Class and Level Geekery XVI - These Characters May Now Drive the Plot

[Resileaf]

Raise dead gives two negative levels and resurrection one, which means that Durkon lost three levels from these deaths.

[Grey_Wolf_c]

Raise dead gives two negative levels

What?

"The subject of the spell loses one level (or 1 Hit Die) when it is raised, just as if it had lost a level or a Hit Die to an energy-draining creature. "

http://www.d20srd.org/srd/spells/raiseDead.htm

Grey Wolf

[Resileaf]

What?

"The subject of the spell loses one level (or 1 Hit Die) when it is raised, just as if it had lost a level or a Hit Die to an energy-draining creature. "

http://www.d20srd.org/srd/spells/raiseDead.htm

Grey Wolf

My bad. I thought PF and D&D raise deads were the same.

[hamishspence]

1184 is nearly over, as we know from Belkar's death prophesy and many other timeline details.

It probably is over. The Azurite new year is "a few months" after the Northern one. So, maybe March or so.

http://www.giantitp.com/comics/oots0302.html

1.) Everything that references a year number "1183" or "1184" is using the Northern calendar. The Southern calendar has a different year attached, but I have avoided using it to keep from confusing casual readers (e.g. anyone not posting on this thread).

2.) The Oracle is using the Southern calendar in his prediction to Roy. Meaning that the "seven weeks" Roy talks about is the time until the new New Year, exactly one year from the celebration seen back in Azure City.

3.) All other references are to relative time...no matter which calendar Redcloak uses, a year is a year, and during the Gobbotopia scenes he announced that it was six years until the one-year-anniversary of the battle. Since the battle took place about a week after the New Year, that means two weeks have passed since Roy's "seven weeks" comment--a few days to travel to Sandsedge, a week spent searching the desert, and a few days looking around the cities on the continent.

A few days at most lapse between this, and the end of the book. And one week has gone by since the end of Blood Runs in the Family.

3 days between Books 5 and 6
12 hours between that and Tinkertown
Godsmoot takes place the day after the Tinkertown sequence
It takes around 2 days for the Council of Clans to gather; at least a day passes between that and arriving at Firmament

I take the first link to mean 3 days inclusive, as in day 1 = the day of Durkon's vampirization, day 2 = briefly seen in #946, and day 3 = start of Book 6. This seems to match with Vampire Durkon's meal plan:
Day 1: first day of existence; Durkon doesn't need any donation because he drained Belkar
Day 2: Roy is drained off-screen between books
Day 3: Elan is drained and says it's his first time
Day 4: Haley was drained right before the Godsmoot
Day 5: Durkon and his minions feast upon local dwarves toward the very end of this day (after dusk since "Ponchula" hadn't refreshed her spells between casting the quick-rise spell and her destruction)
Day 6: Durkon is slain before or around dawn

So we're looking at about 4 weeks till the Azurite New Year. Since the Northern New Year, which is what's numbered, is "a few months before", it's safe to say that it's already been and gone, and we are at least a month or more into 1185.

[Grey_Wolf_c]

It probably is over. The Azurite new year is "a few months" after the Northern one. So, maybe March or so.

Given that the Northern continent is the "default Medieval Western Europe trope land" that would make sense. Most calendars developed in places with seasons tend to start the year in Spring, because that make sense. Heck, the Romans used to do it too, which is why October is "the eight month" despite being, you know, the tenth one.

The Romans moved the start of the year to mid-winter because they needed to run elections for consul every year and as their wars went further afield, the time it took for the new consuls to join the troops started to seriously cut into campaign-in-good-weather time. After the change, they ran elections during winter (which is a miserable time to be out and about warring) and have consuls ready to lead the troops by the time they left the winter quarters.

So, I'm guessing that in OotS something similar happened: a few worlds ago, the Northern gods decided to move their start of year to mid-winter for whatever reason, and then they simply never put it back to a logical place, because momentum (I mean, I suppose it might have been something that a Northern kingdom did in this world, but it feels more like the kind of thing that would be carried into the world than something that gets reinvented every time).

