Dungeon of Dorukan Question

[brian 333]

A question about the presence of monsters in Dorukan's Dungeon has been argued regarding their usefulness as guards. It appears that the ones we saw were in areas in which Xykon had no interest, and the rest were off to the side, out of the direct path to the gate.

So, were the monsters there for style points in the Dungeon Decorators Magazine annual review of the Top Ten Dungeons of Ootsworld? Were they magical spell components? Subjects of horrible monster-centipede experiments? What purpose did they serve?

We know that Dorukan had an interest in creating a magic item to command and control the monsters which were never updated to Third Edition. We also know that Dorukan personally defended his dungeon.

I am guessing that his plan was to command the monsters in case of a forced entry into his dungeon. Instead of static, passive defenses, they would have been used as troops under his command. After his death that was no longer possible, and the monsters became passive defenses, most of whom would have quickly gotten out of the way if they could, accepted Xykon as their boss if it suited their nature, or simply fled the dungeon at the first opportunity.

Admittedly this is conjecture. How plausible is it? Given that we will never know the real answer, is it a guess that is disproveable?

[Fyraltari]

Until the Order started going through secret passages thanks to the goblin teens and later Celia, they only seem to have encountered goblins and ogres, i.e. Xykon's troops.

The monsters they fought we know to be serving under Dorukan were those guarding the talisman.

It seems to me that Xykon killed all the monsters tasked with guarding the way to the Gate, at the heart of the structure, leaving the others alone.

[brian 333]

Until the Order started going through secret passages thanks to the goblin teens and later Celia, they only seem to have encountered goblins and ogres, i.e. Xykon's troops.

The monsters they fought we know to be serving under Dorukan were those guarding the talisman.

It seems to me that Xykon killed all the monsters tasked with guarding the way to the Gate, at the heart of the structure, leaving the others alone.

Agreed.

My question is, how plausible is the idea that Dorukan intended to use them as an active defense rather than a passive one?

As a passive defense, otherwise easily bypassed powerful monsters are useless. As an active defense commanded by a leader, the powers of individual monsters can be considered when tailoring a response to an intruder.

We used to call this principle 'force multiplication.'

[Spartior]

Until the Order started going through secret passages thanks to the goblin teens and later Celia, they only seem to have encountered goblins and ogres, i.e. Xykon's troops.

The monsters they fought we know to be serving under Dorukan were those guarding the talisman.

It seems to me that Xykon killed all the monsters tasked with guarding the way to the Gate, at the heart of the structure, leaving the others alone.

What about Trigak?

[brian 333]

What about Trigak?

Trigak worked for Xykon. Redcloak said something about the quality of cut-rate mercenaries.

I do wonder if Trigak worked for Dorokan first. No information to support or refute that, though.

[Fyraltari]

As a passive defense, otherwise easily bypassed powerful monsters are useless.

Define "easily bypassed". (https://www.giantitp.com/comics/oots0072.html)

[ZhonLord]

I believe part of the purpose of Dorukan's dungeon was to evaluate new caretakers for his Gate. As a human, his lifespan was a short one compared to the elf dwarf and halfling in the Scribble. He needed a contingency, and unlike Girard he didn't obsess over family and paranoia. So he just needed someone worthy.

As a result, the rest of the dungeon involved challenges. Tests of being "pure of heart" and strong of both will and body. The prize talisman also specifically granted control over the monsters in his dungeon, which, if someone is going to be chosen as the Gate's new caretaker, having the obedience of the dungeon's denizens is rather important.

[brian 333]

I had not considered that before. I'll add it to my 'plausible but unproveable' list.

[gbaji]

Until the Order started going through secret passages thanks to the goblin teens and later Celia, they only seem to have encountered goblins and ogres, i.e. Xykon's troops.

Well. Except for the mind flayer, and all the folks standing in line for the bathroom (ok, that's a gag, but whatever).

My assumption is that anything that wasn't in the actual path between the entrance and the gate, they just left where it was, presumably because they didn't have to fight any of it, so why bother?


The monsters they fought we know to be serving under Dorukan were those guarding the talisman.

It seems to me that Xykon killed all the monsters tasked with guarding the way to the Gate, at the heart of the structure, leaving the others alone.

Yup. Totally agree. I think the only question is how many and how tough were "all the monsters tasked with gaurding the way to the gate"? Could be "lots" and "super tough". But could also be "zero" and "super easy" (cause... you know.. zero).

It's also certainly possible that Dorukan had some means to control all the monsters in his dungeon to use them as part of the defense. But, apparently, just like his self destruct, these defenses were unused because he got himself killed instead of actually using them. Which still leaves Dorukan personally as the key weak point in his defenses. He apparently didn't have a single person/creature/construct/whatever with orders to "blow the gate if I die" or something like that. Or even "round up the troops while I go deal with this sorcerer". There was basically nothing left behind.


My personal theory is that Dorukan engaged in the stereotypical magical research thing. And as part of that collected various rare and unusual creatures (for study of their magical abilities, harvesting for magical components, whatever). He also seemed to just have like hobbies or something (like the vault where he collected old edition monsters). And I suspect that the gate was just another one of these things that happened to be down at the bottom of his tower basement, but that the other things were not actively about it. If he hadn't had a gate at the bottom of his dungeon, he likely would still have had those other things (cause... wizard). He just built his tower and dungeon over the gate, because that's where it was, and he needed to defend it, so that's where he built it. And having built it, if he wants to also engage in this other magic research, he kinda has to put all his other stuff in the same location, right?

I honestly don't think there's more to it than that.

[Liquor Box]

In terms of the question of how tough they were, I'll just point out that at least some were tough enough that Serini wanted to recruit them for her dungeons.

Sure, that's not tough enough to really threaten Xykon. But no one defending a gate has been tough enough to seriously threaten Xykon except Scribbles themselves (or their ghosts).

[brian 333]

In terms of the question of how tough they were, I'll just point out that at least some were tough enough that Serini wanted to recruit them for her dungeons.

Sure, that's not tough enough to really threaten Xykon. But no one defending a gate has been tough enough to seriously threaten Xykon except Scribbles themselves (or their ghosts).

Could they have been much more formidable under the command of a competent leader who could select a team with abilities tailord to defeat the threat at hand then lead them in a coordinated attack?

[Liquor Box]

Could they have been much more formidable under the command of a competent leader who could select a team with abilities tailord to defeat the threat at hand then lead them in a coordinated attack?

Possibly, we don't know how intelligent the monsters were.

I'm not sure any of the gate defenders meet that definition though? Or if they did, defended the gate in that manner in practice?

[brian 333]

Possibly, we don't know how intelligent the monsters were.

I'm not sure any of the gate defenders meet that definition though? Or if they did, defended the gate in that manner in practice?

Individual intelligence is not relevant if the monsters are commanded by an intelligent leader.

There is no evidence that the monsters were intended to be used in this way, and no evidence they were not. I propose that it is plausible that they were, realizing that I am speculating. I am hoping other posters can show me better logic.

[Liquor Box]

Individual intelligence is not relevant if the monsters are commanded by an intelligent leader.

There is no evidence that the monsters were intended to be used in this way, and no evidence they were not. I propose that it is plausible that they were, realizing that I am speculating. I am hoping other posters can show me better logic.

Well, it is relevant, because very stupid monsters will not be able to be commanded, and very inteligent ones wouldn't need to be to the same extent.

I must admit, I'm not sure who you are speculating might have cleverly commanded monsters in defence of their dungeon?

[brian 333]

Well, it is relevant, because very stupid monsters will not be able to be commanded, and very inteligent ones wouldn't need to be to the same extent.

I must admit, I'm not sure who you are speculating might have cleverly commanded monsters in defence of their dungeon?

Dorukon.

It appears that he had at least more than a superficial interest in monster control magic. I extrapolate from that and from the presence of idle monsters in his lair that he may have intended to use them as mobile strike forces, tailored to eliminate the threats which entered his dungeons.

Spoiler:

He was dead before Xykon entered, and therefore the monsters were uncommanded.

According to my hypothesis.

[Murk]

Dorukon.

It appears that he had at least more than a superficial interest in monster control magic. I extrapolate from that and from the presence of idle monsters in his lair that he may have intended to use them as mobile strike forces, tailored to eliminate the threats which entered his dungeons.


If that was his intention, then why didn't he?
It's been a while since I read Start of Darkness, but wasn't his castle besieged by Xykon for some time, and Xykon had to goad him out - and then Dorukan came to fight Xykon on his own, no less.
If he intended to use his monsters as a mobile strike force, then why didn't he bring them with him when he went to fight Xykon? Why was he content to stay in the castle under siege?

[gbaji]

If that was his intention, then why didn't he?
It's been a while since I read Start of Darkness, but wasn't his castle besieged by Xykon for some time, and Xykon had to goad him out - and then Dorukan came to fight Xykon on his own, no less.
If he intended to use his monsters as a mobile strike force, then why didn't he bring them with him when he went to fight Xykon? Why was he content to stay in the castle under siege?

My assumption to this is that Dorukan was overconfident. He just assumed that he, as an epic wizard (and not some mere sorcerer) was more than a match for Xykon. When Xykon called him out, he choose to more or less engage in a straight up wizard duel. He may have felt that bringing a horde of monsters with him would sully that fight maybe? Then again, didn't he also spam Xykon with summoned stuff anyway? So yeah. You would think that if he had a large number of powerful monsters under his control, he perhaps would have brought them with him as well.

It's also possible that his control of the monsters only extended to within the bounds of the castle and dungeon. Or perhaps that controling them outside would have required spells that he didn't want to expend right before fight (dunno. reaching here). I've proposed a couple of times that his "control" of the monsters was more like a zoo, and less like "they're my pets" or something. Zoo animals are managed while they are each in their area and being fed, and maintained. But you can't expect to just move them outside of the zoo and assume that they'll do anything useful for you.

Again though, we just don't have enough information to do more than speculate.

[Kish]

I think jumping from "he collected all the creatures never updated to 3ed" to "he intended to use monsters as a mobile strike force" is insupportable. As Hilgya figured out, the only monsters Dorukan can actually be observed to have put any effort into controlling were nearly useless against any mid-level-or-higher spellcaster, because they autofailed every 3ed-style save.

(And if their armor classes had also not been updated, Vaarsuvius would have needed to roll a 1 to miss them with a physical attack; that dracolisk whose breath weapon prompted the Linear Guild returning to fight the Order had an AC of 3.)

His dungeon's defenses came out to fight Xykon. His dungeon's defenses were himself and his amazing magic. Nothing more complicated than that.

[Liquor Box]

I think jumping from "he collected all the creatures never updated to 3ed" to "he intended to use monsters as a mobile strike force" is insupportable. As Hilgya figured out, the only monsters Dorukan can actually be observed to have put any effort into controlling were nearly useless against any mid-level-or-higher spellcaster, because they autofailed every 3ed-style save.

(And if their armor classes had also not been updated, Vaarsuvius would have needed to roll a 1 to miss them with a physical attack; that dracolisk whose breath weapon prompted the Linear Guild returning to fight the Order had an AC of 3.)

His dungeon's defenses came out to fight Xykon. His dungeon's defenses were himself and his amazing magic. Nothing more complicated than that.

I think there s good reason to believe that it was not just the unupdated monsters in the dungeon. Celia for example was also there. Additionally, Serini was recruiting from him, and while it's possible she was recruiting specifically for unupdated monsters for some strange reason, it seems unlikely as those wouldn't be much use to her defence as you point out.

There is a theory that some of the monsters we see when the Order goes through the dungeon, such as the mindflayer and the various monsters queuing outside the bathroom were survivors from Dorukan's time. I'm not sure about that personally, I think they may be more monsters Xykon introduced. But the mere presence of things like bathrooms (well away from where the old edition monsters were kept) suggests the presence of other monsters at Dorukan's time.

There are lots of reasons why Dorukan's monsters might not have sallied forth. Serini's monsters haven't either, to attack Team Evil at night. Maybe they aren't easily controllable in that way (as I suspect most of Serini's aren't).

[gbaji]

There are lots of reasons why Dorukan's monsters might not have sallied forth. Serini's monsters haven't either, to attack Team Evil at night. Maybe they aren't easily controllable in that way (as I suspect most of Serini's aren't).

Serini's monsters are contained within their respective dungeons. How exactly that is done has been subject to a bit of discussion, but it is prettty clear this is the case (because we have heard of no monsters ever leaving their dungeons through the Hollow doors).

The difference is that every single dungeon, with every single monster contained within, is in the path one must travel to get to the gate. So constraining the monsters to their dungeons actually acts as part of the gate defense since one must get through the monsters to get to the gate.

This does not appear to be the case with Dorukan's dungeon, large portions of which are clearly "off to the side", and do not need to be traversed to get to the gate. Hence, monsters in those areas do not need to ever be encountered in order to reach the gate. I've also postulated that Dorukan also constained his monsters to specific portions of his dungeon as well (makes sense, otherwise your monsters would be constantly killing eachother). Certainly, the old edition monsters were constrained to that one vault. As were the various elemental themed monsters. Celia spoke of other "vaults", where Dorukan kept various objects of power. We can speculate that there were other monsters guarding those, who were also not killed, and also did not block passage to the gate. The BBQ serpents and the "easy encounter" monsters also seemed to be hanging out in their respective rooms as well.

None of this precludes the possiblity that there were also other monsters, stationed in and around the main halls and rooms that TE had to progress though to get to the gate, and that TE had to defeat/kill/whatever to get through. The problem is that there is not a single mention of these monsters, much less how many there were, nor how powerful they may have been. And to whatever degree Dorukan could control them, he clearly did not use them to attack Xykon outside his castle, nor did he instruct any of these creatures to activate the self destruct in the event of his death.

[Liquor Box]

None of this precludes the possiblity that there were also other monsters, stationed in and around the main halls and rooms that TE had to progress though to get to the gate, and that TE had to defeat/kill/whatever to get through. The problem is that there is not a single mention of these monsters, much less how many there were, nor how powerful they may have been.

I agree with this, except that I think Serini's efforts at recruitment probably refer to these monsters which gives an indication that they were of a power that interested her for her defence.

But the solution to the problem of not knowing that much about them is not to simply disregard them. We also know nothing about the power and numbers of the Draketooth descendants, and we don't disregard them entirely.

[woweedd]

To be honest, I think Dorukan did have some monsters, but almost certainly mainly relayed on the seals that prevented anyone Evil from accessing the gates. And, to be fair, it worked. Xykon was able to murder Dorukan, but he wasn't able to crack that seal.

