OOTS #1189 - The Discussion Thread

[Petrocorus]

Anyone else getting the Haley-like feeling the Gate isn't behind any of the doors?

Several people raised the hypothesis that the gate is actually in or under Kraagor's statue.

[Lvl 2 Expert]

Anyone else getting the Haley-like feeling the Gate isn't behind any of the doors?

Serini was the rogue of the group.

However, this being a good idea relies on there being a hiding place where people are less likely to look than behind the right door, so the gate would almost have to be somewhere else entirely, rather than say under the statue. Because if I were faced with a thousand dungeons to crawl in order to maybe find this gate I'd check places like that first. And at this point the gate being somewhere else entirely would not just be an anticlimax, but also a pretty big waste of resources that could have been spent actually defending the gate.

[CriticalFailure]

Anyone else getting the Haley-like feeling the Gate isn't behind any of the doors?

Several people raised the hypothesis that the gate is actually in or under Kraagor's statue.

Yeah but I think it could really be under any random section of stone. We know the stone is made of rock that can’t be bypassed. For all we know the point of the dungeons is to prevent anyone from using earthquake to tear up the whole valley and find it, because then they’d be dealing with way too many monsters.

[Hopeless]

I think you missed something.
I believe they were attacked after Och-ul mentioned Xykon & co were being tricked.
Is it possible Serini elevated the rift far above them and that's where they're being taken?

[sabremeister]

That book was magnificently done, Giant, thank you!

But that was an illegitimate child of a cliffhanger you gave us

[Rogar Demonblud]

It never ceases to amaze me that after all these years the Giant can still keep us guessing and then hit us with a swerve that nobody saw coming. I don't know how he does it.

I don't either, but I really hope he keeps writing after this so I can continue to enjoy it. And novels wouldn't stress his drawing hand as much (hopefully, he still does his own covers).

[Breccia]

Is it possible

Yes.

Actually, a less snarky answer is "I like that idea". Simply put, the "existing" line at the end there opens a lot of options up, including people coming back through the Rift -- which matches 100% what you said.

[ShadeSwift]

My first assumption was that they are connected to the IFCC, but I wonder if it could be something else...

I know, this was my first thought too. I also thought it maybe had something to do with the three soul splice souls from a while back, but I don't think that's it. There isn't a clear power structure in the IFCC, so none of them would be referring to another as "boss". The soul splice people are even less likely to do this, as are any two gods probably. I'm not sure what that leaves for options though...

[Mariele]

Serini was the rogue of the group.

However, this being a good idea relies on there being a hiding place where people are less likely to look than behind the right door, so the gate would almost have to be somewhere else entirely, rather than say under the statue. Because if I were faced with a thousand dungeons to crawl in order to maybe find this gate I'd check places like that first. And at this point the gate being somewhere else entirely would not just be an anticlimax, but also a pretty big waste of resources that could have been spent actually defending the gate.

Agreed. Who is going to be faced with dozens (hundreds?) of extremely dangerous dungeons and not go "well, we better check everywhere else, just to be sure"? And then what are all those dungeons for, if someone could stumble across the real Gate with blind luck? An absolute waste of resources. We already got the "the Gate is not where you think it is" rug pulled out from under us with the Illusionist--that fit him perfectly, and there were loads of other safeguards in place. Doing the exact same thing with the rogue... it's like a poorly made sequel. ;) That the rogue would instead focus on the money-related answer--make it as strong as money can buy--makes more sense to me.

It's possible that she hid it somewhere else but... seems like a waste of resources. Like, I could put my extremely expensive jewelry in a bank vault that is heavily secured, or I could hide it under the shrubs outside the bank, and that's a better hiding place because nobody's expecting it to be there? Y'know? That sort of line of thinking. Same goes with carrying it on my person, or putting it in a friend's house. Just because it's a less expected place doesn't necessarily mean it's a safer place.

I will say that I used to think that Serini hid the Gate somewhere else, but after I thought about it, I really am quite set on it being behind one of those doors. Do I think there's still a twist involved somehow? Yes. Do I think the statue will end up being important somehow? Yes. And I will say that there is maybe ~something~ to the idea of Serini going to all these lengths and leading everyone to believe that the Gate is in Kraagor's tomb (maybe assuming that whoever is out to assault the gate is using her diary?) and setting up this big defense that makes intuitive sense (brute force as a way of honoring the barbarian, gotcha) and then pulling a rogue move and putting the Gate somewhere else entirely, in a place nobody could accidentally stumble over. Where that would be, I have no idea. I feel like that's a bit different from what Girard pulled and has a chance of being likely. But I still wouldn't bet on it. I'm absolutely against the idea of the Gate being under the statue or anywhere else in the vicinity if it isn't behind one of those doors.

