OOTS #1303 - The Discussion Thread

[The Giant]

New comic is up.

[Doug Lampert]

One of the more annoying "features" of D&D's "Only magic can counter magic" is all the magic counter's and counter-counters it tends to involve at high level if anyone takes it seriously.

I've commented before that in high level 3.x play, parties in my games tended to fill MOST of their level 4 slots with dimensional anchor, because so much of the MM at higher level had teleport or ethrealness at will or could cast spells of that level and I was willing to have foes maneuver or flee.

[Shining Wrath]

Calder has realized that he's not going to win this fight, but in draconic fashion, he's framing fleeing in terror as mere prudence.

And Roy is right, there's no sense in finding out the hard way that Calder can do something that Serini didn't expect.

Now, is this foreshadowing that Xykon will be able to evade the teleport counters? If so, wouldn't we have seen it already?

But maybe it won't be Xykon who can teleport through Serini's dungeon. Maybe it will be MitD ... who has powers we wot not, and which also he fails to wot.

Having both wings bitten at the same time probably does keep Calder on the ground where the entire Order can pound on him. I expect Paladin reinforcements in a strip or three. Also, that's gotta hurt.

[Kaed]

That last panel is starting to resemble a game between two kids on the playground who both refuse to admit defeat and make up new powers as they go.

And hey, surrender is always an option if Calder wants to live. At least some of the party would stop fighting if he did. Not necessarily because of any inherent honor, but because they are about to fight an epic lich.

Belkar, though...

[goldenPony]

OMG OMG I just had to say all these bits have been some of the most epic comic panels ever (like, in the history of comics or the internet in general) XD

[KorvinStarmast]

Love the last panel: it sums up some of the quirks of the D&D game.

Love Roy's use of spell splinter maneuver! Go Go Grandpa power! :smallbiggrin:.

Nice tactics by Belkar! (Wait, he's acting like a ranger ... we are doomed (https://www.giantitp.com/comics/oots0922.html)! :smalleek: :roy:)

[Shining Wrath]

One of the more annoying "features" of D&D's "Only magic can counter magic" is all the magic counter's and counter-counters it tends to involve at high level if anyone takes it seriously.

I've commented before that in high level 3.x play, parties in my games tended to fill MOST of their level 4 slots with dimensional anchor, because so much of the MM at higher level had teleport or ethrealness at will or could cast spells of that level and I was willing to have foes maneuver or flee.

I do like options (Mage Slayer and the like) which allow a barbarian to counter a spell by punching the wizard in the face. Possibly punching with a greataxe.

[Tundar]

And we are back to old D&D jokes. Love it!!!

[Peelee]

Ah, I see all thr effects budget went to the final panel here.
Calder has realized that he's not going to win this fight, but in draconic fashion, he's framing fleeing in terror as mere prudence.
I don't see "fleeing in terror". If he can't win, retreat is a viable and reasonable solution.

[Quild]

Me: Wait, if Calder escapes they're safe and don't waste anymore ressources. Why do they want to prevent that?
Also me: Oh right, heroes.

[Tarthalion]

I, as a reader, would be disappointed if Calder just up and fled. As a hero, it might be prudent to let him go - if you don't mind missing out in the XP - until they come back for revenge at an even more inopportune moment.

[Lord Torath]

Well, Calder's also expressed an interest in reestablishing his mind control cult, so that's another reason to shut him down hard, here.

Thanks, Rich!

[Psyren]

Uh oh, his hatred has upgraded to all halflings. Watch out Belkar!


That last panel is starting to resemble a game between two kids on the playground who both refuse to admit defeat and make up new powers as they go.

Also known as "game designers" :smallbiggrin:


One of the more annoying "features" of D&D's "Only magic can counter magic" is all the magic counter's and counter-counters it tends to involve at high level if anyone takes it seriously.

And yet, in this very comic we see a martial that can counter just about anything he can cast :smalltongue:

[Coppercloud]

I really like the flame effect around Calder's eye and claws. And as always, thank you immensely, Giant.

[Sir_Norbert]

Nice. I laughed at the last panel.

[Reboot]

One of the more annoying "features" of D&D's "Only magic can counter magic" is all the magic counter's and counter-counters it tends to involve at high level if anyone takes it seriously..

Well, you know the wisdom of Uncle. Magic Must Defeat Magic.

[lipe44]

Ah yes the magic counter counter counter counter until one side gives up. Wise indeed Roy.

Thanks for the strip!

[Lheticus]

Roy should get a bonk on HER for that one. (It was a really good point.)

[Crusher]

That last panel was some excellent 3.5e magic shenanigans.

Fat lady's warming up her voice for Calder, and he knows it. It takes a LOT of damage to put down a red dragon his size (Very Old, perhaps?) but he is just covered in wounds at this point. He's probably still going to do some damage on the way out, though.

[SlashDash]

One of the more annoying "features" of D&D's "Only magic can counter magic" is all the magic counter's and counter-counters it tends to involve at high level if anyone takes it seriously.

Uncle would have a word with you

https://encrypted-tbn0.gstatic.com/images?q=tbn:ANd9GcQatcbn6RmAQZKN6tc1W857incityFxE iECog&s

[Tzardok]

I, as a reader, would be disappointed if Calder just up and fled. As a hero, it might be prudent to let him go - if you don't mind missing out in the XP - until they come back for revenge at an even more inopportune moment.

You get XP for overcoming obstacles, not just for killing them.

[SlashDash]

Interesting things here :

1) Serini says the place is warded from teleporting but she's obviously wrong since they came here through a portal here. Roy was right about having backdoors.

2) I'm wondering if Roy's spell splinter feat is limited in uses per day? And will this come to play later

3) Still no word from Sunny or the paladins.

4) Calder is ready to make a run for it. I'll repeat what I said from the start of this arc - Calder try to escape in a way that blows a hole through this place which let's team evil come straight to the prize.

My guess is that he'll run into the threats of creation we saw earlier and we'll find out why they warned Serini not to go near them.

[enq]

Are the two casters in the final panel supposed to resemble anyone?

[Peelee]

Are the two casters in the final panel supposed to resemble anyone?

I'd say they're supposed to resemble powerful mages. :smalltongue:

[Tundar]

Are the two casters in the final panel supposed to resemble anyone?

Not as far as I know, but I see it as an ancient D&D joke about debuffs and protections from 'insert your choice here'. It's mainly a DM thing to overcome way too creative (or annoying) players.

[Kantaki]

Well, you know the wisdom of Uncle. Magic Must Defeat Magic.

Which is why Roy's hitting the big lizard before he can cast.

[Elanasaurus]

Interesting things here :

1) Serini says the place is warded from teleporting but she's obviously wrong since they came here through a portal here. Roy was right about having backdoors. Observant of you to note that while she says that the whole dungeon prevents teleportation, she might actually be implicitly excluding the area that's obviously designed for teleportation

[Busymm]

Wow here's the whole evil monologue thing coming to bite you in the tushy thing happening again. If he had just up and did the greater teleport spell the chances of it being fizzled would have been less since the heroes would have not been clued into watch out for it. But then he would have looked like a true coward in his own eyes

[Frogwarrior]

That last panel is starting to resemble a game between two kids on the playground who both refuse to admit defeat and make up new powers as they go.

Most definitely.
My brothers and I did this as kids.

"No, I don't want to do that, period!"
"Backspace."

The next time:
"No, I won't, period, print!"
"I tear up the paper."

And the final evolution,
"No, period, print, make invincible!"

Like the Standard Array of Defensive Buffs, this complex just sort of became a part of everyday conversation.

[Xel]

Me: Wait, if Calder escapes they're safe and don't waste anymore ressources. Why do they want to prevent that?
Also me: Oh right, heroes.

Definitely my first thought. And the second as well. Calder isn’t the main villain. And Roy was just talking about conserving resources. They’ve got a Calder on the ropes; if they let him go _and_ beat Team Evil, _and_ save the world (role play xp) there’s every reason to believe they could come at Calder stronger and more prepared later. Seems like a good option to take.

[DaOldeWolf]

Are all the things in last panel for real? Like who needs that much defensive measures? Who would ever design stuff like that?

[Quizatzhaderac]

I notice Roy is basically doing a physical version of this. Spellsplitter counters defensive casting, which counters, AoO, which counters regular spells.

I've heard that supposedly the Baldur's Gate 3 devs didn't put dispelling in game because it would have doubled the game's dev complexity.

I don't see "fleeing in terror". If he can't win, retreat is a viable and reasonable solution.That's what the dinosaurs said about the meteor, but I notice they evolved into chickens.

Uncle would have a word with youI seem to recall from that show that magic was defeated by a blend of 60% kung fu, 25% magic, and 15% plucky kid sidekick.

[Wintermoot]

Definitely my first thought. And the second as well. Calder isn’t the main villain. And Roy was just talking about conserving resources. They’ve got a Calder on the ropes; if they let him go _and_ beat Team Evil, _and_ save the world (role play xp) there’s every reason to believe they could come at Calder stronger and more prepared later. Seems like a good option to take.

"Okay gang, the world is safe, the gates are fixed, Xykon is dead. Now we got loose ends to clear up. Let's start with Calder. What has he been up to since we let him go?"

"Let's see... Oh... He's... He's wiped out three hundred halfling communities, killing about 50K halflings. And the ones he hasn't killed, he's mind controlled into a new cult."

"oh."

[enq]

Definitely my first thought. And the second as well. Calder isn’t the main villain. And Roy was just talking about conserving resources. They’ve got a Calder on the ropes; if they let him go _and_ beat Team Evil, _and_ save the world (role play xp) there’s every reason to believe they could come at Calder stronger and more prepared later. Seems like a good option to take.

Good point, but I suppose that's a fairly Neutral way of looking at the situation. Calder is intent on causing great, great harm. I don't think Roy can in good conscience allow him to leave.

[Psyren]

I seem to recall from that show that magic was defeated by a blend of 60% kung fu, 25% magic, and 15% plucky kid sidekick.

Given that the kung fu users and the plucky kid were all running around with artifacts, I'd say it was more than 25% magic.



2) I'm wondering if Roy's spell splinter feat is limited in uses per day? And will this come to play later

He can do at least 4 (https://www.giantitp.com/comics/oots0886.html) in a single fight, and it certainly didn't seem like he was worried about running out of steam.



Still no word from Sunny or the paladins.
...
Calder is ready to make a run for it. I'll repeat what I said from the start of this arc - Calder try to escape in a way that blows a hole through this place which let's team evil come straight to the prize.

My guess is that he'll run into the threats of creation we saw earlier and we'll find out why they warned Serini not to go near them.

This is an enticing thought. In fact, we might be able to tie up both loose ends.

Calder attempts to flee and touches the threads, but instead of vaporizing him, he becomes more powerful and the Order starts losing. Sunny and the Paladins then help save the day.

[Jay R]

That last panel is starting to resemble a game between two kids on the playground who both refuse to admit defeat and make up new powers as they go.

Hey! You really get D&D!


Me: Wait, if Calder escapes they're safe and don't waste anymore ressources. Why do they want to prevent that?
Also me: Oh right, heroes.

Because he would show up again and attack in the middle of their fight with Xykon, as soon as Probability once again shows its willingness to sneak into a dark alley and service Drama as would a copper-piece harlot.


And yet, in this very comic we see a martial that can counter just about anything he can cast :smalltongue:

... using a Feat that does not exist in the actual game.


You get XP for overcoming obstacles, not just for killing them.

Yup. If Calder escapes now, he gets full XP for getting past the party.


"Okay gang, the world is safe, the gates are fixed, Xykon is dead. Now we got loose ends to clear up. Let's start with Calder. What has he been up to since we let him go?"

"Let's see... Oh... He's... He's wiped out three hundred halfling communities, killing about 50K halflings. And the ones he hasn't killed, he's mind controlled into a new cult."

"oh."

"Oh no! And we could have stopped him if we hadn't focused on our own mission."

"Well, yes, not saving the entire world would have stopped him, all right."

[GreatWyrmGold]

Well, you know the wisdom of Uncle. Magic Must Defeat Magic.
Which is all well and good if your party is all magicians. (And that one big guy.) It's a bit awkward when most of your enemies are magical (to some extent or another) and only half of your team can defeat magic.



Are all the things in last panel for real? Like who needs that much defensive measures? Who would ever design stuff like that?
First question:

Finger of death, death ward, and dispel magic are all reasonably common spells.
Dispelling buffer (https://www.d20srd.org/srd/psionic/powers/dispellingBuffer.htm) is a psionic power that makes it harder to dispel magic.
Buffer penetration (https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC8399039/) is not a thing, nor are any of the counter-counter-countermeasures after it.


Second question: They exist because a measure without a countermeasure can easily become OP, or at least indispensable. 3.5 already had a bunch of measures and countermeasures, and it mostly tweaked balance by adding new things in new sourcebooks rather than overhauling old ones by...rereleasing old books and asking people to buy the new versions? Not sure how that would work.

Anyways, the new countermeasures are just measures, and can end up in the same situation. Usually the cycle petered out around the counter-counter-countermeasure stage, but that's already pretty silly.

[Psyren]

... using a Feat that does not exist in the actual game.

Yes, in the actual game Xykon's Epic Spellcasting would absolutely steamroll the Order and the story would be over. Not to mention they wouldn't even have gotten that far since Durkon would have no way of thinking a vampire to death and therefore they'd have wiped 200 strips ago. Was there a point?

[Zhorn]

I do like options (Mage Slayer and the like) which allow a barbarian to counter a spell by punching the wizard in the face. Possibly punching with a greataxe.
Agreed. Tempted to houserule for my next campaign Mage Slayer triggers before the enemy spell is completed and triggers a concentration check for completing the casting.
Because I like how Roy does it in the comic, but can agree that being a 100% guarantee on a hit without a cost (comparatively counterspell is a minimum 3rd level spell) might be a bit cheap.

[b_jonas]

Hey, I know this one from Casey and Andy #209! (https://galactanet.com/comic/view.php?strip=209)

> Casey: All done!
> Quantum Cop: Good work.
> Milligan: All done.
> Quantum Crook: Excellent.
> Quantum Cop: This quantum vector collector will tell us exactly where Quantum Crook is.
> Quantum Crook: This quantum vector collector inspector will tell us when my opposite tries to find us.
> Quantum Cop: To avoid being snooped, I had you add in a quantum vector collecter inspector detector.
> Quantum Crook: Naturally, we needed to add that quantum vector collector inspector detector deflector to bypass any security the device may have.
> Quantum Cop: And, just to account for an unlikely possibility, I appreciate that you put in the quantum vector collector inspector detector deflector reflector.
> Quantum Crook [facing away from the camera]: If he has a “reflector” of some kind, I'm sure our a death ray will lock on to it's most crucial component: the quantum vector collector inspector detector deflector reflector projector.
> Quantum Cop: … So I'm sure you now see the need for our quantum vector collector inspector detector deflector reflector projector protector.
> Quantum Crook: … And so, as a final flourish, we added in the quantum vector collector inspector detector deflector reflector projector connecter ejector!
> SFX [electric component pops out through a new hole near the bottom of C&A's machine]: POINK!!
> Quantum Cop: So, let's begin.
> Quantum Cop: Excellent. He's in Mt. Fuji and doesn't know we're coming.
> Quantum Crook: Excellent. He knows where we are, and thinks we don't know he's coming.

[Barlion]

I, as a reader, would be disappointed if Calder just up and fled. As a hero, it might be prudent to let him go - if you don't mind missing out in the XP - until they come back for revenge at an even more inopportune moment.

Imagine if killing the dragon leaves them at the edge of gaining a level. Then, during the fight with Xykon, just when it seems they will lose, Belkar accidentally steps on a coachroach and level up.

[Kardwill]

Definitely my first thought. And the second as well. Calder isn’t the main villain. And Roy was just talking about conserving resources. They’ve got a Calder on the ropes; if they let him go _and_ beat Team Evil, _and_ save the world (role play xp) there’s every reason to believe they could come at Calder stronger and more prepared later. Seems like a good option to take.

Calder could damage the dungeon on his way out
Calder could give information to X and RC about the dungeon, Serini and the party
Calder could prey on the innocent, or attack the Mechane
Calder could attack the paladins and Sunny outside this room
Calder could come back earlier than anticipated, and attack when HE is in position of force and more prepared

Right now, Calder is losing. Even putting aside the suffering he will inflict upon the world, finishing him up now sounds like a safer option than having a 5 tons, firepreathing, angry wildcard roaming the dungeon you're trying to defend against a powerful lich.

[Shining Wrath]

Yes, in the actual game Xykon's Epic Spellcasting would absolutely steamroll the Order and the story would be over. Not to mention they wouldn't even have gotten that far since Durkon would have no way of thinking a vampire to death and therefore they'd have wiped 200 strips ago. Was there a point?

A major subplot of the story is Roy proving to his father that a Fighter is a worthwhile choice, that being a wizard is not the only path to power - and doing it by fulfilling his father's Blood Oath. That's what set Roy after Xykon in the first place, before we learned that protecting the Gates was tied to the continued existence of the world. The Giant is taking some liberties with D&D rules to make that story compelling.

Remember, Fighter is a Tier 4 class, Wizard is Tier 1. Fortunately for the Order, Sorcerer is merely Tier 2.

[b_jonas]

Because I like how Roy does it in the comic, but can agree that being a 100% guarantee on a hit without a cost (comparatively counterspell is a minimum 3rd level spell) might be a bit cheap. Zhorn: I think the caster gets the concentration check in OotS too. See #1006 6th to 8th: Roy definitely hits Greg, but Greg can finish the spell.


Imagine if killing the dragon leaves them at the edge of gaining a level. Then, during the fight with Xykon, just when it seems they will lose, Belkar accidentally steps on a coachroach and level up. Barlion: Won't happen, see #439 last and #124 8th.

[DaOldeWolf]

First question:

Finger of death, death ward, and dispel magic are all reasonably common spells.
Dispelling buffer (https://www.d20srd.org/srd/psionic/powers/dispellingBuffer.htm) is a psionic power that makes it harder to dispel magic.
Buffer penetration (https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC8399039/) is not a thing, nor are any of the counter-counter-countermeasures after it.


Second question: They exist because a measure without a countermeasure can easily become OP, or at least indispensable. 3.5 already had a bunch of measures and countermeasures, and it mostly tweaked balance by adding new things in new sourcebooks rather than overhauling old ones by...rereleasing old books and asking people to buy the new versions? Not sure how that would work.

Anyways, the new countermeasures are just measures, and can end up in the same situation. Usually the cycle petered out around the counter-counter-countermeasure stage, but that's already pretty silly.

Thanks! It can be hard a few times to know when its something in the game and when its just a joke.

I am a bit surprised there was more than a couple of countermeasures.

[drazen]

So how many spells does Calder get, anyway? I recall someone saying Polar Ray was fairly high level.

Second question, why isn't he using them... way more?

(I am not even remotely familiar enough with d&d rules to know either... most of what I know about them is from the strip or the forum strip threads and I am sure I miss a lot)

[Tzardok]

Second question, why isn't he using them... way more?


Two reasons: for one, most of his arsenal are presumably mind control spells, and he has been successfully bluffed into believing that his opponents are protected from those.
For another, every time he's casting, he's not breathing fire or unleashing six physical attacks on those around him (claw, claw, bite, wing slap, wing slap, tail slap).

[Fish]

It takes a LOT of damage to put down a red dragon his size (Very Old, perhaps?) but he is just covered in wounds at this point. He's probably still going to do some damage on the way out, though.
Best guess: Calder has enough hit points remaining for Lien and O-Chul’s appearance to make a difference in dramatic stakes.

I mean, what’s the point of holding back the two paladins from the Calder fight if they have no effect on it?

A) withholding Lien and O-Chul now means the Order depletes its resources
B) withholding Lien and O-Chul now means they are fresh for the fight against something else
C) introducing them late to the fight gives the Order a second wind without undermining how the story is about our heroes

I figure it’ll be:

Calder: You fools! You cannot ideate the devastation I shall wreak! I will—
O-Chul: Hello again, Calder.
Calder: …oh.

[enq]

For another, every time he's casting, he's not breathing fire or unleashing six physical attacks on those around him (claw, claw, bite, wing slap, wing slap, tail slap).

Four now, no? ;)

[gatemansgc]

OMG OMG I just had to say all these bits have been some of the most epic comic panels ever (like, in the history of comics or the internet in general) XD

yeah they've been freaking GREAT

[Psyren]

A major subplot of the story is Roy proving to his father that a Fighter is a worthwhile choice, that being a wizard is not the only path to power - and doing it by fulfilling his father's Blood Oath. That's what set Roy after Xykon in the first place, before we learned that protecting the Gates was tied to the continued existence of the world. The Giant is taking some liberties with D&D rules to make that story compelling.

Yes, and my point is there's nothing wrong with that. If the story strictly followed RAW it would be way, way worse.

My further point is that you can add a useful martial technique to the story that, while it does not exist in the game that went out of print 15 years ago, is still both credible and non-magical.

[Naysmith]

Calder has realized that he's not going to win this fight, but in draconic fashion, he's framing fleeing in terror as mere prudence.
Agreed, 100%

I don't see "fleeing in terror". If he can't win, retreat is a viable and reasonable solution.
I do. Dragons have enough Wis and Cha to keep their composure in the face of fear and pass their retreat off as a tactical withdrawal. Remember, he had a cult and said he was going to take vengeance on ALL halflings as well. He's basically a bully, trying to dominate everyone around him and fleeing when people can stand up to him. He's practically the archetype of a high-level bully.

[Reboot]

Which is all well and good if your party is all magicians. (And that one big guy.) It's a bit awkward when most of your enemies are magical (to some extent or another) and only half of your team can defeat magic.

As if it was the casters' fault the others chose a class not capable of doing everything (https://www.giantitp.com/comics/oots0764.html) :p

[Also, Roy has an increasingly-magic sword with various magic powers, Haley has a bag'o'holdingful of wands, and Belkar should by rights be a caster if he had a wisdom score greater than the average lemming's. And all three use various and sundry magic items and buffs.

[Askthepizzaguy]

This reminds me of negating spells with an antimagic field and then using mage's disjunction to shatter the antimagic field... with magic.

Which we saw with V versus the black dragon.

Having Roy inflict damage while also acting as a martial with Counterspell is a wise move. Now the dragon is taking actions which have no effect instead of damaging the party.

[arimareiji]

Best guess: Calder has enough hit points remaining for Lien and O-Chul’s appearance to make a difference in dramatic stakes.

I mean, what’s the point of holding back the two paladins from the Calder fight if they have no effect on it?

A) withholding Lien and O-Chul now means the Order depletes its resources
B) withholding Lien and O-Chul now means they are fresh for the fight against something else
C) introducing them late to the fight gives the Order a second wind without undermining how the story is about our heroes

I figure it’ll be:

Calder: You fools! You cannot ideate the devastation I shall wreak! I will—
O-Chul: Hello again, Calder.
Calder: …oh.