[Liquor Box]

To be honest, I think Dorukan did have some monsters, but almost certainly mainly relayed on the seals that prevented anyone Evil from accessing the gates. And, to be fair, it worked. Xykon was able to murder Dorukan, but he wasn't able to crack that seal.

Yes, no dungeon has held out to attack as long as Dorukan's did.

[brian 333]

Yes, no dungeon has held out to attack as long as Dorukan's did.

Three out of five were destroyed within days by The Order. We do not know how long Girard's would have held because Team Evil never got to it. It appeared as if Soon's was about to kill Team Evil before it was destroyed.

Dorukon's lasted as long as it did because Xykon was content to play with goblins while waiting for the inevitable do-gooder to come along and open it for him. If he had wanted to he could have ported to a nearby village, captured everyone there, and promise to set them all free as soon as the sigil was opened. Then he could see how many villagers died one at a time before some goody goody volunteered to be next.

Two, three days, tops. (Plus travel time.)

[Emberlily]

considering the way team evil never floated the idea of capturing the order of the stick or holding any hostages with them and went entirely with trying to keep them alive and free and trick them into touching it, and how the failure of that trick led to xykon trying to call in the mitd to kill them all instead of going with a plan b of capturing them, I think we can safely assume that (team evil believed) coercion would not cut it, and that a Pure Of Heart person would have to touch it fully willingly

since xykon was fully in control of team evil during the dorukan phase of the story, it seems silly to assume there were all these plans that would have fit xykon's character better that could've worked but just didn't happen, when we can do a little reading between the lines to find something cohesive

[gbaji]

considering the way team evil never floated the idea of capturing the order of the stick or holding any hostages with them and went entirely with trying to keep them alive and free and trick them into touching it, and how the failure of that trick led to xykon trying to call in the mitd to kill them all instead of going with a plan b of capturing them, I think we can safely assume that (team evil believed) coercion would not cut it, and that a Pure Of Heart person would have to touch it fully willingly

I'm not sure how exactly "willingly" is defined in game terms (or story terms) though. We can assume they have to choose to touch it to deactivate it, but whether they choose to do so because otherwise they will be killed, or whether they choose to do so for <other random reasons> may not make any difference at all. If some sort of "true intent" were involved, then tricking someone into doing it wouldn't work either. Elan would not, in his heart of hearts, have intended for the defenses on the gate to be turned off, because he didn't even know that's what touching it would do. So if that's somehow required, that's a whole different bar. And if it's not, then we're pretty much left with "glyph touched and person touching is of good alignment, then glyph deactivates" as the sequence.

Also, heroes usually have to be tricked into doing things like this, while random villagers could be coerced. I'm sure Xykon was just following some trope somewhere.

[Emberlily]

not really worried about the details so much on my end here; I just feel like if "capture some kind-hearted innocents and put them in a no-win Saw-trap-esque situation" was a viable solution to xykon's dilemma he would've jumped on it because that sounds very amusing to him and he was clearly bored as hell waiting in that dungeon

and since the early material of the strip was not written with the long term story in mind, I'm happy to find ways for things to make more sense if you put some thought and a bit of benefit of the doubt into them

[Spartior]

Remember Xykon only assumed a pure hearted person was the needed key to break the seals on the gate. He never tested that theory so it’s possible he was completely wrong.

[gbaji]

not really worried about the details so much on my end here; I just feel like if "capture some kind-hearted innocents and put them in a no-win Saw-trap-esque situation" was a viable solution to xykon's dilemma he would've jumped on it because that sounds very amusing to him and he was clearly bored as hell waiting in that dungeon

and since the early material of the strip was not written with the long term story in mind, I'm happy to find ways for things to make more sense if you put some thought and a bit of benefit of the doubt into them

Technically, the rationale is that they didn't figure it out until they saw the method the LG used to trick the OotS into opening the vault, and that lead them to try to use the same "trick" to get them to open the gate (well, unseal the glyph anyway). But yeah. It seems somewhat absurd that they were literally biding their time for months tossing random goblins into the thing, and it never once occurred to them to try to toss something else in? I mean, even from a "let's not deplete our own forces" pov, it would have made more sense to go capture some different creatures/people/whatever of different races, backgrounds, alignments, etc and test with them. Recloak certainly would have (should have) come up with this plan.

But the story is about the Order, not about TE, and certainly not about the plight of random villagers used to open a gate. So that's why TE sits there, doing nothing, until the Order shows up. It's also why I don't put a lot of weight in the "the glyph held TE at bay for longer than any other gate's defenses" arguments. Dorukan's gate had massive plot armor. It literally was not going to be opened, and not in risk of being opened, until the Order shows up. And it had to be destroyed by the Order, so that the rest of the story could happen. If they dont destroy the gate, then Shojo doesn't send Miko to capture them. They don't show up at Azure City. They aren't put on trial for "weakening the fabric of the universe". They don't learn about the gates or the Scibblers. And they never embark on the quest that is central to the entire story.

[BloodSquirrel]

Technically, the rationale is that they didn't figure it out until they saw the method the LG used to trick the OotS into opening the vault, and that lead them to try to use the same "trick" to get them to open the gate (well, unseal the glyph anyway). But yeah. It seems somewhat absurd that they were literally biding their time for months tossing random goblins into the thing, and it never once occurred to them to try to toss something else in? I mean, even from a "let's not deplete our own forces" pov, it would have made more sense to go capture some different creatures/people/whatever of different races, backgrounds, alignments, etc and test with them. Recloak certainly would have (should have) come up with this plan.


We have no reason to think that would work. Even when they did decide to try using a pure hearted person, they tried trickery, rather than just physically grabbing him and throwing him at the gate, on the (very reasonable) assumption that the pure hearted person had to deliberately touch it and not just be thrown in. For all we know, it may have even required them to not be under duress.

We really don't have any idea what they did or did not try on the seal, because it wasn't important to the story to explain what TE was doing day-to-day for all six months before the comic started. And it still isn't. And if they had shown an exhaustive list of 1,000 different tests and spells that Xykon, Redcloak, and numerous hirelings had tried to break it, you'd still be here claiming that the only reason those 1,000 things didn't work is because the plot needed them not to so they don't count.

[Liquor Box]

We really don't have any idea what they did or did not try on the seal, because it wasn't important to the story to explain what TE was doing day-to-day for all six months before the comic started. And it still isn't. And if they had shown an exhaustive list of 1,000 different tests and spells that Xykon, Redcloak, and numerous hirelings had tried to break it, you'd still be here claiming that the only reason those 1,000 things didn't work is because the plot needed them not to so they don't count.

Nor Team Evil's trek through Dorukan's tower fighting off any monsters in there after defeating Dorukan. Nor whether the Order has used the bathroom since leaving Dorukan's dungeon. It isn't shown because it's not relevant to the story, but that's no reason to assume it didn't happen.

[gbaji]

We have no reason to think that would work. Even when they did decide to try using a pure hearted person, they tried trickery, rather than just physically grabbing him and throwing him at the gate, on the (very reasonable) assumption that the pure hearted person had to deliberately touch it and not just be thrown in

Testing is not limited to "thow people into it". I was contrasting the one thing we were shown in the comic that they tried, to what they could have done instead.


For all we know, it may have even required them to not be under duress.

And for all we know it may not.

Also. Define "not under duress". Then describe how you would enchant this into something (presumably detectable via some magical means) that could be used as a condition for unsealing a glyph.




We really don't have any idea what they did or did not try on the seal, because it wasn't important to the story to explain what TE was doing day-to-day for all six months before the comic started. And it still isn't. And if they had shown an exhaustive list of 1,000 different tests and spells that Xykon, Redcloak, and numerous hirelings had tried to break it, you'd still be here claiming that the only reason those 1,000 things didn't work is because the plot needed them not to so they don't count.

The only thing we are told is You've been sending goblins through the gate ever since we arrived here, and every one has been horribly killed (https://www.giantitp.com/comics/oots0096.html). Once again, we can speculate that they did attempt other things, but we are told they've been doing this "ever since" they arrived there. So not once or twice, not "after trying 18 other things", or "1000 other things", but "ever since we got here". Sure. That doesn't preclude trying other things, but...

And if you click on the very next strip, that's where Xykon says he's figured it out by watching the LG's method for getting into the vault. So yeah, they kept trying this over and over from the day they got there until the moment the OotS showed them how to open a different sigil by being "pure of heart" (well, technically Xykon continued to do it a few more times just because he was bored, but whatever).

If we're going to speculate here, why not speculate "what would have happend if the Order didn't exist, and this wasn't a story about them?". Would TE still be sitting in that first dungoen tossing goblins into the glyph over and over until some different good group showed up? And if we assume "no", then it's reasonable to examine what process would actually be involved in any actual serious attempt to open the gate (ie: not what TE actually did in the story). Can you imagine any group of players, even a group playing an entire party of evil characters, taking 6 months to figure this out? Heck. Most adventuring groups wouldn't take 6 days to figure this out and get through that seal. Let's assume some amount of divination lead them to "the right type of person has to touch the gate" (since they clearly did seem to know that "touching it" was the way to open it), which should lead to trying out different types of people at that point, right? Which leaves us with "race", "class", and "alignment" as the three big categories to try.

Of course, a reasonably intelligent person could assume that it would be configured to allow Dorukan himself to open it, so the first three things you should try is "human", "wizard", and "good" (not sure if he was lawful, chaotic, or neutral though, but try those combos as well). No one would just keep throwing goblins in. So yeah. I"m not taking what TE actually did as a realistic measurement of the actual difficulty at getting through that defense.

[BloodSquirrel]

Also. Define "not under duress". Then describe how you would enchant this into something (presumably detectable via some magical means) that could be used as a condition for unsealing a glyph.


The same way you would make it detect whether someone has a pure heart.





The only thing we are told is You've been sending goblins through the gate ever since we arrived here, and every one has been horribly killed (https://www.giantitp.com/comics/oots0096.html). Once again, we can speculate that they did attempt other things, but we are told they've been doing this "ever since" they arrived there. So not once or twice, not "after trying 18 other things", or "1000 other things", but "ever since we got here". Sure. That doesn't preclude trying other things, but...


"Xykon keeps sending goblins through the gate" does not equal "Xykon is doing nothing but sending goblins through the gate". Redcloak also describes it as "experimentation", which implies variation of method for the purpose of finding one that gets different results. And, in point of fact, we see Xykon try something else as soon as something occurs to him.

EDIT: Yeah, read the next few strips carefully: Xykon kept sending in goblins even after coming up with the plan to get Elan to touch the glyph, so we actually know for a fact that Xykon would have been sending in goblins for the whole six months whether he was trying other things or not.




If we're going to speculate here, why not speculate "what would have happend if the Order didn't exist, and this wasn't a story about them?". Would TE still be sitting in that first dungoen tossing goblins into the glyph over and over until some different good group showed up?

See, the problem here is that you've conflated two very different questions. "What would have happened given the existing setup if the Order did not show up in Dorukan's dungeon" and "This wasn't a story about the Order of the Stick" have completely different answers.

The answer to the first is that, yes, TE might well still be beating their heads against the wall still trying to figure out a way past Dorukan's glyph. We still don't even know if Xykon's speculation was correct, let alone if there was any other way past the glyph, or how long it would take to find out.

The answer to the second is that the situation would be completely different in the first place because the author would be establishing a completely different set of rules to facilitate a completely different story. It is completely irrelevant to this conversation.

There is not an equal amount of speculation going on here.

That Xykon and Redcloak tried for six months to get past the glyph and never succeeded is a fact.
That Dorukan was an epic wizard who created multiple magical artifacts (Like the amulet Nale was after or the one that allowed Xykon to cast cloister) that were well beyond any other living spellcaster we've seen so far is a fact.
That there was a way past the glyph that should have been obvious but was never tried is speculation.

That Xykon might have tried X thing or Y thing is also speculation, but it's speculation that is thematically and logically consistent with the two previously established facts, as well as other facts regarding Xykon and Redcloak as characters. IT's speculation that expands on the story, rather than trying to say that the story was wrong like you are.



Of course, a reasonably intelligent person could assume that it would be configured to allow Dorukan himself to open it, so the first three things you should try is "human", "wizard", and "good" (not sure if he was lawful, chaotic, or neutral though, but try those combos as well). No one would just keep throwing goblins in. So yeah. I"m not taking what TE actually did as a realistic measurement of the actual difficulty at getting through that defense.

That isn't reasonable at all, and it's not even what we were presented with. A reasonable person would assume that there was some sort of physical key or password, since those would be more easily controlled than "Any good human wizard". And Elon wasn't a wizard. And "Pure of heart" doesn't just mean "good-aligned". And there isn't even a good reason to think that it was configured to let Dorukan open it at will. It may have just been the best permanent seal that he could create, and the only way past it would be to find an unintended weakness.

You arguments are bathed in these kinds of unjustified presumptions, all to somehow try to explain how "The most power wizard in living memory created a glyph that was kind of hard to dispel" is an implausible premise for a story.



I am guessing that his plan was to command the monsters in case of a forced entry into his dungeon. Instead of static, passive defenses, they would have been used as troops under his command. After his death that was no longer possible, and the monsters became passive defenses, most of whom would have quickly gotten out of the way if they could, accepted Xykon as their boss if it suited their nature, or simply fled the dungeon at the first opportunity.

Admittedly this is conjecture. How plausible is it? Given that we will never know the real answer, is it a guess that is disproveable?

The only answer here that doesn't involve conjecture is that Xykon thought that he had to draw Dorukan out rather than forcing entry into his dungeon. We can therefore conclude that Dorukan's dungeon provided a significant defensive advantage.

I have a feeling that Dorukan saw the monsters more as an environmental hazard than an army to be actively deployed. Something that might keep an attacker busy or weed out some of his minions, but not a keystone of his defense. He consistently relied on magic first and foremost, and would have probably only resorted to trying to actively send monsters after someone if there was some reason for him to think that showing up himself and casting spells wouldn't work.

[gbaji]

The same way you would make it detect whether someone has a pure heart.

Sure. So the gpylph does a detect alignment deal on someone when they touch the gate. If they are of good alignment, the glpyh deactivates. If they are not, then the glyph zaps them.

That sort of thing?

Now, you come up with a way to do this that detects "pure of heart" *and* "not under duress", using existing and established magical detection methodologies.



