How many rounds?

[Roran]

So, how many rounds do you think are left on Redcloak's Summon Monster spell, and what else could happen before it ends?

Redcloak has a caster level of 17, possibly 18.

In the time since it was cast:

Roy, Belkar, Haley and Elan have (ineffectively) fought a few rounds with the Elemental, then Roy and Elan went a few rounds with Durkon and Z's summons. At a minimum I see 5 on-screen rounds with the elemental, then 2 with the summoned fiends.
V had a conversation with the directors. Talking is a free action?
Nale and Z killed Malack, then Durkon killed Z and chased off Nale. Malack took at least 2 rounds to die. Nale also used at least 2 actions against Durkon; one to try to grab him (second panel of 908) and one to cast Dimension Door.
Durkon knocked out Roy with his 'cure moderate wounds.'

If all of those actions began at the exact same time (the same round that Redcloak's elemental began attacking), we're looking at an absolute minimum of 8 rounds spent. 5 where the Order fights the elemental, 2 where Roy and Elan fought the fiends and 1 where Roy talked to Durkon.
There could be as many as 10 rounds left on the Elemental.

We have yet to see Tarquin's surprise. He was waiting inside the pyramid with Kilkil when we last saw him in 883, and several hours have passed since then. He is probably very close to the pyramid; he might even be able to catch Nale since Dimension Door only takes you a few hundred feet away.

[DeliaP]

So, how many rounds do you think are left on Redcloak's Summon Monster spell, and what else could happen before it ends?

Redcloak has a caster level of 17, possibly 18.

In the time since it was cast:

Roy, Belkar, Haley and Elan have (ineffectively) fought a few rounds with the Elemental, then Roy and Elan went a few rounds with Durkon and Z's summons. At a minimum I see 5 on-screen rounds with the elemental, then 2 with the summoned fiends.
V had a conversation with the directors. Talking is a free action?
Nale and Z killed Malack, then Durkon killed Z and chased off Nale. Malack took at least 2 rounds to die. Nale also used at least 2 actions against Durkon; one to try to grab him (second panel of 908) and one to cast Dimension Door.
Durkon knocked out Roy with his 'cure moderate wounds.'

If all of those actions began at the exact same time (the same round that Redcloak's elemental began attacking), we're looking at an absolute minimum of 8 rounds spent. 5 where the Order fights the elemental, 2 where Roy and Elan fought the fiends and 1 where Roy talked to Durkon.
There could be as many as 10 rounds left on the Elemental.

We have yet to see Tarquin's surprise. He was waiting inside the pyramid with Kilkil when we last saw him in 883, and several hours have passed since then. He is probably very close to the pyramid; he might even be able to catch Nale since Dimension Door only takes you a few hundred feet away.

The fight with the fiends has to be taking longer than 2 rounds: Z and Durkula send their fiends into combat, then Nale swipes Malack's staff. So there's maybe 4 rounds between the fiends moving to attack Elan and Roy and Durkula throwing Z's corpse at the piscoloth.

[SavageWombat]

I don't know about counting actions, but generally if a fight in D&D lasts 17-18 rounds the party is probably half-dead.

(The game assumes that a normal fight will last about four rounds.)

The only way I'd expect spell duration to come up is if Roy makes the deliberate attempt to stall for time.

[Person_Man]

You're assuming that none of the events are not happening simultaneously.

After the first round of OotS battling the Silicon Elemental, Nale could make his move against Malak, and from that point on both sets of events could basically be occurring at the same time. So we could be anywhere between 4ish and 8ish rounds into the spell.

The physical limitations of cartooning generally means that a single strip portrays 1-4ish rounds of combat. And I don't see the Elemental fight going for another 3-4 cartoons. So my guess is that it will be resolved in the next strip by Durkula, or the strip after that by a recently freed V.

[Roran]

You're assuming that none of the events are not happening simultaneously.

After the first round of OotS battling the Silicon Elemental, Nale could make his move against Malak, and from that point on both sets of events could basically be occurring at the same time. So we could be anywhere between 4ish and 8ish rounds into the spell.

The physical limitations of cartooning generally means that a single strip portrays 1-4ish rounds of combat. And I don't see the Elemental fight going for another 3-4 cartoons. So my guess is that it will be resolved in the next strip by Durkula, or the strip after that by a recently freed V.

I gave a minumum count of 8 rounds because we see Roy fighting for at least 7 rounds before Durkon 'healed' him. Certainly more time could have passed if entire rounds are passing offscreen.


The fight with the fiends has to be taking longer than 2 rounds: Z and Durkula send their fiends into combat, then Nale swipes Malack's staff. So there's maybe 4 rounds between the fiends moving to attack Elan and Roy and Durkula throwing Z's corpse at the piscoloth.

Good catch, you're right. That moves the minimum count up to 10 rounds; 5 where the Order fights the elemental, the 4 where Nale kills Malack and Durkon kills Z, and 1 where Durkon 'heals' Roy.

V has been held by the IFCC for... somewhere between 2 minutes and and 20 minutes, 35 seconds? We don't know exactly how long it took for the gate to explode or how long Team Evil spent talking.

Maybe Durkon will get to show off his new vampirey awesomeness by duking it out 1-on-1 with the elemental.

Edit: New strip came up as I posted. Ninja'd by the Giant! Well, that answers that.