Quote Originally Posted by rewinn View Post
This is so. And to go a little further ... competency IRL is different from competency in heroic literature.

If the OOTSverse were IRL, the obvious and only sane thing for V and Durkon to do would be to contact their arcane and divine sponsors, respectively, to report that there's an evil lich sorcerer out to get a doodad that could let him rule the world. V's master and Durkon's order of clerics could mount a much better defense of the Gates than could the Order and the tag-ends of Azure City
That's quite an assertion.
(...indeed one wonders why the elves, if appraised of AC's fall, would not be taking action even now.
Apparently one who didn't see the elves send a team which got ground under Redcloak's foot. Or possibly one very invested in the concept that the Order isn't--irrespective of how competent they are in using their power--very powerful by the standards of the world where they exist.
However, let's say Durkon telephones Thor with a warning. Were Thor a rational human/dwarf/elf/goblin, Thor would squash Xykon promptly and easily. But that's not how the gods work.
Indeed, the gods are unable to act against each other for fear of causing another free-for-all like the one which created the Snarl to begin with. Xykon, whether he knows it or not (and he doesn't), is one of the Dark One's champions in this matter, therefore the other gods will only act against him through mortal champions of their own.

...That does not appear to be the reason you are claiming exists for Thor not to smash Xykon, however.
Why V doesn't contact V's master is a bigger mystery, but perhaps it's related to Kay's Observation:
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"There's always an Arquillian Battle Cruiser, or a Corillian Death Ray, or an intergalactic plague that is about to wipe out all life on this miserable little planet, and the only way these people can get on with their happy lives is that they DO NOT KNOW ABOUT IT!
Perhaps it's related to the way the only indication we have that Vaarsuvius didn't eclipse his/her master when s/he cast his/her first sixth-level spell, is the implied-and-not-even-actually-given word of three archfiends.