The answer to the second is that the situation would be completely different in the first place because the author would be establishing a completely different set of rules to facilitate a completely different story. It is completely irrelevant to this conversation.

Which is my point. TE's ability to bypass the glyph was based on the needs of the story. If there had been a different protagonist (or none at all), then the author would have written different conditions. Hence, my point that the glpyh had "plot armor", and thus we should not take the amount of time and/or difficulty that TE had dealing with it as any sort of rational objective analysis of how effective the glyph actually was.


That isn't reasonable at all, and it's not even what we were presented with. A reasonable person would assume that there was some sort of physical key or password, since those would be more easily controlled than "Any good human wizard".

Sure. And yet, they kept tossing goblins at the gate. Which is "testing" only things related to the person who touched the gate. I suppose we could assume that each goblin was told to shout some random word while touching the gate, maybe. But yeah, if your current thought on "what may bypass the glyph" is "it's related to *who* touches it", then you should, at the very least, start with attributes related to the person who built it.


And Elon wasn't a wizard.

I'm not sure what that has to do with anything. Elan was only selected after Xykon decided that the "pure of heart" condition might be what is required. But, prior to that, one might look at other attributes. If one attribute (being pure of heart) could open the glyph, any other one could as well ("being human", or "being a wizard" perhaps). Again, if we also use a starting point of "what attributes does Dorukan have"?

Does no one actually do any form of testing professionally here? This is like rule1 stuff here. Start with what you know.


And "Pure of heart" doesn't just mean "good-aligned"

Then what does it mean? Haley was one of the three who were "pure of heart" and able to trigger the sigils and open the vault. What exactly do you think makes Haley fit that descriptioin other then that she is of "good" alignment? She's a rogue. In the same dungeon, she stole treasure from her fellow party members and lied about it. She stole a healing potion from Belkar (and lied about it).

Yet, she qualified to activate the sigil that triggererd on being "pure of heart". So yeah, I'm very confident in saying that all that did was detect whether someone was of good alignment and nothing else.



And there isn't even a good reason to think that it was configured to let Dorukan open it at will. It may have just been the best permanent seal that he could create, and the only way past it would be to find an unintended weakness.

First off. It's not an "unintended weakness". Glyphs require a specific method to disable or bypass them (or, I suppose, specific things that trigger them to go off). When creating the glyph, Dorukan would have to define some specific "thing" that disables it (or at least "does not cause it to go off"). It's a requirement for all types of glyphs.

Again. It's a reasonable starting point though. Forget the specifics of the story. You have just defeated a powerful wizard. In his basement is the door to his treasure vault or whatever. It's protected by a powerful glyph. You need to figure out how to deactivate it. How do you go about doing this? You try magic, but nothing you do deactivates it. You conclude you have to figure out whatever conditions are set on the glyph itself.

What do you do? In the absense of any other information, the first thing you do is ask "how would the wizard open it if he needed to?", right? First thing. Try things related to him. And yeah. Look through his notes. See if there are clues that might indicate a password. Or if there is a magical key in his desk drawer or something. You actually do various tests designed to determine what kind of things might be required to open the glyph.

That's how you approach this problem. And yeah, it might take some time. But 6 months? For a glyph as simple as "someone good must touch it" (again, assuming that actually *was* the condition, which you are correct, we don't actually know to be true).


You arguments are bathed in these kinds of unjustified presumptions, all to somehow try to explain how "The most power wizard in living memory created a glyph that was kind of hard to dispel" is an implausible premise for a story.

No. My arguments are following logical processes that one uses to solve problems. And then assuming that any reasonably intelligent group of people, if not bound by story reasons as TE was, would have followed those things instead of doing what they did in the story. And then concluding that this glyph should simply not have held them up that long.

I'm not saying that the creation of the glyph was implausible. I'm saying that the fact that TE was stuck trying to bypass it for so long was. And then following that up with an argument that we should not use the actual amount of time TE was "stuck" trying to get through the glyph as a realistic assessment of how powerful a defense it actually was. If we use the story alone, then we must conclude that Girard's defense was the worst, since his entire family was going to be wiped out by familicide. And that Soon's was terrible because Miko was going to go crazy and destroy the gate.

Those were both ridiculously unlikely things that the gate defenders could not possibly have predicted. But they were all parts of the story, so they happened. Similarly, TE being stuck on the glyph for months until the Order arrived is also part of the story. So we also should not bake that into our assessment IMO.

[Precure]

Another minus point for Xykon's "pure of heart" theory: If we accept it as correct, that means none of those goblins were "pure of heart" which seems poblematic in hindsight considering Rich's usual writing. So, I'll go with "Xykon was wrong about the sigil" and Elan would be dead if not for Haley.

[BloodSquirrel]

Sure. So the gpylph does a detect alignment deal on someone when they touch the gate. If they are of good alignment, the glpyh deactivates. If they are not, then the glyph zaps them.

That sort of thing?

Now, you come up with a way to do this that detects "pure of heart" *and* "not under duress", using existing and established magical detection methodologies.



Creating new spells is a thing that exists in this universe, regardless of how inconvenient it is to your argument



Which is my point. TE's ability to bypass the glyph was based on the needs of the story. If there had been a different protagonist (or none at all), then the author would have written different conditions. Hence, my point that the glpyh had "plot armor", and thus we should not take the amount of time and/or difficulty that TE had dealing with it as any sort of rational objective analysis of how effective the glyph actually was.


"Rational objective analysis" is completely incompatible with "The facts of the story aren't true if I don't want them to be" or "That isn't true because if the author wrote the story a different way it wouldn't be true".



Sure. And yet, they kept tossing goblins at the gate. Which is "testing" only things related to the person who touched the gate. I suppose we could assume that each goblin was told to shout some random word while touching the gate, maybe. But yeah, if your current thought on "what may bypass the glyph" is "it's related to *who* touches it", then you should, at the very least, start with attributes related to the person who built it.


Except that *who* touches it was not established as being important yet. Meanwhile, what Xykon is doing is explicitly described as experimentation. That isn't speculation. It's vague, but it's more of a solid basis for an argument that anything that you have right now.




I'm not sure what that has to do with anything. Elan was only selected after Xykon decided that the "pure of heart" condition might be what is required. But, prior to that, one might look at other attributes. If one attribute (being pure of heart) could open the glyph, any other one could as well ("being human", or "being a wizard" perhaps). Again, if we also use a starting point of "what attributes does Dorukan have"?

Does no one actually do any form of testing professionally here? This is like rule1 stuff here. Start with what you know.


I do, in fact, deal with testing professionally. And proper testing methodology does not involve hindsight bias. You only think this is obvious because the story told you that it might be true; you have not made any coherent argument for why it would be assumed to be true outside of that. A passphrase or magical key would fit "start with what you know" far better. Also, Xykon had minions, and Xykon knows sacrificing minions.




Then what does it mean? Haley was one of the three who were "pure of heart" and able to trigger the sigils and open the vault. What exactly do you think makes Haley fit that descriptioin other then that she is of "good" alignment? She's a rogue. In the same dungeon, she stole treasure from her fellow party members and lied about it. She stole a healing potion from Belkar (and lied about it).

Yet, she qualified to activate the sigil that triggererd on being "pure of heart". So yeah, I'm very confident in saying that all that did was detect whether someone was of good alignment and nothing else.

Haley also had no ambition to use the amulet to take over the world, nor did she know she was helping someone who did. Nale also apparently thought he had to use trickery, rather than just knocking out Haley and having Z press her hand against the sigil.



First off. It's not an "unintended weakness". Glyphs require a specific method to disable or bypass them (or, I suppose, specific things that trigger them to go off). When creating the glyph, Dorukan would have to define some specific "thing" that disables it (or at least "does not cause it to go off"). It's a requirement for all types of glyphs.


If you don't want the glyph being deactivated at all, then it's an unintended weakness, even if it's one inherent to glyphs. Dorukan could have also defined the thing that disables it as "being touched with a rock from the bottom of the ocean by a guy named Frank who owns three cats and one donkey and is wearing a dress with a top hat". Either way, you're assuming that Dorukan wanted it to be something that someone could figure out and guess, and we don't have a reason to think that other than that he used a similar method somewhere else- which Xykon leaped on as soon as he found out.



Again. It's a reasonable starting point though. Forget the specifics of the story. You have just defeated a powerful wizard. In his basement is the door to his treasure vault or whatever. It's protected by a powerful glyph. You need to figure out how to deactivate it. How do you go about doing this? You try magic, but nothing you do deactivates it. You conclude you have to figure out whatever conditions are set on the glyph itself.

What do you do? In the absense of any other information, the first thing you do is ask "how would the wizard open it if he needed to?", right? First thing. Try things related to him. And yeah. Look through his notes. See if there are clues that might indicate a password. Or if there is a magical key in his desk drawer or something. You actually do various tests designed to determine what kind of things might be required to open the glyph.

That's how you approach this problem. And yeah, it might take some time. But 6 months? For a glyph as simple as "someone good must touch it" (again, assuming that actually *was* the condition, which you are correct, we don't actually know to be true).

You still haven't given me one good reason why "someone good much touch it" should be something you would guess in the absence of other evidence. That it's simple means nothing. "Someone covered in peanut butter much touch it" is also simple. "It must be Dorukan himself or one of a number of specific people he chose as backup" would be simple. The number of simple things that it could be is nigh infinite, and many of them are more logical than "someone good must touch it".

The actual, correct answer to your question, which you are apparently allergic to, is that I would assume that the super-intelligent wizard didn't make the glyph so easy to bypass that it would only take the first person to come by an entire afternoon to guess it. I would not assume that he wrote down the password and stuck it to his monitor, and then insist that someone who failed to bypass it was an idiot because they didn't think of that, even though there's no evidence that any such post-it note exists. I would also assume that the condition for deactivating it would be related to the reason for deactivating it- if someone needs to access it for maintenance, then there's no reason for just any random good human to be able to deactivate it.




No. My arguments are following logical processes

I'm sorry, but no. No they are not. Logic starts with "What do I know to be true", not "What do I want to be true". You're engaging in rationalization and backwards reasoning.

[Kish]

It does not seem problematic in hindsight that a handful of goblins Xykon had walk into the Gate did not qualify as pure of heart. Even if one were to interpret Rich's words on the subject of alignment as meaning "OotS goblins have no culture-based alignment tendencies"--which would be an insupportable reading--if you pick half a dozen random humans, the odds are in favor of them all being Neutral, not Good.

[Peelee]

Also. Define "not under duress". Then describe how you would enchant this into something (presumably detectable via some magical means) that could be used as a condition for unsealing a glyph.

While i doubt this was the case, it could be defined as "willing" which is already a condition baked into the magic systen(eg teleporting anyone besides yourself requires a willing creature, as a quick and dirty example).

[Kish]

I think the evidence that Nale could have knocked Haley unconscious (without tipping off the rest of the Order that he was evil, yet) as easily as he could have used reverse psychology to trick her, and thus if he chose the latter it must have been because he needed her to touch the sigil deliberately, lacks.

As gbaji already pointed out, the evidence that "pure of heart" doesn't mean "good-aligned" is nonexistent; it's just a bald, unsupported, insupportable assertion, like Roy when he'd been dosed with Strength poison.

[Peelee]

I think the evidence that Nale could have knocked Haley unconscious (without tipping off the rest of the Order that he was evil, yet) as easily as he could have used reverse psychology to trick her, and thus if he chose the latter it must have been because he needed her to touch the sigil deliberately, lacks.

As gbaji already pointed out, the evidence that "pure of heart" doesn't mean "good-aligned" is nonexistent; it's just a bald, unsupported, insupportable assertion, like Roy when he'd been dosed with Strength poison.

Fair, but does Nale enjoy needlessly convoluted plans.

[Metastachydium]

it's just a bald, unsupported, insupportable assertion, like Roy when he'd been dosed with Strength poison.


…
Roy is an assertion?

[BloodSquirrel]

It does not seem problematic in hindsight that a handful of goblins Xykon had walk into the Gate did not qualify as pure of heart. Even if one were to interpret Rich's words on the subject of alignment as meaning "OotS goblins have no culture-based alignment tendencies"--which would be an insupportable reading--if you pick half a dozen random humans, the odds are in favor of them all being Neutral, not Good.

More importantly, these aren't random goblins; they Xykon's minions. Yeah, he did press gang some of them into his army, but we already saw that the goblin teenagers were able to rebel and sneak away, so "pure of heart" probably does require that a goblin not continue to work for a murder-happy lich.

Of course, this is also where "not under duress" comes in.

I mean, if we're actually trying to reason from what we know about Dorukan, then we know that he was an epic wizard and almost certainly had an int score well into the twenties. It would be downright bizarre if he didn't think of something as obvious (to the point of being cliche) as "bad guy captures good person and forces them to touch the glyph" and make sure the glyph had a countermeasure for it.

[World Illusion]

Yeah, all the goblins working for Xykon were working for a chaotic evil lich who, when not indiscriminately murdering nongoblins, was constantly leisurely killing the goblins themselves. Probably safe to assume a general callous disregard for the sanctity of life in that workforce, specifically, regardless of goblinhood.

Since the most reasonable and supported assumption on the meaning of "pure-of-heart" is either just "good-aligned" or has "good-alignment" as a requirement- throwing goblins at the gate would never have worked. Regardless of how many different ways Xykon choose to do so. He would not have known that though. So it would be strange to criticize him on that point.

Maybe it would have taken him 1 month to coincidentally find a good aligned goblin and toss them into the gate (maybe covered in pickle juice and turmeric) thereby bypassing its defenses and heralding the end of the world (and sparking endless forum debates on why Dorukan would allow pickle juice to bypass his defenses). Maybe it would've taken 100 years. Both he and Redcloak are biologically immortal, their victory was inevitable if they weren't stopped, hence the urgent quest. Kind of a tomb of horrors thing, I guess.

[gbaji]

Creating new spells is a thing that exists in this universe, regardless of how inconvenient it is to your argument

I'm well aware. Now define this new spell that is able to distinquish both "pure of heart" and "not being coerced". What criteria do you actually use to determine this?

Or, if you don't want to do that, tell me how, as a GM running this, you would determine who was "pure of heart" and "Not being coerced"?



Except that *who* touches it was not established as being important yet. Meanwhile, what Xykon is doing is explicitly described as experimentation. That isn't speculation. It's vague, but it's more of a solid basis for an argument that anything that you have right now.