[Doug Lampert]

Unless, of course, they conveniently happen to have captured a bird-of-prey.

On topic: Others are indeed not ruled out, especially as they could likely also be using magic items or whatnot to get Greater Invisibility.

The original series they captured a cloaking device in The Enterprise Incident. So even if they promised real nicely not to use it, they still had it.

Why would the United Federation Of Planets travel across the multiverse to capture Oracle, Huntress or Black Canary?

C'mon! They are girls and this is Kirk.

+1

[KorvinStarmast]

No, the rift is inside the gate. That term is quite specific in this story. This is a ravine.

This is a world connected to D&D. See also The Glacial Rift of the Frost Giant Jarl.Rifts in glaciers are a thing in D&D.

The last panel depicts a glacier, with a rift inside of it that is somewhat crescent shaped.
You can also call it a ravine (or even Monster Hollow as Oona does) if you like. 'Thesaurus are Us' is a very Gygaxian D&D approach. Objecting to someone referring to it as a rift in a glacier, as depicted in the last panel, is bad form.

[HorizonWalker]

This is a world connected to D&D. See also The Glacial Rift of the Frost Giant JarlRifts in glaciers are a thing in D&D.

The last panel depicts a glacier, with a rift inside of it that is somewhat crescent shaped.
You can also call it a ravine (or even Monster Hollow as Oona does) if you like 'Thesaurus are Us' is a very Gygaxian D&D approach. Objecting to someone referring to it as a rift in a glacier, as depicted in the last panel, is bad form.

This isn't a glacier, though. This bit, at least, is actual solid land that just happens to have snow on top. The oceanic ice sheets are some distance away.

[Peelee]

This is a world connected to D&D. See also The Glacial Rift of the Frost Giant JarlRifts in glaciers are a thing in D&D.

The last panel depicts a glacier, with a rift inside of it that is somewhat crescent shaped.
You can also call it a ravine (or even Monster Hollow as Oona does) if you like 'Thesaurus are Us' is a very Gygaxian D&D approach. Objecting to someone referring to it as a rift in a glacier, as depicted in the last panel, is bad form.

A glacier is pure ice that moves. I do agree that "rift" as a general term is acceptable here, but I'm going to say that I don't think this is a glacier.

Yes, that's a ridiculously simplified definition of "glacier," but better definitions still make my point so it works.

[KorvinStarmast]

My guess is, prior to that, they gave the Paladins and the allies they kept talking about the benefit of the doubt, hoping they'd be content to just finish off Team Evil and then go home. But then O-Chul implied they'd be heading for the Gate themselves at some point, so poison darts for everyone.

Perhaps that was the trigger. It's not a bad guess.

This isn't a glacier, though. This bit, at least, is actual solid land that just happens to have snow on top. The oceanic ice sheets are some distance away.

Not all glaciers are oceanic. See Switzerland, and their alps, for example. There are (or were?) glaciers there when I was studying European Geography a few decades ago.

@Peelee: Indeed, it may or may not be a glacier. (But I'll stand by my point in re D&D lore).

As a follow up to the other point on glaciers, the glaciers the cut out the great lakes in the US were not quite "oceanic." When I lived near Kansas City(Western Missouri/Eastern Kansas), a few decades back, the topography in that area was due to having been by glacier movement, and its advance/recede activity during the Ice Age. (Or so said a geologist).

The most recent glaciers I have seen were in Alaska.

[bunsen_h]

I do think the pace is what's going to be MITD's downfall, though. The rest of TE is going to notice something is up soon. RC didn't want to go into the caves more than once originally--now they're trying to do six in one go? They're only going to trust the doors over their memories so long (and the only reason they've been more willing to trust the doors is because going through the caves is probably long, exhausting, and a bit of a blur due to their lack of distinction inside--but even in grindy slogs you begin to realize what's unrealistic and what's not). If MITD had crossed off one or two extra doors, and not consistently, it would take longer for them to catch on and they also wouldn't be progressing through the caves as quickly. I don't think making them so exhausted and tapped out on spells that running six caves puts them at risk for being killed by the monsters within was the plan. So why so fast? Why not just one or two extra doors at a time? They wouldn't have figured it out until near the very end (or even after they had gone through all the doors) if MITD had restrained himself in that way?

I'm under the impression that the doors literally rearrange themselves frequently, perhaps any time they're not under direct observation. That would make it a lot harder to notice that more of them are being marked than there should be. Team Evil does want to get through as many as they can as quickly as they can; the last time the subject came up, they quit for the night because Redcloak was "tapped out".

I agree that MitD is marking more than they should and risking detection, but they're still quite young and learning strategy. "If one or two is good, then seven or eight is even better!" Now that they've had the problem demonstrated, they'll probably slow down.

