What question SHOULD Roy ask [possibly spoilers]

[Peacehammer]

Ok, so the latest comic got me thinking: given that these answers are answered by a devious mind, is there any set of questions which Roy can ask which will give the answer which they are seeking?

Something like:

"Tell me what is the exact route that I can safely take to see the current location of the gate which secures against the snarl which was protected by the Girard family?"


I know it won't have any bearing on the comic, but it is fun to speculate.

[Winter]

I think Roy was particularly stupid in making the same mistake thrice: Asking questions that only referenced the relative position of the place he wanted to find instead of asking in absolute terms.
"Where from here...?" or "Where from the Giarard-statue in this pyramid..." etc would have been smarter chocice, especially for the 2nd or 3rd attempt.

Roy's fault is not changing the type of question he asks but trying to ask the same type of question three times in different versions.

Durkon already had warned him it'd be fuzzy and Roy refused to change his approach, so this scene here is probably one of his dumbest moments in the comic*.

* He of course had no other choice to ask as he did as there was a joke waiting for years to get made. :smalltongue:

[RMS Oceanic]

After that last question, I would contend myself to ask more general questions to narrow things down, like:

"Is the interdimensional rift and gate Girard Draketooth agreed to defend located within this building?"

(If yes)
"Is [the Gate] located at the bottom of this building?"

Stuff like that.

[Unisus]

Simply put he should ask Yes/No or multiple choice questions. As long as he leavesthe answers open, there is always the possibility to get answers without any helpful information.

[TheZenMaster]

Truth is that you could interpret any question a million ways just by putting thought into it. So they wont get anywhere.

[LadyEowyn]

Agreed on the yes/no questions. They're a lot harder to twist or be vague about.

[Acanous]

for the longest time, I thought Speak with Dead *Only* answered yes/no questions.
once used it to locate a dead dragon's horde like that, it shouldn't be too difficult for Roy to locate the gate.

[martianmister]

:roy: "Who is your emotionally weakest member?"

[Winter]

for the longest time, I thought Speak with Dead *Only* answered yes/no questions. .

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

You can ask any question you want. You directly access the imprinted memory of a body, so the answers are not "thought" through and in no way influenced by the personality (as you only speak to the imprinted memory).

What you get are the most direct answers to your question and as such often cryptic, incomplete, to literal. But not limited to yes or no.

[JSSheridan]

If I have four more questions:

1. Is Girard's Gate in this ziggurat?

2. What is the name of the person who caused your death?

3. Was Girard Draketooth alive when you died?

4. Was Serini Toormuck alive when you died?

[RMS Oceanic]

If I have four more questions:

1. Is Girard's Gate in this ziggurat?

"It's not a ziggurat, it's a temple." :smalltongue: Best to just call it a building.


2. What is the name of the person who caused your death?

The body isn't omniscient. At best all they'd know is that a pink bolt struck him, with no idea who sent it, and possibly not even that.


3. Was Girard Draketooth alive when you died?

This is a good question. Unless being a stone statue means he can fudge the issue.


4. Was Serini Toormuck alive when you died?

Not particularly relevant to the immediate crisis.

[JSSheridan]

"It's not a ziggurat, it's a temple." :smalltongue: Best to just call it a building.
Fair enough.


The body isn't omniscient. At best all they'd know is that a pink bolt struck him, with no idea who sent it, and possibly not even that.
I'd expect them not to know, but I'm considering Roy's PoV. He knows less about the circumstances than we do, so it would seem a reasonable question. Plus he'd want to prepare for the encounters ahead of him.


This is a good question. Unless being a stone statue means he can fudge the issue.
If Girard were stoned, it should count as alive unless you can age and die from old age. I don't think you do though.

Celia didn't blink when Nale told her she'd been stoned for 1000 years, and slyphs have a maximum age of 350 years.


Not particularly relevant to the immediate crisis.
True, but if she were, I'd be Sending to her regularly to keep her updated. And she might actually respond.

[Fish]

"What question can I ask you, that you cannot evade, which will tell me exactly how to get to the gate from here?"

[t209]

One question:
"Who killed you?"

[Particle_Man]

If Girard were stoned, it should count as alive unless you can age and die from old age. I don't think you do though.

Not in the OOTSverse according to SSaDT, at least.

[Cizak]

:roy: "Who is your emotionally weakest member?"

