Gate conundrum

[Sky_Schemer]

In #895, Roy says his plan is to destroy Girard's gate (http://www.giantitp.com/comics/oots0895.html). Assuming that's a statement we can take at face value (I assume we'll find out in the next strip), there is a big problem with this plan:

Xykon and Redcloak already know where Kraagor's gate is. If Girard's gate is destroyed then they can simply teleport to their next destination. They don't need this gate specifically, they just need a gate. So it's not enough to just destroy Girard's gate. The OOtS has to somehow hold Team Evil here indefinitely.

So on the face of it, they can't destroy the gate, but they can't not destroy it either. Which tells me Roy has something more in mind here.

Ideas? Conjectures? Wild speculations?

[Kolhammer]

I think it is time for a walk on the other side.

By accident no doubt, for I find it unlikely that anyone in either party would go through the gate willingly.

[Sky_Schemer]

My crazy prediction:

Roy will wait until Xykon arrives and then destroy the gate. They know from O'Chul and Azure City that the gate makes a big explosion when it goes. I think his plan is to destroy Xykon's body [see below] and bury him and Redcloak under the rubble of the pyramid, thus buying the OOtS time to get to Kraagor's gate.

The OOtS needs to get out, though, so that they can survive the explosion. Roy will want to be the one to stay behind and destroy the gate, but Belkar will volunteer. This will end up being Belkar's final act that both kills (and redeems him), fulfilling the Oracle's prediction. The only loose end is V.

Even more wild speculation: TE will teleport in, not to the precise gate location, but outside the pyramid, where they will encounter TT for that epic battle people have been asking for. Tarquin will have called in his old adventuring pals, and they will mostly go down fighting TE, but badly bruising them in the process. The injuries will be enough that Xykon will be destroyed by the exploding gate.

[Sky_Schemer]

I think it is time for a walk on the other side.

By accident no doubt, for I find it unlikely that anyone in either party would go through the gate willingly.

I like this idea, too, though something tells me it will hapen at Kraagor's gate.

[factotum]

It could well be that it's purely a delaying tactic. At half strength as they are, the Order are no match for Xykon, and Roy knows this. Add the Linear Guild into the equation and any defence they could mount for the gate would be doomed. Maybe, then, Roy is trying to re-roll the dice--to delay Xykon and the LG long enough for him to come up with some sort of plan to stop them.

[Vinsfeld]

Xykon and Redcloak already know where Kraagor's gate is. If Girard's gate is destroyed then they can simply teleport to their next destination. They don't need this gate specifically, they just need a gate. So it's not enough to just destroy Girard's gate. The OOtS has to somehow hold Team Evil here indefinitely.

Well, Roy doesn't really know that Xykon knows where Kraagor's gate is.

[MesiDoomstalker]

Well, Roy doesn't really know that Xykon knows where Kraagor's gate is.

Yes they do. (http://www.giantitp.com/comics/oots0695.html)

[ChristianSt]

Well, Roy doesn't really know that Xykon knows where Kraagor's gate is.


Yes they do. (http://www.giantitp.com/comics/oots0695.html)

No - they know that Xykon knows where Girard's Gate is (because Girard says she has the true coordinates - but even that isn't sure, because Serini doesn't necessary need to put all information in her diary (at least for the Order, we know that all locations are in there (http://www.giantitp.com/comics/oots0196.html))), but he doesn't say anything about Kraagor's Gate.
They can only assume that it might contain all location, but that would only be a guess (but assuming that Xykon knows where the last gate is, is probably the safest bet).

[Fish]

Roy isn't thinking clearly. He can't destroy it before Xykon arrives because the Oracle predicted Xykon would be here.

[Sky_Schemer]

Roy isn't thinking clearly. He can't destroy it before Xykon arrives because the Oracle predicted Xykon would be here.

Well, we only had one panel of his plan, so we know the end state but not the details or the timing. I do think he is waiting for Xykon. The question is, how will it go down?

[Kornaki]

Roy destroys gate

Gate explodes all over desert

Xykon arrives at location chosen by rolling percentile dice

Small fragment of exploding gate lands at his feet

:xykon: "Son of a...."

