MitD XIX: The Potted Plant Is Starting To Look Reasonable

[Keltest]

Frankly, I think I would be comfortable removing the ANB from the BFS list on the timing criteria. It was already wild and largely baseless speculation that squeezed it in there, and now an attempt at verifying it has come up in the negative. Even if we can't be sure its actually the author, the lack of any evidence at all in the positive after a deliberate attempt to hunt some down says to me that we should probably default to treating it like every other monster with a timing issue.

Or to put it another way, it was basically decided to ignore the problem because people liked the candidate. Im perfectly fine with us deciding to just stop ignoring the problem, whether because the proposed explanation is even less plausible now or just because we dont feel like ignoring it anymore.

[Elanfanforlife]

I can send some pictures of people I talked to to find Kamelion's Reddit account, though I suppose that can't conclusively prove it. Would it help if I showed that the account in question is from 2016, so I couldn't have made it for the sole purpose of this post?

[Grey_Wolf_c]

I can send some pictures of people I talked to to find Kamelion's Reddit account, though I suppose that can't conclusively prove it. Would it help if I showed that the account in question is from 2016, so I couldn't have made it for the sole purpose of this post?

I cannot imagine you could provide bulletproof evidence, not just from accounts on the internet, and especially with the original post being gone. But you've already got Keltest's vote to back you up, and like I said, I won't fight you on this, so assuming no-one objects, I'd be ok on doing the reclassification on those two positive votes.

GW

[Crusher]

I have some news; Kamelion finally responded, and it turns out that he did not send the Athasian Nightmare Beast to anyone before he wrote it up, which he did on the 1st of July 2005. This means that the ANB should be removed from the FBS. The screenshot is attached here.
https://ibb.co/nCLNNN9

Wow, great job! That's really fun.

Hmm. I'm torn on pulling the ANB from the FBS. On the one hand, I believe Kamelion didn't send Rich a preview copy, and I guess its possible he's not the real Kamelion but I feel that's overzealous. On the other hand, that doesn't mean Rich didn't get a copy *somehow*. I guess I'd lean towards keeping ANB on with the Con that "it is possible Rich *couldn't* have seen the ANB before creating MitB" but I could go either way.

Oh, wait. I see, July 1st of 2005 is obviously way too late, that won't work.

Except, ugh, I think he's wrong about having written it on 7/1/2005. I mean, he posted his draft of the ANB on 6/30/2005 (5:15 pm, server time. Its at the top of the post). He probably wrote it, fiddled with it for a while, posted it for feedback, and then maybe did an edit and saved an updated version on 7/1/2005 which is the date he saw when he checked?

I certainly wouldn't remember the exact (or even vague) date of something I wrote ~20 years ago. Heh, just remembered that, backing my statement up, 20-25 years ago I had a phase where I did some writing and had a number of articles published in trade publications. Today, I couldn't even tell you how many of them there were, let alone the specific *year* for any of them, much less the month or day.

Or maybe the server time is different from his time zone, so maybe it was 7/1 when he posted it (for him) which was the same day he wrote it, but it was only 6/30 server time? Seems unlikely, but its possible.

Which means that he *probably* wrote it after strip #100, because while the 7/1 date probably isn't correct, he probably also didn't spend literal months working on it. Unless he did? Because whether it was a matter of hours or months depends on a zillion things, none of which we know.

Note: I've now gone from: "Just list it as a 'Con'" to "Oh, yeah, we should pull it" back to "Eh, maybe it is just a 'Con'? I dunno.'" plus I've edited this like 10 times. Unsure if I'll vote.

[Tubercular Ox]

Which means that he *probably* wrote it after strip #100, because while the 7/1 date probably isn't correct, he probably also didn't spend literal months working on it.

If you don't think it's all a scam cooked up by Elanfanforlife, go with this one. "I wrote up the ANB and posted it on the old WotC boards right away," is a weird way to remember 10 months of playtesting.

[Sir_Norbert]

I'm also voting in favour of removing the ANB. We don't have to apply court of law standards here; the evidence presented is strong enough that it's gone from "really unlikely but possible if you squint" to "yeah, this didn't happen".

[Darth Paul]

Record me as another positive vote, I have no problem removing the ANB on this evidence.

[Precure]

I trust the source. Remove the ANB.

[lio45]

Also voting to remove the ANB on the grounds of Elanfanforlife’s investigative work and discovery.

