Before we left the city...

[Snails]

A single thread to put best guesses on what is Tarquin's secret plan from the end of #882.

My guess: Reinforcements. He called in his friends from the other two kingdoms, to bring his own party to full strength and seize the Gate.

That is why he is so casual about pursuing the Gate right now. He just wants to slow Roy down and spend some "quality time" with his sons.

[KillianHawkeye]

I have no idea, because we weren't given any information. It could literally be anything that's within Tarquin's ability to do, which is quite a broad range considering the significant resources at his disposal.

[rodneyAnonymous]

Another thread on this subject, with 2 pages of guesses/discussion: http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showthread.php?t=278218

[VanaGalen]

My guess: Reinforcements. He called in his friends from the other two kingdoms, to bring his own party to full strength and seize the Gate.


Yup, I think it's the most probable explanation (and I hope it's true, cause I would love to see more of the girl in yellow robes a.k.a. Ioun Stone Lady.)

At first I thought Tarquin's plan might have something to do with Thog, but Thog and plans don't really go well together, so I think it's unlikely.

What about the possibility of the plan somehow involving Ian Starshine? That Tarquin either captured him or tricked him into working against the OotS?

[B. Dandelion]

What about the possibility of the plan somehow involving Ian Starshine? That Tarquin either captured him or tricked him into working against the OotS?

I floated that one in the unfortunately-locked thread about Bozzok's "friends on the Western continent," but didn't get any bites.

I think it works. Especially when he's talking about it to Kilkil, and the last thing (http://www.giantitp.com/comics/oots0822.html) we saw Kilkil talking about in the capital was that he'd found the file on the prisoner but cut off before saying his name. Since Roy asked for him to be released, Tarquin would know he was important to the Order, and since he'd have his file on-hand he'd probably be able to work out that he's Haley's dad. So he'd make a useful hostage, but if Tarquin wanted to fight the Order first to see how they'd do, he wouldn't bring it up right away. He'd save it as a trump card in case they either took the upper hand and/or were on the verge of blowing up a Gate.

[Snails]

Doh!

Thanks, rodneyAnonymous!

[oppyu]

"We recaptured Ian Starshine and plan to use him as a hostage against my son's fiancé, as he is clearly her father. Did they really think we didn't have surveillance enchantments in our prison in case of expository prison break-ins?"

[dtilque]

"We recaptured Ian Starshine and plan to use him as a hostage against my son's fiancé, as he is clearly her father. Did they really think we didn't have surveillance enchantments in our prison in case of expository prison break-ins?"

Would such enchantments work in an anti-magic field?

[oppyu]

Would such enchantments work in an anti-magic field?

It could just have easily been a random wall with two eye-holes for a minion to look through, because that always works. Or maybe their enchantments are that strong; I don't know how D&D enchantments work.

[Snails]

It could just have easily been a random wall with two eye-holes for a minion to look through, because that always works. Or maybe their enchantments are that strong; I don't know how D&D enchantments work.

Holes in a wall, yes. The only non-Epic magic that can defeat an anti-magic field is an already deployed Wall of Force* (and similar effects), but that would not be relevant here.

* By the Rules As Written, the ancient black dragon's anti-magic trick would have been useless for bypassing V's Forcecage spell. As there are numerous dramatically uninteresting tricks that the dragon could have employed instead, such details are not really important.

[VanaGalen]

As much as I like the idea of holes in the walls, Tarquin could simply have spies among the prisoners or simply torture them to learn what he needs from them.

Anyway, I'm not sure if kidnapping/tricking Haley's father is really so important to make such fuss about it as Tarquin and Kilkil were doing. All they can do with Ian is to blackmail Haley and maybe Elan to surrender - and Haley isn't even lawful enough to have some moral dilemma on that point.

On the other hand, Ian's subplot hasn't really been fully explored, so we might see more of him, especially when he's such wonderful contrast to Tarquin. I just don't think Ian is involved in Tarquin's evil scheme in any way.

[Jay R]

As much as I like the idea of holes in the walls, Tarquin could simply have spies among the prisoners or simply torture them to learn what he needs from them.

Among any group of a dozen or more people in the Empire, it is reasonable to assume at least two are Tarquin's spies.

[Why two? To spy on each other, of course.]