[HolyDraconus]

Oooh thats bad. Big X and *friends are gaining levels. They already had a leg up on the Order in that area before, but the gap is widening now. If Redcloak wasn't epic before, he probably is now.

[KorvinStarmast]

I'm under the impression that the doors literally rearrange themselves frequently, perhaps any time they're not under direct observation.

Marking them with an X ought to get around that, which I suspect is a reason why the doors are being marked (among others).

[CriticalFailure]

Oooh thats bad. Big X and *friends are gaining levels. They already had a leg up on the Order in that area before, but the gap is widening now. If Redcloak wasn't epic before, he probably is now.

Redcloak had just hit level 17 when they left for Girard's gate, so he'd have to have gained 4 levels in a couple weeks. Which seems fast, though if Xykon is getting XP then Redcloak and Oona must be getting ridiculous amounts of XP so maybe it's possible.

[MossyMeow]

I haven’t read the entire thread, so forgive me if this has already been pointed out, but while rereading this strip, I noticed two things:

One, the mysterious ‘green’ voice doesn’t always use complete sentences- he/she says “If I preferred him dead, could’ve kept my mouth shut” instead of “I could’ve kept my mouth.” It could be a typo or grammical error, but my initial thought was that he/she was using a sending spell, not actually talking. However, it doesn’t add up to 25 words, at least in that particular sentence.

Two, the voice says “grab them” not “grab him” or “grab her”, so maybe the orange voice is strong enough or has multiple limbs, so he/she can pick both O-Chul and Lien up at once?

Just some thoughts. I’ll leave the analytic types to puzzle it out.

[Grey Watcher]

Redcloak had just hit level 17 when they left for Girard's gate, so he'd have to have gained 4 levels in a couple weeks. Which seems fast, though if Xykon is getting XP then Redcloak and Oona must be getting ridiculous amounts of XP so maybe it's possible.

If memory serves, you actually don't get XP for encounters with an ECL more than 8 times levels above your level (not sure if it's up to 8 or up to and including 8). I guess the rationale is that at that point you're either succeeding solely through blind luck or are being carried by more powerful characters, but either way you didn't learn anything. So, depending on just how much higher level Xykon is than Redcloak, it's theoretically possible that X could be getting XP while RC isn't. Of course, if that were the case, I wouldn't have expected the lower level characters to survive this many excursions, but it's still (technically) possible.

[Doug Lampert]

Redcloak had just hit level 17 when they left for Girard's gate, so he'd have to have gained 4 levels in a couple weeks. Which seems fast, though if Xykon is getting XP then Redcloak and Oona must be getting ridiculous amounts of XP so maybe it's possible.

Remember, this is 3.5. It takes ~13.333 patrol encounters (aka easy encounters) to level, and 4 per day is the expected rate.

A couple of weeks => 14 days => 56 encounters even if not going fast (they are) => over 4 levels even if none of the encounters is particularly difficult for the character's level (they are since Xykon is being challenged).

I don't expect Rich to have RC be epic, but two weeks of this SHOULD give more than 4 levels if played BtB.

Remember, D&D 3rd edition and on is always the "What I did for my summer vacation" school report that starts at your first encounter with kobolds at level 1, ends EPIC and saving the world, and has plenty of time for a trip to Disney before going back to school.

[Edited to add]

If memory serves, you actually don't get XP for encounters with an ECL more than 8 times your level (not sure if it's up to 8 or up to and including 8). I guess the rationale is that at that point you're either succeeding solely through blind luck or are being carried by more powerful characters, but either way you didn't learn anything. So, depending on just how much higher level Xykon is than Redcloak, it's theoretically possible that X could be getting XP while RC isn't. Of course, if that were the case, I wouldn't have expected the lower level characters to survive this many excursions, but it's still (technically) possible.

The table goes up to +8, so up to 8 and higher is on the table. More than 8 higher in CR falls off the table. But nothing says no XP for those encounters. It says that all XP for more than 8 CR higher is ad-hoc, because whatever let you beat something that strong will adjust the difficulty and so the GM will need to use his judgment.

[Anitar]

One, the mysterious ‘green’ voice doesn’t always use complete sentences- he/she says “If I preferred him dead, could’ve kept my mouth shut” instead of “I could’ve kept my mouth.” It could be a typo or grammical error, but my initial thought was that he/she was using a sending spell, not actually talking. However, it doesn’t add up to 25 words, at least in that particular sentence.

I took that as just being their way of speaking. Somewhat ungrammatical, very informal, and prone to dropping words (particularly the subjects of sentences).

[CriticalFailure]

Remember, this is 3.5. It takes ~13.333 patrol encounters (aka easy encounters) to level, and 4 per day is the expected rate.