"The one who lost his teddy bear on a supply trip." :smallwink:

[Bobb]

"What question can I ask you, that you cannot evade, which will tell me exactly how to get to the gate from here?"A very clever one.

[Snails]

"From the location you died, if you took the most direct safe walking route towards the magical rift Girard had sworn to Serini to guard, could you get within 100 feet of that rift within 20 minutes?"

[Snails]

"What question can I ask you, that you cannot evade, which will tell me exactly how to get to the gate from here?"

There are too many "gates" in any dungeon-like area.

[Snails]

Ideally, one would start even simpler...

"Do you know the exact location of an item or place that is uniquely identified by the description 'the magical Gate protecting the Rift, which Girard swore to protect'?"

"When alive, could you get to with 100 feet of that location '<insert unique description>' by walking for less than 20 minutes from the place where you died?"

It is not hard to get useful information using SwD and even the most bizarrely evasive corpse. One has to work carefully, and be careful about assumptions. And one is not likely to hit a jackpot, unless you can really make an insightful guess.

[Winter]

"What question can I ask you, that you cannot evade, which will tell me exactly how to get to the gate from here?"

That might work with the Oracle, but not with a corpse without brain, thinking function, and simply memory imprints. And even the Oracle would answer "The right one".

I fear this would lead to a guaranteed useless answer (if the corpse can even understand the question, which I doubt).

[Excise]

Although we the audience know the answer, it might be a good idea to ask the corpse "what killed you?"

[Person_Man]

I think this comic perfectly illustrates the fact that no matter how powerful the PCs are, no matter what magic they have access to, no matter what questions they ask, or actions they take, a determined DM can still railroad the plot. (Or more broadly, a writer can write their plot however (s)he wants, regardless of what the characters "should do" or what "makes sense" in given the established rules of the setting).

In this situation, I am personally guessing that Rich does not want the party (or his audience) to know the mystery of the Gate, which is obviously a huge climax/plot point which he wants to spend 100+ more comics building up to. I'm 100% cool with that, since Rich is a great story teller and I love this comic. Plus butt jokes are funny.

[Goosefarble]

How many attempts does one get with the Speak With Dead spell? Non D&Der here, so I've got no idea about this sort of thing. Is it for as long as you want? or do you get a set number of questions before the corpse dies again/the spell wears off?

[Bastian Weaver]

"What were you guys protecting in here? And how can we get there?"

[Snails]

"What question can I ask you, that you cannot evade, which will tell me exactly how to get to the gate from here?"

"I do not know."

The corpse must answer truthfully. But it is not a logic-crunching truth machine with a mind that can consider completely new quandaries in the manner an oracle or divinity might be expected to.

Furthermore, the corpse cannot guess the physical or magical abilities of the questioner so there may not be any genuine answer if there are any substantial barriers along the plausible routes.

Even questions of the ilk I suggested might get an "I do not know" if worded slightly sloppily such that the DM gets confused.

[Mr. Pants]

It's not like he can ask him where Kraagor's gate is...the Draketooth family can't interfere with other gates...:smallfrown:

[MyNameIsSecret]

It's not like he can ask him where Kraagor's gate is...the Draketooth family can't interfere with other gates...:smallfrown:

But is that 'interfering'? Soon was able to tell the OotS the location of Girards Gate, and much other informaion besides.

[Particle_Man]

This is kind of like getting a wish spell but knowing your DM will screw you over if you are not careful with the wording. :)

[Tricia]

How many attempts does one get with the Speak With Dead spell? Non D&Der here, so I've got no idea about this sort of thing. Is it for as long as you want? or do you get a set number of questions before the corpse dies again/the spell wears off?You get one question per two caster levels. So 6-7, per the Class and Level Geekery's estimate on Durkon's level. After that, you can't attempt to communicate with the same corpse for a week.

[Particle_Man]

Well at least they have a lot of corpses to ask.

[olthar]

why ask corpses?

"Is anyone in your family likely to accept being raised by an unknown lawful good cleric?"

If yes, spend the rest of the questions figuring out who that person is (possibly: what color clothing was the person who would accept being raised wearing the day you died? and/or describe the tattoo pattern of the person who would consent to being raised.)

[Snails]

I think this comic perfectly illustrates the fact that no matter how powerful the PCs are, no matter what magic they have access to, no matter what questions they ask, or actions they take, a determined DM can still railroad the plot. (Or more broadly, a writer can write their plot however (s)he wants, regardless of what the characters "should do" or what "makes sense" in given the established rules of the setting).

