acid-breathing-shark damage etc or something, but this makes more sense).

Following up on this:

I note that the comment you referred to says that "mid-twenties" is his Constitution without items. This is not true. O-Chul's feat of Constitution to which that comment referred was surviving the exploding castle and plummeting to the plain outside Azure City headfirst. At that time, he was still wearing his Sapphire Guard gear, which the Giant elsewhere - in referring to Miko's gear turning from blue to beige - refers to as "powerful magic items."

So he could have had a starting 18 in Constitution, 2 or 3 additional points in Constitution from leveling up, and a +4 or +6 item.

[Resileaf]

Following up on this:

I note that the comment you referred to says that "mid-twenties" is his Constitution without items. This is not true. O-Chul's feat of Constitution to which that comment referred was surviving the exploding castle and plummeting to the plain outside Azure City headfirst. At that time, he was still wearing his Sapphire Guard gear, which the Giant elsewhere - in referring to Miko's gear turning from blue to beige - refers to as "powerful magic items."

So he could have had a starting 18 in Constitution, 2 or 3 additional points in Constitution from leveling up, and a +4 or +6 item.

Wouldn't the 'without items' part mean what he would have needed to get 6-7 additional points of Con to get to mid-twenties?

[Peelee]

Wouldn't the 'without items' part mean what he would have needed to get 6-7 additional points of Con to get to mid-twenties?

Sure, if he was low level.

[danielxcutter]

Oh, so that's where that statement came from? Great, now I feel stupid. More stupid.

Still, that's pretty high.

[EmperorSarda]

So this is another 7th level spell (Resurrection) and a 5th level spell (Flame Strike) cast by Hilgya. And she either has raise dead (5th level) or another Resurrection prepared...

So...

Spells cast:
Level 4: Chaos Hammer (1117)
Level 5: Flame Strike (1149), Flame Strike (1123), Summon Monster V (1116)
Level 7: Resurrection (1149), Empowered Flame Strike (1128), Empowered Flame Strike (1119), Greater Scrying (1109)

As far as I can tell, she has not cast any 5th or 7th level domain spell, so she still has one of those for each level to cast.

In order to have cast four 7th level non-domain spells, she could be the following: Cleric 14th level, 32+ wisdom (which grants two fifth level spells and covers that), or she would be a 16th level cleric with a minimum of 24 wisdom.

If she ends up casting Resurrection again... then that is five 7th level non domain spells cast. Which could potentially put her at 18th level with minimum of 32 wisdom. (if any lower level, she'd need a minimum of 40 wisdom)

[Bird]

So, assuming Hilgya resurrects Durkon again, Durkon will have lost two levels.

[zimmerwald1915]

So this is another 7th level spell (Resurrection) and a 5th level spell (Flame Strike) cast by Hilgya. And she either has raise dead (5th level) or another Resurrection prepared...

So...

Spells cast:

See here.

The combination of level and stat bonuses that explains what we see while keeping both level and stat as low as possible is Cleric 15, Wisdom 24. Though that does require Hilgya putting a 7th-level spell into an 8th-level slot (I put resurrection there, but any of her 7th-level spells would have done just as well). Casting resurrection again would only require that she have Wisdom 26, as she could prepare that spell in her 8th-level slot.

[zimmerwald1915]

So, assuming Hilgya resurrects Durkon again, Durkon will have lost two levels.

Support for my nerfing-Durkon theory continues to accrue at an alarming rate.

[EmperorSarda]

See here.

The combination of level and stat bonuses that explains what we see while keeping both level and stat as low as possible is Cleric 15, Wisdom 24. Though that does require Hilgya putting a 7th-level spell into an 8th-level slot (I put resurrection there, but any of her 7th-level spells would have done just as well). Casting resurrection again would only require that she have Wisdom 26, as she could prepare that spell in her 8th-level slot.

I forget sometimes you can put lower level spells in higher slots. Oops.

[zimmerwald1915]

Question: can Hilgya use a raise dead spell to raise Durkon this time, since this last death was as a living man? Or will she have to use resurrection because he was once an undead?

[Peelee]

Question: can Hilgya use a raise dead spell to raise Durkon this time, since this last death was as a living man? Or will she have to use resurrection because he was once an undead?

That's a really good question. Id say RAI would allow Raise Dead.

[Aquillion]

RAI, definitely Raise Dead - I seriously doubt any group ever has interpreted this line from Raise Dead:

A creature who has been turned into an undead creature or killed by a death effect can’t be raised by this spell.

...to mean that it never works on you ever again if you ever get turned into an undead or killed by a death effect.

(Technically I suppose I can see the RAW interpretation that would lead to that, but it's pretty clear that "has been turned" means for their current death, not that this disqualifies you from ever being raised for the rest of your adventuring career.)

[MartianInvader]

So... is Durkon soon to be down 2 levels now?

[Quartz]

I wondered what we can deduce about Durkon's HP from Hilgya's Flame Strike. Note that I'm casting aside the Rule of Funny.

Hilgya did a base of 14d6 or 15d6 damage and Durkon clearly failed his save, but that's only 49 or 52.5 HP damage on average, and a maximum of 84 or 90 HP. Note also that the spell took him to below -9 HP. Durkon lost a level from the Resurrection but Resurrection grants you full HP straight off. A 13th level cleric (Durkon post-Resurrection) has 8+12d8 HP or 56 HP on average, but +13 per point of CON bonus. A CON bonus of +2 would grant +26 HP and give Durkon expected HP of 82 HP - over the top for even a Maximised Flame Strike. (BTW an Empowered Flame Strike does an average of 74 or 79 HP damage.)

An alternative is that Durkon rolled poorly for HP. If he rolled a 1 for all 12 levels beyond the first he would have a base of 20 HP so a CON bonus of +5 would give him 85 HP, which means that he could not be killed outright.

The third possibility - indeed probability - is that Hilgya got a result of 50+ HP damage and thus triggered a save for massive damage, which Durkon failed, despite his Fort save being +8 or more - you can always roll a 1. A roll of 2 would require a CON bonus of +5, or +3 and the Great Fortitude feat. (I'm assuming the dwarf's +2 bonus against spell damage doesn't count here.)

So we can't really deduce anything due to the third possibility but if we exclude that we can deduce that Durkon has a maximum CON bonus of +4 and likely +0 or +1.

[danielxcutter]

Sure hope Hilgya prepared a Revivify instead of a Raise Dead. It's from Spell Compendium, but we've already seen spells from that book since Z's Vitrolic Sphere.