A couple of weeks => 14 days => 56 encounters even if not going fast (they are) => over 4 levels even if none of the encounters is particularly difficult for the character's level (they are since Xykon is being challenged).

I don't expect Rich to have RC be epic, but two weeks of this SHOULD give more than 4 levels if played BtB.

Remember, D&D 3rd edition and on is always the "What I did for my summer vacation" school report that starts at your first encounter with kobolds at level 1, ends EPIC and saving the world, and has plenty of time for a trip to Disney before going back to school.

[Edited to add]

The table goes up to +8, so up to 8 and higher is on the table. More than 8 higher in CR falls off the table. But nothing says no XP for those encounters. It says that all XP for more than 8 CR higher is ad-hoc, because whatever let you beat something that strong will adjust the difficulty and so the GM will need to use his judgment.

Ah, I didn't realize leveling happened quite that quickly.

[Rogar Demonblud]

In theory, you can get from 1 to 20 in a shade over two months. Maybe faster, if there's quest XP and roleplay awards.

[Fish]

At this point I think Scooter is a giant spider. It fits the ability to climb down a cliff and carry multiple objects.

Kermit has a humanoid mouth, at least if that’s a blow dart.

I’m also leaning toward Kermit and Scooter protecting the Gate against paladins. They are, after all, not supposed to be there.

[leveebreakage]

Looking at how these creatures are holding Lien and O-Chul (by the legs, hoisted in the air), they're either big, or they're using some sort of magic. Also worth noting: Lien is way lower in the air than O-Chul. At least one of them seems to be so far away from the ledge they couldn't be standing on it, which makes flying seem more likely. Incredibly powerful poison, invisibility, high enough stealth that they couldn't be detected by sound either, and possibly some other type of magic-- flight or... whatever wouldn't be visible, but would be able to grab, hold, and presumably also carry a paladin for a while.

I'm extremely excited to find out what's going on. May or may not have registered just to comment on this, actually.

[Quizatzhaderac]

Who is going to be faced with dozens (hundreds?) of extremely dangerous dungeons and not go "well, we better check everywhere else, just to be sure"?

Anybody in a D&D universe. Likewise, inhabitants of said universe are compelled to put the most important things in dungeon.

One straight line dungeon would be more efficient in the sense that invaders would need to go through 100% of the monsters.

A chamber with no entrance at all would be more effective in the sense that it's impossible to get to without going through walls, and anybody who can just get through the walls can trivialize a dungeon anyway.

I'm going to put 100 quatloos on a secret passage (requiring some plot stuff to open) in only one of the paths.

So even if invaders find the "right" path, they probably won't find the gate, and will have reason to believe it's elsewhere. There are no other hidden paths or anything to suggest this is anything other that a long, tough, conventional dungeon trawl.

If that invaders know the trick, well there's still the problem of going through 50% (on average) of the dungeon thoroughly searching for secret passages. I'm thinking being an epic rogue helps make an epic secret passage? or could be fudged to if she's collaborating with the dungeonwrights.

If the invaders fall for the trick, they'll rush through every path in the dungeon once then stop and reconsider. Maybe they'll stop and dig under the statue (or some other red herring) before returning to thoroughly search the dungeon.

[Anitar]

Hm... Anyone else think it's odd that Green is worried about them being spotted by a bugbear? (in the "Grab them" panel) The voices themselves are invisible, and Lien's report just indicated that (she believes) this will be a safe place for her and O-Chul to remain for the next two days, i.e. nobody aligned with Team Evil will find them there.

[Quizatzhaderac]

One, the mysterious ‘green’ voice doesn’t always use complete sentences- he/she says “If I preferred him dead, could’ve kept my mouth shut” instead of “I could’ve kept my mouth.”

My guess is that it has a weak ego. Possibly some kind of outside that doesn't really get to make choices. Also note that it's not extremely bothered that it's going to stop existing.

Notice that it's the "I" that gets dropped. Except when it would be extremely contrived to drop it. It's also possible that "grab them" is dropping "Let's" or "We'll"

[Grey Watcher]

My guess is that it has a weak ego. Possibly some kind of outside that doesn't really get to make choices. Also note that it's not extremely bothered that it's going to stop existing.

Notice that it's the "I" that gets dropped. Except when it would be extremely contrived to drop it. It's also possible that "grab them" is dropping "Let's" or "We'll"

Really? Because I feel like dropping "I" is extremely common. "What are you doing Saturday, Joe?" "Going to the movies, Bob." Doesn't really say anything profound about Joe, it's just common, casual, English usage to drop the subject of a sentence when it's obvious.

Also, am I the only one who read the exchange about not existing anymore as sort of a wistful, gallows-humorish way of talking about the (apparently) impending end of the world?