Except that the only experiementation we were ever informed of consisted of tests only of "who" was touching the gate. I'm trying to get you to first recognize that when all you are doing is throwing different people at the gate, then the only difference between personA and personB (and personN) is "who" they are. So, if that's the scope of your testing, why not actually test different variations of "who" in the first place?


I do, in fact, deal with testing professionally. And proper testing methodology does not involve hindsight bias. You only think this is obvious because the story told you that it might be true; you have not made any coherent argument for why it would be assumed to be true outside of that. A passphrase or magical key would fit "start with what you know" far better. Also, Xykon had minions, and Xykon knows sacrificing minions.

It's not hindsight bias to suggest that if someone thought that "throwing peopple at the gate" might open in, then "throwing different types of people at the gate" would be a very logical next step. You test by doing one thing. Then you change one aspect of that one thing and try again. Again, we can speculate that each goblin was given different directions of things to do (say a word, or whatever), but we're never actually told that at all. And again, even if we just look at the very basic rules for glyph creation, the following things are criteria that can be used:


Alternatively or in addition to a password trigger, glyphs can be set according to physical characteristics (such as height or weight) or creature type, subtype, or kind. Glyphs can also be set with respect to good, evil, law, or chaos, or to pass those of your religion. They cannot be set according to class, Hit Dice, or level.

So. Ok. "Wizard" is out. But trying different creature types? And alignments? Probably the minimum set of things you do, if you can't figure out the password (or aren't sure there is one). Tossing goblins at the gate, over and over, for 6 months? While that is what TE *did*, that's not at all a very rational way to do this, so it's really silly to assume that anyone not TE would have done the same thing.



Haley also had no ambition to use the amulet to take over the world, nor did she know she was helping someone who did. Nale also apparently thought he had to use trickery, rather than just knocking out Haley and having Z press her hand against the sigil.

So all one needs to be "pure of heart" is to not want to use whatever is on the other side to "take over the world"? That's a pretty strange definition.

So Hanibal Lecter counts as "pure of heart" in your book?

Let's just be honest here. It was triggered on alignment. Right? Anything else is a silly stretch.



If you don't want the glyph being deactivated at all, then it's an unintended weakness, even if it's one inherent to glyphs. Dorukan could have also defined the thing that disables it as "being touched with a rock from the bottom of the ocean by a guy named Frank who owns three cats and one donkey and is wearing a dress with a top hat". Either way, you're assuming that Dorukan wanted it to be something that someone could figure out and guess, and we don't have a reason to think that other than that he used a similar method somewhere else- which Xykon leaped on as soon as he found out.

Again. We kinda have to assume he's working within the limitations of what can normally be used as triggers for Glyphs here. And yes. Glyphs, by defintion, always have some means to bypass it. It's part of the magic that allows them to be so powerful (has to have a weakness).


You still haven't given me one good reason why "someone good much touch it" should be something you would guess in the absence of other evidence.

Sigh... Because "alignment" is literally one of a relatively short list of criteria actually written into the description for glyphs?

That's not a reason why this is something they should "guess in the absence of other evidence", but it's absolutely something they should have tried.

Again. Testing. You don't guess. You try different things. Emphasis on the different things. And yes, you focus on the different types of things that are most likely to actually be part of the trigger condition for the thing you are testing. And in this case, "alignment" is one of them. Tossing goblin after goblin is a really dumb way to do this. Even knowing nothing other than "it's a glpyh", this is dumb. Knowing who made the glyph and why? Even dumber.

While we can speculate that this was an epic level glpyh, and therefore could have had the kinds of infinite varieties of triggers you suggest, that's still not a reason to not even bother to try out the handful of first and most obvious ones (race and alignment).



I'm sorry, but no. No they are not. Logic starts with "What do I know to be true", not "What do I want to be true". You're engaging in rationalization and backwards reasoning.

yes. And what we know is that it's a glyph and was built by Dorukan and it was built to prevent people from accessing the gate. So you first start with "what sorts of criteria might a glyph use", and "what sort of thing within that set might Dorukan have chosen", and "who specifically might Dorukan have not wanted to have access to the gate versus who he might have been ok with gaining that access"?

I'm not rationalizing and working backwards at all. I'm starting with the beginning and asking "what should TE have tried"? And when I do that, I find a whole lot of things. And yes, as it happens, if the glpyh actually did trigger on "pure of heart", then they would have stumbled upon that just by going through the very logical and reasonable list of things I listed above.

Again. It's one of a fairly short list of things written right into the glyph description in the freaking book. Why the heck *not* start there?

If I were to bottom line this, what I'm getting at is that 6 months later, they only just now for the very first time decided to try "human of good alignment" (Elan), when, based on even the most basic knowledge of glpyhs and how they function, this should have been one of the very first things they tried. It's the race and alignment that matches that of the person who built the glpyh. The fact that they thought Elan could open it (absent password even) tells us that they never tried it before. Which, yeah. I find to be ridiculous.


While i doubt this was the case, it could be defined as "willing" which is already a condition baked into the magic systen(eg teleporting anyone besides yourself requires a willing creature, as a quick and dirty example).

Yes. But those spells only detect "willing to accept the spell at the moment the spell is cast". They don't follow meta concepts like "why is this person willing"?

If I hold your family hostage and say "I'm going to teleport you to <dungeon> and you must go inside and retrieve an item for me and return with it, and then I'll free your family", and you agree to do this, do you qualify as a "willing" target for the teleport? I'm pretty sure you do.

Trying to follow that logic down any further than that runs into incredibly "bad things" quickly. How many times are adventurers "coerced" into doing things? How many times do adventurers have backstories that basically say "I'm only really doing this because of <some other important motivation>"? All the time, right? You'd have spells failing all the time.

Heck. How pure is the "willing" desire to do something if you are just an employee? We could argue that most of what you do at work, you would not be "willing to do" if you weren't being paid. And not being paid means not having a home, food, clothing, etc? So is that "coercion" by your boss? Are you really "willing" to do that? If you're hired for a job, and that job requires being teleported, but you're only doing it for the money, and only need the money to avoid <some negative consequence> is that not also coercion?

It's turtles all the way down if you try this. Nope. Willing is just that: "willing to be teleported at that moment". Don't go any further than that, or it leads to madness.

Same deal with the glyph. Willing or not is irrelevant. At the moment you touched it, you chose to touch it. Why you made that decision really can't be relevant. It's just an incredibly unworkable methodology otherwise. And again, this is based on pure speculation that the person had to actually make the choice, and couldn't just be 'tossed into it". We have no actual evidence for this. Certainly, the glyph triggered its damage on things whether they were willingly touching it or not, so I'm not sure why we're even talking about this as a concept.

[Peelee]

Yes. But those spells only detect "willing to accept the spell at the moment the spell is cast". They don't follow meta concepts like "why is this person willing"?
And they don't need to. The glyph could simply detect "is this person willing at thr moment the touch the glyph?". No need to follow up any meta concept at all.

Again, playing devils advocate here - i dont think willingness waa an issue at all. But if it was, then its trigial to imagine that magic wouldn't be able to detect it, especially a custom spell by an epic wizard.

[Liquor Box]

We presume that the key to bypassing Dorukan's ward is for someone of pure heart to touch it because that was Xykon's conclusion. But Xykon didn't try to force the Order to touch it once he failed to to trick them, so perhaps there is something to the theory that they had to touch it willingly - as Peelee pointed out, that wouldn't pose any problems mechanically.

I may be missing the point of the conversation. But the reason Xykon didn't capture some pure hearted villager was because he didn't know that was the way to bypass the ward. He only finds out (assuming it is true) when he hears Nale talking about that being the key to the sigils. I don't agree with those using their hindsight to say it should have been obvious. In Redcloak and Xykon he had two monsters who are intelligent in different ways, who figured out a novel and creative solution to Lirian's prison in a very short time, and who had a whole heap of resources (magical and mundane) at their disposal, who were stumped for six months. That is an indication that, in the context of the way things work in OotSverse, the wards were very hard nut to crack.

On 'pure of heart', I tend to think that is just their way of saying good aligned. I don't think there's any mechanical reason why it couldn't mean something different - after all the game has mechanics for paladins and knights codes which differ from alignment. But, we know that the 'pure of heat' test was beaten on the sigils by Elan, Roy and Hayley who are all good aligned. While Elan may be, Roy and Hayley aren't exactly held to particularly high standards of goodness. So I think there's good reason to beleive that being good aligned is enough.

[gbaji]

And they don't need to. The glyph could simply detect "is this person willing at thr moment the touch the glyph?". No need to follow up any meta concept at all.

Right. Which would mean that telling someone "touch this glyph or I'll kill you", Or "touch this glyph, or I'll kill your family member" would both work (heck, even "I'll kill you and your family if you don't do this, but if you do, and it works, I'll pay you). So, for someone who has no problem doing this sort of thing to his own minions, this is not really a huge obstacle.


Again, playing devils advocate here - i dont think willingness waa an issue at all. But if it was, then its trigial to imagine that magic wouldn't be able to detect it, especially a custom spell by an epic wizard.

I'm assuming you meant "trivial to imagine that magic would be able to detect it...".

Hey. I love me some devil's advocate. I like exploring odd/strange possiblities and ways of looking at things. I guess why I keep circling around this one, is something I asked earlier: "how would you, as a GM, rule if someone is "willing"? I've run into this sort of thing as a GM (several times), and while it seems easy sitting back to think "Of course we can tell if someone is 'really willing'", but it's actually harder to determine in an objective consistent way than you might think.

Without going into some long winded historical situations I've run into, I've more or less concluded that in any game system, you can usually maybe rule that "you can't be mind controlled" for things like this (and even then, not always). And if there's some actual magic "transaction" spell going on, you could tie that to "no one can be coerced here" sort of thing. But if the transaction/agreement itself is not bound by any magic, but is of the more mundane "I'll kill your family if you don't do this for me" sort of thing? It's pretty much impossible to rationalize any consistent set of rules for how a third party object (spell, trigger, whatever) can know about the reason behind the person deciding to interact with that. The bank teller doesn't know that the person robbing them is doing so because the real bank robbers are holding his family hostage, right?

Again. It's one of those things we as players can always say "but that's coersion", but if you actually stop to try to create a consistent set of rules for this for a game, you'll find yourself having problems. There are just so many situations that occur in RPGs where the PCs actually are being coerced in some way to do something. And, as I kinda touched on before, even figuring out the boundary point for "coercion" itself can be tricky.



We presume that the key to bypassing Dorukan's ward is for someone of pure heart to touch it because that was Xykon's conclusion. But Xykon didn't try to force the Order to touch it once he failed to to trick them, so perhaps there is something to the theory that they had to touch it willingly - as Peelee pointed out, that wouldn't pose any problems mechanically.

Eh. Or once it failed, he didn't have much reason to bother doing anything more than just killing them. Plenty of good aligned people in the world, so if forcing them to touch the gate worked, why bother trying to get a pesky PC party to do this, when you're just a couple teleport spells away from a number of low level NPCs instead?

And again, depending on the conditions of "willingly" it's probably easier to trick people into touching the gate if they don't already know you tried to trick them into touching the gate. I'm not sure this really tells us anything at all.


I may be missing the point of the conversation. But the reason Xykon didn't capture some pure hearted villager was because he didn't know that was the way to bypass the ward. He only finds out (assuming it is true) when he hears Nale talking about that being the key to the sigils. I don't agree with those using their hindsight to say it should have been obvious.

It's not really hindsight, other than I suppose making the observation that if the condition really was "Human of good alignment touches the gate", then you really have to wonder why they didn't try this earlier. Let's recall that it's not like they knew the Order was going to show up, right?

I still keep coming back to the fact that they presumably were trying to figure out how to get through this glyph on the gate, and yet for all that time, never thought to just try variations of the most common conditions used for getting through glyphs. Yeah, Nale's comments about the Sigil conditions would certainly be a "hey. It might be the same thing" lightbulb moment kind of thing. But again, honestly, this is something they *should* have thought of months ago.

It's kinda like seeing someone having trouble getting their stove to work. They turn the knobs and nothing happens. Then that person overhears someone else talking about how their hair dryer didn't work, and they fixed it by reseting the circuit breaker for the bathroom. Then a lightbulb goes off, that they should maybe see if the breaker for the stove isn't tripped. Ok. That might be a sequence of events. But it's also like one of the first things you should normally check if your stove has no power, right? It's certainly on a shortish list of "things you try".

Now imagine this person sat there with a nonfunctioning stove for 6 months until they happened to overhear someone talk about circuit breakers. To me, the fact that trying this didn't occur to them until they overheard Nale is the same level of absurdity. Again. Alignment is literally one of the things in the list of conditions that can be used by default for glyphs. It's something they should have tried long before the Order ever showed up. You know, if the Order wasn't the key point of the story.

It's the kind of mistsake one maybe would accept in someone who knows absolutely nothing at all about the subject matter (I work in IT, so trust me when I say that this kind of thing really does happen). But this isn't just two random people. We're talking about a high level arcane caster and a high level divine caster. The bog standard "glyph of warding" is a standard 3rd level (I think) divine spell. Yeah, we can assume that a glyph created by an epic magic user might have some differences, but again, you start with what you do know about glyphs and their basic conceptual functions (like the kinds of things they normally trigger off of), and then you go from there. Flailing about mindlessly, while expected of the general public maybe, is just not something I expect these two to actually do.

Again, unless you're intentionally writing them in a comedic way to highlight and bring about a specifc outcome. Which works perfectly in the story. But yeah, if we're actually going to do something like try to objectively assess the "real defensive value" of the various gates, I'm not at all going to take the "TE was stumped by the glyph for 6 months" any more seriously than I'd take "a profesional electrician couldn't figure out the stove circuit was tripped for 6 months". Both are ridiculous standards to use here.

[Peelee]

Right. Which would mean that telling someone "touch this glyph or I'll kill you", Or "touch this glyph, or I'll kill your family member" would both work (heck, even "I'll kill you and your family if you don't do this, but if you do, and it works, I'll pay you). So, for someone who has no problem doing this sort of thing to his own minions, this is not really a huge obstacle.

At which point it becomes DM adjudication as to whether that works or not, and in Stickworld, however the universe decides to rule. Meaning as far as you and i are concerned it could go either way. And the only data point we have is that nobody was actually threatened with any of this and instead the plan was to try to trick them.

[gbaji]

Was Xykon tricking the goblins?

[Peelee]

Was Xykon tricking the goblins?

Did it work for the goblins?