In this situation, I am personally guessing that Rich does not want the party (or his audience) to know the mystery of the Gate, which is obviously a huge climax/plot point which he wants to spend 100+ more comics building up to. I'm 100% cool with that, since Rich is a great story teller and I love this comic. Plus butt jokes are funny.

There are situations in which the straightforward and obvious means of attempting to solve a complex problem with simple magic may fail.

Speak with Dead could easily prove useful if Roy were less pedestrian in asking his questions.

Speak with Dead could easily prove very useful, if only the OotS had 2-3 days to methodically employ multiple castings of the spell and other magics as well.

All this has zilch to do with railroading.

[Stormlock]

Question 1: How many yards away from your body do you think the magical gate you were protecting?

Question 2: Which direction? (Or alternately, how many yards from some other landmark, then they can triangulate. Again, use the 'do you think' clause, to avoid weaseling out with 'I do not know'. Allowing for a wrong answer means he must guess as best he can, rather than deny knowing perfectly.)

Question 3: What is the most dangerous thing protecting it you know of?

Question 4: Where was Girard Draketooth's body the last time you thought you knew of it's location?

That should hopefully tell them where the gate is, the biggest or one of the biggest challenges to prepare for in reaching it, and whether or not Girard is alive (since if he's dead, the body would likely be in a tomb they can verify that at.)

[Tricia]

why ask corpses?

"Is anyone in your family likely to accept being raised by an unknown lawful good cleric?"

If yes, spend the rest of the questions figuring out who that person is (possibly: what color clothing was the person who would accept being raised wearing the day you died? and/or describe the tattoo pattern of the person who would consent to being raised.)The problem with this (and several other suggestions) is that you can't ask follow-up questions. The corpse can't "learn" anything from the questioning. It doesn't even remember being questioned. So each question has to completely stand on its own.

[SaintRidley]

The problem with this (and several other suggestions) is that you can't ask follow-up questions. The corpse can't "learn" anything from the questioning. It doesn't even remember being questioned. So each question has to completely stand on its own.

Just be more specific with the questions then -

Who among your family would be likely to consent to a resurrection from a Lawful Good cleric of Thor in order to help protect the gate.

Trish.

What did Trish's haircut look like?

[Haircut]

What color is Trish's hair?

[Color]

How old was Trish the day you died?

[Age]



Now proceed to use the info to find Trish's corpse.

[Winter]

Who among your family would be likely to consent to a resurrection from a Lawful Good cleric of Thor in order to help protect the gate.

You can only access the memory, new conclusions drawn by the dead person are not possible. So unless the body has an answer to that question right in its memory (like they talked about something similar a while ago while being still alive) you won't get a useful answer.

It's still a better attempt than what Roy did, though. :smallwink:

[Kish]

And how can we get there?"
"Walk." text

[Squieonat]

"Walk." text

Hee hee... yeah.

[Paseo H]

A little bit of a tangent here, but...

It seems to me that the whole "get the information via Speak With Dead" thing is a massive Point of Failure in this security situation.

It gives me an idea for an adventure where villains are going around killing people just to interrogate their corpses.

[Kish]

A little bit of a tangent here, but...

It seems to me that the whole "get the information via Speak With Dead" thing is a massive Point of Failure in this security situation.

It gives me an idea for an adventure where villains are going around killing people just to interrogate their corpses.
As has been demonstrated, Speak with Dead is not a very good means of interrogation.

For villains, there are many more effective methods available, ranging from "Dominate Person" to "Zone of Truth and torture*" to "Create Greater Undead."

*Torture isn't an effective interrogation method in real life because the person being tortured is nearly certain to lie; magic can remove that concern.

[Paseo H]

As has been demonstrated, Speak with Dead is not a very good means of interrogation.

For villains, there are many more effective methods available, ranging from "Dominate Person" to "Zone of Truth and torture*" to "Create Greater Undead."

*Torture isn't an effective interrogation method in real life because the person being tortured is nearly certain to lie; magic can remove that concern.

And as this thread shows us, if we are careful we can choose the right question to ask the dead body.