[Crusher]

If you don't think it's all a scam cooked up by Elanfanforlife, go with this one. "I wrote up the ANB and posted it on the old WotC boards right away," is a weird way to remember 10 months of playtesting.

Eh, I doubt he'd have spent any time at all, let alone months, playtesting a single monster entry. More than likely, they said "Write up a bunch of monsters, we need them by X date" with X date being alarmingly soon (days, or maybe a few weeks if he was lucky, certainly not months), because that's how deadlines usually go.

But, publication dates can be inconsistent, so he could have been asked to work on them but right after getting started they might have followed up with "Oh, wait, hang onto them for a while. We're shelving that for a bit to focus on project Y instead and we need you to work on stuff for that instead." Resulting in the half-done monsters sitting for months until the original project is back to being the priority. That totally happens as well, and 20 years later his memory of the details and timelines of those projects probably don't even count as a "blur" anymore.

So, yeah, its probable ANB didn't exist at all when Strip 100 was written, and I'm not going to argue in favor of keeping it. But I have enough doubt that I'm not going to vote to dump it.

[SaltySea]

I've read through OotS recently and I had a general felling, that:

Spoiler

Show

The Monster in the Dark is literally the Dark One, the goblin deity. More specificaly, his incarnation of some sort.

Then I looked through wiki and some related topics and I've found out this is not common opinion on the matter. Anyway, I think it would be realy cool. Very ironic.

Why I think it can be true:

Spoiler

Show

• all the descriptive names (MitD, Beast in the Dark etc.) are literally equivalent of Someone Dark = the Dark One.
• the yellow eyes match; the Dark One pictured in crayons has yellow eyes, like all generic goblins/hobgoblins
• there was that circus scene in the Rise of Darkness where people are generally repulsed, but goblins are excited, which may mysticaly imply some level of subconsious connection... and being special for goblins in some way.
• many puzzling qualities of MitD, like strange footprints, great strength (earthquake) and damage resistance show that he's something unique and not normal in the setting, an anomaly, and can be easily atributted as god-like-high.
• one of his reccuring lines is "Gate? What gate?" which can be a pointer to his connection (and interest) with it, even if subconsious. OotS is pretty much like DragonLance series, and there was that amnesia-suffering godess chick at some point as a major plot revelation; chances are it is the case here, too.
• the Dark One has somehow unusual origin for a god, and he is a young (new born?) one too; which would explain the child-like personality; I guess he would be influenced by this and by the general belief of his followers that he's a great warrior, but manifested in an unexpected way.
• the Dark One in the crayons was generally presented as a reasonable guy who wants to do politics in the best interest of his people, not the Hel-like evil god type. Similarly, MitD don't behave truly evil.
• Cool Factor

[ZhonLord]

I've read through OotS recently and I had a general felling, that:

Spoiler

Show

The Monster in the Dark is literally the Dark One, the goblin deity. More specificaly, his incarnation of some sort.

Then I looked through wiki and some related topics and I've found out this is not common opinion on the matter. Anyway, I think it would be realy cool. Very ironic.

Why I think it can be true:

Spoiler

Show

• all the descriptive names (MitD, Beast in the Dark etc.) are literally equivalent of Someone Dark = the Dark One.
• the yellow eyes match; the Dark One pictured in crayons has yellow eyes, like all generic goblins/hobgoblins
• there was that circus scene in the Rise of Darkness where people are generally repulsed, but goblins are excited, which may mysticaly imply some level of subconsious connection... and being special for goblins in some way.
• many puzzling qualities of MitD, like strange footprints, great strength (earthquake) and damage resistance show that he's something unique and not normal in the setting, an anomaly, and can be easily atributted as god-like-high.
• one of his reccuring lines is "Gate? What gate?" which can be a pointer to his connection (and interest) with it, even if subconsious. OotS is pretty much like DragonLance series, and there was that amnesia-suffering godess chick at some point as a major plot revelation; chances are it is the case here, too.
• the Dark One has somehow unusual origin for a god, and he is a young (new born?) one too; which would explain the child-like personality; I guess he would be influenced by this and by the general belief of his followers that he's a great warrior, but manifested in an unexpected way.
• the Dark One in the crayons was generally presented as a reasonable guy who wants to do politics in the best interest of his people, not the Hel-like evil god type. Similarly, MitD don't behave truly evil.
• Cool Factor

You're going to want to go repost this in the dedicated thread man:
https://forums.giantitp.com/showthre...ook-Reasonable

Also I'm pretty sure that's an option that's been discussed in the various theories and found wanting, particularly in the fact that The Dark One spoke to Jirix and had specific instructions for him, including telling Redcloak "Don't screw this up" regarding the Plan. Even the deities can't physically be in two places at once, and there's no reason to think he'd be innocent and helpful in person while still acting as a full god when speaking to his worshippers at the same time. Interesting thought though.