[gbaji]

And the only data point we have is that nobody was actually threatened with any of this and instead the plan was to try to trick them.


Did it work for the goblins?

No. But it seems relevant if we're to establish that "nobody was actually threatened with any of this" when deciding whether the same should apply to Elan (or anyone else, for that matter). It's one thing to go "Hey. Maybe it requires someone of good alignment", but why *also* leap to "and that person must do so without being threatened or coerced"?

I'm going to go off on a crazy limb and assume that there was a lot of threatening and coersion involved in the previous "goblin experiments" with the gate, so why not worry about that previously, but now suddenly it matters? I'm going to go with the more straighforward explanation that at the time, it seemed easier to just trick them into doing it than to force them. And by the time TE realized that the trick method wasn't working, the combat was already well in swing and they never got an opportunity to defeat, capture, and then force the members of the Order to touch the gate for them.

I'm merely suggesting here that just because that was the first method they tried, doesn't mean that it was the only one that would have worked (again, assuming "good alignment" was the trigger at all of course). It just seems like a really bizarre hypothetical to examine here.

And even if we're to entertain that theory, if they had thought of this months earlier, it's a trivial thing to get around even if it somehow *was* the correct method. How hard is it to capture a bunch of good (and maybe some neutral just for a control) humans from the nearby village, hold them in a room near the gate, take them off one by one to be "interrogated", and let them overhear that "the only escape from this place is through the portal", and then "accidentally" losen their bonds enough for them to escape, run right into the gate room, and gee... what do you suppose will happen next? You've met the alignment and "of own free will" requirements with very little effort involved.

Seriously. Do I have to do all the evil mastermind thinking around here? :smallmad:

[Peelee]

No.

Ok then.

[Kish]

Was Xykon tricking the goblins?
Yes, in one out of one cases where exactly what happened was depicted. :xykon: "You've been promoted! Your job is now to guard this gate. Go examine it." It was...probably the least overtly threatening and coercive he's been toward a goblin, ever.

[gbaji]

Ok then.

So we're agreed that at no point was "tricking someone into touching the gate" ever considered a requirement by TE for bypassing the glyph? :smalltongue:

Kinda seems more to me like they didn't care why someone touched the gate. Just that they did.

[Peelee]

So we're agreed that at no point was "tricking someone into touching the gate" ever considered a requirement by TE for bypassing the glyph?

We are not. I explicitly said it was a single data point, and Kish pointed out that Xykon did trick a goblin anyway.

[Provengreil]

No. But it seems relevant if we're to establish that "nobody was actually threatened with any of this" when deciding whether the same should apply to Elan (or anyone else, for that matter). It's one thing to go "Hey. Maybe it requires someone of good alignment", but why *also* leap to "and that person must do so without being threatened or coerced"?

I'm going to go off on a crazy limb and assume that there was a lot of threatening and coersion involved in the previous "goblin experiments" with the gate, so why not worry about that previously, but now suddenly it matters? I'm going to go with the more straighforward explanation that at the time, it seemed easier to just trick them into doing it than to force them. And by the time TE realized that the trick method wasn't working, the combat was already well in swing and they never got an opportunity to defeat, capture, and then force the members of the Order to touch the gate for them.

I'm merely suggesting here that just because that was the first method they tried, doesn't mean that it was the only one that would have worked (again, assuming "good alignment" was the trigger at all of course). It just seems like a really bizarre hypothetical to examine here.

And even if we're to entertain that theory, if they had thought of this months earlier, it's a trivial thing to get around even if it somehow *was* the correct method. How hard is it to capture a bunch of good (and maybe some neutral just for a control) humans from the nearby village, hold them in a room near the gate, take them off one by one to be "interrogated", and let them overhear that "the only escape from this place is through the portal", and then "accidentally" losen their bonds enough for them to escape, run right into the gate room, and gee... what do you suppose will happen next? You've met the alignment and "of own free will" requirements with very little effort involved.

Seriously. Do I have to do all the evil mastermind thinking around here? :smallmad:

Of course you don't, this is exactly the kind of thing Xykon researched the Moderately Escapable Forcecage to support.


At which point it becomes DM adjudication as to whether that works or not, and in Stickworld, however the universe decides to rule. Meaning as far as you and i are concerned it could go either way. And the only data point we have is that nobody was actually threatened with any of this and instead the plan was to try to trick them.

Actually we might have more, though I'll admit up front it's a stretch. I'm just playing with an idea here.

If the glyph only fires if the person touching it does so without direct coercion, maybe it wouldn't have fired on Xykon when Roy threw him into it. This would mean that having, say, the ogres grab someone and toss them into the gate would have worked just fine.

However, Xykon was still screwing around at the time and thought tricking Elan would just be the most fun way of doing this, and would happily have grabbed the next delivery girl for the job if the whole party died in battle. Once Nale spilled the beans, the Order were just the closest good people and beelining for his current location anyway.

[Liquor Box]

Eh. Or once it failed, he didn't have much reason to bother doing anything more than just killing them. Plenty of good aligned people in the world, so if forcing them to touch the gate worked, why bother trying to get a pesky PC party to do this, when you're just a couple teleport spells away from a number of low level NPCs instead?

There was no less reason to use them after he failed to trick them, unless he was unable to because they had to be willing. There were good aligned people in the world both before and after he failed, so that didn't change.


And again, depending on the conditions of "willingly" it's probably easier to trick people into touching the gate if they don't already know you tried to trick them into touching the gate. I'm not sure this really tells us anything at all.

Exactly. he couldn't trick them any longer after he'd failed. So the option of tricking them had probably gone. He still could have forced them, but he didn't try. Possibly because he didn't think forcing them would work.


It's not really hindsight, other than I suppose making the observation that if the condition really was "Human of good alignment touches the gate", then you really have to wonder why they didn't try this earlier. Let's recall that it's not like they knew the Order was going to show up, right?

Saying something that has already happened was obvious is pretty close to the definition of hindsight.

We know why he didn't try it earlier, he didn't know that it was the way past the wards. He told us, he only found out after hearing Nale say so.


I still keep coming back to the fact that they presumably were trying to figure out how to get through this glyph on the gate, and yet for all that time, never thought to just try variations of the most common conditions used for getting through glyphs. Yeah, Nale's comments about the Sigil conditions would certainly be a "hey. It might be the same thing" lightbulb moment kind of thing. But again, honestly, this is something they *should* have thought of months ago.

It's kinda like seeing someone having trouble getting their stove to work. They turn the knobs and nothing happens. Then that person overhears someone else talking about how their hair dryer didn't work, and they fixed it by reseting the circuit breaker for the bathroom. Then a lightbulb goes off, that they should maybe see if the breaker for the stove isn't tripped. Ok. That might be a sequence of events. But it's also like one of the first things you should normally check if your stove has no power, right? It's certainly on a shortish list of "things you try".

Now imagine this person sat there with a nonfunctioning stove for 6 months until they happened to overhear someone talk about circuit breakers. To me, the fact that trying this didn't occur to them until they overheard Nale is the same level of absurdity. Again. Alignment is literally one of the things in the list of conditions that can be used by default for glyphs. It's something they should have tried long before the Order ever showed up. You know, if the Order wasn't the key point of the story.

It's the kind of mistsake one maybe would accept in someone who knows absolutely nothing at all about the subject matter (I work in IT, so trust me when I say that this kind of thing really does happen). But this isn't just two random people. We're talking about a high level arcane caster and a high level divine caster. The bog standard "glyph of warding" is a standard 3rd level (I think) divine spell. Yeah, we can assume that a glyph created by an epic magic user might have some differences, but again, you start with what you do know about glyphs and their basic conceptual functions (like the kinds of things they normally trigger off of), and then you go from there. Flailing about mindlessly, while expected of the general public maybe, is just not something I expect these two to actually do.

You draw an analogy between this an not checking your circuit isn't broken when your stove isn't working. I say it is analogous to figuring out that the earth rotates and that is why we see stars etc move across the sky.

Both of those things will be obvious to us with the hindsight of having learned them. But was the point around the earth rotating obvious before someone figured it out? I think not, and I think the evidence is that it did take so long for humans to figure that out.

What evidence do we have for how obvious it was that someone of pure heart (possibly willingness also required) was needed for the wards? Exactly the same evidence - what actually happened. What actually happened is that two intelligent individuals, who at different points of the story come up with a variety of different ideas to solve a variety of different problems before them, weren't able to figure it out in six months. I think that is evidence that it was not easy to do so.

[gbaji]

What evidence do we have for how obvious it was that someone of pure heart (possibly willingness also required) was needed for the wards? Exactly the same evidence - what actually happened.

I think you are conflating two things:

1. What the glyph trigger could be
2. What the glyph trigger actually is

We can certainly argue that Xykon can't possibly know (2), until he tries it and discovers it works. And yes, even after overhearing Nale talk about the sigils requirement (pure of heart), that still only really leads to (1) "what it couuld be".

You ask "what evidence do we have for how obvious it was" (for 1: "what the glyph trigger could be"). I've given you the answer already: It's literally written into the standard glpyh rules (https://www.d20srd.org/srd/spells/glyphOfWarding.htm). Alignment is one of like 4 different standard things (passphrase aside) that glpyhs use as triggers (height/weight, species/sub-species, alignment, religion).

IMO, that's pretty strong evidence that, if one were really trying to figure out what to do to get through a glyph, at a bare minimum, they sould try various combinations of the things on that list. The fact that TE had never even considered "human and good" prior to overhearing Nale does not mean that this is a reasonable restriction and no one could possibly have expected them to think of it. If the thing Nale used to bypass the sigil had been complex like "touch the glpyh with your left hand, while hoping on your right foot, rubbing your belly with your right hand, and singing "I'm king Henry the 8th", then we can excuse TE for this.

But it was literally one of the things on the standard list. There's no real excuse for them not to have thought of this before overhearing Nale.


What actually happened is that two intelligent individuals, who at different points of the story come up with a variety of different ideas to solve a variety of different problems before them, weren't able to figure it out in six months. I think that is evidence that it was not easy to do so.

And I disagree. Again, let's set aside (2: What it actually is), since we still don't actually know that. But (1: what it could be)? Specifically "the thing Xykon was trying to trick Elan into doing"? That's something they should have thought of months earlier.

TE consistently runs on "rule of funny". Which is great for wacky villains and whatnot. But, I don't think that's a standard we should use to actually determine the relative difficulty of the gate defenses against any group of bad guys who aren't running on those sorts of story dependent rules.

[BloodSquirrel]

You ask "what evidence do we have for how obvious it was" (for 1: "what the glyph trigger could be"). I've given you the answer already: It's literally written into the standard glpyh rules (https://www.d20srd.org/srd/spells/glyphOfWarding.htm). Alignment is one of like 4 different standard things (passphrase aside) that glpyhs use as triggers (height/weight, species/sub-species, alignment, religion).


You realize that you're linking to something from the Cleric spell list, right? A 3rd level cleric spell? And that Dorukan wasn't a cleric? And that it actually says "physical characteristics", and not just height or weight? And that it also says that ethereal creatures (https://www.giantitp.com/comics/oots0370.html) can bypass it? And that it can be bypassed using disable device? And that they can be dispelled, which we know that Xykon is capable of? And that 5d8 damage wouldn't have destroyed Xykon's body? And that it would have only triggered in the first place if they tried to "enter, pass, or open" the gate, which wouldn't have stopped them from casting the ritual? And that the glyph is "nearly invisible"? And that meeting the conditions for the glyph just means that it doesn't zap you, and not that it disappears, meaning that having a good-aligned creature touch it would have done absolutely nothing? And that the duration of the glyph is "permanent until discharged", meaning that it would have disappeared after the first goblin Xykon sent to go touch it? And that you still haven't explained why Dorukan wouldn't have used a password or similarly more restrictive condition?

But, no, it's clearly obvious that we should assume that the one part of the spell description which we don't know for a fact doesn't apply to this glyph should be something that everyone in-universe would immediately assume would apply to this glyph even though it wouldn't make any sense for Dorukan to make it that way in the first place and nobody in-universe did assume that.

I'd call this more "backwards reasoning", but that would be overly generous. It's not even circular reasoning at this point. The assertions you're making aren't even logically compatible with each other.

Here's what it all boils down to: "The only reason it took so long for someone to guess the security expert's password was because they were too dumb to try '1234', and we know that his password must have been '1234' because that's an obvious password to use, and the system's rules for passwords explicitly say that it must be ten characters long and include at least one number, one letter, and one special character, meaning that all of the characters in '1234' would have been legal to use."



You draw an analogy between this an not checking your circuit isn't broken when your stove isn't working. I say it is analogous to figuring out that the earth rotates and that is why we see stars etc move across the sky.

This analogy is flawed in that the Earth rotating is a fact of nature, and not an arbitrary condition that had to be chosen by a conscious actor who would have been incentivized to actively attempt to choose something non-obvious.

The correct analogy is choosing a password- and by "analogy" I mean that choosing a password was an actual option here and it hasn't been explained why he wouldn't do that.

[Liquor Box]

I think you are conflating two things:

1. What the glyph trigger could be
2. What the glyph trigger actually is

We can certainly argue that Xykon can't possibly know (2), until he tries it and discovers it works. And yes, even after overhearing Nale talk about the sigils requirement (pure of heart), that still only really leads to (1) "what it couuld be".

You ask "what evidence do we have for how obvious it was" (for 1: "what the glyph trigger could be"). I've given you the answer already: It's literally written into the standard glpyh rules (https://www.d20srd.org/srd/spells/glyphOfWarding.htm). Alignment is one of like 4 different standard things (passphrase aside) that glpyhs use as triggers (height/weight, species/sub-species, alignment, religion).

IMO, that's pretty strong evidence that, if one were really trying to figure out what to do to get through a glyph, at a bare minimum, they sould try various combinations of the things on that list. The fact that TE had never even considered "human and good" prior to overhearing Nale does not mean that this is a reasonable restriction and no one could possibly have expected them to think of it. If the thing Nale used to bypass the sigil had been complex like "touch the glpyh with your left hand, while hoping on your right foot, rubbing your belly with your right hand, and singing "I'm king Henry the 8th", then we can excuse TE for this.

But it was literally one of the things on the standard list. There's no real excuse for them not to have thought of this before overhearing Nale.


I'm with Bloodsquirrel that I don't thin the standard glyph rules are relevant, as that was not what this was.

