"Kill that which I would see dead"

[Mikhailangelo]

and not send proxies in my stead

Interesting twenty-second hypothesis:

Malack stated that his God instructs him to kill those he wishes death upon.

Malack clearly does not wish death upon Durkon, as evidenced by his general disposition towards him.

Malack feels a great deal of loyalty to Tarquin and this loyalty is reciprocated.

The defeat of the Order of the Stick is necessary for the 'linear guild's' plan to succeed - the death of Durkon would be of immeasurable aid to this goal.

It is known that Durkon will die before returning to Dwarven lands.

Again, however, Malack does not wish death upon Durkon, so he has no religious justification to attempt to kill him.

But he could use a (kinda) trusted barbarian/ranger halfling, which is now at his disposal, as a proxy to kill Durkon!




Yeah. This has not been thought through at all.

[Math_Mage]

I rather doubt Nergal is more enthused about sending proxies to kill people you don't want dead than about sending proxies to kill people you actually think should die. Also, Malack is averse to undead.

[MartectX]

Also, Malack is averse to undead.
Don't priests have some Command Word at their disposals to make others do their bidding (I'm not that firm in DnD's spell arrays). :smallconfused:

So no need for killings and undeadifications.

[pjackson]

Don't priests have some Command Word at their disposals to make others do their bidding (I'm not that firm in DnD's spell arrays). :smallconfused:


Yes. but what you can command is limited and the effect lasts just 1 round = 6 seconds.

[Phrednethor]

What I see here is a huge amount of hipocrisy in Malack's actions. He wants to kill Nale, and yet he doesn't, hoping the current conflict does its work for him. He's a spineless coward, completely subjugated by his friendboss Tarquin. His religious "convictions" are worth exactly nothing when push comes to shove, it seems.


[edit] Also, aren't these command-type spells unable to make their target do something they normally wouldn't do anyway?

[Winter]

What I see here is a huge amount of hipocrisy in Malack's actions. He wants to kill Nale, and yet he doesn't, hoping the current conflict does its work for him.

No, that is explicitly what he does not do. He is not hoping the current conflict will work for him, if he did that, he'd have used Belkar.
Malack is still very pro killing Nale and intends to do it himself. He just decided he can afford to wait a little longer because a friend asked him to and also provided good reasons for that.

Killing Nale is not off Malack's table and I think Malack prefers to kill Nale himself over seeing Nale stumbling into a saw-blade-killer-bee-honey-smasher-trap.

[Mr.Rictus]

What I see here is a huge amount of hipocrisy in Malack's actions. He wants to kill Nale, and yet he doesn't, hoping the current conflict does its work for him. He's a spineless coward, completely subjugated by his friendboss Tarquin.

Not really, Malack despises Nale, and wants to kill him with his bare hands/claws/spells/whatever. However, Tarquin has invoked what one suspects was one of their group's primary guidelines: business before personal vendettas.
Right now, they need Nale (to an extent), and so Malack is now reluctantly working with him. However, have no doubt, the instant it is clear that Nale is not necessary for world conquest plans, Malack will try to kill Nale again, whether Tarquin agrees or not.

[King of Nowhere]

What I see here is a huge amount of hipocrisy in Malack's actions. He wants to kill Nale, and yet he doesn't, hoping the current conflict does its work for him. He's a spineless coward, completely subjugated by his friendboss Tarquin. His religious "convictions" are worth exactly nothing when push comes to shove, it seems.



It looks more like conflicted loyalties to me. it's a completely different thing. he is loyal to tarquin and his group, but he's also loyal to durkon, and the two are at odds. he hates nale, but nale is his best friend's son. it would be like two of your friends are at odds and both of them ask your help against the other, and none of them would accept your attempts to pacify them.

[Quorothorn]

Yes. but what you can command is limited and the effect lasts just 1 round = 6 seconds.

Well, there is Geas, but it takes 10 minutes to cast (longer than Hold Person's duration) and isn't actually foolproof.

[Mikhailangelo]

Can Clerics cast charm person? I'm not overly familiar with D&D, and I've never played a cleric in the games I have played, so I don't actually know...

[Quorothorn]

Can Clerics cast charm person? I'm not overly familiar with D&D, and I've never played a cleric in the games I have played, so I don't actually know...

Only if they have the Charm Domain, and it's highly unlikely a death deity has that in their portfolio. Malack's Domains are most likely either Death or Repose (alignment-dependant), plus something like Destruction/Rune/Scalykind/Knowledge--maybe Law or Evil if he's LN/LE/NE--but we don't actually know much about his spellcasting details, since we only saw him cast 4 spells in the comic so far I can remember--Blade Barrier (indicating at least 9 levels of Cleric), Harm (raising his minimum level to 11--meanwhile, Harm could have been out of the domain slot from Destruction, but we can't know that's one of his Domains unless he states so or uses Disintegrate or a smite), Quickened Inflict Moderate Wounds (so that's one of his Feats), and now Hold Person (no new information).

We don't even know for a fact if he channels positive or negative energy, honestly (I would bet on negative, though I'm not convinced his Alignment is Evil, but it's not guaranteed as yet if I'm not mistaken). An Inflict spell affected by a metamagic Feat, IIRC, cannot be cast spontaneously, and neither can Harm (Mass Inflict Serious Wounds is the 6th-level spontaneous cast for negative energy clerics, IIRC). And he appears to have used his staff to create/control the mummies, not necessarily his own spells/class features.

So...honestly at this point most ideas as to Malack's abilities are guesswork and basic assumptions. He has access to all Clerical spells of 6th spell level or lower, and he almost certainly has the death touch Domain power since Repose and Death both have that and I honestly don't see a high priest of a deity of death NOT having one or the other. Otherwise...this post of mine mostly amounts to "probably can't Charm Person" plus a *shrug*.

[NerdyKris]

What I see here is a huge amount of hipocrisy in Malack's actions. He wants to kill Nale, and yet he doesn't, hoping the current conflict does its work for him. He's a spineless coward, completely subjugated by his friendboss Tarquin. His religious "convictions" are worth exactly nothing when push comes to shove, it seems.


[edit] Also, aren't these command-type spells unable to make their target do something they normally wouldn't do anyway?

What you're calling "spineless" and "subjacated", most people would call "devoted friendship". He trusts Tarquin completely, and values their friendship above all else, even a personall vendetta. Right now, he's not going to kill Nale. But it's not like he's said "I will never lay a finger on your son ever again". He's simply working with him to accomplish their current goal, and will probably turn on Nale instantly when it's accomplished.

Mindless devotion to principle above all else is what Miko does. And you saw what happened to her.

[ReaderAt2046]

Not really, Malack despises Nale, and wants to kill him with his bare hands/claws/spells/whatever. However, Tarquin has invoked what one suspects was one of their group's primary guidelines: business before personal vendettas.
Right now, they need Nale (to an extent), and so Malack is now reluctantly working with him. However, have no doubt, the instant it is clear that Nale is not necessary for world conquest plans, Malack will try to kill Nale again, whether Tarquin agrees or not.

In support of this position, I cite this argument (http://www.giantitp.com/comics/oots0854.html).

Malack's whole greivance here is clearly that Tarquin invoked the group's rule of "business before personal matters" and then came close to breaking that rule himself.