Sign me up for this hypothesis. If they're present through the whole fight, it invites readers to wonder why they don't wind up crispy with X's for eyes. But if they heal Sunny and end up back just in time to deliver the deathblow, it ties up several dramatic loose ends at once. (They recognize Sunny as a good person worth healing, show Serini paladins aren't all Lawful Stupid wrt Calder, get a moment of awesome, gain a couple of levels to make them more credible against Xykon, etc.)

[Jay R]

Yes, in the actual game Xykon's Epic Spellcasting would absolutely steamroll the Order and the story would be over. Not to mention they wouldn't even have gotten that far since Durkon would have no way of thinking a vampire to death and therefore they'd have wiped 200 strips ago. Was there a point?

Yes, of course there was a point. You appeared to be denying Doug Lampert's position that "Only magic can counter magic" was a feature of D&D, using that strip as evidence to the contrary. I pointed out that the strip is not evidence about D&D, since that Feat doesn't exist in D&D.

[elecampane]

One of the more annoying "features" of D&D's "Only magic can counter magic" is all the magic counter's and counter-counters it tends to involve at high level if anyone takes it seriously.

I've commented before that in high level 3.x play, parties in my games tended to fill MOST of their level 4 slots with dimensional anchor, because so much of the MM at higher level had teleport or ethrealness at will or could cast spells of that level and I was willing to have foes maneuver or flee.
You can always ready an action to shoot at/hit the caster as soon as they start casting, thus (potentially) disrupting their concentration and with it the spell. Grappling is also pretty effective to prevent casting spells with somatic components. Magical effects that are already ongoing are however indeed extremely difficult to rid of without using other magic (or magic items)


Wow here's the whole evil monologue thing coming to bite you in the tushy thing happening again. If he had just up and did the greater teleport spell the chances of it being fizzled would have been less since the heroes would have not been clued into watch out for it. But then he would have looked like a true coward in his own eyes
Pretty sure the attempted casting of teleport would've triggered the attack of opportunity from the spellsplinter maneuver regardless of whether Calder announced it beforehand or not. Its not like Roy'd rushed to be in melee with Calder to make this attack possible



... using a Feat that does not exist in the actual game.

I mean, under the name of Mage Slayer feat from the complete arcane, but it totally exists in the actual game

[Darkever]

Does anyone else expect the two paladins to arrive and give Calder a chance to surrender, like he did many years before when he faced The Order of the Scribble.
Except this time I totally expect Vaarsuvius to disintegrate him on the spot. He has a thing of doing that with dragons 😏

[Heroic Lich]

Zhorn: I think the caster gets the concentration check in OotS too. See #1006 6th to 8th: Roy definitely hits Greg, but Greg can finish the spell.

This has been argued repeatedly but Spellsplinter has a VERY specific design. When Roy attacked Nokrud there, he didn't even try to hit the hands, where he was aiming the other three(?) times. It seems like Roy either got a regular AOO triggered because Durkan't wasn't casting defensively to flex his MASSIVE concentration check/damage reduction or Roy had a readied action and had already used his reaction for something else.
That or the story was served better by Roy getting blasted by Harm. Which is the main assumption in things like this.

[Psychronia]

Yeah, good call on Roy's part to leave nothing up to chance. Spellsplinter seems to be a mostly free move, action economy aside.

It is nice that Roy's secret technique learned from an afterlife martial sage is being put to use so much. I was kinda worried that it would end up underutilized after Draketooth's illusion trap since the narrative writing on the wall was that it wouldn't work on Xykon proper. Instead, it's turned Roy into a veritable menace against all casters within range, even they're "still a dragon".

It might have been more prudent to conserve what resources they could by letting him go instead of finish this fight, but that little bit of difference probably isn't worth allowing what will almost certainly be large-scale death among the Halfling communities.
Here's hoping they can squeeze a long rest in before the final confrontation though.



That's what the dinosaurs said about the meteor, but I notice they evolved into chickens.

I don't know when or how, but I gotta figure out a way to start using this.

[gbaji]

Hah. I love how the haflings are now Calder's focused enemy. Serini for obvious reasons, but Belkar seems to have now "made the list".

I was a little concerned last strip that Bloodfeast was getting pretty torn up. Minrah's heal was nice, but clearly not keeping up at all with the damage he was taking. But now, it looks like he's in a very good position. On Calder's backside with his jaws around his wings means that Calder can really only effectively attack Bloodfeast with his bite/breath and maybe tail (maybe not even that though).

I think this is the beginning of the end for Calder. I also agree that the Paladins may be returning very soon. And while I suspect Calder might try to use the "surrender to a paladin" bit to escape death, I'm kinda expecting a trope aversive response like "we're not actually required to accept a surrender from unrepentant evil doers like you" (after perhaps a bit of back and forth with Sereni). Rich has played on the paladin tropes in the past, but seems to have specifically set up O-chul and Lien to not really be that at all (lawful smart. Well... smartish).

We'll see.



You get XP for overcoming obstacles, not just for killing them.

Was going to say that as well. Normally, the only advantage to actually killing an opponent rather than "overcoming" them is getting their loot. But this is a dragon with no handy horde nearby, so...

But yeah. There are other benefits to outright killing Calder right here and now if at all possible.


He can do at least 4 (https://www.giantitp.com/comics/oots0886.html) in a single fight, and it certainly didn't seem like he was worried about running out of steam.

Except that was an epic illusion that was specifically giving them their fantasy outcome. While I'm sure Roy's spellsplinter move will be significant in the battle with Xykon, I'm not sure it'll be that full on overwhelmingly effective.



Calder attempts to flee and touches the threads, but instead of vaporizing him, he becomes more powerful and the Order starts losing. Sunny and the Paladins then help save the day.

Honestly? Kinda hope not. I'm not adverse to the threads of creation coming into play at some point, but that just seems a bit hamfisted to me. Also not sure how Calder could get to them before running into Sunny and the Paladins (they're literally in the room Calder has to go through). Also not sure how to make "becomes more powerful, but Sunny and the paladins are able to make up for that" really work. Dragons are already a slog fight (high AC, high spell resistances, high HPs, lots of attacks, potential magic/spell abilities, etc). Dragon fights tend to be either "you just can't hit/hurt it and you die" or "you can hit/hurt it, but still have to survive long enough to deplete its HPs or die". Anything that would make Calder tougher for Roy, Haley, and Belkar to damage, would do the same to the paladins are well, so the best this could do is create a second slog fest on top of the one we already did. Narratively, you're just dragging the audience though the same thing again, and you gain nothing that you don't gain by just having Sunny and the paladins show up right here rather than at a second location.


Well, except maybe seeing what the threads do. But I suspect there are better narrative spots to explore that.

[KorvinStarmast]

Well, Calder's also expressed an interest in reestablishing his mind control cult, so that's another reason to shut him down hard, here. Fair point.

Who would ever design stuff like that? A company that makes a card game called Magic: the Gathering. Some cards counter other cards.
(But as others have pointed out, counters have been in the D&D game for a while...)

Calder: You fools! You cannot ideate the devastation I shall wreak! I will—
O-Chul: Hello again, Calder.
Calder: …oh. When did O-Chul meet Calder before? Calder met Soon before this. :smallwink:

[DougTheHead]

I feel like it might be better to give Calder the Empire of Blood treatment? Let him go and mop him up after the fabric of existence no longer requires them to retain as many spells and feats as possible for a conflict likely to happen within the next 24 hours? They could all actually have Mind Blank cast on them during their next encounter too, rather than having to bluff him into thinking they do.

Speaking of bluffs, maybe have Haley yell, "The Empire of Blood will get you, Calder!" as he's on his way out, see if you can get two birds to kill each other without throwing even one stone.


That last panel is starting to resemble a game between two kids on the playground who both refuse to admit defeat and make up new powers as they go.

I'm going to tactfully avoid making any statements about average D&D players (even if a similar comparison was the genesis for the name of this website).

[Heroic Lich]

I feel like it might be better to give Calder the Empire of Blood treatment? Let him go and mop him up after the fabric of existence no longer requires them to retain as many spells and feats as possible for a conflict likely to happen within the next 24 hours

Unfortunately, I don't think of any way that would be feasible. Calder is just too much of a wild card to let him run around loose.
If he activates any traps, that's one more trap that Xykon doesn't have to deal with.
If Calder teleports out, he could run into Team Evil, giving them information about the Order and Serini.
If Calder just decides to stick around and attack them later in the dungeon, then the Order won't have the element of surprise.
Besides, the Order is conserving resources. Durkon, Minrah and V are only casting spells when they absolutely have to. Durkon and Minrah already acknowledged that they have to rest sometime soon to recover spells, best at the Gate, and V still has quite a few high level spells to rub together if needed. The only people who are still really fighting is Roy, Belkar, Serini, and Haley, who's abilities aren't limited to the number of times they can be used. All the group is losing is HP and that can be recovered before the fight with enough warning.

[GreatWyrmGold]

Imagine if killing the dragon leaves them at the edge of gaining a level. Then, during the fight with Xykon, just when it seems they will lose, Belkar accidentally steps on a coachroach and level up.
According to the Class and Level Geekery thread (https://forums.giantitp.com/showthread.php?639009-Class-and-Level-Geekery-XIX-Nobody-Cares-about-that-Stuff-Anymore), Belkar is currently level 15. DMG table 2-6, Experience Point Awards (single monster), indicates that a 15th-level character should generally not receive XP rewards from monsters below CR 8. Also, I'm pretty sure the demon cockroaches would be considered part of the larger encounter, rather than a separate simultaneous encounter.

So this wouldn't be a joke about D&D rules, so much as a joke about the concept of experience points.



Best guess: Calder has enough hit points remaining for Lien and O-Chul’s appearance to make a difference in dramatic stakes.

I mean, what’s the point of holding back the two paladins from the Calder fight if they have no effect on it?

Point 1: It stresses the non-paladins' resources (spells, HP, etc) while leaving the paladins intact, which might be an important plot point later.

Point 2: Punchline for comic #1297, "Cold Open" (https://www.giantitp.com/comics/oots1297.html).



As if it was the casters' fault the others chose a class not capable of doing everything (https://www.giantitp.com/comics/oots0764.html) :p

[Also, Roy has an increasingly-magic sword with various magic powers, Haley has a bag'o'holdingful of wands, and Belkar should by rights be a caster if he had a wisdom score greater than the average lemming's. And all three use various and sundry magic items and buffs.
A +5 sword doesn't let you cast freedom of movement or dispel debuffs. The kinds of equipment most non-casters are encouraged to buy boosts their numbers for nonmagical tasks without giving them the tools to handle nonmagical ones.
Also, a ranger's mighty 4th-level spells aren't much compared to V's 8th-level ones.

To be clear, I'm criticizing the specific confluence of "Magic must defeat magic" and game design where a significant fraction of the party has limited access to magic.



A company that makes a card game called Magic: the Gathering. Some cards counter other cards.
MtG handles counters differently. Its counters either take the form of general mechanics (instants and abilities that "counter" a spell being cast, spells that are immune to being countered, etc) or broad dynamics (red decks wrecking a blue player's life total before their game-winning combo is set up).

[Peelee]

Agreed, 100%

I do. Dragons have enough Wis and Cha to keep their composure in the face of fear and pass their retreat off as a tactical withdrawal. Remember, he had a cult and said he was going to take vengeance on ALL halflings as well. He's basically a bully, trying to dominate everyone around him and fleeing when people can stand up to him. He's practically the archetype of a high-level bully.

Sure, he's a bully. But you're saying he's terrified and saying that you can tell because he can hide his terror. That doesn't really work. It's like me saying that my neighbor is a Martian, and i can tell because Martians have the ability to look exactly like humans.

Sure, you can choose to believe he's terrified, but your reasoning for it isn't exactly persuasive.

[Naysmith]

Sure, he's a bully. But you're saying he's terrified and saying that you can tell because he can hide his terror. That doesn't really work. It's like me saying that my neighbor is a Martian, and i can tell because Martians have the ability to look exactly like humans.

Sure, you can choose to believe he's terrified, but your reasoning for it isn't exactly persuasive.
I was saying that he can keep his composure, not that he can hide it completely. His statements, demeanor, and past actions paint the picture of him being afraid.

[Peelee]

I was saying that he can keep his composure, not that he can hide it completely. His statements, demeanor, and past actions paint the picture of him being afraid.

I'd argue statements paint the picture of him realizing his ego has overtaken his other senses and that he is reigning in his pride in order to make better tactical decisions. I see what you mean now, but i still just don't see fear. At least, no more fear than anyone who is losing a battle and decides to retreat has regardless.

[Psyren]

I think this is the beginning of the end for Calder. I also agree that the Paladins may be returning very soon. And while I suspect Calder might try to use the "surrender to a paladin" bit to escape death, I'm kinda expecting a trope aversive response like "we're not actually required to accept a surrender from unrepentant evil doers like you" (after perhaps a bit of back and forth with Sereni). Rich has played on the paladin tropes in the past, but seems to have specifically set up O-chul and Lien to not really be that at all (lawful smart. Well... smartish).

We'll see.

If all the paladins manage to do in this fight is be less of a long-term liability than Soon was... that'll honestly be pretty disappointing, and about as strong an argument as I can think of for the 3.5e Paladin being jettisoned from the game.



Except that was an epic illusion that was specifically giving them their fantasy outcome. While I'm sure Roy's spellsplinter move will be significant in the battle with Xykon, I'm not sure it'll be that full on overwhelmingly effective.

Well hold on, leave those goalposts alone. The question was how many times can Roy use his technique. The whole point of the boss illusion is that it's supposed to feel real when you're inside it, so real that it took Elan's narrative mastery to break. If Roy's technique was supposed to be 1/encounter and he could suddenly spam it, that would be an instant clue that something was off, which would be a pretty glaring flaw in the illusion. Instead, being able to spam his technique 4 times back to back felt completely believable to him, therefore it's good evidence for us that he can use it that often in the real world too.



Honestly? Kinda hope not. I'm not adverse to the threads of creation coming into play at some point, but that just seems a bit hamfisted to me. Also not sure how Calder could get to them before running into Sunny and the Paladins (they're literally in the room Calder has to go through). Also not sure how to make "becomes more powerful, but Sunny and the paladins are able to make up for that" really work. Dragons are already a slog fight (high AC, high spell resistances, high HPs, lots of attacks, potential magic/spell abilities, etc). Dragon fights tend to be either "you just can't hit/hurt it and you die" or "you can hit/hurt it, but still have to survive long enough to deplete its HPs or die". Anything that would make Calder tougher for Roy, Haley, and Belkar to damage, would do the same to the paladins are well, so the best this could do is create a second slog fest on top of the one we already did. Narratively, you're just dragging the audience though the same thing again, and you gain nothing that you don't gain by just having Sunny and the paladins show up right here rather than at a second location.


Well, except maybe seeing what the threads do. But I suspect there are better narrative spots to explore that.

I'll be perfectly honest, I don't actually care whether the threads come into play here or not. What I care about are three things:

1) The battle should at some point go sour in such a way that the paladins and Sunny are needed
2) The fight with Calder should change the current status quo in some way (e.g. damaging the complex) rather than being a random boss fight.
3) Finding out what touching the threads does (does not have to happen as part of this encounter.)

While Calder getting a powerup from them does accomplish all three of these objectives, it's not the only way they can be achieved. So I'm not going to defend one off-the-cuff idea.

[Xel]

Good point, but I suppose that's a fairly Neutral way of looking at the situation. Calder is intent on causing great, great harm. I don't think Roy can in good conscience allow him to leave.

Two past behaviors from The Order that I think have bearing on the "good conscience" front:
1. Run Away has been a key strategy.
2. They didn't stop to take Tarquin down. Who was intent on causing great, great harm (from the Order's perspective, even if not from Tarquin's).

I don't think assessing risks and priorities and concluding that there's a more prudent path for moment is specific to any given alignment. Disclaimer: I do always seem to get the Neutral result on those on-line alignment quizzes, but I'll protest that the questions and answers available are almost always poor indicators.

I also think there's a lot of judgement needed in this decision, and there's not a clear best choice for Roy, at least given the information I've seen. So I won't judge it, even if I might choose differently in the situation.

[Xel]

Unfortunately, I don't think of any way that would be feasible. Calder is just too much of a wild card to let him run around loose.
If he activates any traps, that's one more trap that Xykon doesn't have to deal with.
If Calder teleports out, he could run into Team Evil, giving them information about the Order and Serini.
If Calder just decides to stick around and attack them later in the dungeon, then the Order won't have the element of surprise.
Besides, the Order is conserving resources. Durkon, Minrah and V are only casting spells when they absolutely have to. Durkon and Minrah already acknowledged that they have to rest sometime soon to recover spells, best at the Gate, and V still has quite a few high level spells to rub together if needed. The only people who are still really fighting is Roy, Belkar, Serini, and Haley, who's abilities aren't limited to the number of times they can be used. All the group is losing is HP and that can be recovered before the fight with enough warning.

Balancing those risks is that Calder has a decent chance of killing of one or more of the Order if they continue the fight (see Vaarsuvius in recent pages), even if he's unlikely to win. Possibly even permanently, given high-level spell casting abilities, but at least causing a loss of level even with a Resurrection. Even more likely if he's starting to focus on effectiveness of his tactics.

[Heroic Lich]

Balancing those risks is that Calder has a decent chance of killing of one or more of the Order if they continue the fight.

Perhaps but looking at Calder's situation it's not looking all that threatening. He might be minding his tactics more but... I don't see any actual tactics. With Protection from fire, V getting out of dodge, Roy making sure that spells can't get off, Haley convincing Calder that it would be a waste of time to dominate Haley or Serini and Bloodfeast tying up most of Calder's natural attacks it's really not much of a risk at this point. 86 him and move on.
Narratively, Calder's only going to serve one of two purposes at this point: Either he convinces Serini that the Order is cool (Notice how she called him Greenhilt instead of an insulting nickname) or the Paladins both refuse to accept Calder's surrender, convincing Serini that the Paladins are slightly less odious than she thought (A purpose admittedly already served by caring for Sunny). He could also escape and touch a thread to clear that up.

[Ghosty]

Ah, I see all thr effects budget went to the final panel here...

Isn't it a great refresh of the "Made My Saving Throw," strip? Lol.

I'm honestly surprised Bloodfeast is still around. The Order is doing very well. For now.

Still think we're going to get some sort of info about the Scribble, or something else Serini's hiding from everyone.

[b_jonas]

Heroic Lich: thank you, I hadn't known of those discussions about #1006.

[arimareiji]

Two past behaviors from The Order that I think have bearing on the "good conscience" front:
1. Run Away has been a key strategy.
2. They didn't stop to take Tarquin down. Who was intent on causing great, great harm (from the Order's perspective, even if not from Tarquin's).

I don't think assessing risks and priorities and concluding that there's a more prudent path for moment is specific to any given alignment. Disclaimer: I do always seem to get the Neutral result on those on-line alignment quizzes, but I'll protest that the questions and answers available are almost always poor indicators.

I also think there's a lot of judgement needed in this decision, and there's not a clear best choice for Roy, at least given the information I've seen. So I won't judge it, even if I might choose differently in the situation.

Counterpoint to #2: If they're doctors doing triage, Tarquin and his gang are metastasized cancer that's going to be really time-consuming trying to get rid of without doing a lot of harm (while Team Evil continues to race at top speed toward triggering a Reset). If they can whack Calder here, it's a very sensible use of time to do a quick emergency tracheotomy.

[Ruck]

Counterpoint to #2: If they're doctors doing triage, Tarquin and his gang are metastasized cancer that's going to be really time-consuming trying to get rid of without doing a lot of harm (while Team Evil continues to race at top speed toward triggering a Reset). If they can whack Calder here, it's a very sensible use of time to do a quick emergency tracheotomy.

And, I'll add, they've got Calder on the ropes (presumably, if he's concluded retreating is better), and he's already declared his intentions to rest up and build another cult to do more damage and kill more people. It's easier to just take him out now, which will both prevent that future harm and can be achieved relatively quickly as compared to taking down Tarquin's entire empire.

(And Elan did give Ian a plan for taking down Tarquin, so it's not like they didn't help. They just have more urgent priorities that keep them from being actively involved. Calder is more actively interfering with those priorities and leaving him alive could come back to hurt their goals later, even beyond the dragon's stated intentions.)

[Wraithfighter]

Counterpoint to #2: If they're doctors doing triage, Tarquin and his gang are metastasized cancer that's going to be really time-consuming trying to get rid of without doing a lot of harm (while Team Evil continues to race at top speed toward triggering a Reset). If they can whack Calder here, it's a very sensible use of time to do a quick emergency tracheotomy.

Well, as far as our heroes are concerned, Tarquin and company are.

I'm not counting them out of this story quite yet, though. Girard's Gate (or, rather, the hole in the fabric of the universe that's there) was last seen with seems like the Snarl's form slashing through. It wouldn't exactly shock me if, when what the deal with the world behind the rifts is finally unveiled, we find out that things have gone particularly pear-shaped for the Tarquin and his buddies' whole scheme, either because of the Snarl, the rebellion that Ian's guiding with Elan's plan, or a combination of the two...

[gatorized]

Now, is this foreshadowing that Xykon will be able to evade the teleport counters? If so, wouldn't we have seen it already?

Have we seen anyone land a dimensional anchor or other teleport-countering spell or effect on Xykon yet? Of course V attempted it, but it didn't land. I'm not aware of any point in the comic where he would have had cause to use such a spell. I can't see any reason why we would have seen it already. (edit) There is the teleport-impairing walls, naturally. However, I don't think Xykon has tried to teleport through them at any point. And teleport-counter-counters that work for spells may not necessarily work for the walls.


Me: Wait, if Calder escapes they're safe and don't waste anymore ressources. Why do they want to prevent that?
Also me: Oh right, heroes.

I'm not certain that "we just pissed off a dragon which is going to rest and recover spell slots, and possibly recruit allies and / or gather magic items and artifacts, and then come kick our ass shortly" qualifies as safe. (edit) And now that dragon has a great deal of knowledge about our capabilities and preferred tactics, and we have lost any sort of element of surprise we may have had. And it now has the opportunity to prepare the battlefield and an ambush. And it probably has divination spells or indirect access to them, so it may be able to predict where we'll be and when.


Are all the things in last panel for real? Like who needs that much defensive measures? Who would ever design stuff like that?

The 3.5 developers. Well, up to dispelling buffers, at least. So, the 3.5 developers and the people who edit dandwiki.



That's what the dinosaurs said about the meteor, but I notice they evolved into chickens.


Dinosaurs didn't have intelligence (at least, not in a sense that is relevant here), could not have known what a meteor was, and did not have any viable means of retreating from it or its effects in any case. If the dinosaurs were capable of constructing underground bunkers or some other way of retreating from an extinction level event, and had methods of detecting space objects, they certainly would have retreated. It's not analogous to the comic in any way.

RE : Calder, yes, he probably is afraid, because he's intelligent. Fear is a useful tactical tool. It tells us when it's a good time to retreat without requiring us to spend a lot of expensive and precious attention on conscious processes to determine that. There's no reward for being brave and dead. You're just dead. (edit) In the context of your personal goals on the material plane, that is. Obviously there's an afterlife in D&D. Given the great lengths many creatures go to, to avoid going there, I think it's safe to assume that many creatures still value their material goals in their physical lives regardless.