[Niesra]

I think that, if one is trying hard enough (and that certainly seems the case here) any question can be twisted to give a vague answer. I think perhaps a more interesting thing to wonder is what question will Rou ask. The plot must move forward. Either they will get no answer and something will happen because they are in a place where stuff is bound to happen, or they will get a meaningful answer to at least one question, however vague, and that will move the plot ahead.

I think they will try to find out who killed them. Also if there are additional protections to the gate, and will continue to try to find where it is (obviously). I also think they are interested in whether/how they can contact Serini (it might be an idea, even if they don't do much with it at this time, and even if they try it through a method different than asking the dead).

[SaintRidley]

And as this thread shows us, if we are careful we can choose the right question to ask the dead body.

Of course, we also have to consider the saving throw for someone with a different alignment. Obviously, since the corpse we have answered, he failed. But no guarantee on another corpse failing its save.

[Snails]

I think that, if one is trying hard enough (and that certainly seems the case here) any question can be twisted to give a vague answer. I think perhaps a more interesting thing to wonder is what question will Rou ask. The plot must move forward. Either they will get no answer and something will happen because they are in a place where stuff is bound to happen, or they will get a meaningful answer to at least one question, however vague, and that will move the plot ahead.

The corpse is a corpse, and it cannot try really really hard to evade a question.

However, it can give the more useless of multiple reasonable answers, especially if that was the nature of the living creature.

I would bet that the living Clan Draketooth made a sport of sitting around the fire with ale in hand, coming up with the funniest literal-minded answers to every obvious Speak with Dead question. Eventually these answer could become running jokes, a morbid and silly clan tradition. I would bet they also named random landmarks to make the even the helpful seeming answers even more ambiguous.

It would be an entirely logical gambit for a paranoid Clan whose is both well-versed in the ways of magic and expecting to eventually be assaulted by outsiders that presumably possess some magical prowess.

The corpse would not be cheating or "trying hard enough". The corpse is choosing the less helpful of a number of possible answers the living being had on the tip of his tongue.

[balladfen]

I guess this would depend on how much thought the corpse is capable of, but I thought a sensible question would be "Which way do we need to go to get to the Gate before the epic level lich and his armies reach it?" If the corpse is basically mindless, this would result in the same responses they've been getting. If it has some limited intelligence, it might go "Uh oh! Lich coming! Better be helpful this time!" If it was capable of more thought, it would likely conclude they were lying and continue to respond unhelpfully. In a D&D game, that would be down to the DM's discretion; in a comic strip it would come down to plot requirements (if they're supposed to find the gate, the corpse understands the question and decides to help, if they're not, it doesn't).

They could also do it the comically slow way. "From the current position of my head, in what direction (of the following six: away from the center of the planet, toward the center of the planet, toward my right hand, toward my left hand, toward you, or away from you) would I move to become physically nearer the magical Gate Girard came here to guard, and the hole in the Snarl's prison it contains?" Then, if it answers as you stipulated, "As best you remember, what is the distance, to the nearest foot, between the center of my head and the magical Gate Girard came here to guard?" Finally (because Roy has, I think, three questions left) "If you needed to travel from the point where I am standing to the magical Gate Girard built this place to protect, and you didn't want to be harmed before getting to it, what specific steps would you take to avoid the gate's defenses?"

The important thing would be to then get Haley and Vaarsuvius to analyze the answers for deception, because I'm pretty sure it would still be possible to answer those questions uselessly.

[Othesemo]

In the event that you believed us to be your most trusted friends, and believed that telling us the location of the rift, protected by Girard Draketooth through the creation of 'Girard's Gate,' in accordance with the deal made by his former adventuring party, was the single best option available to you, what directions would you give us that we could arrive within ten feet of it as expediently and safely as possible, verbatim?

[twinkletoes]

:roy:: If you had to tell me the quickest, safest, most direct route to the gate commonly refered to as 'Girard's Gate', which is built around one of the five rifts in the fabric of reality, what directions would you give me?

[Stormlock]

:roy:: If you had to tell me the quickest, safest, most direct route to the gate commonly refered to as 'Girard's Gate', which is built around one of the five rifts in the fabric of reality, what directions would you give me?

Use a map.:smalltongue:

Keep in mind, if the corpse doesn't know what the gate is (and it may very well be on a need to know basis) asking it specifically about the hole in reality, snarl, or such things might be LESS helpful, since it could assume you might be talking about some other gate.

