OOTS #459 - The Discussion Thread

[Laman_Stahros]

Nope. The advanced forms of Magic Missile that existed in 2e are gone. The only thing remaining is one in the Spell Compendium that I can't remember the name of of.

And for those that are saying that Holy's 2d6 or Flaming's 1d6 ignore DR, sorry, wrong on all counts. All of those enhance the weapon's damage dealing ability. They are not special damages seperate from the weapon damage. Unless a GM house-rules it to be seperate, of course.

[fractal]

And for those that are saying that Holy's 2d6 or Flaming's 1d6 ignore DR, sorry, wrong on all counts. All of those enhance the weapon's damage dealing ability. They are not special damages seperate from the weapon damage. Unless a GM house-rules it to be seperate, of course.

You're mistaken. Flaming, in particular, deals fire damage - stopped by elemental resistance to fire, but not damage reduction.

Flaming: Upon command, a flaming weapon is sheathed in fire. The fire does not harm the wielder. The effect remains until another command is given. A flaming weapon deals an extra 1d6 points of fire damage on a successful hit. Bows, crossbows, and slings so crafted bestow the fire energy upon their ammunition.

Damage Reduction (Ex or Su): A creature with this special quality ignores damage from most weapons and natural attacks. Wounds heal immediately, or the weapon bounces off harmlessly (in either case, the opponent knows the attack was ineffective). The creature takes normal damage from energy attacks (even nonmagical ones), spells, spell-like abilities, and supernatural abilities.

Holy isn't quite as clear, but Flaming works.

[see]

With the whole crew on him, smiting evil, holy-swording and the like, Xykon should have been bone dust long before Redcloak even got near the palace.

Everything we know about the mechanics of the ghost-martyrs from the comics can be summarized pretty quickly:

1) They were of the paladin class before they died.
2) They are incorporeal.
3) They draw on positive energy, and so react the opposite way from undead to the channeling of negative energy.
4) Soon is a lot tougher than the others.
5) The others are weak enough to be turned by Redcloak but not by the hobgoblin clerics.
6) They are intelligent.

Essentially all claims about their powers, including any belief that they have any access to any paladin class features, are not supported by any data we are given in the comic. There is no reason to believe they can cast spells, smite evil, or lay on hands, or any of the rest of the things people have conjectured that they can do. It wouldn't be surprising if some or all can do those things, but there's no actual reason to be surprised if most or all can't, either.

[Rift_Wolf]

Everything we know about the mechanics of the ghost-martyrs from the comics can be summarized pretty quickly:

1) They were of the paladin class before they died.
2) They are incorporeal.
3) They draw on positive energy, and so react the opposite way from undead to the channeling of negative energy.
4) Soon is a lot tougher than the others.
5) The others are weak enough to be turned by Redcloak but not by the hobgoblin clerics.
6) They are intelligent.

Essentially all claims about their powers, including any belief that they have any access to any paladin class features, are not supported by any data we are given in the comic. There is no reason to believe they can cast spells, smite evil, or lay on hands, or any of the rest of the things people have conjectured that they can do. It wouldn't be surprising if some or all can do those things, but there's no actual reason to be surprised if most or all can't, either.

Doesn't Soon Smite Evil in the last panel? This suggests Paladin skills remain intact, or at the very least their smiting powers.

[factotum]

I may be wrong, but the difference there is that Smite Evil simply boosts your weapon attack. Most of a Paladin's other abilities (such as Lay on Hands) require a touch attack. Therefore, we can maybe assume that the martyrs can use their weapons, but can't touch anything corporeal? It would explain why they haven't used Lay on Hands to zap Xykon into next week.

[MrQ]

Just because i´m totally in the "go evil"- league and pissed mostly because of this ghost-martyr thing, i´d like to suppress high hopes of oots saving the day.

Sure, they don´t seem to be whacked up, and if they were, they would be doing what V is. Either running for their lives or hiding.

But still. Consider this. Even in the extremely unlikely situation of Durkon actually having prepared dispel magic, get this: Unless "Become a Ribbon" is an option, they´re still subject to blade barrier. Now, with a check modifier of +10 against DR of 26, in a scenario where 1 automatically fails (if this is still the case in 3,5) a roll between 2 and 16 result in failure, there is the slight 20%-margin of actually succesfully dispelling the barrier and only Haley has a chance not to get cut to pieces by means of evasion and such. With a medium of 45-53 pts. of slashing damage (depending on which bell curve they use, mathematical [where 3,5 is the average roll on d6] or D&D[3]) I´d say that at this point they are not going to walz through that and pray for lousy damage rolls. At least, that´s something I wouldn´t be doing. Well. They allways could wait for the spells duration to end. That´s only 15 minutes.... or 150 rounds... at least. And in a combat that is a bitchingly huge time. Probably longer than the whole siege in it self.

As for X, none of them has any chance what so ever to even harm him on close combat. Well. Durkon. With a hammer. Let us look this by numbers.