[Breccia]

That last panel has some "Trace Buster Buster" energy.

But what really got me was SNAP. That was just brutal.

[arimareiji]

I'm not certain that "we just pissed off a dragon which is going to rest and recover spell slots, and possibly recruit allies and / or gather magic items and artifacts, and then come kick our ass shortly" qualifies as safe.

V would definitely be in your corner on this one.

[OvisCaedo]

Some people are mentioning the conservation of party resources, but weren't they expecting to have time to fully rest at the end of things and then lie in wait? I could have sworn that, even with his increased speed, the estimate for Xykon clearing all of the doors was over a full day. The plan was to rest and heal up after finding the perfect spot to set up an ambush.

Ah, went and checked, I may have missed some other estimate, but Roy's guess was in the realm of 48 hours (https://www.giantitp.com/comics/oots1282.html) or so.

[Dummy]

Does anyone else expect the two paladins to arrive and give Calder a chance to surrender, like he did many years before when he faced The Order of the Scribble.
Except this time I totally expect Vaarsuvius to disintegrate him on the spot. He has a thing of doing that with dragons 😏

I'm fully prepared for the paladins to arrive, Calder to recognize them as paladins and try to surrender again just for someone to execute him and the paladins to not make a big deal about it, surprising Serini.

O'Chul: "We couldn't in good faith accept his surrender. We don't have the means to take care of a prisoner right now and besides, we weren't even the ones who was fighting."

Lien: "Besides, his scales weren't shiny."

[Kardwill]

I'm not certain that "we just pissed off a dragon which is going to rest and recover spell slots, and possibly recruit allies and / or gather magic items and artifacts, and then come kick our ass shortly" qualifies as safe. (edit) And now that dragon has a great deal of knowledge about our capabilities and preferred tactics, and we have lost any sort of element of surprise we may have had. And it now has the opportunity to prepare the battlefield and an ambush. And it probably has divination spells or indirect access to them, so it may be able to predict where we'll be and when.


"Oh, and since the dragon is trapped in the dungeon, his next attack will probably happen in the next 24 hours, while we are trying to protect the final room and its precious, fragile gate and actually have to conserve our ressources for Xykon that should arrive in the same time frame"

And that's not even taking into consideration what would happen if Calder met team evil. Xykon and Redcloak teaming up with a living, (fire)breathing, spellcasting, fully healed and rested dragon who had time to think about anti-order tactics, would be FAR more dangerous than Xykon reanimating a dragon-shaped lump of dead flesh.

[Fyraltari]

Pretty sure that guy at the end does not have a single offensive spell prepared.

[Unoriginal]

Some people are mentioning the conservation of party resources, but weren't they expecting to have time to fully rest at the end of things and then lie in wait? I could have sworn that, even with his increased speed, the estimate for Xykon clearing all of the doors was over a full day. The plan was to rest and heal up after finding the perfect spot to set up an ambush.

Ah, went and checked, I may have missed some other estimate, but Roy's guess was in the realm of 48 hours (https://www.giantitp.com/comics/oots1282.html) or so.

They should be able to regain any rest-regainable ressources, but things like potions and consumable items spent here do cost them something, still.

Plus Calder could do things like damage their equipment or inflict something that costs ressources to fix.

So yeah Calder is unlikely to cost them *much* ressources (unless he managed to kill someone or break their magic weapons), but just the potion(s?) Vaarsuvius drank is less ressources to face Xykon with.

[Shining Wrath]

I think Calder is showing as much fear as a dragon's ego will permit him to show. Things are not going well for him - he's covered in wounds and the party looks to be damaged (some wounds) but not critically so. And he's very intelligent and perceptive and knows these things.

Letting him flee would be stupid because he might give information to Team Evil - for example, how to get past the illusion traps. The Order needs time to rest after this fight, even if they are winning; anything that accelerates Xykon's arrival is Very Bad.

It's possible that the Paladins are off-stage for action economy; it's two fewer people for Rich to include in what have been fairly complicated pieces of art, to write dialogue for, et cetera. Yes, I can tell that not everyone shows up in every strip; point still stands. But I do expect them to show in time to help kill Calder.

[Sneaky 2.0]

I think Roy made the right move, stopping that teleport.

Calder might be able to teleport to somewhere within the dungeon, if not leave it entirely.

Might end up switching with a creature still trapped and free both?

[Green Sand Mage]

I think the reason Roy stopped Calder is simple.

Calder said he would take revenge on all halflings. Roy read LOTR in college, and he doesn't want to spend the second half of this final book rescuing the Shire from an evil, manipulative, B-list villain after they've already defeated the big baddie.

[KorvinStarmast]

But if they heal Sunny and end up back just in time to deliver the deathblow, it ties up several dramatic loose ends at once. (They recognize Sunny as a good person worth healing, show Serini paladins aren't all Lawful Stupid wrt Calder, get a moment of awesome, gain a couple of levels to make them more credible against Xykon, etc.) Not sure that a character can gain more than one level at a time based on D&D rules, which Rich uses to some extent. I recall the comment in Azure City regarding Belkar getting no XP for killing that small mountain of hobgoblins.
Caveat: if WotC changed that restriction (only gain one level at a time) in 3.5e, then NVM.

Disclaimer: I do always seem to get the Neutral result on those on-line alignment quizzes After four consecutive "Neutral Good" results I stopped taking them.

And, I'll add, they've got Calder on the ropes (presumably, if he's concluded retreating is better), and he's already declared his intentions to rest up and build another cult to do more damage and kill more people. It's easier to just take him out now, which will both prevent that future harm and can be achieved relatively quickly as compared to taking down Tarquin's entire empire.

(And Elan did give Ian a plan for taking down Tarquin, so it's not like they didn't help. They just have more urgent priorities that keep them from being actively involved. Calder is more actively interfering with those priorities and leaving him alive could come back to hurt their goals later, even beyond the dragon's stated intentions.) Concur on all points.

Xykon and Redcloak teaming up with a living, (fire)breathing, spellcasting, fully healed and rested dragon who had time to think about anti-order tactics, would be FAR more dangerous than Xykon reanimating a dragon-shaped lump of dead flesh. Yes. Need to remove this chess piece from the board.

[Raven777]

I've commented before that in high level 3.x play, parties in my games tended to fill MOST of their level 4 slots with dimensional anchor, because so much of the MM at higher level had teleport or ethrealness at will or could cast spells of that level and I was willing to have foes maneuver or flee.

That's because retreat is actually the most likely realistic option when it can be achieved. Most animals and most armies will not fight to the death if they can escape. That we so often do in games and video games is actually a departure from how most violent conflict turns out in reality.

In fact, I do think Roy prolonging the fight now that the dragon clearly wants to flee enters "now we're wasting ressources" territory. They've won. They'd be getting the Xp regardless at this point. It doesn't matter that Calder can exact revenge in a week, if they fail to protect the Gate today.

[Lord Torath]

That last panel has some "Trace Buster Buster" energy.

But what really got me was SNAP. That was just brutal extreme.Fixed that for ya! :smallwink:

"Extreminate him Bloodfeast!"

[H_H_F_F]

I disagree with a lot of the pro-fight arguments being thrown around here. Calder was casting greater teleport. He was not trying to reach back to the north pole, he was going home. The argument that letting him go would somehow help Xykon more than losing the resources necessary to keep fighting him seems very contrived to me. Tactically, I think they should've let him go.

And sure, that would be massively damaging to many people, and a significant long term risk for the Order - but Roy is usually depicted as more pragmatic than that. Nothing matters if they don't stop Xykon. Letting someone evil get away would've been impossible for a paladin, but Roy kept freaking Belkar around. He's used to tolerating evil for the greater good.

Very uncharacteristic strip, IMO.

[Precure]

Calder in the first strip reminds me this (https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=fUoMTC44OEQ)

I also agree that it was a stupid move to stop Calder from escaping away. I would expect Belkar to be bloodthirsty, but Roy seems out of character.

[Shining Wrath]

That's because retreat is actually the most likely realistic option when it can be achieved. Most animals and most armies will not fight to the death if they can escape. That we so often do in games and video games is actually a departure from how most violent conflict turns out in reality.

In fact, I do think Roy prolonging the fight now that the dragon clearly wants to flee enters "now we're wasting ressources" territory. They've won. They'd be getting the Xp regardless at this point. It doesn't matter that Calder can exact revenge in a week, if they fail to protect the Gate today.

Historically an important role for cavalry was to chase down and slaughter enemies who retreated in a disorganized way. If you want to retreat, you have to stick together and not panic. If you can't do that, standing and fighting might be smarter if there's any hope of victory, being offered quarter, or reinforcements. Calder was hoping to "retreat in good order" with Greater Teleport, but now has to fight his way out of the room.


I disagree with a lot of the pro-fight arguments being thrown around here. Calder was casting greater teleport. He was not trying to reach back to the north pole, he was going home. The argument that letting him go would somehow help Xykon more than losing the resources necessary to keep fighting him seems very contrived to me. Tactically, I think they should've let him go.

And sure, that would be massively damaging to many people, and a significant long term risk for the Order - but Roy is usually depicted as more pragmatic than that. Nothing matters if they don't stop Xykon. Letting someone evil get away would've been impossible for a paladin, but Roy kept freaking Belkar around. He's used to tolerating evil for the greater good.

Very uncharacteristic strip, IMO.

If Calder encounters Team Evil and, to the least imaginable degree, helps them reach the Gate sooner, that's a catastrophe. Roy does not know where Calder's home is, but it might very plausibly be near here, since otherwise how did the Scribblers get him into this dungeon?

[H_H_F_F]

If Calder encounters Team Evil and, to the least imaginable degree, helps them reach the Gate sooner, that's a catastrophe. Roy does not know where Calder's home is, but it might very plausibly be near here, since otherwise how did the Scribblers get him into this dungeon?

Calder is greater teleporting. He's getting away from the Final Dungeon (which we don't actually know the real location of, IIRC.)

Serini has filled every dungeon with monsters from all over the world, it's a real stretch to say they all came from the desolate tundra around Kraggor's Tomb. Especially given the fact that we've seen the background of Calder's old cult, and it wasn't snowy or northern-looking.

There is absolutely no reason to think that Calder, in trying to escape the dungeon, would teleport to the entrance complex, which is where Team Evil is currently spelunking, and spend most of their time inside the gauntlet.

On the other hand, if they fight him, they will 100% suffer damage that could tip the battle for the fate of the world.

That's what I mean when I say the argument seems contrived to me - even before we recognize that Team Evil has been meeting countless enemies (including dragons) in the gauntlet, and simply massacering or caging them without a second thought, which the Order know for a fact.

[Precure]

And I doubt Calder would be much help.

[Shining Wrath]

Calder is greater teleporting. He's getting away from the Final Dungeon (which we don't actually know the real location of, IIRC.)

Serini has filled every dungeon with monsters from all over the world, it's a real stretch to say they all came from the desolate tundra around Kraggor's Tomb. Especially given the fact that we've seen the background of Calder's old cult, and it wasn't snowy or northern-looking.

There is absolutely no reason to think that Calder, in trying to escape the dungeon, would teleport to the entrance complex, which is where Team Evil is currently spelunking, and spend most of their time inside the gauntlet.

On the other hand, if they fight him, they will 100% suffer damage that could tip the battle for the fate of the world.

That's what I mean when I say the argument seems contrived to me - even before we recognize that Team Evil has been meeting countless enemies (including dragons) in the gauntlet, and simply massacering or caging them without a second thought, which the Order know for a fact.

Well, lets look at the possible outcomes.

Greater Teleport fails. Result: still have to kill Calder.
Greater Teleport takes Calder far away and he never engages with Team Evil. Result: more evil in the world, but no further expenditure of resources.
Greater Teleport works and takes Calder some distance away. Calder, being hyper-intelligent, realizes that OotS has an enemy in the region of the dungeon, and decides to return and join them, or tell them what he knows. Result: catastrophic.
Greater Teleport works but Calder winds up near the dungeon (perhaps because of the anti-teleport stuff in the dungeon, or because that's where he wanted to go). Calder contacts Team Evil - joins or informs. Result: catastrophic.
Greater Teleport deposits Calder near the dungeon. Calder encounters Team Evil and a battle ensues. Result: Team Evil strengthen by a dragon zombie.



I tried to list these in order of probability. If you think the order is wrong, or that there are important cases not listed, that's OK. I still think the items at the bottom of the list are important enough to not let him escape. On NASA programs (and others), they do risk assessment with a nice matrix - rank probability from 1 (very unlikely) to 5 (probable), and also rank consequences from 1 (annoying) to 5 (catastrophic - loss of mission / people die). Items 3 and 4 are probability 1 or 2, consequence 5 sorts of things, while item #5 is a probability 1 or 2, consequence 3.
Let me assure you that NASA doesn't ignore low probability high consequence engineering problems.

[Frozenstep]

Caldur's in really, really bad shape. I agree not wasting resources is key, but at this point the order might be a turn or two from winning this battle by just attacking, and I doubt Caldur can do anything more then burn a little more hp off the order, especially if Roy can interrupt any further spell attempts (since Caldur is grounded and within range). HP damage can just be fixed with the stock of basic healing potions the order probably has (the ones from the Mechane, or the basic potion seller).

[Peelee]

Let me assure you that NASA doesn't ignore low probability high consequence engineering problems.

Devil's Advocate: I dunno, I remember Challenger.

[gatorized]

For all we know, calder is in league with Xykon and was going to teleport to his side. We just met this dragon a few comics ago, there is much we don't know. Sure, it seems to the reader that Xykon hasn't been in this part of the dungeon, and has never met calder elsewhere, but are you sure? How much would you bet on it? Dragons live a long time, and liches longer. We don't know everything about their pasts, and haven't seen everything they've done in the comic. By preventing him from leaving, he may effectively be denying a resource to Xykon, as well as splitting his party, so to speak (it's easier to defeat two enemies separately than at the same time).

Do I think this is really what's going on? I doubt it. Maybe 15% chance this is the case. But it occurred to me without much thought, and Roy is far smarter than me, so it may have occurred to him as well - and Roy is certainly the type to consider even remote possibilities, especially when the potential consequences for a mistake are infinitely bad for all living things.

[Edreyn]

There is also an option that Calder teleports away, then comes back with reinforcements. Like a few more dragons. Or frees more monstrosities from the dungeon - like this undescribable monster that we associate with MitD.

[arimareiji]

Show of hands: How many people think, even if Calder surrenders (despite extremely keen memories of how that turned out last time) and the paladins demand that he be allowed to surrender and Serini acquiesces -- or if he figures out a way past the herd of people surrounding him and actively trying to kill him...

that V would shrug and say "Yeah, let's let the dragon go. I mean, what's the worst that could happen?"

(Edit: If it's not obvious, I'm of the mind V would be more likely to say "Not if my index finger has anything to say about it. And, as it turned out, it had quite the stirring dissertation prepared on that very subject. ". (^_~) https://www.giantitp.com/comics/oots0596.html )

[Shining Wrath]

Devil's Advocate: I dunno, I remember Challenger.

And that's what happens when you "take off your engineer hat and put on your management hat".

The people I worked with on Orion remember that event; it's only 38 years ago, there's senior NASA people who were working for NASA when that happened - and a lot more that had it drilled into it.

I worked with a guy who was sitting at the thermal subsystem station at NASA Houston when Columbia broke up. He still remembers the loss of contact, watching for telemetry to return, and then a voice over the intercom saying "Everyone turn to page ###". So he flipped to that page, and it was titled something like "Preservation of Data in a Loss of Crew Event" and his stomach dropped into his shoes. I assure you they remember Challenger, and Columbia, and Apollo 1, every single day.

You really should meet someone from the NASA Crew Office sometime. They can be ... intense ... about the safety of the humans. And at least on Orion they swing a pretty big stick.

EDIT:

Orion has a Launch Abort System - a separate rocket atop the Crew Module that can pull the crew away from a malfunctioning launch vehicle. It's the ultimate E ticket ride - greater than 10 g's acceleration, which is pretty dangerous but not as dangerous as an exploding launcher.

[bunsen_h]

That last panel is starting to resemble a game between two kids on the playground who both refuse to admit defeat and make up new powers as they go.

In my local parlance (as of some decades ago): "Stamped it! No backsies! No erases!"


Well hold on, leave those goalposts alone. The question was how many times can Roy use his technique. The whole point of the boss illusion is that it's supposed to feel real when you're inside it, so real that it took Elan's narrative mastery to break. If Roy's technique was supposed to be 1/encounter and he could suddenly spam it, that would be an instant clue that something was off, which would be a pretty glaring flaw in the illusion. Instead, being able to spam his technique 4 times back to back felt completely believable to him, therefore it's good evidence for us that he can use it that often in the real world too.

Would Roy necessarily know how many times he was able to use the maneuver, prior to discovering the limit empirically?


O'Chul: "We couldn't in good faith accept his surrender. We don't have the means to take care of a prisoner right now and besides, we weren't even the ones who was fighting."

I'm not sure that the "we weren't even the ones" argument holds up, since they're all in the same party. But I can agree with the rest of it.


Devil's Advocate: I dunno, I remember Challenger.

The O-ring problem was completely unanticipated; it wasn't part of their risk assessment at all. As a general thing, space travel isn't risk-free. I'm not sure how the "casualties / person * distance travelled" compares with regular air travel, when one takes into account many orbits, and the values would depend a lot on which historical period was being considered.

I highly recommend Echo's Children's song Columbia (https://echoschildren.bandcamp.com/track/columbia).

[Peelee]

You really should meet someone from the NASA Crew Office sometime. They can be ... intense ... about the safety of the humans.
Fun fact! A few years ago, a friend invited me to use his spare ticket up at the USSRC in Huntsville for Ira Flatow's special on the 50th anniversary of the moon landing for his Science Friday show. At one point, he asked for anyone who worked on the Apollo program to raise their hand. Roughly 80-90% of the room raised their hand. Huntsville is fun, is what I'm saying here. :smallamused:

Anyway, my point was that sometimes even the best of us will ignore stuff.

EDIT:

Orion has a Launch Abort System - a separate rocket atop the Crew Module that can pull the crew away from a malfunctioning launch vehicle. It's the ultimate E ticket ride - greater than 10 g's acceleration, which is pretty dangerous but not as dangerous as an exploding launcher.
If it's not from the top region of the Saturn V then it's just sparkling ejection rockets. :smalltongue:


The O-ring problem was completely unanticipated;

I thought about using that Thor "was it, though" image, but a link is probably better (https://lettersofnote.com/2009/10/27/the-result-would-be-a-catastrophe/).

[Tzardok]

Would Roy necessarily know how many times he was able to use the maneuver, prior to discovering the limit empirically?


Of course he would. These people can look at their char sheets, one should expect that they know what their stuff does.

[Doug Lampert]

I've commented before that in high level 3.x play, parties in my games tended to fill MOST of their level 4 slots with dimensional anchor, because so much of the MM at higher level had teleport or ethrealness at will or could cast spells of that level and I was willing to have foes maneuver or flee.
That's because retreat is actually the most likely realistic option when it can be achieved. Most animals and most armies will not fight to the death if they can escape. That we so often do in games and video games is actually a departure from how most violent conflict turns out in reality.

In fact, I do think Roy prolonging the fight now that the dragon clearly wants to flee enters "now we're wasting ressources" territory. They've won. They'd be getting the Xp regardless at this point. It doesn't matter that Calder can exact revenge in a week, if they fail to protect the Gate today.

Did you notice that I mentioned that they went to a lot of trouble to NOT let the foes escape, and yes, I did give full XP for driving an enemy off.

The foe coming back at you at a time and place of their choice is MUCH worse than finishing it here and now. The foe ganging up with other foes is catastrophically bad.

Just let them get away with dangerous foes is BAD. Captures and paroles were common in that setting, but letting foes escape was not, and it was not for a reason. D&D combat gives an ENORMOUS edge to the side with initiative and its buffs pre-cast. Right now the party has their buffs and has the advantage, giving that up and letting Calder retreat and recruit help is not a good plan.

[Cryos]

A good showcase of what happens when your GM gets tired of you ending fights with one spell

[Wanderer]

Hey, I know this one from Casey and Andy #209! (https://galactanet.com/comic/view.php?strip=209)

> Casey: All done!
> Quantum Cop: Good work.
> Milligan: All done.
> Quantum Crook: Excellent.
> Quantum Cop: This quantum vector collector will tell us exactly where Quantum Crook is.
> Quantum Crook: This quantum vector collector inspector will tell us when my opposite tries to find us.
> Quantum Cop: To avoid being snooped, I had you add in a quantum vector collecter inspector detector.
> Quantum Crook: Naturally, we needed to add that quantum vector collector inspector detector deflector to bypass any security the device may have.
> Quantum Cop: And, just to account for an unlikely possibility, I appreciate that you put in the quantum vector collector inspector detector deflector reflector.
> Quantum Crook [facing away from the camera]: If he has a “reflector” of some kind, I'm sure our a death ray will lock on to it's most crucial component: the quantum vector collector inspector detector deflector reflector projector.
> Quantum Cop: … So I'm sure you now see the need for our quantum vector collector inspector detector deflector reflector projector protector.
> Quantum Crook: … And so, as a final flourish, we added in the quantum vector collector inspector detector deflector reflector projector connecter ejector!
> SFX [electric component pops out through a new hole near the bottom of C&A's machine]: POINK!!
> Quantum Cop: So, let's begin.
> Quantum Cop: Excellent. He's in Mt. Fuji and doesn't know we're coming.
> Quantum Crook: Excellent. He knows where we are, and thinks we don't know he's coming.

Glad to see I'm not the only one who was thinking of that strip.

[Emperor Time]

A good showcase of what happens when your GM gets tired of you ending fights with one spell

I have to agree with you since Calder is pretty tricky for an enemy this late into the story.

[Psyren]

Would Roy necessarily know how many times he was able to use the maneuver, prior to discovering the limit empirically?

(a) Given that he explicitly practiced the maneuver repeatedly (which he even mentions in that strip), why wouldn't he know its usage limit, if at all? It just seems illogical to assume he knows nothing about a technique he's been actively working at/honing.

(b) Similarly, if he didn't think he could do it 4 times, why would he try to in the first place? And his confident expression on the third swing doesn't indicate that he's doing something he isn't sure will work multiple times either.

Finally, even if it does have a usage limit - which again, we have zero evidence of currently - my statement was "at least 4 times." Which we see to be true on the page. For that to be a product of the illusion rather than Roy's own capabilities would be a clear indicator that he's dreaming, which is not how the illusion is supposed to work.


I disagree with a lot of the pro-fight arguments being thrown around here. Calder was casting greater teleport. He was not trying to reach back to the north pole, he was going home. The argument that letting him go would somehow help Xykon more than losing the resources necessary to keep fighting him seems very contrived to me. Tactically, I think they should've let him go.

And sure, that would be massively damaging to many people, and a significant long term risk for the Order - but Roy is usually depicted as more pragmatic than that. Nothing matters if they don't stop Xykon. Letting someone evil get away would've been impossible for a paladin, but Roy kept freaking Belkar around. He's used to tolerating evil for the greater good.