[Madfellow]

At this point there are a few things Roy knows with some degree of certainty:

1) The Linear Guild is in the pyramid and actively searching for the gate.

2) Team Evil has either arrived or will arrive soon.

3) Hinjo sent O-Chul and Lien to Kraagor's Gate.

Knowing these things, it's in the Order's best interest to destroy the gate now while the LG and TE are preoccupied in the desert and while O-Chul and Lien have a head start for Kraagor's Gate. If Girard's Gate remains intact, there's a growing chance that either the LG or TE will discover it fairly soon, overpower the severely outmatched Order, and get to work harnessing its power. With Girard's Gate destroyed, the LG and/or TE will either (a) get caught in the explosion, (b) continue to waste their time searching in the desert, or (c) head immediately for Kraagor's Gate, even though O-Chul and Lien have a head start. Either way the Order wins, even if they get themselves blown up in the process.

[VanaGalen]

Knowing these things, it's in the Order's best interest to destroy the gate now while the LG and TE are preoccupied in the desert and while O-Chul and Lien have a head start for Kraagor's Gate. If Girard's Gate remains intact, there's a growing chance that either the LG or TE will discover it fairly soon, overpower the severely outmatched Order, and get to work harnessing its power. With Girard's Gate destroyed, the LG and/or TE will either (a) get caught in the explosion, (b) continue to waste their time searching in the desert, or (c) head immediately for Kraagor's Gate, even though O-Chul and Lien have a head start. Either way the Order wins, even if they get themselves blown up in the process.

I'm not sure if it will really turn out well. As for (b) option, I think it's highly unlikely any of the evil teams would miss the giant explosion and keep looking for the gate.
As for option (c), Lien and O-Chul did have a head start, but Xykon has teleport and other spells/items that speed up crossing big distances. Also, Lien and O-Chul already had their asses handed to them twice by Xykon, so I'm not sure if they can do much on their own against evil teams, even if they get there on time. From Serini's diary and Shojo's story we know that Kraagor's Gate defenses are probably the worst of all gates, so I don't think the Order could assume the Kraagor's Gate is safe and they can get blown up in the explosion and stay happily dead ever after.

I think at this point they don't have a good choice - they can't leave the gate intact, as one of the evil teams might get it. They have no means of setting up any kind of protection with Durkon gone. They also can't destroy it because... well, because of that whole Snarl story.
I think it's time for V to appear and give them a hint about what Blackwing saw in the Azure City rift.

[Madfellow]

I think it's time for V to appear and give them a hint about what Blackwing saw in the Azure City rift.

Except even Blackwing isn't sure exactly what he saw in the rift. I mean, we know it was a planet, but we don't know why or how there's a planet on the other side of the rift. Also, it's not certain that a character in a medieval fantasy world would know what a planet looks like from a distance. For all Blackwing knew, it might just be a REALLY big bauble.

I've noticed a lot of talk around this subforum recently about V and what his/her reemergence would mean for the plot. Some people think he/she'll be a deus ex machina for the Order, while others think he/she'll get possessed by the Fiendish Trio and spell doom for everybody.

[KillianHawkeye]

I've noticed a lot of talk around this subforum recently about V and what his/her reemergence would mean for the plot. Some people think he/she'll be a deus ex machina for the Order, while others think he/she'll get possessed by the Fiendish Trio and spell doom for everybody.

Either way, V has been out of the picture for a good long while and it's high time he returned to action.

[factotum]

Roy isn't thinking clearly. He can't destroy it before Xykon arrives because the Oracle predicted Xykon would be here.

Not necessarily. Given the question Roy actually asked ("Of these two gates, which location will Xykon be within 1000 feet of first?") it's entirely possible for the prophecy to be fulfilled if Xykon arrives at the location of the destroyed Gate.

[CowardlyPaladin]

Personally I'd wait until Team Evil and the LG meet up and inevtiably duke it out, and when team evil emerges victorious, hopefully they will be weakened enough that OOTS can finish them off

[VanaGalen]

Except even Blackwing isn't sure exactly what he saw in the rift. I mean, we know it was a planet, but we don't know why or how there's a planet on the other side of the rift. Also, it's not certain that a character in a medieval fantasy world would know what a planet looks like from a distance. For all Blackwing knew, it might just be a REALLY big bauble.