Grey Wolf

[Flame of Anor]

I imagine this has been gone over, but why don't we have an upper limit for Xykon's caster level from Durkon's successful dispel in 429? Is the upper limit so low that we have to ignore it and assume houserules?

[zimmerwald1915]

Is the upper limit so low that we have to ignore it and assume houserules?

Yes. Yes. Yes. Yes.

[hamishspence]

If Xykon was level 22 at the time, the DC to match would be 33, and if Durkon was level 13, and rolled a 20, he would get 33.

So, it's theoretically possible for a level 13 Durkon to dispel a level 22 Xykon's spells. That said, a level 22 Xykon is kind of problematic.

[Emanick]

I always assumed Redcloak cast the Greater Invisibility spell, in order to resolve that problem.

[MultitudeMan]

I always assumed Redcloak cast the Greater Invisibility spell, in order to resolve that problem.

I don't think clerics get Greater Invisibility on their spell list, unless we're positing some variant cleric class for Redcloak that I haven't heard of.

[understatement]

Also, Xykon says he controls the zombie dragon, but wasn't it Redcloak who Animated it?

SRD mentions it "remain[s] under your control indefinitely"

[dps]

Given that the Northern continent is the "default Medieval Western Europe trope land" that would make sense. Most calendars developed in places with seasons tend to start the year in Spring, because that make sense. Heck, the Romans used to do it too, which is why October is "the eight month" despite being, you know, the tenth one.

Grey Wolf

No, October is the "eight month" despite being the tenth one because the Romans originally used a calendar with a 10-month year, but later reformed their calendar to add 2 more months.

[NoHaxJustPi]

Also, Xykon says he controls the zombie dragon, but wasn't it Redcloak who Animated it?

SRD mentions it "remain[s] under your control indefinitely"

Where are you getting that RC animated it? The only thing he's explicitly mentioned animating are the three Xykon decoys. I might have missed something, though.

[understatement]

Where are you getting that RC animated it? The only thing he's explicitly mentioned animating are the three Xykon decoys. I might have missed something, though.

First panel. Panel 12 shows it starting to flap its wings, so it's definitely RC animating the dragon.

[Grey_Wolf_c]

No, October is the "eight month" despite being the tenth one because the Romans originally used a calendar with a 10-month year, but later reformed their calendar to add 2 more months.

[citation needed]. Mine is The History of Rome podcast.

The roman year used to not particularly care much about the winter months, yes, but they reformed the calendar to move up the elections, as I said.

Grey Wolf

[PirateMonk]

The tricky part is calibrating O-Chul's age using Hinjo. We know he's 15 to 16 in HtPGHS and 23 in War & XPs - but there's quite a bit of flexibility.

Is he a young 15 (only just turned 15) or an old 16 (nearly 17?)
Is he in War & XPs a young 23 (just celebrated his birthday) or an old 23, almost 24?)

If he's a young 15 and an old 23 - then almost 9 years have gone by between the two books - making O-Chul around 51 in War & XPs (plus or minus a few months).

If he's an old 16 and a young 23, then only just over 6 years have gone by between the two books - making O-Chul around 48 in War & XPs (plus or minus a few months).

I'm not saying we need to pin down a specific age for O-Chul, just that the currently listed figure of 29+ is way less precise than it could be, to the point of being potentially misleading. 42+, 48+, 48-51, and 48-55 would all be fine.

[danielxcutter]

Well, maybe Xykon cast it from a scroll or something. Sorcerers have a limited number of spells known and maybe he just doesn't have it. I sure don't remember him using it himself.

[Gluteus_Maximus]

Do we have any information on the statistics of the Exarch?

[zimmerwald1915]

Do we have any information on the statistics of the Exarch?

He's at least a 5th-level Cleric.

[Peelee]

Do we have any information on the statistics of the Exarch?

Yes!

Dwarf, Cleric 1+, vampire template.

[dps]

[citation needed]. Mine is The History of Rome podcast.

