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View Full Version : Is Kilkil making himself look smarter than he really is?



CaDzilla
2013-11-29, 05:32 PM
How do we know that Kilkil isn't falsifying reports to make things look better? 847 (http://www.giantitp.com/comics/oots0847.html) What is the actual chance that any of the team died. We know that Kilkil has been informed about the entire party and should therefore know their levels, classes, and equipment. Also, given the damage range of Z's vitriolic sphere, how likely was it that an order member could have died if all of the stick's members are assumed to be there.

SaintRidley
2013-11-29, 09:42 PM
Assuming Z used an Empowered Vitriolic Sphere the first go, that's 15d4 * 1.5 (anywhere from 15 to 60, average 37.5, plus 50%, so 22 to 90 damage, average 56 damage overall).

KilKil is probably assuming all members of the order are present. If so, V is probably the very tiny chance of death, being that V likely has the least HP in the Order.

V has some 15d4 HP plus 15*Con (which could be a -15 to HP, no benefit, or +15 HP, according to Class and Level Geekery), plus anything from magic items.

I'll leave it to someone else to calculate the exact odds of death for V, considering the above.

DaveMcW
2013-11-29, 10:30 PM
Kilkil is probably lawful evil.

A LE accountant would not falsify records. Rather, he would identify new sources of revenue (i.e. seize criminals' possessions), and eliminate expenses (i.e., cut the slave drivers' benefits).

Kilkil would not end up with personal wealth like a chaotic embezzler accountant. But as a trusted high-ranking bureaucrat he has so much power that he doesn't need money.

Benthesquid
2013-11-29, 10:43 PM
Unlikely. Tarquin made a decision to bring Kilkil along, and I'm sure he could have scrounged up another kobold if his only concern was symmetry. Now, he didn't bring Kilkil along for the chase scene once he'd decided to kill Roy, and we know that Kilkil was of a low enough level to be paralyzed by Holy Word.

So it seems safe to conclude that Kilkil's purpose wasn't combat. More likely, he's present because he's just that good with numbers. He can adjust actuarial tables for teams of adventurers on the fly. (No pun intended. Or is there?!) He can arrange the overtime, hazard pay, and supply lines for an entire specially trained division on extremely short notice.

CaDzilla
2013-11-29, 10:50 PM
Unlikely. Tarquin made a decision to bring Kilkil along, and I'm sure he could have scrounged up another kobold if his only concern was symmetry. Now, he didn't bring Kilkil along for the chase scene once he'd decided to kill Roy, and we know that Kilkil was of a low enough level to be paralyzed by Holy Word.

So it seems safe to conclude that Kilkil's purpose wasn't combat. More likely, he's present because he's just that good with numbers. He can adjust actuarial tables for teams of adventurers on the fly. (No pun intended. Or is there?!) He can arrange the overtime, hazard pay, and supply lines for an entire specially trained division on extremely short notice.

The question being asked was if Kilkil just makes up random numbers for the situation at hand to stroke Tarquin's ego. i.e. you will get a (6 digit number) amount of gp out of this new plan of yours, with all distinct digits.

CaDzilla
2013-11-29, 10:51 PM
Kilkil is probably lawful evil.

A LE accountant would not falsify records. Rather, he would identify new sources of revenue (i.e. seize criminals' possessions), and eliminate expenses (i.e., cut the slave drivers' benefits).

Kilkil would not end up with personal wealth like a chaotic embezzler accountant. But as a trusted high-ranking bureaucrat he has so much power that he doesn't need money.

Killkil was listed as lawful neutral by Rich

Ramien
2013-11-29, 11:15 PM
The question being asked was if Kilkil just makes up random numbers for the situation at hand to stroke Tarquin's ego. i.e. you will get a (6 digit number) amount of gp out of this new plan of yours, with all distinct digits.

A kobold? Lie about gold? Surely you jest...

Honestly, I think he's just that good with numbers. Tarquin obviously made sure to hire a very good accountant once he had the money to begin his scheme.

Forikroder
2013-11-30, 01:04 AM
How do we know that Kilkil isn't falsifying reports to make things look better? 847 (http://www.giantitp.com/comics/oots0847.html) What is the actual chance that any of the team died. We know that Kilkil has been informed about the entire party and should therefore know their levels, classes, and equipment. Also, given the damage range of Z's vitriolic sphere, how likely was it that an order member could have died if all of the stick's members are assumed to be there.
hes probably factoring in the odds of the order having been softened up by traps and such

DaggerPen
2013-11-30, 03:32 AM
Given the health range for all of the members of the Order, it wouldn't be too hard to figure out the probability that the Vitriolic Sphere did enough damage to kill one of them, but I find it most likely that Giant pulled a low number that sounded right off the top of his head. Also, Kilkil is by all appearances a fairly typical accountant (http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showpost.php?p=16452643&postcount=145), which includes being good with numbers.