As to what it could have been - any one of a million things. I think the very fact that Xykon and Redcloak, an intelligent pair who have solved a wide variety of situations in the past, hadn't guessed 'alignment' in 6 months of trying things is good evidence that it wasn't an obvious possibility (or that it was more complicated, like their experiment on a good person failing because the person was not willing).

[brian 333]

Redcloak and Xykon had no time constraints while at Dorukon's Gate. The Scribblers were not coming to the rescue, and literally nobody could scry on them, or even know that they should. Though they didn't know it at the time, Shojo could not send his agent until The Order actually left the dungeon.

Neither Xykon nor Redcloak was going to age and die, and MitD was only going to grow larger and more powerful over time. They were in no hurry at all. Six months, six years, or six centuries might pass, and so what? There was plenty of time to do what they needed to do.

Xykon was literally playing: creating zombies out of goblins because he was bored. Also, it was an incentive for Redcloak to figure out the key to opening the gate. But he was in no hurry. There was plenty of time and no threats headed their way.

[BloodSquirrel]

Redcloak and Xykon had no time constraints while at Dorukon's Gate. The Scribblers were not coming to the rescue, and literally nobody could scry on them, or even know that they should. Though they didn't know it at the time, Shojo could not send his agent until The Order actually left the dungeon.

Neither Xykon nor Redcloak was going to age and die, and MitD was only going to grow larger and more powerful over time. They were in no hurry at all. Six months, six years, or six centuries might pass, and so what? There was plenty of time to do what they needed to do.

Xykon was literally playing: creating zombies out of goblins because he was bored. Also, it was an incentive for Redcloak to figure out the key to opening the gate. But he was in no hurry. There was plenty of time and no threats headed their way.

That doesn't logically imply that they were doing nothing for all of that time. Xykon doesn't like sitting around when he's bored. If he thought that throwing innocent villagers into the gate might even have a slim chance of working he'd have done it just for the entertainment value.

Not having any time constraints only helps explain why someone would not take an action if there was some benefit to delay- such as being able to proceed with more caution or having other more time-sensitive tasks to perform.

Xykon was happy to delay at Serini's gate because he was killing things and getting XP. Redcloak had to actively work to keep him in place in Gobbotopia.

[gbaji]

You realize that you're linking to something from the Cleric spell list, right? A 3rd level cleric spell? And that Dorukan wasn't a cleric?

Yes. So what? I already mentioned earlier that it was a 3rrd level cleric spell. Again. So what? Do you have some other source in the 3.5 D&D rules we might use as a starting point to figure out how a glyph might function? Meta rules don't change because the level or branch of magic being used change. Higher level spells tend to be more powerful, and tend to have fewer limits, but otherwise function in a similar way. So yeah. If we extrapolate how a glyph created by a high level wizard might function, maybe starting at the basic glyph description in the cleric spell list is a reasonable start.


And that you still haven't explained why Dorukan wouldn't have used a password or similarly more restrictive condition?

Interesing that you assume one thing written in the cleric "glyph of warding" spell could be a requirement, but not other things. Which is strange, given that one of these same "other things" (in this case alignment) is what Xykon finally came to believe was the correct trigger.


But, no, it's clearly obvious that we should assume that the one part of the spell description which we don't know for a fact doesn't apply to this glyph should be something that everyone in-universe would immediately assume would apply to this glyph even though it wouldn't make any sense for Dorukan to make it that way in the first place and nobody in-universe did assume that.

First off. Drop the assumptions here. Change "would apply" to "could apply".

And then explain why Xykon believed that alignment was a perfectly reasonable trigger for the glpyh, once he overheard Nale? He clearly believed that this was something that could be the answer. It's not like he immediately said "It can't be that. This is a high level wizard created glyph, and therefore cannot possibly use one of the triggers used by the low level cleric spell!". Right? Oh wait. He didn't say that. He immediately went "OMG! That must be it!!!"

And I'll repeat. Again. If Xykon accepted this as a perfectly reasonable trigger for the glyph, and he's an epic level arcane caster, then maybe we should accept that he knows more about this than you or I do. And given that he did accept it, then that means it's something that could be a trigger for such a glyph.

Which yeah. Brings me right back to: If alignment could be a trigger, why didn't they try it long ago".


I'd call this more "backwards reasoning", but that would be overly generous. It's not even circular reasoning at this point. The assertions you're making aren't even logically compatible with each other.

I'm not sure what could possibly be more logical than: Here's what the only spell in the game with "glyph" is its name uses as possible triggers, so even though we know this is permanent, and much more powerful, maybe we should use that as a starting point for what might possibly be a trigger.

What do you propose as an alternative "logical" means to approach this problem? Just try random things and hope they work? What I'm talking about is literally the only "logical" method to approach this. Or do you have another idea? Seriously. How would you approach this problem?



The correct analogy is choosing a password- and by "analogy" I mean that choosing a password was an actual option here and it hasn't been explained why he wouldn't do that.

And I'll point out again, that your belief that a password could be the triger also comes from the glyph of warding spell description, but whatever.

I'm also not considering what Dorukan should have done. That's not the point. The point isn't even "what actually was the trigger" (since we actually don't know). The question is purely "why would Xykon believe that alignment could bypass the glyph now, but didn't think of it earlier?"

[brian 333]

That doesn't logically imply that they were doing nothing for all of that time. Xykon doesn't like sitting around when he's bored. If he thought that throwing innocent villagers into the gate might even have a slim chance of working he'd have done it just for the entertainment value.

Not having any time constraints only helps explain why someone would not take an action if there was some benefit to delay- such as being able to proceed with more caution or having other more time-sensitive tasks to perform.

Xykon was happy to delay at Serini's gate because he was killing things and getting XP. Redcloak had to actively work to keep him in place in Gobbotopia.

Xylon was doing two things:
1) amusing himself while Redcloak was trying to solve the problem, and
2) converting costly living hirelings into cost effective unliving ones.

[BloodSquirrel]

YI'm not sure what could possibly be more logical than: Here's what the only spell in the game with "glyph" is its name uses as possible triggers, so even though we know this is permanent, and much more powerful, maybe we should use that as a starting point for what might possibly be a trigger.

What do you propose as an alternative "logical" means to approach this problem? Just try random things and hope they work? What I'm talking about is literally the only "logical" method to approach this. Or do you have another idea? Seriously. How would you approach this problem?

You could throw a rock at a game store and be sure to hit a spell or ability that is more compatible with Dorukan's seal than Glyph of Warding. I practically went sentence by sentence and pointed out that the only one that didn't explicitly contradict what we saw was the one that you are only speculating might apply, even though it makes no sense for any other reason.

The answer to your question is literally anything. Covering yourself with nacho cheese and rolling around in an ant hill would be more logical than insisting that a spell that has a 0% correlation between all observed effects of Dorukan's seal should be your starting point. The flying spaghetti monster is not as complete an exercise in absurdity as trying to claim Dorukan's seal should have the same limitation as a lower-level spell that is otherwise the complete opposite in behavior on all points. Simply making something up and only having 90% of it contradict the on-panel evidence would be more sane. Letting Zap Brannigan send wave after wave of men into the gate on the hope that the seal has a pre-set kill limit would have a more rational through-line than "The seal fits literally no part of this spell description, so this must be the right one!" To say that the only reason you are insisting that it must be Glyph of Warding is that it is convenient for your argument would be an unfathomable gift of unwarranted credit, since you couldn't have picked a spell that makes your argument look worse. There is literally more evidence for it being a modification of Fireball, since that's at least arcane magic.

Hell, is there even a panel where Dorukan's seal is called a "glyph"? Because the words that I keep seeing in the comic are "sigil", "gate", and "seal".

[OvisCaedo]

Xykon didn't come to the conclusion because "oh right of course, that's one of the designated triggers for the cleric spell that isn't what was used is", he came to the conclusion after finding out that HAD worked for a ward elsewhere in the tower. Of course he'll think it's possible; he just found out it had been done.

You'd think "liches regenerate" would be common knowledge, too, but it came as a surprise to all of the good guys.

we kind of have to make assumptions no matter what, since we don't have any idea how the sigil actually worked. So, as a certain someone once said, why not make assumptions that fit with the story instead of ones that don't? Clearly, purity of heart was an obscure trigger if two magical experts in Xykon and Redcloak didn't figure it out on their own.

[gbaji]

You could throw a rock at a game store and be sure to hit a spell or ability that is more compatible with Dorukan's seal than Glyph of Warding.

Great. It's so easy, then do it. Give me the name of a spell that acts more like Dorukan's glyph on the Gate, then the glyph of warding spell.

And yes. Point taken that I'm not sure either if it's actually ever called a "glyph" in the strip. But it's about the function, not the specificis here. You have some kind of magic that zaps people if they touch it, but has some condition which will allows it to be disabled/bypassed/whatever (but isn't a "trap" that can be simply disarmed). Is that *exactly* like a glyph of warding? No. Does it share a lot of the same features? Yes. Specifically, if we are assuming there *is* some kind of condition on it (which TE certainly seemed to believe was the case), then looking at other spells that have "meet condition or get zapped" as their function is a useful starting point.

Which yeah, leads us to "why not just try the set of conditions listed in the glyph of warding spell".


The answer to your question is literally anything.

Yes, it could. But in a case where "it could be anything", you have to start somewhere. You don't start with "covering yourself in nacho cheese and rolling around in an ant hill". You start with basics. You start with very broad things and then work towards more specifics, until you either find the condition, or you get to the point where you are too narrow in focus for it to be worth your time to continue.

This entire discussion is strange to me, because what I'm describing is basic problem solving skills. In this case, it's a starting point of "what kind of things are most commonly used as a condition for a spell effect like this?". Why not try those things first? If I'm debugging a computer problem, I start by going through the list of more common things that could cause what I'm seeing first then move to the more esoteric ones.

I'll ask again. Provide a logical approach you would take if actually faced with this exact problem. You are a PC in a dungeon, and need to open the gate for some adventure reason. How would you proceed? If it helps, let's assume you are an evil party and don't have problems with sacrificing people "testing" your attempted solutions.

Me? I'd certainly look around to see if there's something that might be a passcode. But if I'm reaching the point of "try to have different types of people touch it and see if it opens", I'm going to try variations of the same kinds of things that work for glyphs of warding, since that's a "list of conditions" that I already know about (and know that the metamagic rules of the game accept as conditions in the first place). If your alternative is "it could be anything!", why not start with a short list of "known things" first before going to the infinitely sized list of "unknown things"?

[Precure]

Xykon had to trick Elan because that's how Nale has done it before. He has no way of knowing whether forcing someone would work since he's been following Nale's example.

[BloodSquirrel]

Great. It's so easy, then do it. Give me the name of a spell that acts more like Dorukan's glyph on the Gate, then the glyph of warding spell.


I already did. Fireball.

[OvisCaedo]

I also do have to question whether "pure of heart" actually does just mean "good alignment" in a universe where everyone is generally aware of alignment being a thing and openly talk about it without euphemism

but a lot of things are just chalked up to early comic wonkiness

[Liquor Box]

Great. It's so easy, then do it. Give me the name of a spell that acts more like Dorukan's glyph on the Gate, then the glyph of warding spell.

From the perspective of Team Evil it was probably more similar with a Symbol of Death. All he knew was every time his goblins touched the gate they died, and Symbol of Death is closer to doing that than a glyph.

Your argument is circular. Your reasoning is that 'it has a bypass condition so it is like a glyph', but then say 'it is like a glyph so Xykon should have guessed it had a bypass condition'.

The fact that noone described it as a glyph is not some meaningless choice of words, it shows that those characters (who know much more about magic in universe than we do) did not see it as a glyph, or like a glyph etc etc.


This entire discussion is strange to me, because what I'm describing is basic problem solving skills. In this case, it's a starting point of "what kind of things are most commonly used as a condition for a spell effect like this?". Why not try those things first? If I'm debugging a computer problem, I start by going through the list of more common things that could cause what I'm seeing first then move to the more esoteric ones.

On what basis would Xykon think there are usually conditions for a spell effect such as this? If you are debugging a computer, is getting someone pure of heart to touch it one of the first things you would try? Because they is barely less logical than jumping to that conclusion here.


I'll ask again. Provide a logical approach you would take if actually faced with this exact problem. You are a PC in a dungeon, and need to open the gate for some adventure reason. How would you proceed? If it helps, let's assume you are an evil party and don't have problems with sacrificing people "testing" your attempted solutions.

If you thought it was a trap you;d try to disarm it. If you thought it was magical you'd try to dispel it. If those didn't work and you were a bit evil, you'd probably send someone to trigger it hoping it only has one charge. I think those are the obvious solutions. There might be others that would present themself if we knew more - like if there was a symbol on it, you might try and cut it off.

After that, there are thousands of possible answers, none of which strike me as really being much more likely that sending hundreds of goblins into it in the hope it uses all its charges. But I'm sure there was plenty else that Xykon tried.


Me? I'd certainly look around to see if there's something that might be a passcode. But if I'm reaching the point of "try to have different types of people touch it and see if it opens", I'm going to try variations of the same kinds of things that work for glyphs of warding, since that's a "list of conditions" that I already know about (and know that the metamagic rules of the game accept as conditions in the first place). If your alternative is "it could be anything!", why not start with a short list of "known things" first before going to the infinitely sized list of "unknown things"?

Again, there's no indication that there's a list of conditions here.

Really, there's only one thing we can be sure wasn't an obvious answer - having someone pure of heart touch it. We can be sure that wasn't obvious because we know that neither of the very clever characters attacking the problem for six months straight thought of it.

[Kish]

I also do have to question whether "pure of heart" actually does just mean "good alignment" in a universe where everyone is generally aware of alignment being a thing and openly talk about it without euphemism

but a lot of things are just chalked up to early comic wonkiness
Some people break the fourth wall more than others. Some people break the fourth wall in one situation and not in another.

"Pure of heart" provably means something that applies to: Haley, Roy, Elan, and not any of the Linear Guild (so no, it's not "has no ambitions to use the Talisman," or Thog would have qualified, even aside from the Catch-22 Dorukan would have been building in if it was that).


Really, there's only one thing we can be sure wasn't an obvious answer - having someone pure of heart touch it. We can be sure that wasn't obvious because we know that neither of the very clever characters attacking the problem for six months straight thought of it.
Objection. The creature in the darkness wasn't attacking the problem, he had no idea what the Gate was...

...oh, you mean Xykon? Setting aside whether he qualifies as "very clever," he wasn't attacking the problem either; he expected Redcloak to deal with it while he amused himself, in part by tricking goblins into touching the Gate and dying. And whatever nonepic spell you want to map the ward on the gate to, death effects won't cut it, since it destroyed Xykon.