I've noticed a lot of talk around this subforum recently about V and what his/her reemergence would mean for the plot. Some people think he/she'll be a deus ex machina for the Order, while others think he/she'll get possessed by the Fiendish Trio and spell doom for everybody.

Blackwing isn't sure what exactly was that thing in the rift, but it definitely wasn't angry monster that wants to destroy the world and that's already something. From his conversation with V we can assume Blackwing recognized it was a planet.

As for the IFCC, they aren't actively supporting any of the evil teams. The seem to want some sort of balance between the involved parties. As the OotS is now in the worst position of all teams, IFCC may want to even help them at the moment. Though I'm also worried what happens when V finds the gate.


Personally I'd wait until Team Evil and the LG meet up and inevtiably duke it out, and when team evil emerges victorious, hopefully they will be weakened enough that OOTS can finish them off

I think it might be what Tarquin has in mind at the moment - to let Nale, Xykon and the Order kill each other and get the gate himself.

[Madfellow]

As for the IFCC, they aren't actively supporting any of the evil teams.

Actually, they're supporting the Linear Guild, if only because the LG is their little puppet on a string on the Material Plane. They may also support the Order because they have an investment in V. The only group they seem to be opposing is Team Evil, and we saw how well that went with V's Soul Splices.

[KillianHawkeye]

Actually, they're supporting the Linear Guild, if only because the LG is their little puppet on a string on the Material Plane. They may also support the Order because they have an investment in V. The only group they seem to be opposing is Team Evil, and we saw how well that went with V's Soul Splices.

I wouldn't really say the IFCC is opposing Xykon. From their comments during V's assault on Azure City, it seems they didn't expect him to defeat Xykon. Rather, they were hoping it would motivate Xykon to get moving again, which it did (albeit delayed thanks to the lost phylactery).

As far as wake-up calls go, you can't do much better than an Epic magic duel. :smallamused:

[angry_bear]

I wouldn't really say the IFCC is opposing Xykon. From their comments during V's assault on Azure City, it seems they didn't expect him to defeat Xykon. Rather, they were hoping it would motivate Xykon to get moving again, which it did (albeit delayed thanks to the lost phylactery).

As far as wake-up calls go, you can't do much better than an Epic magic duel. :smallamused:

This. As far as the IFCC goes, it seems like they're just trying to get as many powerful people looking for the gates as possible right now. Their endgame isn't exactly clear yet, but anytime they get the chance, they nudge people into going after the gate.

[denthor]

Please read comic 300http://www.giantitp.com/comics/oots0300.html

Not only does team awesome evil know where the gates are they have color coded the locations.

[King of Nowhere]

Waiting until xykon arrives and blowing the gate on his face could be a good idea. roy has plenty of hp, while xykon has no con bonus to hiws hd due to being undead, so roy may even survive something that kills xykon. I am assuming here an explosion would deal bludgeoning damage, against which xykon has no immunity (they would be screwed if it dealt fire damage, as xykon has an item that grantws fire immunity).
In the best case scenatio, xykon will be destroied, and his phylactery will be buried under rock without enough room to regenerate xykon, so xykon would be effectively blocked there until someone finds him. that would be great.
On the other hand, worst case scenario for the explosion is that xykon survives and roy dies, and that would suck. they would not be able to raise roy, as his body would be trapped and within the clutches of redcloak.
even worst would be if xykon managed to stop roy from destroying the gate.

[factotum]

Waiting until xykon arrives and blowing the gate on his face could be a good idea. roy has plenty of hp, while xykon has no con bonus to hiws hd due to being undead, so roy may even survive something that kills xykon. I am assuming here an explosion would deal bludgeoning damage, against which xykon has no immunity (they would be screwed if it dealt fire damage, as xykon has an item that grantws fire immunity).