137beth
2013-12-01, 11:11 PM
This...no, this doesn't seem particularly likely.

Reddish Mage
2013-12-02, 10:53 AM
How do we know that Kilkil isn't falsifying reports to make things look better? 847 (http://www.giantitp.com/comics/oots0847.html) What is the actual chance that any of the team died. We know that Kilkil has been informed about the entire party and should therefore know their levels, classes, and equipment. Also, given the damage range of Z's vitriolic sphere, how likely was it that an order member could have died if all of the stick's members are assumed to be there.


Assuming Z used an Empowered Vitriolic Sphere the first go, that's 15d4 * 1.5 (anywhere from 15 to 60, average 37.5, plus 50%, so 22 to 90 damage, average 56 damage overall).

KilKil is probably assuming all members of the order are present. If so, V is probably the very tiny chance of death, being that V likely has the least HP in the Order.

V has some 15d4 HP plus 15*Con (which could be a -15 to HP, no benefit, or +15 HP, according to Class and Level Geekery), plus anything from magic items.

I'll leave it to someone else to calculate the exact odds of death for V, considering the above.

That isn't very hard if we assume no DR and not taking into account the chance of being softened up. Saint gives the Vitriolic Sphere the same damage as V's hit dice. If V does not make her save (and has no resistance) she would have a 50% chance of being dropped to zero from full hp from a normal sphere (much higher from empowered). However, if we want to calculate the chance of V being dead dead (at -10 hp), its much less than 8% for a normal Vitriolic Sphere even assuming the save failed. An Empowered sphere would be much, much more likely than the 8% (or even 50%).

Since the Order can get V a heal, I discount the secondary damage from Vitriolic sphere. We don't know V's hp but we do know V can take some punishment, if we just assume V had average hp we can calculate things precisely.

Just because Kilkil knows some facts about the order does NOT mean he knows their level, equipment, ability scores etc (when do you get that information on an opponent in a D&D game?).

It looks like 8% being taken out of the air by the Giant, but I don't think it was meant to be scrutinized. Much as we can quibble about it Kilkil is supposed to be an accountant who is efficient and good with numbers. (http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showpost.php?p=16452643&postcount=145) We are meant to imagine Kilkil had some sort of basis for this calculation and didn't just make a SOP guesstimate. This sort of estimation isn't what accountants do, but I imagine Kilkil is some sort of accountant/managerial consultant/statistician, you know the type that has an alphabet soup following their name.

For the record Kilkil told us that the Empire recovered the full WBL for Enor and Gannji which allowed the Geekery thread to calculate the level of Enor and Gannji from the gold. THAT number was calculated by Rich.

Sir_Leorik
2013-12-02, 02:34 PM
Guys, you're overthinking this. Kilkil is nothing more than a dutiful, if socially awkward accountant, who dreams of nothing more than producing musicals assisting a ruthless warlord conquer the Western Continent (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Producers_(1968_film)).

:smalltongue:

Yakk
2013-12-02, 02:48 PM
I suspect Rich thought about "would this spell kill a member of the order or not?", and worked out the odds (at least as a back-of-napkin calculation) for each member of the order. And then thought it would be funny to inject into the comic.

Reddish Mage
2013-12-03, 12:03 PM
I suspect Rich thought about "would this spell kill a member of the order or not?", and worked out the odds (at least as a back-of-napkin calculation) for each member of the order. And then thought it would be funny to inject into the comic.

Channelling the angst of V, I will mourn my hour spent calculating what the odds would be like to actually kill V (the weakest member of the order)three posts up, as it has fallen to a comment by a latecomer with an imagination and no concept of the actual algorithmic complexities of this combinatoric problem.

137beth
2013-12-03, 09:32 PM
Channelling the angst of V, I will mourn my hour spent calculating what the odds would be like to actually kill V (the weakest member of the order)three posts up, as it has fallen to a comment by a latecomer with an imagination and no concept of the actual algorithmic complexities of this combinatoric problem.
The proper word is "combinatorial."