[Peelee]

The Mod on the Silver Mountain: Threads merged

I've read through OotS recently and I had a general felling, that:

Spoiler

Show

The Monster in the Dark is literally the Dark One, the goblin deity. More specificaly, his incarnation of some sort.

Why I think it is not true:

[The Monster in the Dark] isn't something I just made up for the story.

[Psepha]

I've read through OotS recently and I had a general felling, that:

Spoiler

Show

The Monster in the Dark is literally the Dark One, the goblin deity. More specificaly, his incarnation of some sort.

Then I looked through wiki and some related topics and I've found out this is not common opinion on the matter. Anyway, I think it would be realy cool. Very ironic.

Why I think it can be true:

Spoiler

Show

• all the descriptive names (MitD, Beast in the Dark etc.) are literally equivalent of Someone Dark = the Dark One.
• the yellow eyes match; the Dark One pictured in crayons has yellow eyes, like all generic goblins/hobgoblins
• there was that circus scene in the Rise of Darkness where people are generally repulsed, but goblins are excited, which may mysticaly imply some level of subconsious connection... and being special for goblins in some way.
• many puzzling qualities of MitD, like strange footprints, great strength (earthquake) and damage resistance show that he's something unique and not normal in the setting, an anomaly, and can be easily atributted as god-like-high.
• one of his reccuring lines is "Gate? What gate?" which can be a pointer to his connection (and interest) with it, even if subconsious. OotS is pretty much like DragonLance series, and there was that amnesia-suffering godess chick at some point as a major plot revelation; chances are it is the case here, too.
• the Dark One has somehow unusual origin for a god, and he is a young (new born?) one too; which would explain the child-like personality; I guess he would be influenced by this and by the general belief of his followers that he's a great warrior, but manifested in an unexpected way.
• the Dark One in the crayons was generally presented as a reasonable guy who wants to do politics in the best interest of his people, not the Hel-like evil god type. Similarly, MitD don't behave truly evil.
• Cool Factor

But if MiTD was The Dark One, why would he try to actively impede their search for the final gate? Redcloak is trying to find the gate FOR The Dark One, according to The Dark One's own plan and orders.

[Precure]

The Mod on the Silver Mountain: Threads merged



Why I think it is not true:

It's definitely not something he made up:

https://wot.fandom.com/wiki/Dark_One

It would also nicely connect "MitD is Snarl" and "Dark One is Snarl" theories into a one grand unified theory.

[hroþila]

It's definitely not something he made up:

https://wot.fandom.com/wiki/Dark_One

It would also nicely connect "MitD is Snarl" and "Dark One is Snarl" theories into a one grand unified theory.

This is like arguing that Rich didn't make up Roy by pointing at Roy Wood Jr

[Quebbster]

Redcloak claims to know what the Monster is. Redcloak also claims to not be in direct contact with the Dark One. I think that is a strong indication that the Monster is not the Dark One.

[Peelee]

This is like arguing that Rich didn't make up Roy by pointing at Roy Wood Jr

You hit it out of the park before i even got to step up to the plate. Well done!

[Metastachydium]

But if MiTD was The Dark One, why would he try to actively impede their search for the final gate? Redcloak is trying to find the gate FOR The Dark One, according to The Dark One's own plan and orders.

[DARTHS&DROIDS]Maybe he's MANY![/DARTHS&DROIDS]

Redcloak claims to know what the Monster is. Redcloak also claims to not be in direct contact with the Dark One. I think that is a strong indication that the Monster is not the Dark One.

Well, Redcloak knows what the Monster is. And he also knows what the Dark One is! It's perfect, if you think about it.

[Shinypants]

I'm gonna throw out my guess: the Monster is the Tarrasque, under the effects of an Awakening, and some kind of miniaturizing baleful polymorph.