There's at least two things wrong with that statement: firstly, even though Xykon no longer has a CON score or any CON bonus to HP, being undead means he gets d12 hit dice and thus has an awful lot of HP anyway. Secondly, a lich's damage reduction is 15/bludgeoning *and* magic, which means he has to be hit with a magical bludgeoning weapon to bypass it (and I doubt the pieces of the Gate would be considered magical weapons for the purposes of estimating that).

[Roland Itiative]

I wonder how easy it would be to destroy the Gate. Lyrian's and Soon's looked rather frail (the first being kept by the ents, the second being just a sapphire), but we don't really know how much punishment a Gate more akin to Dorukan's can withstand (since it was destroyed by a spell of unknown power, but quite likely epic). Can the Order even destroy it?

[dtilque]

Genre conventions say that Roy is unlikely to immediately consumate his declared intention to destroy the gate. Something will intervene: most likely either Tarquin or Xykon showing up. Or the gate could be impervious to his sword, assuming he's planning on just whacking it.

However the gate will be destroyed in some way or another. One possible way would be if there's a battle between TE and the Order. As in the illusory battle, Haley will try to take out Redcloak with arrows. Redcloak replies with an Implosion, which Haley will dodge, of course. The Implosion hits whatever is behind Haley, which of course, will be the gate. The gate explodes, but the Implosion counteracts the explosion. So no one is killed but the gate is destroyed anyway.

[Kish]

^However little concern Rich currently has for the rules of D&D, I do not expect it to play out in a way that hinges on him house-ruling Implosion in a way that contradicts both D&D and its established function in the comic.

There is no projectile for Implosion. No Reflex save, nothing for Haley to dodge, no effect on inanimate objects. If Redcloak casts Implosion on Haley, she'd better hope she rolls a 20 on her Fortitude save, and if she does then simply nothing will happen.

Not necessarily. Given the question Roy actually asked ("Of these two gates, which location will Xykon be within 1000 feet of first?") it's entirely possible for the prophecy to be fulfilled if Xykon arrives at the location of the destroyed Gate.
"If the lich sorcerer commonly referred to as 'Xykon' will ever be, at some future point in time, within a 1000-foot radius of one of these two magical gates..."

If Xykon was going to arrive at the location of Girard's gate after it was destroyed, I would expect the answer to be either, "Kraagor's Gate" or "He won't."

[factotum]

"If the lich sorcerer commonly referred to as 'Xykon' will ever be, at some future point in time, within a 1000-foot radius of one of these two magical gates..."


You missed the rest of the quote, which goes: "...of which of those locations will he be within said radius first, chronologically?". That changes it from asking about the Gate itself to the *location* of the Gate, which is why I think it's entirely possible that going to the location after the Gate is destroyed fulfils the prophecy just fine.

[Arrowstorm122]

As Belkar mentioned, the book is running long, and will likely end soon. On what note it will end, I don't know, but I can't imagine we have more than 5-10 comics to go or so. There is still the thing with Tarquin having ordered Kilkil to do something. It might play in. V getting controlled by the IFC might also play in.

[Kish]

You missed the rest of the quote, which goes: "...of which of those locations will he be within said radius first, chronologically?". That changes it from asking about the Gate itself to the *location* of the Gate, which is why I think it's entirely possible that going to the location after the Gate is destroyed fulfils the prophecy just fine.
No, I just left it out. Because I disagree with (and do not understand) your assertion that those words mean the question is no longer about a 1000-foot radius of one of the Gates, but a 1000-foot radius of the location where one of the Gates used to be.

California is not, present tense, my location. The Redmountain Hills is not, present tense, the location of Dorukan's Gate (because nowhere is anymore).

[factotum]

California is not, present tense, my location. The Redmountain Hills is not, present tense, the location of Dorukan's Gate (because nowhere is anymore).

So you never heard anyone refer to "the location of the old temple" or something like that when referring to something that doesn't exist anymore?

[Kish]

See, sticking in the word "old" changes the meaning of the sentence. In my experience, it would be a pretty safe bet that the speaker meant a building, possibly a ruin, but certainly not a strip mall that happened to be built on a site that once held a temple. But Roy didn't ask if Xykon would be within 1000 feet of "Girard's old Gate," anyway. If someone told you something was at Kish's location, would you think there was any chance at all it was in California, or would you be certain it was in Florida? (I'm in Florida now, btw.)