[BloodSquirrel]

"Pure of heart" provably means something that applies to: Haley, Roy, Elan, and not any of the Linear Guild (so no, it's not "has no ambitions to use the Talisman," or Thog would have qualified, even aside from the Catch-22 Dorukan would have been building in if it was that).


You're assuming that "pure of heart" is something that can be easily reduced to a single clause that can be expressed in known game terms. There could easily be multiple requirements, or it could be something more abstract that qualifies as an independent aspect of someone's personality.

And, as I've pointed out before, this is not uninformed speculation. It would not make a lot of sense, a priori, for Dorukan to make the requirement for his sigils so easy to pass that you could find at least one person who meets it in your average countryside village. If we had to guess, without any other information, what the final door that Serini's gate is locked behind is made out of, we would probably start with "metal or stone" and not "paper", purely on account of the former two options being better for the purpose that they are there to serve.


Some people break the fourth wall more than others. Some people break the fourth wall in one situation and not in another.

"Pure of heart" provably means something that applies to: Haley, Roy, Elan, and not any of the Linear Guild (so no, it's not "has no ambitions to use the Talisman," or Thog would have qualified, even aside from the Catch-22 Dorukan would have been building in if it was that).

Objection. The creature in the darkness wasn't attacking the problem, he had no idea what the Gate was...

...oh, you mean Xykon? Setting aside whether he qualifies as "very clever," he wasn't attacking the problem either; he expected Redcloak to deal with it while he amused himself, in part by tricking goblins into touching the Gate and dying. And whatever nonepic spell you want to map the ward on the gate to, death effects won't cut it, since it destroyed Xykon.

This is a flat-out untruth. He never, at any point, indicates that he is expecting Redcloak to figure out how to open the gate, and in fact it's Redcloak who asks him if he can find a way to experiment with the seal without killing so many goblins.

[Liquor Box]

Objection. The creature in the darkness wasn't attacking the problem, he had no idea what the Gate was...

...oh, you mean Xykon? Setting aside whether he qualifies as "very clever," he wasn't attacking the problem either; he expected Redcloak to deal with it while he amused himself, in part by tricking goblins into touching the Gate and dying. And whatever nonepic spell you want to map the ward on the gate to, death effects won't cut it, since it destroyed Xykon.

Xykon is clearly intelligent. He out maneuvres Redcloak again and again throughout this comic and Start of Darkness, he broke Serini's code in her diary, came up with a clever way to lure Dorukan out of his dungeon, tricked Miko into being a scrying focus, even his current feat of consistently forming sentences ending in an uneven number of letters requires intelligence. Xykon should not be underestimated because his intelligence relies more on flashes on inspiration than the more studious methodical Redcloak. In fact, that is an advantage, because between the two of them, they have both bases covered.

I'm not sure why you think it was only Redcloak trying to figure out how to crack the gate problem. It was Xykon throwing goblins at it, and it was Xykon who ultimately figured out (what we presume to be) the answer.

I do agree though, that it is a mistake to liken the ward to any non-epic spell. I was only answering the question of whether there was any spell more similar to it than the glyph spell.

[FujinAkari]

Agreed.

My question is, how plausible is the idea that Dorukan intended to use them as an active defense rather than a passive one?

As a passive defense, otherwise easily bypassed powerful monsters are useless. As an active defense commanded by a leader, the powers of individual monsters can be considered when tailoring a response to an intruder.

We used to call this principle 'force multiplication.'

This may have been brought up already (apologies, but I didn't review all the pages in their entirety)

In Start of Darkness, we learn that Xykon goaded Durokan into engaging him on the field outside of his dungeon, thus avoiding the necessity of having to navigate the dungeon defenses. I would guess that likely also means that Xykon was able to bypass the various talisman's that Roy was trying to activate to access the final chambers of the dungeon due to Xykon having Durokan's staff, which likely just lets him go wherever in the dungeon. You don't invent a magic door/portal/whatever that has prerequisites to bypass without also giving yourself a way to skip the queue :P

So the dungeon was likely designed with each of the four wings being required, possibly being used as a flanking tool. It seems likely )though impossible to verify) that Durokan would have also actively managed the dungeon's defense had he actually been alive when the dungeon was breached

[gbaji]

I already did. Fireball.

Huh? Fireball is enchanted onto an object and then triggers on someone touching that object if they don't meet some pre-set conditions in the spell? Are we looking at the same spell list?

You are getting hung up on the payload, and not looking at the more relevant issue which is the trigger mechanism. It's not about what spell is triggered, but that this is some sort of magic that triggers when "conditions met". Or more correctly, it triggers unless certain conditions are met. This is relevant to this discussion because what TE was trying to do was figure out the trigger condition they needed to meet. It wasn't about "how to avoid dying from the spell that is triggered?", but "how do we disable the thing that does the triggering"?".

So you look for other spells that trigger unless specific conditions are met. Right? And when you do that, you find glyph of warding. It's literally the first and most obvious thing to use as a basic starting point. So, for anyone actually trying to defeat this thing, the very first thing you start with is the list of things used as trigger conditions for that spell, since that part operates in a similar manner. And if they had done that, and if the condition actually was "someone of good alignment touches it", they should have discovered that very quickly. It's literally one of like 4 or 5 basic criteria.

Again. Why *not* start with the one other spell in the book that functions in this manner? If not there, then where?

Heck. I'll address Liquor Box's stuff too:


Your argument is circular. Your reasoning is that 'it has a bypass condition so it is like a glyph', but then say 'it is like a glyph so Xykon should have guessed it had a bypass condition'.

No. The folks who were trying to open the gate reasoned that it had some kind of bypass condition. They were trying to unseal the gate for months. Can we at least agree on the most basic assumption that TE did believe that there was some method to "unseal the gate"? If not, then this entire discussion is really really pointless.


On what basis would Xykon think there are usually conditions for a spell effect such as this?

Um... Because that's how magic works in D&D? I'm not sure what you are asking here. Anything that has "zaps you when you touch it" has some means to open/disarm/dispell/whatever so that it no longer zaps you when you touch it. Are you now going to ask me why wheels are round?


If you are debugging a computer, is getting someone pure of heart to touch it one of the first things you would try? Because they is barely less logical than jumping to that conclusion here.

If I'm trying to gain access to a computer, then yes, even if I know nothing about the operating system, or the specifics of the security, the first set of things I'm going to try are the kinds of things used by other computer systems I am familiar with to secure them. So. Could be a username/password combo. Look for a keyboard to type these into. Could be biometrics. Look for a face, fingerprint, retina scanner. Maybe it requires a dongle of some kind. Look for a port that takes some kind of hardare key.

If "someone with a specific detectable atribute touching it" is one of the common methods used to bypass security like this, then yes, that's what I'm going to try. Alignment is one of a handful of magically detectable attrirbutes used by the magic system in D&D. There are three different sets of spells that do specific things based on alignment. Detect alignment. Protection from alignment. And dispell alignment. Additionally, it's one of the things listed as a condition which can be used by the glyph of warding spell. And, intrestingly enough, since someone brought up the Symbol spells, they also use alignment as one of the possible trigger conditions:


You can also set special triggering limitations of your own. These can be as simple or elaborate as you desire. Special conditions for triggering a symbol of death can be based on a creature’s name, identity, or alignment, but otherwise must be based on observable actions or qualities. Intangibles such as level, class, Hit Dice, and hit points don’t qualify.

So there you go. Yet more evidence that trying creatures of different alignments should have been one of the things they tried early on. And note, that similarly to the glyph of warding description, while alignment can be used, things like class, level, etc cannot. It's almost like there's a list in the D&D magic system of "things that can be used as triggers".

Again. Why on earth not try this?

[Kish]

Fireball would also have barely inconvenienced Xykon, if Dorukan's gate ward was somehow based on Fireball.

[BloodSquirrel]

Huh? Fireball is enchanted onto an object and then triggers on someone touching that object if they don't meet some pre-set conditions in the spell? Are we looking at the same spell list?


Fireball is a wizard spell. This is already more than Glyph of Warding has in common with Dorukan's seal.

[gbaji]

Fireball is a wizard spell. This is already more than Glyph of Warding has in common with Dorukan's seal.

I'm looking at function here. What does a spell do? How does it work? That's what they have "in common". Which class can cast them is really not relevant here, and becomes less relevant the farther we get into metamagic rules (which is where epic level stuff functions anyway).

You're looking really hard at irrelevant differences while ignoring the very relevant similarities. In this case, we have some sort of high power spell enchantment that triggers when someone touches it, and we're trying to figure out how to disable or bypass that effect. The obvious first step is to look at other spells that exist in the universe (what type of spell is irrelevant) that have a similar function and look at how they work, and what sorts of things can disable or bypass them.

Seriously here. What is the alternative? I've asked this many times, but so far have gotten no (serious) answer. List off the first 10 things you would try if you were playing in a game and the GM presented you with Dorukan's gate and you had to figure out how to open it. I've already answered this question. And yes, "try having people with different alignments touch it" is one of the things on that list (looking for and/or trying to figure out a passcode is number one of course). You'd have to be seriously blind not to try this pretty early in the progression. There just aren't that many different "things" to try that fit in with other spells that work in a similar way "trigger when touched, and have some means to bypass/disable/whatever". And certainly, if we're looking at "easy to try", gathering up a handful of people of different alignments is pretty darn easy and makes this like the first thing you should run through anyway (while looking for that passcode, which maybe he wrote down on a post-it or something).

Every other "thing it could be" requires a ton of searching and what not. This is like "just try it" level stuff. So why not? What exactly do they have to lose here?

[brian 333]

Um... Because that's how magic works in D&D? I'm not sure what you are asking here. Anything that has "zaps you when you touch it" has some means to open/disarm/dispell/whatever so that it no longer zaps you when you touch it. Are you now going to ask me why wheels are round?

Holy Avenger.

There is no bypass mechanism which allows a non-Good character to wield one and any Evil character takes damage in every round it is held.

Dorukon's sigil may or may not have had a mechanism to bypass it. Perhaps the sigil had to be removed via some form of Erase spell. Perhaps the only result of Elan touching it would have been a dead Elan.

We'll never know, because instead, Elan pushed a button clearly marked Do Not Touch.

So, whatever you think the sigil did, however you think it worked, nobody can ever prove you wrong.

[Liquor Box]

No. The folks who were trying to open the gate reasoned that it had some kind of bypass condition. They were trying to unseal the gate for months. Can we at least agree on the most basic assumption that TE did believe that there was some method to "unseal the gate"? If not, then this entire discussion is really really pointless.

They tried to open the gate, but not by trying to trigger any bypass as far as we know (they may have tried to set one off in case it existed, but we don't see that). From Xykon's perspective throwing goblins into the gate might have used all its charges.

We can agree that he thought there was a way to get past the seal on the gate, otherwise they wouldn't have been trying. But that is very different from there being a bypass mechanism.


Um... Because that's how magic works in D&D? I'm not sure what you are asking here. Anything that has "zaps you when you touch it" has some means to open/disarm/dispell/whatever so that it no longer zaps you when you touch it. Are you now going to ask me why wheels are round?

Again, I think you are conflating a deliberate bypass mechanism like glyph has (dwarfs may pass) with things that are not inteded to have bypasses, but can be defeated with things like dispels

I agree that one might expect the ward to have some way to get past it. But that doesn't imply a glyph-like bypass mechanism where on just has to throw a creature at it that meets the pre-conditions.


If I'm trying to gain access to a computer, then yes, even if I know nothing about the operating system, or the specifics of the security, the first set of things I'm going to try are the kinds of things used by other computer systems I am familiar with to secure them. So. Could be a username/password combo. Look for a keyboard to type these into. Could be biometrics. Look for a face, fingerprint, retina scanner. Maybe it requires a dongle of some kind. Look for a port that takes some kind of hardare key.

If "someone with a specific detectable atribute touching it" is one of the common methods used to bypass security like this, then yes, that's what I'm going to try. Alignment is one of a handful of magically detectable attrirbutes used by the magic system in D&D. There are three different sets of spells that do specific things based on alignment. Detect alignment. Protection from alignment. And dispell alignment. Additionally, it's one of the things listed as a condition which can be used by the glyph of warding spell. And, intrestingly enough, since someone brought up the Symbol spells, they also use alignment as one of the possible trigger conditions:

But "someone with a specific detectable atribute touching it" is not one of the common methods to bypass security. You have found one spell (which Xykon had not way to know was similar to the wards he faced) where that is one possible bypass of amongst hundred (9 alignments, 20 or more races, 30 or more classes, almost limitless possible heights or weights). But it is not a common method at all. An example of a common way to get past a magical defence is dispel, and I'd be amazed if Xykon had not tried that.


So there you go. Yet more evidence that trying creatures of different alignments should have been one of the things they tried early on. And note, that similarly to the glyph of warding description, while alignment can be used, things like class, level, etc cannot. It's almost like there's a list in the D&D magic system of "things that can be used as triggers".

Again. Why on earth not try this?

Maybe he did try this. That says a specific alignment can trigger symbol of death, so as soon as you use someone of a different alignment, you know it was not a trigger.

Or maybe he didn't. There was no reason for him to liken this spell to symbol or Glyph, because it was very different to both (just more different to glyph than to symbol. It's kind of like saying "why on earth look for secret passages at Girard's dungeon because you found them in another dungeon"

Again, the only evidence we have is what happened. What happened is that the wards stymied two intelligent characters who have solved several problems throughout the course of the comic, and who are highly familiar with magic for longer than any other problem. That is evidence that this is not a solution that would have been easily arrived at by an intelligent person with knowledge of magic in universe.

[BloodSquirrel]

I'm looking at function here.

No you aren't. You haven't named a single functional similarity between Glyph of Warding and Dorukan's seal.

[Precure]

This may have been brought up already (apologies, but I didn't review all the pages in their entirety)

In Start of Darkness, we learn that Xykon goaded Durokan into engaging him on the field outside of his dungeon, thus avoiding the necessity of having to navigate the dungeon defenses. I would guess that likely also means that Xykon was able to bypass the various talisman's that Roy was trying to activate to access the final chambers of the dungeon due to Xykon having Durokan's staff, which likely just lets him go wherever in the dungeon. You don't invent a magic door/portal/whatever that has prerequisites to bypass without also giving yourself a way to skip the queue :P

So the dungeon was likely designed with each of the four wings being required, possibly being used as a flanking tool. It seems likely )though impossible to verify) that Durokan would have also actively managed the dungeon's defense had he actually been alive when the dungeon was breached

(OMG! Answering to legendary FujinAkari)

I've checked the book and Dorukan's staff simply disappear from the story after falling somewhere off panel during their fight. We follow Xykon then until the end of the story, he never shown to pick it up. We also see them entering the dungeon in the last panel and none of them were carrying the staff or anything like that. So, i think it's pretty unlikely for Xykon to use it.