Meta-thematically, it's the biggest monster in the 3rd edition monster manual besides ancient dragons, and it has been conspicuously absent from the monster gallery so far. Everyone who DM'ed 3rd edition had to at least think about using it - it's the kind of critter that makes for a big reveal. I think the thing with Bloodfeast was kind of sideways foreshadowing; Belkar mentioned his plan to throw a pocket tyrannosaur ahead of time and got called out by Elan for revealing it early. The villains have kept their biggest monster in the pocket so far. Xykon knows he could unleash it as a full-sized terror with an anti-magic field or superb dispel, and so he doesn't care if the Monster is willing to fight, trained, or particularly obedient. A full reveal-and-dispel would strip away its baleful polymorph, and maybe also strip away the Awakening effect, setting it loose to mess up whatever's its path while Xykon gains some altitude and watches. Xykon also knows he doesn't have the spells to pacify it and put it back under the umbrella again, so he's been reluctant to waste the reveal.

The old-gen heroes would've been the ones to pacify and awaken it. Soon's old party had a demonstrated m.o. of pacifying rather than killing terrible threats, especially Lirian the epic-leveled druid. They were able to capture a biggest red dragon. How would they deal with The Tarrasque, which just comes back if 'killed'? By turning it into something smaller and friendlier. The Monster is smart but naive, with a blurry memory of its past, which fits something very old but recently awakened with 3+3d6 int.

Its life-cycle and habits are similar to the Snarl - long periods of dormancy, occasional hungry rampages, basically un-aligned. The Tarrasque's origins are unspecified. In this setting, it might be something inspired by, or manifested from, or just sympathetic to, the Snarl. When the Monster did his 'Escape' thing, (notably, not a teleport, plane-shift or any named spell on the books, and not something he can repeat at will) he was very nearby an opened rift to the Snarlholme. I would guess that the 'Escape' power came from the Snarl in response to the Monster's prayer. It's an entity with god-tier powers and no formal code of conduct about direct interventions.

I read the Protean theory and a lot of those points fit too, but Proteans got that weird ability to de-stabilize the forms of stuff they hit, and that seems like something which would've come up in the Monster's dialogue about eating stuff.

[Timy]

I'm gonna throw out my guess: the Monster is the Tarrasque, under the effects of an Awakening, and some kind of miniaturizing baleful polymorph.

OOOOR : it is a potted plant half green dragon half green dragon half green dragon polymorphed into the Tarrasque and THEN awakened and miniaturized by a spell !

[b_jonas]

Shinypants: if the monster is baleful polymorphed then its original form doesn't matter for most of the big scenes. Its current form has to be able to hit Miko and Windstriker through the tower wall, be scary in the circus, and make O-Chul and Vaarsuvius escape. You'll still need to find the new form that is capable of those feats. The original Tarrasque form might perhaps explain why Miko's and Belkar's attack didn't hurt him much. Also the Tarrasque has high stats, including a +38 bonus to its fortitude save, so I'm not sure there's anyone who could successfully Baleful polymorph it.

[Psepha]

The old-gen heroes would've been the ones to pacify and awaken it. Soon's old party had a demonstrated m.o. of pacifying rather than killing terrible threats, especially Lirian the epic-leveled druid. They were able to capture a biggest red dragon. How would they deal with The Tarrasque, which just comes back if 'killed'? By turning it into something smaller and friendlier. The Monster is smart but naive, with a blurry memory of its past, which fits something very old but recently awakened with 3+3d6 int.

One thing I was thinking about here was that in the example of the red dragon, their "mercy" was dependent on a specific thing - Calder surrendered. I'm not sure how that scenario would arise with the Tarrasque.

[Nokob]

Looked through the existing suggestions at the beginning of the thread and didn't see this, so here's my guess.

It's mostly based on two things:

1. The fact that the MitD has likely been to the Astral Plane (but has no specific memories of it) (comic 833)
2. What the Astral Plane is (comic 1138)

What if the MitD came from the Astral Plane — that is, it started out as the idea of some sort of "monster", and that idea got big enough, in a sense, to gain a physical form, in much the same way as various other powerful ideas became the Outer Planes?

So my thought is that the MitD's true identity is the Monster… Under the Bed.