Very uncharacteristic strip, IMO.

I couldn't disagree more. If Calder has a means of bypassing the teleport countermeasures then that would logically work both ways, meaning he could get the drop on them at any point, and Calder is definitely spiteful enough to pick them off piecemeal (starting with the halflings) or to hit them in the back while they're fighting Xykon. Roy did the right thing by locking him down and potentially ending the threat right here, because they have no guarantee that Calder would simply go off and leave them alone until the gate issue is resolved (which Calder may not even know about - and certainly doesn't know about the gods potentially upending the entire sandbox even if Xykon wins, since even Serini didn't.)

[Ghosty]

And that's what happens when you "take off your engineer hat and put on your management hat". ..

...Orion has a Launch Abort System - a separate rocket atop the Crew Module that can pull the crew away from a malfunctioning launch vehicle. It's the ultimate E ticket ride - greater than 10 g's acceleration, which is pretty dangerous but not as dangerous as an exploding launcher.

"Normalization of deviance." AKA, 'We got away with breaking the rules this time and that time, we can get away with it everytime.'

The Russians have actually had to use their version of the pad escape rocket once (https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Soyuz_7K-ST_No.16L) and the wiki description makes it sound like Elan would have approved of the scene.

"The launch escape system of the Soyuz spacecraft fired six seconds before the launch vehicle exploded, saving the crew... ...The launch control team activated the escape system but the control cables had already burned through, and the Soyuz crew could not activate or control the escape system themselves. The backup radio command to fire the LES required 2 independent operators to receive separate commands to do so and each act within 5 seconds, which took several seconds to occur..."

14-17 g of acceleration. Which stung, but beats dying. There've been a few other notable aborts during the lengthy Soyuz program history.

Never thought we'd be discussing spaceflight, on the topic of contingencies for the angry, fleeing Red Dragon, but it fits. Agreeing with Roy on this one, and I'm still wondering if Calder will let slip how and whether that was Kraagor or Girard in Sunny's drawing of Calder. Plus what did they do with Calder in the time between "it took all six of us to put him down" and residence in the stasis trap. Or anything else Scribble noteworthy.

[KorvinStarmast]

Orion has a Launch Abort System - a separate rocket atop the Crew Module that can pull the crew away from a malfunctioning launch vehicle. It's the ultimate E ticket ride - greater than 10 g's acceleration, which is pretty dangerous but not as dangerous as an exploding launcher. Typical acceleration in an F-18 ejection seat is 10-13 g.

Finally, even if it does have a usage limit - which again, we have zero evidence of currently - my statement was "at least 4 times." Which we see to be true on the page. For that to be a product of the illusion rather than Roy's own capabilities would be a clear indicator that he's dreaming, which is not how the illusion is supposed to work. Given the number of times he has used it, him discovering "huh, I guess it's run out of charges" at some point would have been worthy of an on screen panel.

I couldn't disagree more. I also disagree with H_F_F_F but for a slightly different reason.
The claim is that the fight is uncharacteristic. That's a take which ignores the evidence on screen in strip 1295, which shows unambiguously that
Calder started this fight. Roy's opening move was to parley. (https://www.giantitp.com/comics/oots1295.html) See the last two panels.

They could not just bypass the room completely (even though that was Serini's original intention and guidance) because they had to recover Sunny.

And beyond that: the strip is rooted in Dungeons and Dragons, the game. They are in the Final Dungeon. It makes perfect sense - within this genre - to end up in a battle with a Dragon. That they will also be in a battle with a vile lich who is intent on world domination is also a nod to genre conventions.

[Aquillion]

I disagree with a lot of the pro-fight arguments being thrown around here. Calder was casting greater teleport. He was not trying to reach back to the north pole, he was going home. The argument that letting him go would somehow help Xykon more than losing the resources necessary to keep fighting him seems very contrived to me. Tactically, I think they should've let him go.

And sure, that would be massively damaging to many people, and a significant long term risk for the Order - but Roy is usually depicted as more pragmatic than that. Nothing matters if they don't stop Xykon. Letting someone evil get away would've been impossible for a paladin, but Roy kept freaking Belkar around. He's used to tolerating evil for the greater good.

Very uncharacteristic strip, IMO.
I mean ultimately it was a split-second decision. It doesn't seem that unreasonable to me even if we can sit here in our computer chairs and go "wait, on second thought, would it be that bad to just let him go?"

Especially since Roy probably believes (rightly or wrongly) that the fight is basically over and that ending it won't cost more resources or anything. We, as readers, suspect that there's going to be some additional cost for narrative reasons, but in-universe there's no reason to believe that.

Heck, the additional XP from winning decisively might be enough for some members of the party to level up (especially the lower-level ones they've picked up, like Meenah.) That could be more decisive in the last encounter than whatever they spend on the last few rounds.

[Daibhid C]

I disagree with a lot of the pro-fight arguments being thrown around here. Calder was casting greater teleport. He was not trying to reach back to the north pole, he was going home. The argument that letting him go would somehow help Xykon more than losing the resources necessary to keep fighting him seems very contrived to me. Tactically, I think they should've let him go.

And sure, that would be massively damaging to many people, and a significant long term risk for the Order - but Roy is usually depicted as more pragmatic than that. Nothing matters if they don't stop Xykon. Letting someone evil get away would've been impossible for a paladin, but Roy kept freaking Belkar around. He's used to tolerating evil for the greater good.

Very uncharacteristic strip, IMO.

In addition to the point that Calder outright stated his intent to "visit my vengeance upon the halfling" once he's back to full power, which, depending on his outside resources, might be half an hour from now, I'm not sure I've ever seen Roy as being a "Yes, innocent people will suffer, but it's all for the greater good" pragmatist. That's pretty much exactly the attitude he distrusts the gods for, and not a million miles away from why he resents his father.

Yes, he kept Belkar around. When asked to explain why this was something a Lawful Good person would do, his argument was specifically that the alternative was letting Belkar run around loose. And while that was at least partly an ad hoc justification, I think there was a certain amount of truth to it. Roy doesn't like letting evil go unchecked if he has the ability to check it. But that's just my take.

[Mordar]

I'm not certain that "we just pissed off a dragon which is going to rest and recover spell slots, and possibly recruit allies and / or gather magic items and artifacts, and then come kick our ass shortly" qualifies as safe. (edit) And now that dragon has a great deal of knowledge about our capabilities and preferred tactics, and we have lost any sort of element of surprise we may have had. And it now has the opportunity to prepare the battlefield and an ambush. And it probably has divination spells or indirect access to them, so it may be able to predict where we'll be and when.

I do wonder about this.

I know the Order was once frequently chided for not being remotely optimized, but I think they have grown.

Calder had surprise and a young eye tyrant on his side. The Order walked into the room face first. The Order is going to walk out intact, minus any necessary drama servicing...and their two spellcasters weren't even ready for a dragon fight.

I'm putting the Order as significantly stronger favorites in a rematch, particularly if it is within say a week.

- M

[hungrycrow]

I do wonder about this.

I know the Order was once frequently chided for not being remotely optimized, but I think they have grown.

Calder had surprise and a young eye tyrant on his side. The Order walked into the room face first. The Order is going to walk out intact, minus any necessary drama servicing...and their two spellcasters weren't even ready for a dragon fight.

I'm putting the Order as significantly stronger favorites in a rematch, particularly if it is within say a week.

- M

Next week they might have lost some members and be significantly weaker, while fighting a Calder with magic items, new minions, and a better choice of battlefield. Not worth the risk.

And of course even if they come out of the struggle against Xykon with everyone intact and can fight Calder at full strength, he'll definitely have killed a bunch of halflings by then. That's not something Roy would accept just to save a few mid-level spells.

[gbaji]

When did O-Chul meet Calder before? Calder met Soon before this. :smallwink:

Hmm.... which suggests an addendum to my "lawful smart(ish)" paladins.

Paladins arrive while Calder is on the ropes. Calder demands they honor a surrender. They respond with something like "Oh wait. Your name is Calder you say? Well, we were given a set of oaths when we joined the Sapphire Guard, mostly related to other things, but one of them required that if we ever encountered a dragon named Calder we were to take all pains to execute him for his horrific crimes. Something about correcting a terrible mistake made one time. Guess that's you and your time is up".

I could totally see Soon, as he got older, coming to regret some decisions he made earlier in life, and the concern that by giving mercy to Calder he would be responsible for whatever may happen if Calder should ever escape might have weighed on him. Having accepted the surrender, he could not execute Calder while imprisoned (and would arguably have to fight/oppose anyone who tried), but would almost certainly have decided "if he ever escapes, his surrender is forfeit, as is his life". And how fortunate that even if this didn't happen during his lifetime, he just happened to be forming an order of paladins to whom he could pass that on.

I have never played paladins as "lawful stupid".



If all the paladins manage to do in this fight is be less of a long-term liability than Soon was... that'll honestly be pretty disappointing, and about as strong an argument as I can think of for the 3.5e Paladin being jettisoned from the game.

Well. Joining in the fight and helping finish off Calder was assumed. Paladins get the same combat tables as fighters (just not the same feats), and the same HP/level. So having two additional high to-hit melee fighters (and more physical bodies to absorb attacks) would be a massive benefit to the fight.


Well hold on, leave those goalposts alone. The question was how many times can Roy use his technique. The whole point of the boss illusion is that it's supposed to feel real when you're inside it, so real that it took Elan's narrative mastery to break. If Roy's technique was supposed to be 1/encounter and he could suddenly spam it, that would be an instant clue that something was off, which would be a pretty glaring flaw in the illusion. Instead, being able to spam his technique 4 times back to back felt completely believable to him, therefore it's good evidence for us that he can use it that often in the real world too.

Fair point. I was focused on how effective it might actually be in real combat (against Xykon). But yeah. The question of how many times he can use it in a fight/day/whatever would seem to be "at least four".



Well, lets look at the possible outcomes.

Greater Teleport fails. Result: still have to kill Calder.
Greater Teleport takes Calder far away and he never engages with Team Evil. Result: more evil in the world, but no further expenditure of resources.
Greater Teleport works and takes Calder some distance away. Calder, being hyper-intelligent, realizes that OotS has an enemy in the region of the dungeon, and decides to return and join them, or tell them what he knows. Result: catastrophic.
Greater Teleport works but Calder winds up near the dungeon (perhaps because of the anti-teleport stuff in the dungeon, or because that's where he wanted to go). Calder contacts Team Evil - joins or informs. Result: catastrophic.
Greater Teleport deposits Calder near the dungeon. Calder encounters Team Evil and a battle ensues. Result: Team Evil strengthen by a dragon zombie.



You missed:

Greater Teleport succeeds but fails to penetrate the walls of the dungeon, leaving him in the room. Calder then chooses to escape physically, and the order is now running after him, while he's flying around triggering traps and releasing uber powerful monsters into the dungeon, and likely further reducing the order's resources and making it difficult to even get to the gate room, much less be able to rest there, and also reducing the challenge for TE when they travel though the dungeon, making them expend fewer resources getting to the party. Result: Catastrophic

And:

Greater Teleport succeeds, but fails to penetrate the walls of the dungeon, and drops him somewhere at the "edge" of the dungeon (still inside, but no longer near the Order). Now you have Calder sneaking around the dungeon, potentially attacking the Order later, and/or releasing more monsters at a later time, or encountering TE (maybe it drops him back in the portal/entrance room?). Result: Variable from minor to catastrophic.


The larger point is that the absolute best case (teleport fails and leaves him in the room), actually leads potentially to a terrible outcome. It's also unfortunate that Sereni even mentioned the anti-teleportation in the walls. Had she kept quiet, Calder would have assumed that his teleport would have worked, if only Roy hadn't disrupted his casting, and likely spent effort trying to recast the spell. Now he may know that teleportation wont work, so wont waste more time trying to do that, and thus may immediately try to find some other way to escape.

Which, ironically, puts Roy in the position of doing something clever and deceptive (or at least concealing something from the enemy), while Sereni, the epic rogue, blurted out critical information to an enemy like a 1st level novice.



For all we know, calder is in league with Xykon and was going to teleport to his side. We just met this dragon a few comics ago, there is much we don't know. Sure, it seems to the reader that Xykon hasn't been in this part of the dungeon, and has never met calder elsewhere, but are you sure? How much would you bet on it? Dragons live a long time, and liches longer. We don't know everything about their pasts, and haven't seen everything they've done in the comic. By preventing him from leaving, he may effectively be denying a resource to Xykon, as well as splitting his party, so to speak (it's easier to defeat two enemies separately than at the same time).

Do I think this is really what's going on? I doubt it. Maybe 15% chance this is the case. But it occurred to me without much thought, and Roy is far smarter than me, so it may have occurred to him as well - and Roy is certainly the type to consider even remote possibilities, especially when the potential consequences for a mistake are infinitely bad for all living things.

Xykon hasn't meet Calder for the same reason O-Chul hasn't. Calder was defeated back when the Scribblers were still adventuring together (so before they built the gates). Xykon became a lich after being trapped by Lirian's anti-magic virus, which was her epic level defense of her gate. So... well after Calder was defeated. Somewhere there's a timeline of events, but I'm not sure if Xykon was even born yet (as a living human) when Calder was still up and out there. And even if he was, he would have been human (but still an evil sorcerer) and very young, and likely would have just been a dragon servant or food supply or something. This doesn't at all preclude Calder and TE joining forces against the Order, but not because of some past between them, but maybe the usual villain "we have a common goal... for the moment" kind of thing.


The bigger point here is that Roy doing everything he can to stop Calder right here and right now is "the right thing to do"(tm). They've pretty much got him on the ropes. Why on earth let Calder escape? Best case is that they have a similarly difficult fight and have to kill him later. But odds are that fight will be much much more difficult. Calder will have mind controlled a number of servants, and have them assisting him. He'll also presumably set himself up in a better defensive position (more room to fly, and no dimensional stone blocking teleportation, and less vulnerability to anti-magic stuff). There's literally no better time/place to kill a dragon than "inside a sealed dungeon, in an empty room, with no resources/help (for the dragon)".

And that's in addition to lawful good Roy feeling responsible for every evil thing Calder does between now and then, when he could have stopped him. Nope. Roy's going to end Calder if he has any ability at all to do so.

[Mordar]

Next week they might have lost some members and be significantly weaker, while fighting a Calder with magic items, new minions, and a better choice of battlefield. Not worth the risk.

And of course even if they come out of the struggle against Xykon with everyone intact and can fight Calder at full strength, he'll definitely have killed a bunch of halflings by then. That's not something Roy would accept just to save a few mid-level spells.

I'm certainly not advocating for letting him skate...just saying that these two same sides with one week preparation almost certainly goes the Order's way, potentially at the level of speedbump/curb stomp.

Call it 6 months out and I think the dynamic changes and is a much more interesting conflict.

- M

[pendell]

It's been forever since I've done 3.5 or anything like it; Mechanically speaking, how does Roy do what he does. Does he have to ready spellsplinter as an action, which triggers when the dragon tries to cast? Does this mean he has to forgo other actions in his round in order to have spellsplinter ready to go? Or does he simply choose spell splinter as his action every round so that he will be able to use the feat if the dragon casts, and if the dragon doesn't Roy still does normal damage?

I get the impression, by the way that spellsplinter is a feat (https://www.d20srd.org/srd/feats.htm), like Cleave or Power Attack, which implies there's no limit to the number of times he can use it in an encounter or in a day, but probably only once per round.

So I assume Calder's next move is to surrender. He seems to have given up both on fight and on flight, so that only leaves surrender as a survival option. That would be an apt time for the paladins to walk in. What happens then? Does the OOTS accept? Are the paladins obligated to accept his surrender or fall?

ETA: Given our experience with Miko Miyazaki, it appears that any creature can be executed by a paladin in cold blood provided they register as evil under Detect Evil, which Calder assuredly will. So I suspect the choice to show mercy would be up to the judgement of the paladins, not mandated by the gods, the choice between mercy and prudence will be entirely their own.

Respectfully,

Brian P.

[Tzardok]

It's been forever since I've done 3.5 or anything like it; Mechanically speaking, how does Roy do what he does. Does he have to ready spellsplinter as an action, which triggers when the dragon tries to cast? Does this mean he has to forgo other actions in his round in order to have spellsplinter ready to go? Or does he simply choose spell splinter as his action every round so that he will be able to use the feat if the dragon casts, and if the dragon doesn't Roy still does normal damage?

As Spellsplinter is a homebrew feat, we don't know anything about the specifics of its function.


I get the impression, by the way that spellsplinter is a feat (https://www.d20srd.org/srd/feats.htm), like Cleave or Power Attack, which implies there's no limit to the number of times he can use it in an encounter or in a day, but probably only once per round.

That impression is not necessarily correct. There are feats with limited uses. For example, the Sudden Maximize feat allows you to 3/day Maximize a spell that hadn't been prepared as Maximized.

[Wintermoot]

It's been forever since I've done 3.5 or anything like it; Mechanically speaking, how does Roy do what he does. Does he have to ready spellsplinter as an action, which triggers when the dragon tries to cast? Does this mean he has to forgo other actions in his round in order to have spellsplinter ready to go? Or does he simply choose spell splinter as his action every round so that he will be able to use the feat if the dragon casts, and if the dragon doesn't Roy still does normal damage?

I get the impression, by the way that spellsplinter is a feat (https://www.d20srd.org/srd/feats.htm), like Cleave or Power Attack, which implies there's no limit to the number of times he can use it in an encounter or in a day, but probably only once per round.

So I assume Calder's next move is to surrender. He seems to have given up both on fight and on flight, so that only leaves surrender as a survival option. That would be an apt time for the paladins to walk in. What happens then? Does the OOTS accept? Are the paladins obligated to accept his surrender or fall?

ETA: Given our experience with Miko Miyazaki, it appears that any creature can be executed by a paladin in cold blood provided they register as evil under Detect Evil, which Calder assuredly will. So I suspect the choice to show mercy would be up to the judgement of the paladins, not mandated by the gods, the choice between mercy and prudence will be entirely their own.

Respectfully,

Brian P.


I'm not sure its been specified yet. But based on the times we've seen it, it certainly isn't restricted to "within reach" and doesn't feel like a readied action either. When a spell is cast, Roy moves up to within reach and disrupts the spell. But there's no real indication that he is sacrificing attacks or move actions to "ready" in case a spell is cast.

If I was building the feat myself, I would probably be something like "you can ready an action to splinter a spell. If a spell is cast by your target within your line of view, you can use one move action and one attack action to move to the target and attempt to disrupt the spell. this additional move action is treated as a free action for action economy purposes"

Based on how its been portrayed so far, I would expect the text as intended/shown to be something like "you state a target to spellsplinter and proceed as normal. You don't need to ready actions. when a spell is cast by the target, you get an immediate move and attack action to spend to move to the target and attempt to splinter the spell. You must then sacrifice an attack action on the following turn after the spellsplinter" Or something like that.

[Psyren]

It's been forever since I've done 3.5 or anything like it; Mechanically speaking, how does Roy do what he does. Does he have to ready spellsplinter as an action, which triggers when the dragon tries to cast? Does this mean he has to forgo other actions in his round in order to have spellsplinter ready to go? Or does he simply choose spell splinter as his action every round so that he will be able to use the feat if the dragon casts, and if the dragon doesn't Roy still does normal damage?

So in 3.5, casting while in melee normally provokes an attack of opportunity. This is a separate ability to act from a Reaction Immediate Action or from a Readied Action; normally characters only get one of those per round, but there's a fighter feat (Combat Reflexes) that lets you get more.

Presumably, Spellsplinter piggybacks off of this mechanic, because one way a caster can get around this ability and cast safely in melee is to cast defensively, denying the martial their attack of opportunity. Illusory Xykon says this to Roy in the strip, indicating that that's why Roy was able to interrupt him; Roy, knowing how his ability works, would accept that explanation proffered up by the illusion.

But without an in-comic explanation of Spellsplinter's exact mechanics, we don't totally know for sure. All we know is that he used it 4x in one fight and didn't seem surprised by that.

EDIT: Well, scratch that, we do know one more thing - that even when hit with Spellsplinter, it's possible for the spellcaster to still get their spell off (https://www.giantitp.com/comics/oots1006.html) (though presumably, it's considerably harder given the on-page failure rate.)

[Barstro]

It's like me saying that my neighbor is a Martian, and i can tell because Martians have the ability to look exactly like humans.

If it’s because he’s wearing a diner cook’s hat, then he’s actually Venusian.

[Mordar]

EDIT: Well, scratch that, we do know one more thing - that even when hit with Spellsplinter, it's possible for the spellcaster to still get their spell off (https://www.giantitp.com/comics/oots1006.html) (though presumably, it's considerably harder given the on-page failure rate.)

Are you sure? No glowyness and actually hits him instead of "cutting through the magic", looks like just an AoO?

- M

[Barstro]

EDIT: Well, scratch that, we do know one more thing - that even when hit with Spellsplinter, it's possible for the spellcaster to still get their spell off (https://www.giantitp.com/comics/oots1006.html) (though presumably, it's considerably harder given the on-page failure rate.)

Was Roy using Spellsplinter? I don’t see a white trail.

[Wintermoot]

Was Roy using Spellsplinter? I don’t see a white trail.

He was not. It has been shown that, when he spell splinters, you see "fizzle" and the sword goes through the glowy energy in the caster's hands. (sometimes hitting the caster, usually not) In the scene with Durkon*, he's simply taking an attack of opportunity against a caster who isn't casting defensively and sinking him big sword into the guy but failing to disrupt the spell itself.

[137beth]

Huh, my browser's cache prevented me from noticing the update yesterday.

I wonder if stopping the dragon from teleporting out was really the best idea, seeing as Calder leaving could allow the Order to focus on Xykon and track Calder down afterwards.


It's like me saying that my neighbor is a Martian, and i can tell because Martians have the ability to look exactly like humans.

Well what if I can tell you're a vampire because you're using disguise magic to look like you're not a vampire? (https://www.giantitp.com/comics/oots1132.html)

[bunsen_h]

Of course he would. These people can look at their char sheets, one should expect that they know what their stuff does.

Back In The Day, my char sheets would sometimes have details missing -- stuff that the DM knew, but which my characters hadn't yet learned. For example, per RAW, if one acquired a magic item that had charges, one wouldn't necessarily know how many charges it had left.


(a) Given that he explicitly practiced the maneuver repeatedly (which he even mentions in that strip), why wouldn't he know its usage limit, if at all? It just seems illogical to assume he knows nothing about a technique he's been actively working at/honing.

That strip also makes clear that he wasn't sure if the maneuver would work. Practised the moves, yes, but it didn't look like he'd, say, done some combat practise with Durkon and attempted to mess up the latter's spellcasting.


(b) Similarly, if he didn't think he could do it 4 times, why would he try to in the first place? And his confident expression on the third swing doesn't indicate that he's doing something he isn't sure will work multiple times either.

Finally, even if it does have a usage limit - which again, we have zero evidence of currently - my statement was "at least 4 times." Which we see to be true on the page. For that to be a product of the illusion rather than Roy's own capabilities would be a clear indicator that he's dreaming, which is not how the illusion is supposed to work.