[KorvinStarmast]

Yeah, all the goblins working for Xykon were working for a chaotic evil lich who, when not indiscriminately murdering nongoblins, was constantly leisurely killing the goblins themselves. Probably safe to assume a general callous disregard for the sanctity of life in that workforce, specifically, regardless of goblinhood. Command climate, or corporate culture, for Team Evil at work.

Since the most reasonable and supported assumption on the meaning of "pure-of-heart" is either just "good-aligned" or has "good-alignment" as a requirement As one of multiple requirements. I don't think Roy qualifies as being pure of heart, even though he is of good alignment. IIRC, Elan's naive/innocent nature works for him in this case.

But the reason Xykon didn't capture some pure hearted villager was because he didn't know that was the way to bypass the ward. He only finds out (assuming it is true) when he hears Nale talking about that being the key to the sigils. Hmm, need to go back and read that again, maybe Roy and Haley do qualify along with Elan. And I guess Durkon does.

I also do have to question whether "pure of heart" actually does just mean "good alignment" in a universe where everyone is generally aware of alignment being a thing and openly talk about it without euphemism

but a lot of things are just chalked up to early comic wonkiness And similarly, D&D 3.5e wonkiness. (Or D&D wonkiness in general).

You're assuming that "pure of heart" is something that can be easily reduced to a single clause that can be expressed in known game terms. There could easily be multiple requirements, or it could be something more abstract that qualifies as an independent aspect of someone's personality. That's how I saw it, but looking back at the elemental sigils, I may not have parsed that correctly. EDIT: yeah, appears so, had to review Nale's input to see that it wasn't just Elan (https://www.giantitp.com/comics/oots0057.html)
Xykon is clearly intelligent. Yes. I have never understood the idea that he isn't. I think his biggest two flaws (besides the whole Evil bit) are hubris, and impulsiveness.

[gbaji]

Been trying to just drop this entire conversation, but...


Holy Avenger.

There is no bypass mechanism which allows a non-Good character to wield one and any Evil character takes damage in every round it is held.

You're actually countering my argument of "They should have tried having people with different alignments touch the gate, since alignment is a common thing used by magic in D&D to differentiate effects/triggers/conditions" with "Holy Avenger; an item that does different things based on the alignment of the person picking it up"?

You're only re-inforcing my argument that alignment differences should have been among the first small set of things they tried.


So, whatever you think the sigil did, however you think it worked, nobody can ever prove you wrong.

It's not about what I think the sigil did, or what actually would have worked to unseal the gate. My argument is that they should have tried to see if alignment would unseal the gate, but didn't. So I don't take the amount of time it took them to think of that as a useful measuring stick of how powerful the seal actually was.


Look. If the lamp in someone's living room hasn't been working for 6 months, and after 6 months of trying to get the lamp to work again, they finally think of "Hey. Let's try changing the bulb", I'm not going to conclude that 6 months is the standard amount of time it takes to fix a non-working lamp in a living room, right? I'm instead going to assume "these guys are morons". Even if it later turns out that changing the bulb didn't fix it, and the lamp was broken or failing in some other way, it still doesn't change my assessment of their debugging/testing process. The fact that it took them that long to even think of what should have been one of the first things they tried (change the bulb, make sure the switch is on, make sure it's plugged in) tells me all I need to know.

To use your own example:

If you were playing a game of D&D and found a cool glowing sword, and the evil rogue in your party picked it up and got burned, would you just go "welp. I guess it's a cursed item that burns everyone who touches it" and throw it away? I'm assuming that most sane, rational, and semi-intelligent players would immediately have someone of good alignment try to pick up the sword right? Cause it might be a holy weapon, or something that triggers on alignment. I mean, it might be something else, and might have more complex triggers or conditions, but that's literally the very first thing you would try, right?

So explain to me why TE, having seen that when evil people (goblins) touch the gate, they get zapped, would not have immediately thought: "Let's try having neutral and good people touch it instead?". It's the easiest thing to try, so it should be the first thing you try. Sure. You also start looking for passcodes and whatnot, but why not try alignment? Certainly, it should not have taken 6 months for this to even occur to them. And that's the point I'm making here. They should have thought of this sooner, but they didn't, so we can't take how long it took *them* to think of this as a standard for how difficult or time consuming it would have been for someone else.

Which is why I find the argument that "Durokan's gate was the strongest because the seal stopped TE for 6 months" to have no weight.

[OvisCaedo]

if you were playing a game of D&D and found a cool glowing sword, and the evil rogue in your party picked it up and got burned, would you just go "welp. I guess it's a cursed item that burns everyone who touches it" and throw it away? I'm assuming that most sane, rational, and semi-intelligent players would immediately have someone of good alignment try to pick up the sword right? Cause it might be a holy weapon, or something that triggers on alignment. I mean, it might be something else, and might have more complex triggers or conditions, but that's literally the very first thing you would try, right?

...No? The first thing I'd do is have a spellcaster analyze it instead of immediately assuming it MUST have been about alignment and having someone else potentially hurt themselves on it.

[Kish]

I think it's the easiest thing in the world to say, in hindsight, "they should have immediately jumped to what the ward on the gate actually was."

But the thing is, when Xykon sent a goblin into the Gate and the goblin died, they knew it was because of something about that goblin--and that's it. If they assumed Dorukan was supposed to be able to fulfill the criteria for someone to bypass his ward: insufficient Intelligence bonus? Class =/= Wizard? Race =/= Human? I could go on all day, and Xykon was at least distracted from serious efforts to figure it out by how hilarious he found watching goblins die from touching it.

[gbaji]

...No? The first thing I'd do is have a spellcaster analyze it instead of immediately assuming it MUST have been about alignment and having someone else potentially hurt themselves on it.

Ok. And if your party does not have someone capable of casting magic that can analyze the item (or you do, and it returns nothing useful because it's an artifact/epic effect), what would you do next? We all know exactly what would happen in any rpg party we've ever played in if we ran into this sort of thing. The party paladin (or good aligned fighter) would be practically pushing everyone aside to pick up the weapon. You know it. I know it. Let's stop pretending otherwise here for the sake of an argument. Because players are smart enough to know that things in D&D often do different things based on the alignment of the person interacting with them. So it's a good "first thing to try". Sure use magic to analyze the item if you have it, but that's not the point here.

Show me any party that would leave that sword untouched for 6 months just because they couldn't get a magical divination/whatever to tell them exactly what it is, and not actually just try having different people pick the thing up. Doesn't exist. Has never existed. Heck. I'm quite certain that 90% of actual gaming groups, if they ran into that situation and the party wizard just didn't currently have the appropriate analyze spell memorized, would not bother to wait to get new spells. They'd just have different people try picking it up. Party has plenty of heal spells, so why wait for the wizard right?

It's not about "assuming it MUST have been about alignment". I'm not assuming anything. I'm pointing out that if you are in the situation of "try different things" (ie: any magical means of divination or analysis have failed), you try things based on some combination of how easy they are to test, and how likely they are to be the correct "thing" you need. Alignment just happens to score very well on both of those scales in D&D. It's easy to test (there's only a few alignments in the game, and everyone has one). And it's one of the most commonly used "things" in the magic system to differentiate effects or triggers/conditions.

The idea that someone would just not think to try this for 6 months? Laughable. I'm not even saying that it *was* about alignment. That's not remotely the point. I'm just questioning the fact that they never thought to try until 6 months had gone by.



I think it's the easiest thing in the world to say, in hindsight, "they should have immediately jumped to what the ward on the gate actually was."

Not relevant. We don't actually know that it *was* alignment that would have worked. Elan destroyed the gate before we could find out. That's not the point I'm making at all. It's that they never tried it in 6 months. They never even thought of it. Something that any random group of D&D players would think of in like 2 minutes after running into something like this, they never thought of. That's the bit I have a hard time believing. Which is why, when this topic first came up, I dismissed the fact that TE was "stuck" on the seal for 6 months as "plot armor" and not a realistic assessment of how much of an obstacle the seal on the gate actually was.

They weren't able to get though the seal because the plot required that they not get through the seal. Period.

[Kish]

Not relevant. We don't actually know that it *was* alignment that would have worked.

I disagree but right back at you: not relevant. Pretend I wrote "easy to jump to what Xykon finally decided it was" if you want: it remains 20-20 hindsight on your part, not somehow objective reality that they should have gone, "It fried the goblin we tested it on...I bet it was because he was evil!"

Actually wait just one second here.

You're arguing in the same breath that having Elan touch it might not have worked, and that Dorukan's gate ward wasn't impressive. If "we" don't know that it was the same pure of heart check as the elemental sigils, then it's pure assuming the conclusion to say that it was surely bypassable in some way that only the plot prevented Xykon and Redcloak from getting past.

[brian 333]

Been trying to just drop this entire conversation, but...



You're actually countering my argument of "They should have tried having people with different alignments touch the gate, since alignment is a common thing used by magic in D&D to differentiate effects/triggers/conditions" with "Holy Avenger; an item that does different things based on the alignment of the person picking it up"?

You're only re-inforcing my argument that alignment differences should have been among the first small set of things they tried.



It's not about what I think the sigil did, or what actually would have worked to unseal the gate. My argument is that they should have tried to see if alignment would unseal the gate, but didn't. So I don't take the amount of time it took them to think of that as a useful measuring stick of how powerful the seal actually was.


Look. If the lamp in someone's living room hasn't been working for 6 months, and after 6 months of trying to get the lamp to work again, they finally think of "Hey. Let's try changing the bulb", I'm not going to conclude that 6 months is the standard amount of time it takes to fix a non-working lamp in a living room, right? I'm instead going to assume "these guys are morons". Even if it later turns out that changing the bulb didn't fix it, and the lamp was broken or failing in some other way, it still doesn't change my assessment of their debugging/testing process. The fact that it took them that long to even think of what should have been one of the first things they tried (change the bulb, make sure the switch is on, make sure it's plugged in) tells me all I need to know.

To use your own example:

If you were playing a game of D&D and found a cool glowing sword, and the evil rogue in your party picked it up and got burned, would you just go "welp. I guess it's a cursed item that burns everyone who touches it" and throw it away? I'm assuming that most sane, rational, and semi-intelligent players would immediately have someone of good alignment try to pick up the sword right? Cause it might be a holy weapon, or something that triggers on alignment. I mean, it might be something else, and might have more complex triggers or conditions, but that's literally the very first thing you would try, right?

So explain to me why TE, having seen that when evil people (goblins) touch the gate, they get zapped, would not have immediately thought: "Let's try having neutral and good people touch it instead?". It's the easiest thing to try, so it should be the first thing you try. Sure. You also start looking for passcodes and whatnot, but why not try alignment? Certainly, it should not have taken 6 months for this to even occur to them. And that's the point I'm making here. They should have thought of this sooner, but they didn't, so we can't take how long it took *them* to think of this as a standard for how difficult or time consuming it would have been for someone else.

Which is why I find the argument that "Durokan's gate was the strongest because the seal stopped TE for 6 months" to have no weight.

I'm the guy who said that Xykon should have gone to the nearest village, gathered everyone up, and made them touch the gate one by one.

(I assumed that he had an idea how it worked, but no suitable test subjects, so he was tossing goblins at it in hopes of finding a good one.)

[KorvinStarmast]

Or, if you don't want to do that, tell me how, as a GM running this, you would determine who was "pure of heart" and "Not being coerced"? Well, if they brought pizza and it's my favorite kind, there's a lot of latitude ... :smallwink:


So Hanibal Lecter counts as "pure of heart" in your book? Pure of intention. Pure evil

[Provengreil]

I'm the guy who said that Xykon should have gone to the nearest village, gathered everyone up, and made them touch the gate one by one.

(I assumed that he had an idea how it worked, but no suitable test subjects, so he was tossing goblins at it in hopes of finding a good one.)

I expect he would have, but when he overheard Nale bring it up the Order was already in the dungeon and coming his way. Xykon is the kind of guy to look at that as serendipity and just roll with it.

[Liquor Box]

Look. If the lamp in someone's living room hasn't been working for 6 months, and after 6 months of trying to get the lamp to work again, they finally think of "Hey. Let's try changing the bulb", I'm not going to conclude that 6 months is the standard amount of time it takes to fix a non-working lamp in a living room, right? I'm instead going to assume "these guys are morons". Even if it later turns out that changing the bulb didn't fix it, and the lamp was broken or failing in some other way, it still doesn't change my assessment of their debugging/testing process. The fact that it took them that long to even think of what should have been one of the first things they tried (change the bulb, make sure the switch is on, make sure it's plugged in) tells me all I need to know.

Your analogies aren't helpful. Everyone understands your point - that you think the solution Xykon arrived at after six months was one that should have been something obvious he should have tried nearly immediately, and therefore you think it doesn't follow from him taking six months that the problem was difficult. People just disagree with you that the possible solution to Dorukan's seal should have been obvious from the start. So making more analogies that presuppose that it is obvious isn't helping people understand your point. Instead you need to go to the source of the disagreement - whether the solution was obvious or not.

[brian 333]

Xykon made an error of logic: he presumed that there was a way to bypass the sigil on the gate.

The talisman was supposed to be accessible. The condition required to access it required three Good beings to each touch a sigil in separate parts of the dungeon simultaneously. He even had three such Good beings on staff and available to do so if he needed them.

Here's the logical error: there was no need for anyone to ever open one of the five seals which keep the world from tearing apart and unleashing a gods-eating abomination.

Why would any condition unlock that particular lock? The sigils are obviously custom spells. The creator could decide how they were intended to work, including any conditions required to bypass them. So, what if he chose 'None'?

Elan touching the sigil may have had no different outcome than that of the many goblins who did so. I'm not saying that it is so; I'm showing how logical errors lead to more logical errors.

Example: fur seals and penguins sometimes share beaches during breeding season. Therefore, seals do not eat penguins.

[Precure]

Yeah, I alwayys supported that Xykon's theory doesn't make any sense.