[Kornaki]

If you're going to quibble about semantics to that extent, if Xykon never gets within 1000 feet of either of the gates then any answer to that question would have been correct

[Kish]

...Right, why should words mean anything? Well. Anyway. We should know within a few strips whether the prophecy does mean anything.

[veti]

Question (http://www.giantitp.com/comics/oots0331.html):

"If [Xykon] will ever be, at some future point in time, within a 1000-foot radius of one of these two magical gates, of which of these locations will he be within said radius of first, chronologically?"

Break it down:

There's an 'If' clause. If that's not satisified, then the answer is "it won't happen", or "neither". But the "If" clause can be satisfied if Xykon will ever be within that radius of either gate. Kraagor's gate works for that purpose.

So if Roy destroys this gate, then Xykon turns up at this location, and then Xykon goes to within the same radius of Kraagor's gate, which is still standing - the prophecy is fulfilled to the letter.

However, there's also the terminology of the Oracle's answer: "Of these two given locations, Xykon will be within 1000 feet of Girard's Gate first". That does require Girard's Gate to be still standing, unless the Oracle is using "gate" as shorthand for "location of gate" - which I think would be out of character for such a pedant.

It's all built into the ambiguity Roy gets for asking such a stupidly convoluted question (and incidentally causing me to seriously doubt his much-vaunted alleged WIS score).

[Domino Quartz]

It's all built into the ambiguity Roy gets for asking such a stupidly convoluted question (and incidentally causing me to seriously doubt his much-vaunted alleged WIS score).

He asked a convoluted question because he didn't want to get a technically true but useless answer. The only problem was that he had momentarily forgotten about the existence of another gate.

[Warren Dew]

As Belkar mentioned, the book is running long, and will likely end soon. On what note it will end, I don't know, but I can't imagine we have more than 5-10 comics to go or so. There is still the thing with Tarquin having ordered Kilkil to do something. It might play in. V getting controlled by the IFC might also play in.
I hope and expect there will be a big battle that will not fit within 10 comics.

[TheYell]

Some people think he/she'll be a deus ex machina for the Order, while others think he/she'll get possessed by the Fiendish Trio and spell doom for everybody.

Argh. That is like saying Frodo was a DEM cause Sauron never saw him enter Mordor. We know who V is, what she does, and where she is, and she's randomly roaming around the same building as everybody else.

[tomandtish]

Question (http://www.giantitp.com/comics/oots0331.html):

"If [Xykon] will ever be, at some future point in time, within a 1000-foot radius of one of these two magical gates, of which of these locations will he be within said radius of first, chronologically?"

Break it down:

There's an 'If' clause. If that's not satisified, then the answer is "it won't happen", or "neither". But the "If" clause can be satisfied if Xykon will ever be within that radius of either gate. Kraagor's gate works for that purpose.

So if Roy destroys this gate, then Xykon turns up at this location, and then Xykon goes to within the same radius of Kraagor's gate, which is still standing - the prophecy is fulfilled to the letter.

However, there's also the terminology of the Oracle's answer: "Of these two given locations, Xykon will be within 1000 feet of Girard's Gate first". That does require Girard's Gate to be still standing, unless the Oracle is using "gate" as shorthand for "location of gate" - which I think would be out of character for such a pedant.

It's all built into the ambiguity Roy gets for asking such a stupidly convoluted question (and incidentally causing me to seriously doubt his much-vaunted alleged WIS score).

There's another twist that it appears that Rich is not going to use that I would have found hysterical:

Being within a 1000 foot radius of one of these gates first didn't necessarily mean that it would be the gate they went to first (even if it was just those two gates). It's just which gate he'd be 1000 feet from.

I can see it now:

:xykon: "There's the entrance to Kraagor's tomb. Out front I see… 3 dragons, 2 Balors, and … what is that?"

:redcloak: "I think it's the Tarasque, Lord Xykon".

:xykon: "…. Remember when I said this would be more fun?"

:redcloak: "Gerard's gate then?"

:xykon: "Yep".