If he wasn't sure how many times it would work, it would be worth trying. It's the most effective action he could take in a fight with Xykon; better to use it to disrupt one of Xykon's heavy-duty spells than to get a hit on Xykon. It's possible that it wouldn't work, if the uses per day were limited; that comes down to an assessment of the probabilities.


I thought about using that Thor "was it, though" image, but a link is probably better (https://lettersofnote.com/2009/10/27/the-result-would-be-a-catastrophe/).

Fair enough. Though that article suggests that the concerns about the O-rings were generally discounted completely, and may not have been widely known.

[Psyren]

Was Roy using Spellsplinter? I don’t see a white trail.

I do? It goes right in front of Greg's face in that panel?



That strip also makes clear that he wasn't sure if the maneuver would work.

Yeah it was his first time using it in actual combat, but that's irrelevant to how often he can do it. Practice sessions can tell you that just fine.



If he wasn't sure how many times it would work, it would be worth trying. It's the most effective action he could take in a fight with Xykon; better to use it to disrupt one of Xykon's heavy-duty spells than to get a hit on Xykon. It's possible that it wouldn't work, if the uses per day were limited; that comes down to an assessment of the probabilities.

Yet again though, he gets more certainty as he uses it, not less.

[bunsen_h]

Yeah it was his first time using it in actual combat, but that's irrelevant to how often he can do it. Practice sessions can tell you that just fine.

Would they? If someone is training to use a feat, and their limit for using the feat once they've learned it is X times, can they only go through the motions X times? It's different if they're actually going all the way and putting it into practise during training, but from that strip, it didn't appear that Roy had done that: his happy "It—it worked!" seems to me to indicate more than a bit of uncertainty. "Just like I practiced..." rather than "just like we practiced...".

[Psyren]

Would they?

Yes, they would.

[Unoriginal]

Show of hands: How many people think, even if Calder surrenders (despite extremely keen memories of how that turned out last time) and the paladins demand that he be allowed to surrender and Serini acquiesces -- or if he figures out a way past the herd of people surrounding him and actively trying to kill him...

that V would shrug and say "Yeah, let's let the dragon go. I mean, what's the worst that could happen?"

(Edit: If it's not obvious, I'm of the mind V would be more likely to say "Not if my index finger has anything to say about it. And, as it turned out, it had quite the stirring dissertation prepared on that very subject. ". (^_~) https://www.giantitp.com/comics/oots0596.html )

Vaarsuvius is trying to be a better person nowadays.

And they've killed enough dragons for several lifetimes. Several elven lifetimes.

[brian 333]

Having played a mage-killer built halfing ranger in 3.5, my tactic was to either rain full-attack arrows on the target, forcing Concentration Checks, or to sneak up and full-attack dual shortswords. Very few arcanists can deal with that even fully buffed. I usually tried melee.

Going by what I see, Spellsplinter appears to replace AoOs.

If I were creating the feat, I would begin there.

BAB 8+
Class= Barbarian, Fighter Paladin, or Ranger
Spring Attack feat

Spellsplinter is an Attack of Opportunity which inflicts no actual damage. Instead, if a Ranged Touch Attack is successful, it automatically disrupts any spell being cast by an opponent in Reach which has a Spell Level of 1/4 the Spellsplinter user's Character Level. Higher Spell Level spells or spells Cast Defensively gain a Concentration Check as if the Spellsplinter user had inflicted the rolled Damage with that attack, not including damage multiplication from Critical Hits.

Greater Spellsplinter

BAB 16+
Spellsplinter Feat

As Spellsplinter except that success is automatic on spells of 1/2 the Spellsplinter user's character level, and the Concentration Check on higher level spells or spells which would not normally provoke an AoO are calculated as if maximum damage had been rolled, including any Damage Multiplication from Critical Hits.

Tweaking is needed. I may have overcomplicated things.

[arimareiji]

Vaarsuvius is trying to be a better person nowadays.

And they've killed enough dragons for several lifetimes. Several elven lifetimes.

Did V horribly overdo it with Familicide? Absolutely.

Does that mean V would look kindly on "Let's let this dragon go, because waiting to see what sort of revenge a dragon concocts isn't likely to end badly"? Doubtful.

[enq]

Huh, my browser's cache prevented me from noticing the update yesterday.

This is why I bookmark the forum instead :P

[Tzardok]

Back In The Day, my char sheets would sometimes have details missing -- stuff that the DM knew, but which my characters hadn't yet learned. For example, per RAW, if one acquired a magic item that had charges, one wouldn't necessarily know how many charges it had left.


Yeah, for items which need to be identified and stuff, but not for your own capabilities, which you acquired yourself as your own feats. You would need to be someone like early Belkar to not know what those are.

It would be different if it was a secret power that needs to be unlocked, like with the Greenhilt Sword, but this is a technique taught by someone who knew what he was doing.

[Deathhappens]

Heh, Cleric fight. Only missing a "made my save" for the callback. :biggrin:

[Barstro]

I do? It goes right in front of Greg's face in that panel?
.

Small phone and old eyes. I withdraw my “evidence”.

Edit: The white may still denote only movement, as opposed to SpellSplitter, but lack of evidence is not the same as evidence of a lack.

[Heroic Lich]

I do? It goes right in front of Greg's face in that panel?

Not to beat asn undead horse, but there are several factors present here that are never shown in the other spellsplinter manuvers. Most notably, Roy didn't even try to go for the hands. Something similar is seen with Xykon, sure, but that's after Xykon notes that casting defensively does nothing.
It's not written in stone but personally, I think that the attack we see in #1006 against Durkula was not a spellsplinter manuver, but Nega-Durkon being clever. Spellsplinter gets around casting defensively, so he instead relied on his damage reduction and insanely high concentration stat to just get off a spell as normal. This proged an opportunity attack from Roy, not a spellsplinter, two different things.

[AstralFire]

I never thought I'd be nostalgic for the days of layered contingencies and similar. Not that I sincerely miss those mechanics, but it still feels pleasantly familiar.

[Mordar]

I do? It goes right in front of Greg's face in that panel?


Small phone and old eyes. I withdraw my “evidence”.

Edit: The white may still denote only movement, as opposed to SpellSplitter, but lack of evidence is not the same as evidence of a lack.

I think the actual hitting of the target is a difference...have we seen other Spellsplitters that also sink into the body of the caster?


Not to beat asn undead horse, but there are several factors present here that are never shown in the other spellsplinter manuvers. Most notably, Roy didn't even try to go for the hands. Something similar is seen with Xykon, sure, but that's after Xykon notes that casting defensively does nothing.
It's not written in stone but personally, I think that the attack we see in #1006 against Durkula was not a spellsplinter manuver, but Nega-Durkon being clever. Spellsplinter gets around casting defensively, so he instead relied on his damage reduction and insanely high concentration stat to just get off a spell as normal. This proged an opportunity attack from Roy, not a spellsplinter, two different things.

Mostly agree...I think he went for VampireDwarfSplitter instead.

- M

[Heroic Lich]

Mostly agree...I think he went for VampireDwarfSplitter instead.

Crippling curiosity, what's the part you disagree with?

Edit: Looking back, during Roy's training with Horace, we see the sword go into the dummy. This is, so far, the only time we know for sure that the Spellsplinter manuver has been used and coused damage. Against Xykon, after the first spellsplinter there does appear to be minor damage, but the damage in that scene was inconsistent anyways, with Xykon getting damage from seemingly nowhere at the begining, then healing, then inexplicibly being damaged again, so it's hard to tell.
It's an epic level Phantasm, but it's cutting corners in some places. Notice how Belkar's wasn't even trying to be realistic.

[Mordar]

Crippling curiosity, what's the part you disagree with?

Edit: Looking back, during Roy's training with Horace, we see the sword go into the dummy. This is, so far, the only time we know for sure that the Spellsplinter manuver has been used and coused damage. Against Xykon, after the first spellsplinter there does appear to be minor damage, but the damage in that scene was inconsistent anyways, with Xykon getting damage from seemingly nowhere at the begining, then healing, then inexplicibly being damaged again, so it's hard to tell.
It's an epic level Phantasm, but it's cutting corners in some places. Notice how Belkar's wasn't even trying to be realistic.

Just that I don't think the Vampire was being clever, necessarily. Just that he wanted to fling the spell, and even if it didn't go off, [to paraphrase another monster] "Even once I am out of spells...I am still a Vampire!".

- M

[Psyren]

I think the actual hitting of the target is a difference...have we seen other Spellsplitters that also sink into the body of the caster?



Mostly agree...I think he went for VampireDwarfSplitter instead.

- M

All the ones he used on Xykon struck home as well (note the new battle damage appearing on every hit.) So I stand by my reading.


This proged an opportunity attack from Roy, not a spellsplinter, two different things.

Spellsplinter most likely uses the AoO mechanics (rather than Readying or similar), otherwise Xykon's protestation about casting defensively would be irrelevant. The whole point of casting defensively is to preclude provoking an AoO.

[Mordar]

All the ones he used on Xykon struck home as well (note the new battle damage appearing on every hit.) So I stand by my reading.

Spellsplinter most likely uses the AoO mechanics (rather than Readying or similar), otherwise Xykon's protestation about casting defensively would be irrelevant. The whole point of casting defensively is to preclude provoking an AoO.

Then I think I am compelled to agree! Vampire made his concentration check.

- M

[Heroic Lich]

All the ones he used on Xykon struck home as well (note the new battle damage appearing on every hit.) So I stand by my reading.



Spellsplinter most likely uses the AoO mechanics (rather than Readying or similar), otherwise Xykon's protestation about casting defensively would be irrelevant. The whole point of casting defensively is to preclude provoking an AoO.

Honestly, the situation with Xykon is interesting. As I said earlier, damage in that sequence was inconsistent, notice how some of his wounds will disappear in that scene.
Also we don't know if any after that first were spellsplinter and not Xykon giving up on casting defensively.
However, I do think that MECHANICALLY it would require Roy to make an arcana check and add his to hit bonus, which has a chance of failure, but THEMATICALLY it's the pinnacle of Roy's arc: That fighters have a way to affect the world beyond supporting spellcasters, so a chance of failure would undercut that.
I think that spellsplinter is what it looks like when Roy attacks the hands, but wounds showed up when fighting Xykon so I could be wrong. Still, following the movements on #1006, Roy didn't even try to hit the hands, which is the main constant of the spell splinter manuver every time it's been used (When Xykon turned around he's no longer casting defensively).
Another valid arguement is that Rich hadn't quite managed to figure out what he wanted the spell splinter to look like, as from #1006 onward Spell Splinter has been largely consistent while in #886 and before the attacks aren't at all matching up in where Roy is trying to hit, noting how with Xykon's greater teleport Xykon is stabbed through his chest and would definitely be trying to cast defensively.

Edit: I just read that last part and I'd normally agree but the way that Redcloak talks about the spell makes it look like this is about stopping spellcasting specifically, not just attacking even when someone is casting a spell. Even Horace says that it "messes up spellcasting" as opposed to "THey can't protect themselves from leaving themselves open" even when that is a better statement.
If it forced a concentration check then I honestly don't think that Nose-Fur-atu can pass a concentration check that Xykon repeatedly fails, especially a charisma caster vs a MAD cleric. Xykon claimed that getting hit with three lightning traps was a "low" check and that easily defeated V, who would have had a pile of points in concentration, although not constitution to be fair.

I could be wrong, you could be right, that the Spellsplinter has a chance of failure. However, I think it fits better thematically that the Spell Splinter is Roy's perfect counter to spellcasters, his way to bridge the gap, and the scene against Undurkon was just an AOO so that Roy had a way to get his ass kicked enough to break through his "This vampire is still Durkon" haze

[Tzardok]

However, I do think that MECHANICALLY it would require Roy to make an arcana check and add his to hit bonus, which has a chance of failure, but THEMATICALLY it's the pinnacle of Roy's arc: That fighters have a way to affect the world beyond supporting spellcasters, so a chance of failure would undercut that.


This isn't 5e; there are no arcana checks.

[Doug Lampert]

This isn't 5e; there are no arcana checks.

There is "Knowledge Arcana", it's one of the 10 listed knowledge fields in the PHB for 3.5. But it doesn't include knowing anything significant about spells or how to counter them, that all comes off Spellcraft.

[Heroic Lich]

This isn't 5e; there are no arcana checks.

I did mean spellcraft or Knowlege:Arcane, my bad. Spending too much time with Pathfinder/5e, the latter against my better judgement.

[gbaji]

It could also be that the spellsplinter is an offensive feat used with an attack action. The fighter delays until the spellcaster casts (times his blow with the formation of the spell energy), and then strikes. If successful, he hits the target and disrupts the spell. Which would suggest that the fighter has to have higher initiative (or be delaying from a previous round) and use this instead of other actions (like say, full attack).

This would explain why it's so effective even against folks with high(er) concentration rolls (if it just provided an AOO with a concentration adjustment, then it may not work well against Xykon), but might also explain why Durkon's spell goes though. Not sure of the specifics, but is it possible that because he came out of mist form that Durkon got to attack Roy first in that round (or just that Roy didn't have a readied action to use Spellsplinter for some reason)? Which would mean that was just a normal AOO and concentration roll, and not actually the feat in action. Don't know how else to describe that, since it does look like what I'd expect a normal "AOO against spellcaster hits and does damage, but spellcaster makes their concentration roll" sequence to me.

It does seem more like an active rather than reactive thing (has to plan to use it and then wait for the right time to swing). And also seems like it's more based on the fighter making some roll, and not the caster failing a roll. Of course, we can totally take the effectiveness of it against Xykon with a massive grain of salt, since that was a "happy ever after" illusion. Eh... But I still think that it would not have been introduced into the story if it wasn't going to be a signficant hindrance to Xykon at some point, and yeah, I get that Rich can just write the D20 for a concentration check as he wishes, but it still feels like a bit more than just that.

[Heroic Lich]

It could also be that the spellsplinter is an offensive feat used with an attack action. The fighter delays until the spellcaster casts (times his blow with the formation of the spell energy), and then strikes. If successful, he hits the target and disrupts the spell. Which would suggest that the fighter has to have higher initiative (or be delaying from a previous round) and use this instead of other actions (like say, full attack).

This would explain why it's so effective even against folks with high(er) concentration rolls (if it just provided an AOO with a concentration adjustment, then it may not work well against Xykon), but might also explain why Durkon's spell goes though. Not sure of the specifics, but is it possible that because he came out of mist form that Durkon got to attack Roy first in that round (or just that Roy didn't have a readied action to use Spellsplinter for some reason)? Which would mean that was just a normal AOO and concentration roll, and not actually the feat in action. Don't know how else to describe that, since it does look like what I'd expect a normal "AOO against spellcaster hits and does damage, but spellcaster makes their concentration roll" sequence to me.

It does seem more like an active rather than reactive thing (has to plan to use it and then wait for the right time to swing). And also seems like it's more based on the fighter making some roll, and not the caster failing a roll. Of course, we can totally take the effectiveness of it against Xykon with a massive grain of salt, since that was a "happy ever after" illusion. Eh... But I still think that it would not have been introduced into the story if it wasn't going to be a signficant hindrance to Xykon at some point, and yeah, I get that Rich can just write the D20 for a concentration check as he wishes, but it still feels like a bit more than just that.

I mean when it comes down to it, Roy needed to get blasted by Harm to set up for "Durkon"* to get overconfident and slip that he's not Durkon. Which means that Jerkon had to get a spell off, so Roy didn't use the manuver.
I think there has to be some element of preperation, especially against Xykon. Notice how Roy did have higher initiative, but couldn't block the meteor swarm. If it was a simple reaction, then Roy should have been able to react then. There is some element of Roy needing to prepare to hit.
Which is another reason why the attack against Leechy Veinquaff was a simple AOO, rather than a Spellsplinter.

[Psyren]

It could also be that the spellsplinter is an offensive feat used with an attack action. The fighter delays until the spellcaster casts (times his blow with the formation of the spell energy), and then strikes.

It's possible, but there's still the point that if it were active rather than using the reactive AoO system then Xykon casting defensively would be irrelevant.

[bunsen_h]

Yeah, for items which need to be identified and stuff, but not for your own capabilities, which you acquired yourself as your own feats. You would need to be someone like early Belkar to not know what those are.

It would be different if it was a secret power that needs to be unlocked, like with the Greenhilt Sword, but this is a technique taught by someone who knew what he was doing.

"And for some reason, I have this awesome idea (https://www.giantitp.com/comics/oots0666.html) for a cool sword move... I think I might try it out later, see if it works." Roy explicitly doesn't recall some of the details about it. If anything, it's a bit odd that he remembers it at all; IIRC people aren't supposed to remember their their time between death and resurrection.

[Kish]

I mean when it comes down to it, Roy needed to get blasted by Harm to set up for "Durkon"* to get overconfident and slip that he's not Durkon. Which means that Jerkon had to get a spell off, so Roy didn't use the manuver.

...no? He used the maneuver, it just didn't work. If your theory conflicts with the evidence that's not a reason to discard the evidence.

I suspect the feat is a renamed Mage Slayer feat, from Complete Arcane.

[elecampane]

I don't understand why do yall think Roy should even believe that Calder is indeed trying to escape instead of just making a feint. For all he knew the dragon could've been casting "Greater teleport all my enemies into a wall". And, like, if he indeed was trying to escape, and the stone of the dungeon would indeed block him from going outside, the spell could've just put him in a reachable destination, i.e. into a nearby room. What if that was a room with Sunny and the paladins? That would've been bad.



Xykon hasn't meet Calder for the same reason O-Chul hasn't. Calder was defeated back when the Scribblers were still adventuring together (so before they built the gates). Xykon became a lich after being trapped by Lirian's anti-magic virus, which was her epic level defense of her gate. So... well after Calder was defeated. Somewhere there's a timeline of events, but I'm not sure if Xykon was even born yet (as a living human) when Calder was still up and out there. And even if he was, he would have been human (but still an evil sorcerer) and very young, and likely would have just been a dragon servant or food supply or something. This doesn't at all preclude Calder and TE joining forces against the Order, but not because of some past between them, but maybe the usual villain "we have a common goal... for the moment" kind of thing.

For all we know Xykon (the sorcerer) could even be Calder's descendant, we don't know that much about Xykon's past and the sorcerous origin of his powers.
And Xykon was already a lich when he'd defeated still not-so-old Serini (https://www.giantitp.com/comics/oots1227.html). Given that halflings don't live that longer than humans, and that Xykon was already a very old man when he became a lich, he's probably older than Serini and certainly had time to meet Calder.


It's been forever since I've done 3.5 or anything like it; Mechanically speaking, how does Roy do what he does. Does he have to ready spellsplinter as an action, which triggers when the dragon tries to cast? Does this mean he has to forgo other actions in his round in order to have spellsplinter ready to go? Or does he simply choose spell splinter as his action every round so that he will be able to use the feat if the dragon casts, and if the dragon doesn't Roy still does normal damage?

I get the impression, by the way that spellsplinter is a feat (https://www.d20srd.org/srd/feats.htm), like Cleave or Power Attack, which implies there's no limit to the number of times he can use it in an encounter or in a day, but probably only once per round.

<...>
Respectfully,

Brian P.
Personally, I haven't seen in the comic any reason to believe that it does anything different from the actual (non-core) Mage Slayer feat from 3.5, i.e. simply denies the caster the opportunity to cast defensively, thus giving the fighter a chance to disrupt the casting with the damage from an Opportunity attack. That would mean that Roy can do this at least once per turn, more if he has a Combat Reflexes feat. Since that's the easiest explanation that isn't contradicted by anything I see in the comic, I'm using Occam's razor and going with this interpretation
Edit: ok, maybe one modification. Maybe Giant had removed the clause "[spellcasters] are aware that they cannot cast defensively while being threatened by a character with this feat" since the spellsplinter maneuver is so rare. And all the times we saw enemies loose their spells without receiving much visible damage was just clause "[spellcasters you threaten] automatically fail their Concentration checks to [cast spells defensively]" being triggered, without even requiring an AoO from Roy. And the times we saw when they do get damaged were the times when they'd casted the spell in a regular way, thus allowing the spell to potentially go through, as in the Ha-rm panel in the fight with Durkula.

[LookieLouE1707]

I think the paladins have been gone long enough for it to be reasonable to suspect there's some narrative purpose for their absence bigger than them entering like thomas jefferson in Hamilton singing "what did i miss?" ... like, maybe the paladins and sunny are currently being captured by team evil (who surely will be showing up sooner than oots expect them to, thanks to unspoken plan guarantee).

[Precure]

Xykon is close in age to the scribblers. So, I wouldn't be surprised if he and Calder were coffee buddies back in good old days.

[Barstro]

I don't understand why do yall think Roy should even believe that Calder is indeed trying to escape instead of just making a feint. For all he knew the dragon could've been casting "Greater teleport all my enemies into a wall"..

I had been thinking Xykon could pretend to cast spells to waste Roy’s counters. But your view is a whole new level.

[Shining Wrath]

I had been thinking Xykon could pretend to cast spells to waste Roy’s counters. But your view is a whole new level.

Or teleport something nasty from the next room over into this one. Say, a giant flame elemental that Calder would be immune to?

[bunsen_h]

"And for some reason, I have this awesome idea (https://www.giantitp.com/comics/oots0666.html) for a cool sword move... I think I might try it out later, see if it works." Roy explicitly doesn't recall some of the details about it. If anything, it's a bit odd that he remembers it at all; IIRC people aren't supposed to remember their their time between death and resurrection.

Also, FWIW, "Just don't forget to spend a feat on them (https://www.giantitp.com/comics/oots0600.html) when you're back in the land of the living." There's little question that it does count as a feat, at any rate.

[brian 333]

In the successful Spellsplinter in this comic we see the blade of Roy's sword pass through the magical effect, but it does not impact Calder's hand. In fact, it goes in an arc through the effect without hitting the hand. In a typical spell disrupting attack the Concentration Check is DC: 10+ damage inflicted. So Roy should want to hit some part of Calder.

Therefore it appears to me that the Spellsplinter targets the accumulating magical energies rather than the spellcaster. It is disrupting the magic, not the mage.

It also appears to be the only attack Roy makes in that round. Serini chiding Roy for wasting time may be because instead of inflicting 2d6+5+Str Bonus (20hp?) points of damage in this round he disrupted a 'useless' spell. Had he inflicted the damage Serini would have had no cause to complain.

(Of course, she would have complained anyway, because Serini has to Serini.)

[Psyren]

I don't understand why do yall think Roy should even believe that Calder is indeed trying to escape instead of just making a feint. For all he knew the dragon could've been casting "Greater teleport all my enemies into a wall".

Well, point of order - Teleport and Greater Teleport require willing targets, so at a minimum Calder would have to knock everyone out and then be touching all of them. You also can't teleport into a wall.

[Thermophille]

Remember, Fighter is a Tier 4 class, Wizard is Tier 1. Fortunately for the Order, Sorcerer is merely Tier 2.

That changes a bit when you use Charisma to calculate hp, and have the spell slots to keep on the gas if combat lasts long enough for that hp to matter.