[AlexanderRM]

And as this thread shows us, if we are careful we can choose the right question to ask the dead body.

Yes, except that Speak with Dead *also* allows a Will Save as if it was alive if the creature's alignment was different from yours... so I suppose villains could kill Evil people to interrogate them, maybe if they had 3 Clerics one of each alignment (all following the same NE deity?), but by and large you'd be FAR better off with Dominate Person or Charm Person, for a huge number of reasons- most notably for non-villains, you don't have to kill the person, so even heros can use them- in fact, PCs using Charm Person to interrogate is one of the examples of spellcasting in the PHB. Plus, there's no limit to # of questions and most importantly, you can talk with the person, give them instructions as to how to answer, etc. etc. Charm Person makes them actually WANT to help you.

[avakeiya]

Why don't they just get Haley and Elan to ask the next few questions? She already thinks like a Draketooth and Elan may be able to stumble onto the right answer through genre savvy or just being Elan.:smalltongue:

[Snails]

In the event that you believed us to be your most trusted friends, and believed that telling us the location of the rift, protected by Girard Draketooth through the creation of 'Girard's Gate,' in accordance with the deal made by his former adventuring party, was the single best option available to you, what directions would you give us that we could arrive within ten feet of it as expediently and safely as possible, verbatim?

Any variant of "What should I do?" here can add enormous ambiguity. The corpse cannot guess what abilities the questioner might have. The corpse could easily be mid-level and have access to some combination of travel enhancements Spider Climb, Fly, Water Walking, Overland Flight, Water Breathing, Gaseous Form, Dimension Door, Passwall, Phase Door, plus various passwords (in obscure languages) and symbols that may bypass traps.

It is best to start with something along the line of "What would you if you wanted to do X?" and make educated guesses from there.

[Snails]

:roy:: If you had to tell me the quickest, safest, most direct route to the gate commonly refered to as 'Girard's Gate', which is built around one of the five rifts in the fabric of reality, what directions would you give me?

The corpse cannot guess the abilities of the questioner. There may be no reasonable answer for "safest" if the best routes are all extremely dangerous.

You could get answer like: "There is no safest, if you do not know the 123 passwords and when to use them. A thousands deaths await."

[Particle_Man]

"Durkon, you have a high wisdom score. Tell me what question I should ask to get the answer I want. Please don't phrase it as a question as we don't want to cue the corpse and I bet we only have a few questions left."

I was going to phrase that as a question, but realized that might cue the corpse. :smallsmile:

[balladfen]

Durkon's probably the least likely person in the Order to get results. Sure, he's got good Wisdom, but he also obviously has difficulty understanding generally deceitful people. Haley would be a better choice.

That "If you believed us to be your trusted friends" line is a good opener, though. Something like "If you believed us to be your trusted friends, and we said 'Hey, where's the Gate? You know, the super important magical one you're here to guard?' what are the exact words you would respond with?"

[Kish]

That "If you believed us to be your trusted friends" line is a good opener, though. Something like "If you believed us to be your trusted friends, and we said 'Hey, where's the Gate? You know, the super important magical one you're here to guard?' what are the exact words you would respond with?"
"Why don't you already know that? What are you, a doppelganger?"

[Hamiltonz]

Are we even sure that the location of the gate was generally known amonst membes of the clan.

[balladfen]

"Why don't you already know that? What are you, a doppelganger?"

Ah, but he believes the asker to be a trusted friend. Not "If I looked like your trusted friend..." but "If you believed..." That implies that he does not believe the asker to be an imposter.

[eulmanis12]

what would a lawful good cleric of thor need to do in order to make you consent to being raised?

[Deepbluediver]

That "If you believed us to be your trusted friends" line is a good opener, though.

I don't know the exact limits of the SwD spell, but why, exactly, should the Draketooth clan have friends at all, and even if they did, why should they trust them? It might be like asking a question that is the equivalent of "If I where a fish and you where a cactus...", essentially, it is so meaningless that there is no good answer.

A better question would probably be "If I where a member of the Draketooth family..."; maybe even "If I where Girard Draketooth, what would you tell me if I asked you...".

[Finagle]

Obviously Speak with Dead is not supposed to work. OOTS will have to explore on their own. The whole strip was just to show that OOTS was pursuing all angles before heading downstairs. I mean, jeez, Speak with Dead was the first thing I thought of, even before Raise Dead.