Pros:

• Thematically fits both the childish personality and the fact that he's always in the dark.
• No need to worry about specific skills or power levels. (Though I wonder if Xykon would have made a mistake revealing him; perhaps he's only as powerful as he is when you can't see him?)
• That said, it arguably makes sense that he can teleport; after all, if you turn on the lights and look under the bed, the monster's not there anymore, so clearly he must have gone somewhere else, right? (Of course, that's more about teleporting himself rather than other people, but it's not a big leap to think it could be both.)
• Easily fits into an enclosed space approximately the size of a human.

Cons:

• It sounds like he's part of a species rather than a completely unique being, and that that species gets quite big (probably too big to fit under a bed?). Perhaps it wasn't just "the monster under the bed" though, but all sorts of things that go bump in the night that were spawned from this idea in the Astral Plane?
• Why would humans but not goblins be disgusted when seeing him? Maybe it has something to do with like, dissonance from seeing an abstract concept as a real thing? And the goblins just don't have the same superstition so aren't affected in the same way, or something?
• How would he recognize that the paper Tsukiko was working on was half a ritual? Maybe that was just a case of fresh eyes, or some half-remembered thing that he heard Xykon & Redcloak talking about at one point?
• One thing that a monster under the bed would not do is have a strong smell, though that might just mean that he gets self-conscious about having any smell at all.

In all honesty, while looking into this and writing up the cons there I've lost a lot of confidence in this guess, but I've gotten this far so I might as well post it. It could be that part of it is on the right track, even if other parts aren't; perhaps it'll give someone else an idea, at least.

[Kish]

Meta-thematically, [the tarrasque] is the biggest monster in the 3rd edition monster manual besides ancient dragons, and it has been conspicuously absent from the monster gallery so far.

It's supposed to be unique. Whether or not all the D&D writers themselves respected that, that did mean "this is not a creature we should treat as a race which might show up from a roll on a random table" to some of us.

Everyone who DM'ed 3rd edition had to at least think about using it - it's the kind of critter that makes for a big reveal.

Everyone? Really? Raise your hand if you DM or DMd Third Edition and never thought about using the tarrasque, whether you lived without the bigness of the reveal of "the tarrasque!" or possibly because said big reveal would have turned your campaign into a shaggy dog story and you found that undesirable. *raises hand*

[Psepha]

Isn't the Tarrasque awakening meant to be a cataclysmic event? If it's a story-driven campaign they generally don't just toss in a big monster like that (or they make the story about the monster). Maybe it's a more common consideration in more sandbox games designed to present challenge-of-the-week to the party.

[Tubercular Ox]

Everyone? Really? Raise your hand if you DM or DMd Third Edition and never thought about using the tarrasque, whether you lived without the bigness of the reveal of "the tarrasque!" or possibly because said big reveal would have turned your campaign into a shaggy dog story and you found that undesirable. *raises hand*

The popularity of the Tarrasque as a candidate is well known and everyone knows "everyone" is a notoriously hyperbolic word. Demonstrating that it is hyperbole changes the subject more than it changes the meaning of what he's saying.

I can lift an argument from the very first post that fits into this slot better: "Tarrasque is an iconic creature, famed for eating a lot and sleeping a lot. Unfortunately, there is no particular reason to think that MitD is an iconic creature."

[Metastachydium]

Shinypants: if the monster is baleful polymorphed then its original form doesn't matter for most of the big scenes.

While I absolutely don't buy the Balefully Tiny Tarrasque thing… How much of an issue that is in the Stickverse is, oddlly enough, not quite as clear as that: Bloodfeast, for instance, somehow retains enough of his biting power to convince the Exarch, a freaking Vampire with high DR that murdering the tiger is not worth the inconvenience. That he, as a little innocuous lizard, shouldn't be able to do that is explicitly lampshaded by the Exarch.

[Ruck]

I read the Protean theory and a lot of those points fit too, but Proteans got that weird ability to de-stabilize the forms of stuff they hit, and that seems like something which would've come up in the Monster's dialogue about eating stuff.

I'm unclear how, as eating and hitting are not the same thing.

[Grey_Wolf_c]

I'm unclear how, as eating and hitting are not the same thing.

Ages ago I advanced the theory that it's the reason why he enjoys gruel so much: it's not that different from the soupy remains a protean "in the wild" would eat anyway.

(The idea being that a protean hunts its prey, hits is a couple of times, reducing it to a decohered mess, then slurps it up with whatever mouth part it happens to have at the time)

GW