[elecampane]

Well, point of order - Teleport and Greater Teleport require willing targets, so at a minimum Calder would have to knock everyone out and then be touching all of them. You also can't teleport into a wall.

No-no-no, that's not what I meant. I didn't mean he's casting "Greater teleport" with targets being "all my enemies" and destination being "into the wall". I meant he's casting "greater teleport all my enemies into a wall" as a new spell he'd researched in his spare time. He's obviously heavily customized with a non-core/homebrew material, like the feat that removes cold vulnerability, and all this mindbender stuff. There's no reason to expect all his spells are standard spells.
And as for the teleport possibilities: there's Baleful teleport that teleports away pieces of the target's body, dealing 9d6 damage. There's "Trobiand's Baleful Teleport" from one of the supplements that works like a regular teleport but works on an unwilling target. So the "greater teleport all my enemies into the wall" is not an unfeasible spell.

[danielxcutter]

That changes a bit when you use Charisma to calculate hp, and have the spell slots to keep on the gas if combat lasts long enough for that hp to matter.

3.5e doesn't let undead get any stat to their hit points by default, unless they're one of the types that get Unholy Toughness (which liches aren't; Unholy Toughness became a thing a bit into the edition, presumably because the HD bloat to ensure they didn't evaporate under a full attack or be at the mercy of any cleric with turn/rebuke attempts left). Xykon is probably still on the durable side for a pure arcane caster, thanks to his various AC boosters and innate lich abilities and just having such a high level, but that's not a very high bar in the first place.

Also, actual spellcasters, rather than the hypothetical "I have the exact right spells prepared/known at all times" white-room spherical cows, still have their limits. In particular the Order does know most of his spell list thanks to O-Chul, which means they can make the most efficient choices with their resources. OotS in general has an extremely low optimization level - Team Evil is one of the major exceptions - but it's still far more efficient for casters to support the martials than trying to invalidate them.

That being said, the optimization ceiling for martials is a lot lower than ideal and the floor is even worse, especially since there are literally trap options put in to "award system mastery" (and I think Cook said in an interview he straight up shot spontaneous casters' metamagic use in the foot just because he didn't like the concept in general).

[elecampane]

3.5e doesn't let undead get any stat to their hit points by default, unless they're one of the types that get Unholy Toughness (which liches aren't; Unholy Toughness became a thing a bit into the edition, presumably because the HD bloat to ensure they didn't evaporate under a full attack or be at the mercy of any cleric with turn/rebuke attempts left). Xykon is probably still on the durable side for a pure arcane caster, thanks to his various AC boosters and innate lich abilities and just having such a high level, but that's not a very high bar in the first place.
And he still gets a d12 hit die instead of the standard sorcerer's d4. That's on average 4 more hit points per level (6.5 instead of 2.5), which is on par with a Con 18 living sorcerer

[danielxcutter]

That's the thing though, a Con 18 sorcerer. Xykon has a high AC, DR 15/bludgeoning and magic, and a lot of immunities, but his actual hit points are definitely going to be a lot lower than Calder. Or possibly Roy.

[stevecharb]

"I counter your counter times infinity!"
"Nuh-uh, I counter your counter-counter times infinity plus one!"

[Shining Wrath]

That's the thing though, a Con 18 sorcerer. Xykon has a high AC, DR 15/bludgeoning and magic, and a lot of immunities, but his actual hit points are definitely going to be a lot lower than Calder. Or possibly Roy.

If Xykon is level 25 (guess), but getting no boost from ability scores, he's got 12 + 24*6.5 HP, or 168.
If Roy is level 16 and has a CON of 18, he's got 10 + 4 + 15*(5.5 + 4) HP, or 156.
Calder probably has 400 to 600 HP, depending on age.

Roughly equal, but that DR 15 matters a lot. If Roy was really optimized as a Xykon-killer, he'd have a maul, not a greatsword. Of course, maybe that's one of the yet-to-be revealed abilities of the ancestral weapon.

[danielxcutter]

Admittedly there is a fighter feat called Sense Weakness that lets you ignore up to 5 points of DR when using a weapon you have Weapon Focus in, and Roy meets all the requirements anyways.

[brian 333]

If Xykon is level 25 (guess), but getting no boost from ability scores, he's got 12 + 24*6.5 HP, or 168.
If Roy is level 16 and has a CON of 18, he's got 10 + 4 + 15*(5.5 + 4) HP, or 156.
Calder probably has 400 to 600 HP, depending on age.

Roughly equal, but that DR 15 matters a lot. If Roy was really optimized as a Xykon-killer, he'd have a maul, not a greatsword. Of course, maybe that's one of the yet-to-be revealed abilities of the ancestral weapon.

Let's just ignore what the swordsmith said about Roy's sword. It was in the second to last panel, so it was obviously just a setup for the last panel joke.

A +5 maul would inflict the same base damage as a great sword, but its damage would not be halved as it is for slashing weapons. Since we do not know the properties of Starmetal versus Undead, we do not know if its bonuses would compensate for that loss of potential damage.

I'm willing to admit that a +5 Starmetal maul would be a better weapon than the Greenhilt Sword. But then, Roy Greenhandle just doesn't have the same ring to it.

[gbaji]

For all we know Xykon (the sorcerer) could even be Calder's descendant, we don't know that much about Xykon's past and the sorcerous origin of his powers.
And Xykon was already a lich when he'd defeated still not-so-old Serini (https://www.giantitp.com/comics/oots1227.html). Given that halflings don't live that longer than humans, and that Xykon was already a very old man when he became a lich, he's probably older than Serini and certainly had time to meet Calder.

There is an Order of the Stick timeline (https://oots.fandom.com/wiki/Timeline) out there, with collected dates for a lot of significant events.

Xykon was born in 1073.

Soon first discovers the rifts in 1117. The Scribblers search them out, seal them, and build the gates over the next few years, completing this by 1119.

It's unclear how much time after that Sereni finishes building her gate defenses, but presumably the Scribblers broke up in or very shortly after 1119. Which means that Calder most likely was defeated and imprisoned (somehow) prior to that point.

So... it's possible that Xykon could have known Calder. Xykon was in his mid 40s by that point, and already a pretty well established evil sorcerer (but still human, not yet a lich). So yeah. Possible. I mean, I suppose they do share an alignment, but when the alignment is CE, that's not really a recipe for folks getting along.


Personally, I haven't seen in the comic any reason to believe that it does anything different from the actual (non-core) Mage Slayer feat from 3.5, i.e. simply denies the caster the opportunity to cast defensively, thus giving the fighter a chance to disrupt the casting with the damage from an Opportunity attack. That would mean that Roy can do this at least once per turn, more if he has a Combat Reflexes feat. Since that's the easiest explanation that isn't contradicted by anything I see in the comic, I'm using Occam's razor and going with this interpretation

Yup. That's the easiest description of the feat. But it leaves us with some problems:

1. It's still very strongly dependent on the caster making their concentration roll. So if Durkon was able to make it that one time, then Xykon will almost certainly make them most if not all of the time. Since we are expecting it to actually work against Xykon, this makes it less valuable from a storytelling pov. Any resolution methodology that is based on the caster making a roll rather than Roy making one puts us into an awkward statistical position here.

2. Roy seems to have to choosen to use this as an action (we see him using this in lieu of taking normal attacks in the fantasy fight against Xykon, and similiar seeming restrictions when fighting Durkon, and Sereni responds as though he's "wasting time" using it). If it's just an AOO, and the feat just allows him to use the AOO against spellcasters casting defensively, then that would not consume any actions on his part.

Attacks of Opportunity are "free". So we should see Roy going "attack, attack, attack..." on his round, then interrupt the caster with his feat, then repeat the next round. But instead we see Roy waiting, and then "fizzle + <some damage from one hit>" on the rounds he uses it. Which looks a lot more like he's using a delayed attack action to time his attack to the casting of the spell, both disrupting it and doing a single hits damage.

I'm trying to come up with a description for the feat that matches all of the depictions of it being used, and not just the one that would be the easiest from a rule writing pov. I'm also trying to make it less about caster concentration and more about the fighter giving something up to have a very high chance to disrupt a spell casting. Having to delay your attack action and use it against an in range and targettable caster's spell action feels like a good balance for having that much higher chance to succeed. This possible way of doing it, changes it from a "I can use this any time a caster is in range with no cost, but the caster can overcome it with a concentration roll" (which is nice, but probably not going to work well against high level casters) to "I have to have an action available, delay it specifically to target this one caster, but having done that I can disrupt their casting regardless of their own concentration abilities, as long as I make my to-hit roll".

It also allows for the Durkon situation if we assume that because Durkon was in mist form, Roy wasn't able to target Durkon and hold his action, making that one a normal AoO against a spell casting, and Durkon making his normal concentration roll. Eh... Possible anyway. I'm hardly married to the idea or anything. Just tossing it out there.

[JessmanCA]

Forgive me if it’s already been asked, but, if Calder had the Ability to leave the dungeon, why hadn’t he used it previously in all those years he was trapped there? Makes no sense. Either he was bluffing about it (to what end I don’t know) or he couldn’t have teleported very far.

[Peelee]

Forgive me if it’s already been asked, but, if Calder had the Ability to leave the dungeon, why hadn’t he used it previously in all those years he was trapped there? Makes no sense. Either he was bluffing about it (to what end I don’t know) or he couldn’t have teleported very far.

Because it wasn't until now that Calder was able to get an anti-magic field on the runes on the floor (https://www.giantitp.com/comics/oots1295.html), which probably mattered a whole lot.

[gbaji]

My guess is that the stasis effect prevented him from using any sort of physical spells or abilities (which precludes any sort of physical movement including via teleport). But his mind was still active, so purely mental abilities (like suggestion or whatever he used on Sunny) could still work. And it's also possible that it took him quite some time to figure out what was going on, and learn how to exert himself mentally even just to do that.

[Precure]

His wrath against the halfling made him foolish.

[brian 333]

There is an Order of the Stick timeline (https://oots.fandom.com/wiki/Timeline) out there, with collected dates for a lot of significant events.

Xykon was born in 1073.

Soon first discovers the rifts in 1117. The Scribblers search them out, seal them, and build the gates over the next few years, completing this by 1119.

It's unclear how much time after that Sereni finishes building her gate defenses, but presumably the Scribblers broke up in or very shortly after 1119. Which means that Calder most likely was defeated and imprisoned (somehow) prior to that point.

So... it's possible that Xykon could have known Calder. Xykon was in his mid 40s by that point, and already a pretty well established evil sorcerer (but still human, not yet a lich). So yeah. Possible. I mean, I suppose they do share an alignment, but when the alignment is CE, that's not really a recipe for folks getting along.



Yup. That's the easiest description of the feat. But it leaves us with some problems:

1. It's still very strongly dependent on the caster making their concentration roll. So if Durkon was able to make it that one time, then Xykon will almost certainly make them most if not all of the time. Since we are expecting it to actually work against Xykon, this makes it less valuable from a storytelling pov. Any resolution methodology that is based on the caster making a roll rather than Roy making one puts us into an awkward statistical position here.

2. Roy seems to have to choosen to use this as an action (we see him using this in lieu of taking normal attacks in the fantasy fight against Xykon, and similiar seeming restrictions when fighting Durkon, and Sereni responds as though he's "wasting time" using it). If it's just an AOO, and the feat just allows him to use the AOO against spellcasters casting defensively, then that would not consume any actions on his part.

Attacks of Opportunity are "free". So we should see Roy going "attack, attack, attack..." on his round, then interrupt the caster with his feat, then repeat the next round. But instead we see Roy waiting, and then "fizzle + <some damage from one hit>" on the rounds he uses it. Which looks a lot more like he's using a delayed attack action to time his attack to the casting of the spell, both disrupting it and doing a single hits damage.

I'm trying to come up with a description for the feat that matches all of the depictions of it being used, and not just the one that would be the easiest from a rule writing pov. I'm also trying to make it less about caster concentration and more about the fighter giving something up to have a very high chance to disrupt a spell casting. Having to delay your attack action and use it against an in range and targettable caster's spell action feels like a good balance for having that much higher chance to succeed. This possible way of doing it, changes it from a "I can use this any time a caster is in range with no cost, but the caster can overcome it with a concentration roll" (which is nice, but probably not going to work well against high level casters) to "I have to have an action available, delay it specifically to target this one caster, but having done that I can disrupt their casting regardless of their own concentration abilities, as long as I make my to-hit roll".

It also allows for the Durkon situation if we assume that because Durkon was in mist form, Roy wasn't able to target Durkon and hold his action, making that one a normal AoO against a spell casting, and Durkon making his normal concentration roll. Eh... Possible anyway. I'm hardly married to the idea or anything. Just tossing it out there.

I've come around to this way of thinking. My previous post on a possible feat linked it to an AoO mechanic but, as you point out, Toy appears to hold his attack for the right moment.

Another poster mentioned Roy's memory of events on Mount Celestia. Horace may have linked that knowledge to the sword while he had it in Roy's afterlife. Now the item itself allows the wielder to train to use the feat.

Finally: I am willing to bet that The Giant got the feat from a published splatbook that most of us never read. Since Grandpa Horace did. It may have even been published for use in an earlier edition of the game. After all, Ian Starshine was a 1st edition Thief. Horace is even older.

[Psyren]

Attacks of Opportunity are "free". So we should see Roy going "attack, attack, attack..." on his round, then interrupt the caster with his feat, then repeat the next round.

Question for you: Why should we see that? What does featuring all his "filler" attacks on-panel add to the narrative?
The important part of that fight is that every spell Xykon attempted got interrupted. Those are the narrative beats we need so they are shown front and center. Your assumption that those were the only attacks Roy made in that entire encounter is just that - an assumption.

And if you don't mind me poking a hole in that assumption, let me put this to you another way - do you honestly think Roy brought an Epic Lich from full health to zero in just 4 swings? Especially when we saw him fail to do so before? (https://www.giantitp.com/comics/oots0442.html)


I meant he's casting "greater teleport all my enemies into a wall" as a new spell he'd researched in his spare time.

For the record, I agree with Roy's decision to interrupt whatever it was without assuming (like Serini did) that it would be safe to ignore. But I don't think spell research would (or should) let you override the basic rules of magic and spell schools like that. That way lies madness; otherwise, somebody really should have researched "Create Water In My Enemy's Lungs!" a very long time ago.

[Tzardok]

For the record, I agree with Roy's decision to interrupt whatever it was without assuming (like Serini did) that it would be safe to ignore. But I don't think spell research would (or should) let you override the basic rules of magic and spell schools like that. That way lies madness; otherwise, somebody really should have researched "Create Water In My Enemy's Lungs!" a very long time ago.

I generally agree with you, though that spell technically exists. It's called Drown, and is a 6th level druid spell in the Spell Compendium.

Rather the point is to be made that a hostile teleportation spell that can actually put people into solid objects instead of shunting them to the next free space wouldn't be called "Greater Teleport, But With Modifications", it would be a new spell called, for example, Deadly Teleportation or Telefragging, or whatever.

[arimareiji]

I generally agree with you, though that spell technically exists. It's called Drown, and is a 6th level druid spell in the Spell Compendium.

Wow. I half-wondered if this was from back when druid spells only went up to 7th level, but nope... 3.5.

"Hey DM, can I research a spell that has the same effect as Finger of Death, but it's 2 levels lower?"
"Seriously?"
"Well, I'm adding some catches to make it less powerful."
*raised eyebrow*
"For instance, it doesn't work on water-breathers. Or any monsters that don't breathe."
...
"And if someone instantly realizes what I did and can get to them the next round and make a DC 15 Heal check, then they only drop to zero hit points."
...
"Also, bato neh zug-zug*."
...
...
"Okay, but if they make their save, they don't lose 3d6 +1 per caster level."


* - For those who have the good fortune to have not seen Caveman but are morbidly curious, here's a helpful translator (https://public.wsu.edu/~delahoyd/cavespeak.html).

[elecampane]

For the record, I agree with Roy's decision to interrupt whatever it was without assuming (like Serini did) that it would be safe to ignore. But I don't think spell research would (or should) let you override the basic rules of magic and spell schools like that. That way lies madness; otherwise, somebody really should have researched "Create Water In My Enemy's Lungs!" a very long time ago.

I mean, I pointed out that baleful teleports exist to address exactly the issue of the range of spells covered by conjuration(teleportation) subschool. But sure, let's say the spell was not "Greater teleport all my enemies into the wall", but rather "Greater teleport, baleful". Or even "Greater telepathic pain infliction". Larger point being, even if the spell starts with "greater telep-", it can still be an offensive spell

And from the narrative standpoint -- if Calder escapes now, there's close to zero chance he won't return before the end of the comic. And lately Roy totally takes such storytelling considerations into account.

[Unoriginal]

It's possible Calder would have Greater Teleported to somewhere else in the same dungeon, and attempted to rebuild his cult by freeing the imprisoned creatures that can be mind-controlled.

Not saying it's the most likely possibility, but it is a possibility none the less.

After all, the "Greater" part does not refer only to distance, but also precision, and the dragon is hurt enough getting off-target could have been lethal. Calder wouldn't even have needed to have seen the spot he wanted to go.

[danielxcutter]

Yeah, and since dragons have sorcerer casting it might essentially be a very inefficient Dimension Door for him. Either way, probably best not to take chances.

[bunsen_h]

Would they? If someone is training to use a feat, and their limit for using the feat once they've learned it is X times, can they only go through the motions X times? It's different if they're actually going all the way and putting it into practise during training, but from that strip, it didn't appear that Roy had done that: his happy "It—it worked!" seems to me to indicate more than a bit of uncertainty. "Just like I practiced..." rather than "just like we practiced...".


Yes, they would.

I feel a bit uncomfortable asking this, but... source, please? I learned AD&D before feats were a thing. I've done a bit of browsing, and I'm not seeing any reference for your assertion. Generally, when characters train, they'd have mentors / teachers who would tell them such details, unlike Roy figuring out the Spellsplinter maneuver based on an unclear memory he had after being resurrected. Or it would arguably be part of their original education about their class: "When you get to be level [X] and can take feat [Y], you'll be able to do it N times per day." Roy's taking this feat isn't at all the usual process.

[Kish]

I don't think I understand the question because it looks like you're asking, "If 2+2 is 4, then does 2+2 = 4"? If Roy can do the Spellsplinter Maneuver X times then of course he can do the Spellsplinter Maneuver X times. Though "limit for using a feat" is also a confusing question. If you're starting from the premise that the Spellsplinter Maneuver lets Roy disrupt spells five times in his life, and after that he can swing his sword in the exact same way as many times as he likes but it will never do anything, that's completely different from the way any feat functions. (Some of the magical feats have an "X times per day" limit and I suppose a writer or DM might decide that Sudden Maximize comes with specific hand motions which cease to have effectiveness if its uses per day are used up...except no they couldn't, because it would say "adds a somatic component to the spell being maximized if it doesn't have one" if it meant that.)

[arimareiji]

If you're starting from the premise that the Spellsplinter Maneuver lets Roy disrupt spells five times in his life, and after that he can swing his sword in the exact same way as many times as he likes but it will never do anything, that's completely different from the way any feat functions.

"I don't understand, why doesn't anyone want to use this cool feat I wrote for the sourcebook?"
"Because they can only use it five times in their life, Fred."
"But they can keep trying anyway!"
"That… doesn't really make things better."

[bunsen_h]

I don't think I understand the question because it looks like you're asking, "If 2+2 is 4, then does 2+2 = 4"? If Roy can do the Spellsplinter Maneuver X times then of course he can do the Spellsplinter Maneuver X times. Though "limit for using a feat" is also a confusing question. If you're starting from the premise that the Spellsplinter Maneuver lets Roy disrupt spells five times in his life, and after that he can swing his sword in the exact same way as many times as he likes but it will never do anything, that's completely different from the way any feat functions. (Some of the magical feats have an "X times per day" limit and I suppose a writer or DM might decide that Sudden Maximize comes with specific hand motions which cease to have effectiveness if its uses per day are used up...except no they couldn't, because it would say "adds a somatic component to the spell being maximized if it doesn't have one" if it meant that.)

Does Roy know, in advance of using the maneuver N times, that he'll be able to use it that many times on that occasion? Does he know if there's a limit of, say, 5 uses per day if he hasn't ever tried a 6th time and had it not work because of the limit? Can he be confident, going into his first combat where he uses the maneuver, that he can pull it off as many times as he wants, or should he have some concern about conserving it for countering really bad enemy magic? He presumably will have been practising the physical moves, but it doesn't look like he's been trying it out in some kind of combat practise with Durkon where the latter has been using spells and Roy has been trying to disrupt them.

[Kish]

"You can have this feat but not know what it does" would be entirely in the realm of the DM making something up and thus not really be answerable except by Rich.

Though, as has been mentioned before, "This feat works a finite number of times per something" is in the realm of meta-metamagic feats like Sudden Maximize, as far as I know. Logic tells us no one can prove a negative but I haven't encountered a nonmagical feat that isn't either always on (like Leadership and Weapon Specialization) or at-will (like Cleave).

[Psyren]

I feel a bit uncomfortable asking this, but... source, please?

You're the one making the positive claim (that you believe Roy's technique has limited uses) and therefore you're the one that needs to support that claim with evidence. I'm not here to make your argument for you.

In light of that fact, my brief answer was meant to convey that we're at an impasse and I wasn't really interested in further attempts at convincing you of anything. I'm fine agreeing to disagree and moving on. Hopefully that's clearer.

(Also, what Kish said.)

[bunsen_h]

You're the one making the positive claim (that you believe Roy's technique has limited uses) and therefore you're the one that needs to support that claim with evidence. I'm not here to make your argument for you.

In light of that fact, my brief answer was meant to convey that we're at an impasse and I wasn't really interested in further attempts at convincing you of anything. I'm fine agreeing to disagree and moving on. Hopefully that's clearer.

(Also, what Kish said.)

The original question (https://forums.giantitp.com/showthread.php?p=26023032#post26023032) was "I'm wondering if Roy's spell splinter feat is limited in uses per day?" and you repeatedly asserted that it wasn't, based on it having worked four times (in the illusion). I don't have a strong opinion either way, but you're the one who was making the definite claim.

[danielxcutter]

I'm frankly not interested in Roy's ace in the hole suddenly having a limitation he wasn't aware of, especially how the deck is still heavily stacked against them. We've already got the IFCC for "we've decided to have you snatch defeat from the jaws of victory".

[Kish]

Considering the references to AD&D and stated unfamiliarity with feats, I think bunsen_h is going "Feat? What a strange, arcane thing. Can that be limited in uses? (someone references the Complete Arcane Sudden feats) Yes it can? Then Roy's feat is likely to be." whereas those of us who are used to thinking of 3.5ed as our default D&D setting are hearing "I think a core mechanic functions in a niche way here just because."

[danielxcutter]

Yeah the only reason that the Sudden X feats are limited is because they're literally free metamagic, so that'd be OP if it was unlimited. Most feats, especially martial ones, don't have any sort of use limit at all. Except for Martial Study I guess, but none of those work like the Splinterspell Maneuver in the first place.