The roman year used to not particularly care much about the winter months, yes, but they reformed the calendar to move up the elections, as I said.

Grey Wolf

According to Wikipedia, you're correct. I was going off my memory of the article on the calendar in the 1973 World Book Encyclopedia which I read 45 years ago.

[Grey_Wolf_c]

According to Wikipedia, you're correct. I was going off my memory of the article on the calendar in the 1973 World Book Encyclopedia which I read 45 years ago.

Fair enough, although I wanted on the record that I consider The History of Rome podcast a better citation source than Wikipedia. After all, for all you know, I went into the article the moment after I made my claim to edit in my position.

(OK, you could check the history and see I did no such thing, but I'm fairly positive you didn't do it before I mentioned it in this post)

Grey Wolf

[danielxcutter]

Yes!

Dwarf, Cleric 1+, vampire template.

Probably Cleric 5+, since he's a full-fledged vampire instead of a spawn, but then again we hardly know if he has other levels in say, Fighter, or a prestige class.

For some reason I thought #995 mentioned he had 7th-level spell slots, but it just says "high-level spell slots", so meh.

Actually, I don't think we have seen him actually cast spells yet, now I think of it.

[understatement]

Probably Cleric 5+, since he's a full-fledged vampire instead of a spawn, but then again we hardly know if he has other levels in say, Fighter, or a prestige class.

For some reason I thought #995 mentioned he had 7th-level spell slots, but it just says "high-level spell slots", so meh.

Actually, I don't think we have seen him actually cast spells yet, now I think of it.

Is his Con score able to be calculated by how quickly Durkula drains his blood?

[Peelee]

Is his Con score able to be calculated by how quickly Durkula drains his blood?

Sure!

Con: 5+

[Ephemera]

Sure!

Con: 5+

Eventually someone is going to create a secondary thread to track all stats of any character about whom we can deduce anything at all.

If it weren’t to much work (and probably against board rules) someone would probably already have made one to track most likely stats (rather than what we do, which is track min/max provable/possible, within some semi-defined rules of plausibility). Well, except for the part where you’d never achieve agreement about what’s most likely...

[Seward]

My bad. I thought PF and D&D raise deads were the same.

Pathfinder negative levels from being raised are just like being level drained and can be cured with restoration.

D&D negative levels from death are permanent.

The pathfinder authors considered falling behind your party due to death/raise was stupid, and made the incapacity temporary. I've had a lowish level character in Pathfinder killed, spent most of his wealth getting a raise and had to endure the level loss for a couple adventures until he could afford the more expensive material compents for two restoration spells. (it's expensive if you pass the 24 hour period in pathfinder). Once you can afford the restoration+raise in one go (level 9ish) then death is mostly just expensive.

[Rogar Demonblud]

And largely meaningless, IME.

[Seward]

Also, Xykon says he controls the zombie dragon, but wasn't it Redcloak who Animated it?

SRD mentions it "remain[s] under your control indefinitely"

Xykon is a necromancer. He animates lots of things in Start of Darkness. Presumably one of his spells known is one of the larger create undead spells.

Edit: Command Undead is a level 2 sor/wiz spell which would give a sorcerer of Xykon's strength the power to seize control of just about any size zombie, with full "dominate" level of control and no saving throw.

That's almost certainly how it was done since as another poster has mentioned, Redcloak is shown doing the animation.

[Seward]

And largely meaningless, IME.

At level 9, death goes from "seriously a problem until you scrape up the cash and find a high level cleric" to "this is a serious hit to our wealth by level".

By level 15ish, the way Hilgya behaved is fairly accurate. It is about as expensive as buying a "Fly" potion back at level 5, so as long as it isn't your high level cleric that is dead, it's a "fill an empty slot and cast" or at worst "rest and regain spells" kind of situation. At L15 getting one of your expensive items destroyed is much more serious than getting a party member killed.

By epic (say level 24), you can rebuild an adequate gear set out of petty cash, and a henchman can cast true resurrection any time you fail to respond to a daily Sending. You care much more about your reputation than anything else on your character sheet.