[Shining Wrath]

With regards to how often Roy can use Spellsplinter, I'd expect there to be a maximum number of uses per round; in 3.5 getting more than one attack of opportunity per round required a feat, which I think had prerequisites (can't get to D20 SRD right now).

With regards to disrupting Calder's attempt to flee (given the dialogue, I think it is a safe assumption that he was attempting to exit stage left) - I think Elan would tell us that narratively, a villain who is not the main villain but who escapes vowing vengeance, has only a chance in a million of meeting the main villain and becoming an ally - that is, we should assume it is highly probable. :smallbiggrin:

[pendell]

So far as we can tell, we have no evidence that there are limited uses, so I will believe it is unlimited unless and until either Roy runs up against the limit or voices concern over a limit on-panel.

If Rich didn't explicitly answer the question one way or the other, I assume that it isn't going to be a factor in the outcome of the story, and therefore is irrelevant, since it's not going to be a plot point.

ETA: For that matter, the last time Xykon and Roy fought head to head, Spellsplinter wouldn't have been all that helpful. I'm talking about the battle above Azure City. Roy could have spellsplintered a finger of death xykon threw at him, but the next stage of the battle would still be Xykon using overland flight to escape from Roy, then using Meteor Swarm to first hit him, then knock him from the sky. I suppose the hit points from finger of death might have been the difference between single-digit alive and xs in the eyes, but the battle still would have had the same outcome: Roy on the ground while Xykon flies on into the tower to fight the Sapphire Guard.

Really, if you're playing a mage character and you let a high-level fighter get into melee range with you, you're doing something wrong.

Respectfully,

Brian P.

[Doug Lampert]

"You can have this feat but not know what it does" would be entirely in the realm of the DM making something up and thus not really be answerable except by Rich.

Though, as has been mentioned before, "This feat works a finite number of times per something" is in the realm of meta-metamagic feats like Sudden Maximize, as far as I know. Logic tells us no one can prove a negative but I haven't encountered a nonmagical feat that isn't either always on (like Leadership and Weapon Specialization) or at-will (like Cleave).

If I recall correctly: Stunning Fist and Extra Turning are the only X/day feats in core, and Stunning Fist is a melee combat maneuver.

I don't think that spell-splitter is limited in uses by anything but action economy, but it would not be unpreccedented for it to have a usage limit.

[Provengreil]

If Xykon is level 25 (guess), but getting no boost from ability scores, he's got 12 + 24*6.5 HP, or 168.
If Roy is level 16 and has a CON of 18, he's got 10 + 4 + 15*(5.5 + 4) HP, or 156.
Calder probably has 400 to 600 HP, depending on age.

Roughly equal, but that DR 15 matters a lot. If Roy was really optimized as a Xykon-killer, he'd have a maul, not a greatsword. Of course, maybe that's one of the yet-to-be revealed abilities of the ancestral weapon.

That's my expectation for the green fire, that in addition to some extra damage it cuts past DR on undead targets.

That is, IF the DR is even addressed: the Giant is almost certainly not keeping HP totals during fights, just keeping an eye on whether or not someone's continued survival is believable and how ragged they should look.

[danielxcutter]

With regards to how often Roy can use Spellsplinter, I'd expect there to be a maximum number of uses per round; in 3.5 getting more than one attack of opportunity per round required a feat, which I think had prerequisites (can't get to D20 SRD right now).

With regards to disrupting Calder's attempt to flee (given the dialogue, I think it is a safe assumption that he was attempting to exit stage left) - I think Elan would tell us that narratively, a villain who is not the main villain but who escapes vowing vengeance, has only a chance in a million of meeting the main villain and becoming an ally - that is, we should assume it is highly probable. :smallbiggrin:

Combat Reflexes only requires Dex 13. Roy's stats are quite well-rounded so I think it's plausible he has that.


So far as we can tell, we have no evidence that there are limited uses, so I will believe it is unlimited unless and until either Roy runs up against the limit or voices concern over a limit on-panel.

If Rich didn't explicitly answer the question one way or the other, I assume that it isn't going to be a factor in the outcome of the story, and therefore is irrelevant, since it's not going to be a plot point.

ETA: For that matter, the last time Xykon and Roy fought head to head, Spellsplinter wouldn't have been all that helpful. I'm talking about the battle above Azure City. Roy could have spellsplintered a finger of death xykon threw at him, but the next stage of the battle would still be Xykon using overland flight to escape from Roy, then using Meteor Swarm to first hit him, then knock him from the sky. I suppose the hit points from finger of death might have been the difference between single-digit alive and xs in the eyes, but the battle still would have had the same outcome: Roy on the ground while Xykon flies on into the tower to fight the Sapphire Guard.

Really, if you're playing a mage character and you let a high-level fighter get into melee range with you, you're doing something wrong.

Respectfully,

Brian P.

If you ask me, I'd say that's because Xykon is hilariously overleveled and hilariously overoptimized compared to most of the other characters in the comic. Like, I think he'd work in a legit 3.5e game as the final boss where the players haven't crippled their own builds.


If I recall correctly: Stunning Fist and Extra Turning are the only X/day feats in core, and Stunning Fist is a melee combat maneuver.

I don't think that spell-splitter is limited in uses by anything but action economy, but it would not be unprecedented for it to have a usage limit.

Yeah but Stunning Fist is mostly a Monk feat, and the developers purposely put trap options in to "reward system mastery".

[gbaji]

Question for you: Why should we see that? What does featuring all his "filler" attacks on-panel add to the narrative?
The important part of that fight is that every spell Xykon attempted got interrupted. Those are the narrative beats we need so they are shown front and center. Your assumption that those were the only attacks Roy made in that entire encounter is just that - an assumption.

Sure. If we only look at the Dream Xykon fight. And we can absolutely assume that we're only being shown the relevant bits (no one else seems to attack during that fight either), and the same "filler missing" applies in either direction (so doesn't really tell us anything about how the feat actually works). But I'm also taking into account the Durkon fight (starting here (https://www.giantitp.com/comics/oots1001.html). What do we see here:


Roy leaps down and attacks and hits Durkon, knocking Durkon down/back.
Roy presses the assault, attacking and hitting Durkon again.
Durkon swirly-eyes Roy.
Roy breaks free and attacks Durkon.
Durkon hits Roy with a hold person. Roy resists.
Roy full attacks Durkon. Hitting him 3 times (clanging on the shield) in one panel, then again in the next skewering Durkon.
Durkon hits Roy with an unnamed spell.
Roy hits Durkon back.
Durkon retreats a bit. Roy pursues into melee range but does not attack.
Durkon begins casting Destruction, Roy interrupts it with spellsplinter (which is commented on by the gallery).
Roy then attacks Durkon knocking him down again.
Durkon melee attacks Roy, getting him with energy drain
Roy pushes Durkon away from him. Durkon uses the range to cast flame strike on Roy.
Durkon flees, Roy pursues.
Durkon hits Roy with another energy drain.
Roy responds with a melee attack and pins Durkon with his sword.
Durkon mist forms away and taunts Roy for a while.
Durkon sneaks behind Roy in mist form, turns solid and casts harm. Roy hits Durkon during casting causing damage, but Durkon finishes the spell and hits Roy.
Durkon attemps to hit Roy with energy drain while he's on the ropes, and Roy goes full defense to avoid/block the attacks.
Durkon is conveniently distracted, giving Roy time to kick him off the balcony
Durkon casts Hel's Might and pursues Roy. Roy drinks a healing potion and gets hit a couple times (including what looks like another energy drain), while hitting Durkon once
Durkon swirly-eyes Roy. Roy breaks free again also activating a new ability with his sword (green glowy eyes) and hits Durkon with green glow attack.
Durkon falls off the balcony again, shirking to normal size.
Roy jumps down and hits him with green glowing attack again.
Durkon attemps to cast slay living, but Roy interrupts his spell (which looks like the spellsplinter again), while also striking Durkon (and with green glowing attack).
Roy then hits Durkon 3 more times in a row with green glowy attacks, ultimately knocking him back into a wall (then the green glow on him fades, leaving him seemingly fully healed/recovered).
Roy runs after Durkon. Durkon casts Anti-life Shell, ending the fight.


Now, sure we could also assume that lots of additional attacks were in there, but other than the very final surge of green glow attacks by Roy, it sure looked like Roy doing full round actions against Durkon resulted in Durkon casting a spell against him without any interruption. The first (and only absolutely confirmed) time he uses spellsplinter, he very clearly stops just trading rounds of actions against Durkon and times his attack to the spellcasting (at least that's very much what it looks like to me). We clearly see him do move/attack or full attack prior to that point, but never interrupts Durkon's casting while doing that. If it was an AoO thing, there were 2 or 3 points in the fight where he should have been able to use it, but nothing was shown to indicate it was even attempted.

The last time does seem a bit differernt. It *could* be defined as "move/attack on round one", then "AoO with spellsplinter, while doing a full attack on round two", but could also be "move/attack on round one", "delays and use spellsplinter to interrupt Durkon's spell and damage him more on round two", and "full attack on round three".

While we can certainly assume that not every single attack made in a combat is shown, one would assume that if something is shown, that the effects relevant to that thing shown would be shown as well. So Durkon, casting spells within melee range of Roy, is shown in the strip. If Roy can AoO this with his fancy new feat, not showing that each and every time it's possible to use it would seem... odd. Doubly odd since this is the very first time the audience gets to see this being used (for real) in the comic, but for some reason Rich waits until Durkon and Roy have been fighting for a few rounds, and Durkon has already cast two spells (both while in melee range and the feat should have been usable if that's how it worked).

Narratively, it looks like Roy was initially fighting Durkon like a fighter normally would (press the attack, try to keep the caster off-balance), and Durkon gets every spell off he tried. Then Roy shifts tactics and starts using Spellsplinter and disrupting Durkon's casts. This forces Durkon to change to using special abilities (gaze and energy drains), and only casts spells if he's first got distance or surprise from that point on.

I believe there are at least two (possibly three, but kinda hard to tell) sequences where, if the feat worked off an AoO, it should have activated but didn't, while only one point in the entire combat where it's possible we're being shown him using it while also doing a full attack (but could also *not* be that, depending on where we put the round boundaries, and especially if we assume that Roy has higher initiative in this combat).



And if you don't mind me poking a hole in that assumption, let me put this to you another way - do you honestly think Roy brought an Epic Lich from full health to zero in just 4 swings? Especially when we saw him fail to do so before? (https://www.giantitp.com/comics/oots0442.html)

Again. Dream sequence. We also don't see anyone else attack either, despite that portion of the fight presumably taking 4 rounds. Redcloak is in a box, yet Haley and V literally stand there doing nothing for four rounds? I think it's fair to take that entire thing with a massive grain of salt. That was Roy's fantasy fight against Xykon.



Considering the references to AD&D and stated unfamiliarity with feats, I think bunsen_h is going "Feat? What a strange, arcane thing. Can that be limited in uses? (someone references the Complete Arcane Sudden feats) Yes it can? Then Roy's feat is likely to be." whereas those of us who are used to thinking of 3.5ed as our default D&D setting are hearing "I think a core mechanic functions in a niche way here just because."

I actually got the main question not really being "does the feat have limited uses?", but "if the feat does have limited uses, would Roy know this, and if so, how?". That was also based on the idea that when practicing the move, one presumably isn't actually interrupting a spell being cast, and thus would not consume a use of the feat (again, if it does have X/day uses). That's what the comment about Roy saying "It... it worked!" was about. He'd literally never actually used it to disrupt a spell prior to that point (well, and really hadn't yet then either). So... unless it comes with an instruction manual, how would someone "in game" know this?

At least that's more of the angle on this I was looking at. Honestly, I would assume that it does not have a use limit. But the question of "if it does, how woud he know how many uses it has" is relevant (well, for some degrees of relevancy/pedantry I suppose).

[Quizatzhaderac]

Would Roy necessarily know how many times he was able to use the maneuver, prior to discovering the limit empirically?

I've never made a pound cake, but I'm exceeding confident it's finally weight is a little less than four pounds. Because my model of chemistry/cooking tells me ingredients are four pounds exactly and a little water will be lost to evaporation during baking. For some things it's just ridiculous to require direct personal experience of that very specific case.


IIRC people aren't supposed to remember their their time between death and resurrection.The thing is, he doesn't remember the time (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Episodic_memory) at all. Roy's semantic memory can all have as many details of the maneuver he wants. Even if he just knew the bar minimum, he has context to put the maneuver into.

Roy is educated and the theory of how martial attacks work, as well as more of the theory of magic than any non-caster. It's not strange for him to know the exact physical requirements for a caster to cast (somatic motions, obstructions, metals on the caster).


Roy understands how spellsplinter works and it's not using any resources any other sword strike uses (his physical muscles). The unknowns are his opponent/ opponent's spell, not Roy himself.

[Kish]

If I recall correctly: Stunning Fist and Extra Turning are the only X/day feats in core, and Stunning Fist is a melee combat maneuver.

I don't think that spell-splitter is limited in uses by anything but action economy, but it would not be unpreccedented for it to have a usage limit.
I stand corrected. Stunning Fist is indeed a perfect example, completely core as well. Should Rich want to do "actually Roy can only Spellsplinter Maneuver X times per day" there would be even less stopping him than there usually is.

[arimareiji]

I stand corrected. Stunning Fist is indeed a perfect example, completely core as well. Should Rich want to do "actually Roy can only Spellsplinter Maneuver X times per day" there would be even less stopping him than there usually is.
Indeed. :smallbiggrin:

Captain Kirk: "Computer, calculate the ratio of how much the Giant cares about crafting a good story to how much he cares about exactly following the rules when they get in the way."
Computer: *frustrated electronic noises and smoke*

https://y.yarn.co/5f9a3a6e-e569-4a3d-b718-3b5013eb13db_200_10.gif

[brian 333]

Indeed. :smallbiggrin:

Captain Kirk: "Computer, calculate the ratio of how much the Giant cares about crafting a good story to how much he cares about exactly following the rules when they get in the way."
Computer: *frustrated electronic noises and smoke*

https://y.yarn.co/5f9a3a6e-e569-4a3d-b718-3b5013eb13db_200_10.gif

I wish I had thought of that. That's funny, right there!

I will point out that The Author is very well versed in Knowledge, (D&D ruled, expansions, errata, and third party content.) Time and again we have discovered that only a very small handful of actual examples of him ignoring the rules exist. In most of those cases it's for something funny.

[arimareiji]

I wish I had thought of that. That's funny, right there!

I will point out that The Author is very well versed in Knowledge, (D&D ruled, expansions, errata, and third party content.) Time and again we have discovered that only a very small handful of actual examples of him ignoring the rules exist. In most of those cases it's for something funny.

Thank you. (^_^)

And agreed. I'd take serious exception to the wording I gave Kirk, if it didn't include "when they get in the way".

One of the quickest ways to jar a reader out of immersion in your story is to lose internal consistency. People can accept a story in which male zombies can transform into magical girls and pilot giant robots as 'realistic'... but not if suddenly they can't transform for no logical reason except "the plotline demands it". It's one of the key reasons that as an English teacher put it decades ago, "You have to understand the rules pretty well, before you can truly understand when it's safe to break them."

[Tarjei]

Calder has realized that he's not going to win this fight, but in draconic fashion, he's framing fleeing in terror as mere prudence.

And Roy is right, there's no sense in finding out the hard way that Calder can do something that Serini didn't expect.

Now, is this foreshadowing that Xykon will be able to evade the teleport counters? If so, wouldn't we have seen it already?

But maybe it won't be Xykon who can teleport through Serini's dungeon. Maybe it will be MitD ... who has powers we wot not, and which also he fails to wot.

Having both wings bitten at the same time probably does keep Calder on the ground where the entire Order can pound on him. I expect Paladin reinforcements in a strip or three. Also, that's gotta hurt.

I'm seeing this different.

Calder gets insulted in the worst way imaginable for a dragon. He dies.

Order goes on to do questy stuff and proceeds towards the final gate.

Meanwhile Xykon, Redcloak & Company catch up. The Paladins eventually catch up to Team Evil and the Thing under the Umbrella gets left behind to deal with the Paladins. Queue emotional stuff.

Xykon - miffed that his "ultimate weapon" got left behind soon runs into dead Calder. Calder gets turned into an undead monstrosity - probably a thinking one that retains it's past memories. Now Xykon has a new ultimate weapon to replace the Umbrella Monster. Also after the paladins (and maybe the thing) catch up again the paladins will have no qualms attacking THIS version of Calder, seeing how he's essentially an abomination now.

Let's see what actually happens! ;)

[danielxcutter]

Considering that the entire Order saw Xykon riding a zombie dragon during the Battle of Azure City, I find it very unlikely they'll leave Calder's corpse behind for him to reanimate.

[Shining Wrath]

Considering that the entire Order saw Xykon riding a zombie dragon during the Battle of Azure City, I find it very unlikely they'll leave Calder's corpse behind for him to reanimate.

It is difficult to eliminate an entire dragon corpse except with Disintegrate. Will V want to burn that spell slot just on the off chance Xykon might come through this way (which is not on the path to the Gate)?

[danielxcutter]

Well they've got two days until Team Evil gets access to the dungeon, so yes. Especially since most of the monsters here seem geared towards "physically weak but obnoxious gimmicks" and even the exceptions all seem significantly less beefier than Calder.

[elecampane]

It is difficult to eliminate an entire dragon corpse except with Disintegrate. Will V want to burn that spell slot just on the off chance Xykon might come through this way (which is not on the path to the Gate)?

If only they had a friendly floating eyeball that can use disintegrate ray (also known as #8 (https://www.giantitp.com/comics/oots1246.html)) at will

[Quizatzhaderac]

If only they had a friendly floating eyeball that can use disintegrate ray (also known as #8 (https://www.giantitp.com/comics/oots1246.html)) at willThe dragon's name is Calder, not Will.

[bunsen_h]

I actually got the main question not really being "does the feat have limited uses?", but "if the feat does have limited uses, would Roy know this, and if so, how?". That was also based on the idea that when practicing the move, one presumably isn't actually interrupting a spell being cast, and thus would not consume a use of the feat (again, if it does have X/day uses). That's what the comment about Roy saying "It... it worked!" was about. He'd literally never actually used it to disrupt a spell prior to that point (well, and really hadn't yet then either). So... unless it comes with an instruction manual, how would someone "in game" know this?

Part of what makes the dream sequence weird for me is the implication that Roy was somewhat surprised that the maneuver worked... that he'd never used it for real previously. It's tactically unsound to haul out an untested move in a big fight, where its failure would have terrible consequences. Roy ought to have been practising the move against Durkon, in some kind of combat work-out. (Do D&D fighters do fighter practise? All of the SCA fighters I know do, to keep in shape and to keep their skills up. Real-world fighters gain the equivalent of XP from their practise sessions, but I'm assuming that D&D fighters don't.)

Roy used the maneuver successfully, for real (https://www.giantitp.com/comics/oots0928.html), only a short time after the phantasm trap. I'd been thinking that he hadn't mastered it, in practise with Durkon, prior to the dream sequence, then did more training and figured it out before using it for real. But that can't be the case.

[Peelee]

Roy used the maneuver successfully, for real (https://www.giantitp.com/comics/oots0928.html), only a short time after the phantasm trap.

Did he? Damage can disrupt casting (eg panel 2 (https://www.giantitp.com/comics/oots0652.html)) generally, and there's nothing specific in 928 to indicate it's the maneuver.

[gbaji]

Part of what makes the dream sequence weird for me is the implication that Roy was somewhat surprised that the maneuver worked... that he'd never used it for real previously. It's tactically unsound to haul out an untested move in a big fight, where its failure would have terrible consequences. Roy ought to have been practising the move against Durkon, in some kind of combat work-out. (Do D&D fighters do fighter practise? All of the SCA fighters I know do, to keep in shape and to keep their skills up. Real-world fighters gain the equivalent of XP from their practise sessions, but I'm assuming that D&D fighters don't.)

Yeah. It is strange that he never seems to have actually practiced with it against an actual spellcaster. Unfortunately, this is just one of those "game mechanics trump in-game realism" things. Characters gain a level and then just magically gain whatever new abilities those levels provide. If it's a feat, they go from "have zero chance to do this" to "I can do this as well as I ever will be able to, and know every detail about how it works".


I'd been thinking that he hadn't mastered it, in practise with Durkon, prior to the dream sequence, then did more training and figured it out before using it for real. But that can't be the case.

The rules assume that this is the case, that the character has actually been practicing whatever new "thing" they gain along the way (see Elan's conversation with V about this here (https://www.giantitp.com/comics/oots0126.html)). And we would normally assume this, and perhaps could assume this with Roy. There was presumably some time period between when Roy was resurrected and when he gained his next level. So there should have been time for him to have been "practicing" the move he vaguely remembered his grandfather showing him in the afterlife until he regained his lost level and could take it as a feat. It's possible that he did actually practice it, but clearly not with Durkon (https://www.giantitp.com/comics/oots1003.html). Durkon comments that he "wasn't sure it would be effective against divine magic", which suggests that he knew about the feat that Roy had, but that he and Roy had never actually tested it out.

Which seems somewhat odd. Roy was practicing this move, talked about it (at least to Durkon), but never actually practiced using it? Or maybe he did, but only with V? I would have thought Durkon would want to practice it with Roy, if for no other reason that to know for sure whether it would work against divine magic ahead of a potential fight with Roy. Unless maybe the feat was taken before Durkon's vampirization and Roy had practiced with it before then? Dunno. Timing is really tricky for that to have been the case though, so maybe we just go with "he never actually practiced using it with an actual spellcaster".

Which puts us back to "that's strange". How do you practice using a combat move that requires timing your strike to the spell energy building up to whatever, without maybe having a spellcaster to assist with learning when that is? It's kinda like learning how to shoot more accurately by doing target practice, but without any actual targets ("I'm quite certain that shot would have been closer to where I would have been aiming than the last ones, so I must be getting better!"). I'm stil pretty firmly in the "it doesn't have per-day uses" camp, so that's not really as much of an issue IMO. And I even get the reason for Durkon and Roy not testing this (it allowed for Durkon and Roy's fight to show the feat in use. In front of specators even). And in a fun twist, it's kind of Rich using the ambiguity and oddness of the rules to his benefit storytelling wise. It's "assumed you practiced", but apparently that assumed past practice doesn't involve actual practice that other people (like Durkon) would have first hand experience with. So... evil vamp kept in the dark due to odd rules loopholes. Foiled again!

[pendell]

Which puts us back to "that's strange". How do you practice using a combat move that requires timing your strike to the spell energy building up to whatever, without maybe having a spellcaster to assist with learning when that is? It's kinda like learning how to shoot more accurately by doing target practice, but without any actual targets ("I'm quite certain that shot would have been closer to where I would have been aiming than the last ones, so I must be getting better!"). I'm stil pretty firmly in the "it doesn't have per-day uses" camp, so that's not really as much of an issue IMO. And I even get the reason for Durkon and Roy not testing this (it allowed for Durkon and Roy's fight to show the feat in use. In front of specators even). And in a fun twist, it's kind of Rich using the ambiguity and oddness of the rules to his benefit storytelling wise. It's "assumed you practiced", but apparently that assumed past practice doesn't involve actual practice that other people (like Durkon) would have first hand experience with. So... evil vamp kept in the dark due to odd rules loopholes. Foiled again!


A missed opportunity , in my view. Roy has a sister who is a spell caster and they could have perfected the feat together; it would have been a neat bonding and character-building moment. Ah well.

Respectfully,

Brian P.

[brian 333]

I retroactively assume that Roy practiced with Vaarsuvius along the way and the reason we never saw it on panel was that he didn't. But I retroactively assume he did.

[arimareiji]

I retroactively assume that Roy practiced with Vaarsuvius along the way and the reason we never saw it on panel was that he didn't. But I retroactively assume he did.

Thor help us, please don't say we're going to get a Royanalicus comic... XD

[bunsen_h]

"I'm quite certain that shot would have been closer to where I would have been aiming than the last ones, so I must be getting better!"

"I'm glad I can just pull my arrows out of thin air, rather than having to collect them between rounds of practise!"

[KorvinStarmast]

Considering that the entire Order saw Xykon riding a zombie dragon during the Battle of Azure City, I find it very unlikely they'll leave Calder's corpse behind for him to reanimate. Correct.

It is difficult to eliminate an entire dragon corpse except with Disintegrate. Will V want to burn that spell slot just on the off chance Xykon might come through this way (which is not on the path to the Gate)? "Say Disintegrate one more time, Vaarsuvius. For me." (https://www.giantitp.com/comics/oots0626.html) :smallcool:

[Taragorn]

Does Roy know, in advance of using the maneuver N times, that he'll be able to use it that many times on that occasion? Does he know if there's a limit of, say, 5 uses per day if he hasn't ever tried a 6th time and had it not work because of the limit? Can he be confident, going into his first combat where he uses the maneuver, that he can pull it off as many times as he wants, or should he have some concern about conserving it for countering really bad enemy magic? He presumably will have been practising the physical moves, but it doesn't look like he's been trying it out in some kind of combat practise with Durkon where the latter has been using spells and Roy has been trying to disrupt them.

That's probably because it requires Durkon to actually use a spell slot trying to cast. and Roy to actually try to hurt him with a sword. It's only been a few days max since Durkon became human again and Roy has had much of a chance to try that. All of those days involved the possibility of violence and they wouldn't want to be down 5 (10? More?) Spell slots, hit points, the feats themselves, experimenting. Not to mention physically splitting open the skin muscle and bone of your friend so you can find out how something works is generally something people don't do.

As for leaving Calder's corpse behind, and the likelihood of Team Evil finding it, Team Evil isnt on the path to the gate, They are on a brute force check of all doors. They are doing it faster now, but they are still just wandering methodically. The chance of them finding it is pretty good, but at least its not one in a million (https://www.giantitp.com/comics/oots0584.html).

[bunsen_h]

That's probably because it requires Durkon to actually use a spell slot trying to cast. and Roy to actually try to hurt him with a sword. It's only been a few days max since Durkon became human again and Roy has had much of a chance to try that. All of those days involved the possibility of violence and they wouldn't want to be down 5 (10? More?) Spell slots, hit points, the feats themselves, experimenting. Not to mention physically splitting open the skin muscle and bone of your friend so you can find out how something works is generally something people don't do.

Fighter training is usually done with blunted weapons, or simulated weapons (e.g. wooden swords). Fighters do it regularly, to train up and to stay in shape. One collects bruises but, if it's done properly, no significant damage. (It always seemed weird to me to see the SCA fighters bragging about their bruise collections. My best guess was that it was a kind of bragging: "look how tough I am!" rather than "I'm not that good at defensive fighting".) And Durkon could be using his 0-level slots for much of the training, not much of a loss.

EDIT:

Yeah. It is strange that he never seems to have actually practiced with it against an actual spellcaster. Unfortunately, this is just one of those "game mechanics trump in-game realism" things. Characters gain a level and then just magically gain whatever new abilities those levels provide. If it's a feat, they go from "have zero chance to do this" to "I can do this as well as I ever will be able to, and know every detail about how it works".

See also: Roy trying to figure out (https://www.giantitp.com/comics/oots1045.html) how to unlock the special abilities of his sword, knowing that there are powers, but not what they are nor how to activate them.

[arimareiji]

(It always seemed weird to me to see the SCA fighters bragging about their bruise collections. My best guess was that it was a kind of bragging: "look how tough I am!" rather than "I'm not that good at defensive fighting".)

You reminded me of Joe West's finest moment as an umpire (https://www.tiktok.com/@elitedingers/video/7282576657066609966): Flexing to show how tough he was, when he was too everything to get out of the way of a foul ball.

[gbaji]

That's probably because it requires Durkon to actually use a spell slot trying to cast. and Roy to actually try to hurt him with a sword. It's only been a few days max since Durkon became human again and Roy has had much of a chance to try that. All of those days involved the possibility of violence and they wouldn't want to be down 5 (10? More?) Spell slots, hit points, the feats themselves, experimenting. Not to mention physically splitting open the skin muscle and bone of your friend so you can find out how something works is generally something people don't do.

It's unclear when Roy actually took the feat. He imagines using it in the illusion, so I'm assuming he leveled up somewhere along "fighting slavers in the desert", "dealing with the worm", "finding the wrong gate address", "getting into a barfight", "gladiator training", "defeating thog" (my personal bet), "first fight/retreat with the linear guild", and "leading a successful ambush in the pyramid". Where exactly, is impossible to say, but it presuambly happened *before* Durkon became a vampire. So it's not about the time Durkon has been since becoming human (dwarf?) again, but how much time he had prior to Durkon becoming a vampire in the first place.

They didn't have a ton of time in there though. But here's the thing. Durkon later seems to know about the feat (at the godsmote), so he and Roy must have discussed it at some point. Again though, the timeline is tricky to try to nail down. But I would have guessed that they did have time on the airship to practice this if they wanted. Might have had time while travelling through the desert (before meeting Tarquin), as well. But yeah, if he leveled up in the Thog fight, there was not really any time prior to Durkon's vampification that Roy and any of the spellcasters could have practiced it. Afterwards, he could have practiced with either V or Durkon while on the airship though. But takes me back to "Durkon was a vamp then, and clearly would have benefited from knowing whether it worked against divine magic, so why not practice with Roy then to find out?".

I guess the storytelling reason was "but then we would not have a dramatic use of it while in the big Durkon/Roy fight, with the gallery watching them". So... either Roy never actually practiced it, or he practiced it with V, but not Durkon for some reason (which would also explain why Durkon would know it works against arcane magic, but not divine... I guess). We do know that they had a 10 day journey to go, 8 if the world depended on it, and could shave off two additional days if they got permission from the Elves to use their airspace. So... that still leaves us with a minimum of 6 days travel. Of course, then they hit a storm, and had to detour to the gnomes for repairs, and then detour again the the godsmoot, and then again to Firmament, so it's unclear how much actual time was expended where. But there should have been a day or three in there to practice this if he wanted to. I mean, Durkon had enough time to get Belkar to jump off the ship at least twice during all of this, so there was clearly a fair amount of idle time involved.

And, of course, they had two days travel from Firmament to Kraagar's gate, so Roy certainly had enough time after devamping Durkon to have practiced this enough to know if it had per-day uses, and if so, how many. But I was more going with the "what did he know about this prior to the Durkon/Roy fight at the godsmoot?" question.


As for leaving Calder's corpse behind, and the likelihood of Team Evil finding it, Team Evil isnt on the path to the gate, They are on a brute force check of all doors. They are doing it faster now, but they are still just wandering methodically. The chance of them finding it is pretty good, but at least its not one in a million (https://www.giantitp.com/comics/oots0584.html).

The chance of them finding it are zero, unless Calder flees into the dungeon, triggers a bunch of traps and is killed by something other than the Order.

If the Order kills Calder, they will disintegrate the body. There's literally zero reason not to, and they know exactly what Xykon would do with the corpse if it's found.

[brian 333]

Fighter training is usually done with blunted weapons, or simulated weapons (e.g. wooden swords). Fighters do it regularly, to train up and to stay in shape. One collects bruises but, if it's done properly, no significant damage. (It always seemed weird to me to see the SCA fighters bragging about their bruise collections. My best guess was that it was a kind of bragging: "look how tough I am!" rather than "I'm not that good at defensive fighting".) And Durkon could be using his 0-level slots for much of the training, not much of a loss.

EDIT:


See also: Roy trying to figure out (https://www.giantitp.com/comics/oots1045.html) how to unlock the special abilities of his sword, knowing that there are powers, but not what they are nor how to activate them.


You reminded me of Joe West's finest moment as an umpire (https://www.tiktok.com/@elitedingers/video/7282576657066609966): Flexing to show how tough he was, when he was too everything to get out of the way of a foul ball.

Combat training of any kind involves bruises and bragging. The difference between training and the real thing is, training leaves you with a bruise you can brag about while swordfighting leaves you with the nickname "Lefty."

While it is not shown that Roy practiced, Horace did say that he would have to. It is unreasonable to think he did not. He had both Durkon and V to aid him, both of whom could benefit from the knowledge they would receive by doing so.

[The MunchKING]

I retroactively assume that Roy practiced with Vaarsuvius along the way and the reason we never saw it on panel was that he didn't. But I retroactively assume he did.

I assumed he DIDN'T practice with Vaarsuvius because he didn't want to put a Greatsword through her chest. (https://www.giantitp.com/comics/oots0600.html) And the feat doesn't disrupt the spell unless it lands kind of thing.

[brian 333]

In panel 6 (https://www.giantitp.com/comics/oots1303.html) it appears that Roy avoids actually striking the dragon and instead 'hits' the magical field developing around Calder's hand. It does not appear that actually striking the caster is necessary for Spellsplinter to work.

[bunsen_h]

While it is not shown that Roy practiced, Horace did say that he would have to. It is unreasonable to think he did not. He had both Durkon and V to aid him, both of whom could benefit from the knowledge they would receive by doing so.

And now I may have to back off on my concerns, because Roy apparently learned the maneuver just by attacking a dummy (https://www.giantitp.com/comics/oots0600.html). Hmm.


In panel 6 (https://www.giantitp.com/comics/oots1303.html) it appears that Roy avoids actually striking the dragon and instead 'hits' the magical field developing around Calder's hand. It does not appear that actually striking the caster is necessary for Spellsplinter to work.

That's a bit hard to be sure about. Xykon is definitely collecting damage in the dream sequence, for what it's worth. And it does look like Roy struck Miron, though as Peelee points out, it's not certain that Roy used the maneuver there.

[arimareiji]

And now I may have to back off on my concerns, because Roy apparently learned the maneuver just by attacking a dummy (https://www.giantitp.com/comics/oots0600.html). Hmm.

Well, Xykon IS a sorceror. (^_~)

[The MunchKING]

In panel 6 (https://www.giantitp.com/comics/oots1303.html) it appears that Roy avoids actually striking the dragon and instead 'hits' the magical field developing around Calder's hand. It does not appear that actually striking the caster is necessary for Spellsplinter to work.

I was interpreting that as smacking the hand with his fancy twirl, but looking at it again I can see where your take would also be a valid interpretation.

[Precure]

Xykon is a dummy.

[Shining Wrath]

It is plausible that Spell Splinter attacks the spell (it's in the name, after all) but if the sword happens to impact the caster, well, frosting on the cake.

[F.Harr]

If they ignore it, it will return.

[Taragorn]

It's unclear when Roy actually took the feat. He imagines using it in the illusion, so I'm assuming he leveled up somewhere along "fighting slavers in the desert", "dealing with the worm", "finding the wrong gate address", "getting into a barfight", "gladiator training", "defeating thog" (my personal bet), "first fight/retreat with the linear guild", and "leading a successful ambush in the pyramid". Where exactly, is impossible to say, but it presuambly happened *before* Durkon became a vampire. So it's not about the time Durkon has been since becoming human (dwarf?) again, but how much time he had prior to Durkon becoming a vampire in the first place.

They didn't have a ton of time in there though. But here's the thing. Durkon later seems to know about the feat (at the godsmote), so he and Roy must have discussed it at some point. Again though, the timeline is tricky to try to nail down. But I would have guessed that they did have time on the airship to practice this if they wanted. Might have had time while travelling through the desert (before meeting Tarquin), as well. But yeah, if he leveled up in the Thog fight, there was not really any time prior to Durkon's vampification that Roy and any of the spellcasters could have practiced it. Afterwards, he could have practiced with either V or Durkon while on the airship though. But takes me back to "Durkon was a vamp then, and clearly would have benefited from knowing whether it worked against divine magic, so why not practice with Roy then to find out?".

I guess the storytelling reason was "but then we would not have a dramatic use of it while in the big Durkon/Roy fight, with the gallery watching them". So... either Roy never actually practiced it, or he practiced it with V, but not Durkon for some reason (which would also explain why Durkon would know it works against arcane magic, but not divine... I guess). We do know that they had a 10 day journey to go, 8 if the world depended on it, and could shave off two additional days if they got permission from the Elves to use their airspace. So... that still leaves us with a minimum of 6 days travel. Of course, then they hit a storm, and had to detour to the gnomes for repairs, and then detour again the the godsmoot, and then again to Firmament, so it's unclear how much actual time was expended where. But there should have been a day or three in there to practice this if he wanted to. I mean, Durkon had enough time to get Belkar to jump off the ship at least twice during all of this, so there was clearly a fair amount of idle time involved.

And, of course, they had two days travel from Firmament to Kraagar's gate, so Roy certainly had enough time after devamping Durkon to have practiced this enough to know if it had per-day uses, and if so, how many. But I was more going with the "what did he know about this prior to the Durkon/Roy fight at the godsmoot?" question.


The chance of them finding it are zero, unless Calder flees into the dungeon, triggers a bunch of traps and is killed by something other than the Order.

If the Order kills Calder, they will disintegrate the body. There's literally zero reason not to, and they know exactly what Xykon would do with the corpse if it's found.


I think that the fight at the godsmoot is proof they never practiced it as Durkon didn't know if it would work on divine magic. Since then they have been in a fight for the world. Yes they had two days as they approached Kragor's gate, but they are approaching the fight of thier lives and I'm guessing they stayed at high readiness for what ever took out thier missing paladins, Xykon on patrol, etc. My headcannon for the spellsplinter feat is that you can practice the move all you want, but to actually try breaking a spell you need to stick them with the sword. That means to find out if there's a daily limit you need to keep hurting your friend. Even if they have heals, that's rough. Plus does it matter if its a level 8 spell vs a level 1 one? Better try them all, don't forget the heal slots to repair yourself, etc. That's a lot of resources when Team Evil is running around, your scout paladins have vanished, etc. Plus they know that few feats have daily limits, so why look for something that may not exist. So far its worked (even if it might have been resisted once) each time that he's tried to do it. He hasnt run out yet, so he doesn't have much reason to go looking for a rule that probably doesn't exist.

[Psyren]

The original question (https://forums.giantitp.com/showthread.php?p=26023032#post26023032) was "I'm wondering if Roy's spell splinter feat is limited in uses per day?" and you repeatedly asserted that it wasn't, based on it having worked four times (in the illusion). I don't have a strong opinion either way, but you're the one who was making the definite claim.

My definite claim (https://forums.giantitp.com/showthread.php?668156-OOTS-1303-The-Discussion-Thread&p=26023073&viewfull=1#post26023073) was "at least four" - not "unlimited." You then proceeded to put a bunch of words in my mouth, along with some baseless claims.

[Kardwill]

If the Order kills Calder, they will disintegrate the body. There's literally zero reason not to, and they know exactly what Xykon would do with the corpse if it's found.

Would it be a big deal, though? I mean, a Colossal zombie is just a big, slow bunch of HP with a moderate attack. And Xykon has been dungeoneering for days (weeks), and has access to a lot of monster corpse to reanimate.
I'm probably missing something, but would undead-Calder make such a difference in Xykon's arsenal?

It doesn't mean they won't disintegrate him just to be sure and to avoid Xykon getting a "speak with dead" infodump, of course.

(Calder raised from the dead would be another story, though. But I don't see Team Evil doing such a thing.)

[brian 333]

I think that the fight at the godsmoot is proof they never practiced it as Durkon didn't know if it would work on divine magic. Since then they have been in a fight for the world. Yes they had two days as they approached Kragor's gate, but they are approaching the fight of thier lives and I'm guessing they stayed at high readiness for what ever took out thier missing paladins, Xykon on patrol, etc. My headcannon for the spellsplinter feat is that you can practice the move all you want, but to actually try breaking a spell you need to stick them with the sword. That means to find out if there's a daily limit you need to keep hurting your friend. Even if they have heals, that's rough. Plus does it matter if its a level 8 spell vs a level 1 one? Better try them all, don't forget the heal slots to repair yourself, etc. That's a lot of resources when Team Evil is running around, your scout paladins have vanished, etc. Plus they know that few feats have daily limits, so why look for something that may not exist. So far its worked (even if it might have been resisted once) each time that he's tried to do it. He hasnt run out yet, so he doesn't have much reason to go looking for a rule that probably doesn't exist.

I quibble with the bolded part. In this comic we see Spellsplinter work, but no damage inflicted on the caster.

As for when he practiced, I suppose the theory is that if we didn't see it on panel it never happened. In which case, The Order never eats breakfast, Durkon never calls his mommy, and Belkar never farts in public spaces. I'm betting that as a Lawful Fighter, Roy has a daily workout routine that we never see on panel because it would be boring. Sure, you may enjoy going to the gym and watching physically fit humans exert themselves in physically demanding ways, but I would not expect the majority of comic readers to have that interest.

[Quizatzhaderac]

It always seemed weird to me to see the SCA fighters bragging about their bruise collections. My best guess was that it was a kind of bragging: "look how tough I am!" rather than "I'm not that good at defensive fighting".It's not reasonable to expect to be good at something from the start, and typically getting good at a thing involves doing it badly at first. And even if one is already good, one isn't perfect and frequent and intensive training will still leave bruises.

Without actually meeting them, I'd SCA/HEMA values improvement above absolute skill. If a group want to retain new members a culture of improvement enables the group to validate new members that aren't good, but are trying. Absolute skill isn't directly important since nobody is going off to die in battle or fight million dollar prize matches.

Would it be a big deal, though? I mean, a Colossal zombie is just a big, slow bunch of HP with a moderate attack. And Xykon has been dungeoneering for days (weeks), and has access to a lot of monster corpse to reanimate.
I'm probably missing something, but would undead-Calder make such a difference in Xykon's arsenal?Most of those monsters are too visually complex to reanimate properly.

Zombie dragons also have damage reduction, although the order doesn't seem to be struggling with that now.

[No good @ names]

Most of those monsters are too visually complex to reanimate properly.

They’re animated now?


Alas, poor Sir Thumb, I’m not sure he’d be able to manage that! Unless he has an army of digit knights!

[arimareiji]

They’re animated now?


Alas, poor Sir Thumb, I’m not sure he’d be able to manage that! Unless he has an army of digit knights! [emphasis added]

Now I have a great idea for the name of a CGI-special-effects production company…

[Peelee]

Now I have a great idea for the name of a CGI-special-effects production company…

I think it's better for a GGI-practical-effects company.

[arimareiji]

I think it's better for a GGI-practical-effects company.

Gaming Genre Influencer?

(The degree of "micro" and "actions per second" the top StarCraft players can generate blows my mind. My thoughts don't move that fast, let alone my fingers. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UaAp2XDY-MM )

[KorvinStarmast]

(The degree of "micro" and "actions per second" the top StarCraft players can generate blows my mind. ) Mine as well. I have slowed down a bit, but even at my best I could not keep up so now I just play versus the PC. :smallcool:

[brian 333]

Best use is for a K-Pop boy dance band. I wonder if The Giant thought about copyrighting Digit Knight?

Kwan And The Digit Knights
The Superb Digit Knights
The Digit Knights With Analog Dae

[Atomburster]

Didn't Serini just teleport around earlier?

https://www.giantitp.com/comics/oots1295.html

[Doctor West]

Yes, short teleports are still possible as long as they don't cross through the dimensional stone walls. Calder probably did not intend to make a short trip if he was using Greater Teleport though.

[Provengreil]

Yes, short teleports are still possible as long as they don't cross through the dimensional stone walls. Calder probably did not intend to make a short trip if he was using Greater Teleport though.

Yeah, it's extremely unlikely he's familiar with the nature of the stone. He probably would have been stymied.

I don't blame Roy for going for the Spellsplinter though. This is rapidly turning against Calder, what with Bloodfeast constantly getting him into grapples. Keeping the dragon shut down is probably more effective at this moment than laying on extra dps, and he probably couldn't know what spell was gonna be cast before splintering it (I'm on the "needs a readied action camp: Roy in panels 4 and 6 is moving in a way inconsistent with the other full attack or standard attack actions in this fight and others).

[Unoriginal]

Yes, short teleports are still possible as long as they don't cross through the dimensional stone walls. Calder probably did not intend to make a short trip if he was using Greater Teleport though.

Why not? Greater Teleport doesn't just let you travel far, it let you teleport without any risk and to places you've never seen.

Even teleporting a couple rooms away would be enough of a lead to make it difficult for the humanoids to catch him again.

[Provengreil]

Why not? Greater Teleport doesn't just let you travel far, it let you teleport without any risk and to places you've never seen.

Even teleporting a couple rooms away would be enough of a lead to make it difficult for the humanoids to catch him again.

I think it comes down to how much Calder knows about the dungeon, which we can't possibly answer with current information. Does he know about the dimensional stone? If so, does he know a way out? Is there even a way out for someone his size without the party catching back up? If nothing else, someone like him would probably recognize that a dungeon like this is likely to impede him, so I'm inclined to agree that he was going for the longer shot.

[Peelee]

Why not? Greater Teleport doesn't just let you travel far, it let you teleport without any risk and to places you've never seen.

Even teleporting a couple rooms away would be enough of a lead to make it difficult for the humanoids to catch him again.

And where would he go? If he doesn't know the layout, then the whole thing is just as much a maze for him as it is for everyone else. If he does know the layout, then a regular teleport can get him to the entrance. I don't see any reason for Greater Teleport in this scenario other than range.

[Taragorn]

I quibble with the bolded part. In this comic we see Spellsplinter work, but no damage inflicted on the caster.

As for when he practiced, I suppose the theory is that if we didn't see it on panel it never happened. In which case, The Order never eats breakfast, Durkon never calls his mommy, and Belkar never farts in public spaces. I'm betting that as a Lawful Fighter, Roy has a daily workout routine that we never see on panel because it would be boring. Sure, you may enjoy going to the gym and watching physically fit humans exert themselves in physically demanding ways, but I would not expect the majority of comic readers to have that interest.

I'm not sure where you got that I was staying "they didn't show it so it didn't happen." My point is that they wouldn't want to use a potentially valuable resource when combat could ensue at any given moment.

As for the needing to hit them, lets say I'm reading off a set of 25 numbers and you want to practice a move that will make me mess up my reading of those numbers. To find out if you're actually going to be able to make me mess up you're actually going to have to hit me. Nothing else would work. Also, Calder looks pretty damaged to me.