Durkon: probably nearly out of spells, nonmagical hammer no reason to believe that he has even access let alone prepared such spells as to buff his or anyones hammer to a magical epic-crushing maul of devastative horror and gut-shaking doom to epic-level liches. Disruption? No dice. Compare the levels. 13 does not equal 20-22. And the fact that whatever the situation, X has more hitpoints (20-22 lvl sorc/lich= 1d12[6 avg]* 20-22= 120-132) and more resistance to damage (15/crap), better saves (+6/+11 at least) and attack modifiers (+14/+9 at least) than any of the remaining group (Hinjo maybe excluded and belkar in terms of attack prowess) and a thing called paralysis.... I were a cleric, I´d stay the hell away from such a being.

So. We all know that elan is completely useless in a battle and in terms of close combat, so is haley. And what comes to X, with toothpicks of belkar... zero to none hits per round. B would have to work either double or triple criticals to evercome that DR of his or pack a strenght of measly 34 to have a 25% chance of causing a single point of damage by any given hit. Oh. Criticals don´t apply to undead. Silly me.

Off course all this doesn´t mean that Soon wouldn´t pose a threat. Or the robed figure.

But knowing that they´re gonna storm another gate, we know for sure that this isn´t the end of them.

Now, redcloak is not stupid enough to bring X:s phylactery into battle if he thought it would be in significant danger. Xykon, on the other hand does not care. And considering few things here.

At 18th level sorc minimum, he has 6 spells per level up till 7th. Plus any charisma modifiers. The fun thing to assume is that a power player at those levels probably had all of his ability bonuses stacked into the relevant ability of malice and destruction, charisma. Added fun, Liches DO get a bonus of +2 to said ability, among others.

So it´s safe to assume that X packs a charisma of 24-25 quite easily. And the bonus spells are: 2/2/2/1/1/1/1 with a grand total of 8/8/8/7/7/7/7/5/3.

Let´s speak of Maximized magic missile. Granted, no save damage of 25 each round. No refunds. which probably means this: damage caused by seven consecutive Maxed mm:s is: 175 pts. Well over any average hitpoints of any paladin. Emphasis on the average. Even after that it`s still 8 uses of regular mm... with guaranteed 10 pts of nice force caliber. thats 80 pts, minumum, so i´d say that pretty much anybody is in serious trouble. And besides, Xykon and RC both have insane spell DC:s. spell level, ability bonuses in the +5-+7 range, feats, possible items of boosting +X... At this point we know that rolls under 22 won´t help agains RC:s 6th- levellers. With X, same is true for 24. At purely averages, this means that a 20th level character with no special modifiers has 50%(RC) or 40%(X) chance of making any given save of 6th and above, well... even less then. Of course they do, that´s for sure. But still, give those factors a chance.

So. With this in mind, I truly hope that Xykon is gonna mop the floor with anything and anybody stupid enough to mess with them.

Because of this gut-twistingly awful "good will prevail"- crybaby nonsense morals we have to share in this world, I presume something quite the opposite...

Tsukiko assaulting RC while oots try to ruin the day for baddies and succeed in everything despite the unlikeliness of the event -hey, that´s top grade heroism!- and Soon and cloaky whupping X to shreds... And yea. mitd coming up in the last second and getting talked into submission by ELAN (high charisma and both are idiots), instead of saving X:s @ss........

God, I hope not. But this is probable. And so wrong.

[see]

Doesn't Soon Smite Evil in the last panel?

Geez, I'd think I'd have paid enough attention to notice that before I posted, but clearly I didn't.

This suggests Paladin skills remain intact, or at the very least their smiting powers.

Well, maybe.

Okay,

7) Soon can smite evil, at least once.

This might be a retained paladin power. It might be a special power of whatever notundead creature he is now. It might be a special power that appears on high-level characters who become this kind of notundead, but not lower-level ones (maybe they're even different kinds of notundead). It might, in Soon's specific case (given that he was from a long time ago) be from paladin levels he earned after becoming notundead. Maybe you have to trade in paladin levels to become this sort of notundead, and only Soon had enough to retain any paladin powers after the trade-in. Maybe only some subset of paladin powers can be used in notundead form. Or, well, make up your own explanation.

Which is to say, we don't have a monster entry for these things, which means means we don't know for certain what all they can do.

[Manga Shoggoth]

What would really be bad is if certain Archfiends (not the ones that Sabine serves) find out that the souls of those slain by the Snarl, are merely held inside the abomination and not destroyed. Then imagine Asmodeus, Mephistopheles, Baalzeebub, Demogorgon, Orcus or Graz'zt popping in and then extracting those souls and dragging them into one of the Lower Planes. I don't think that Rich would do that, but it would be really bad. Afterward that same Archfiend could try to conquer Azure City, drawing the attention of all Celestials in existance. Xykon and Redcloak would run away like dogs with their tails between their legs.

Given that the Snarl wiped out a large section of the pantheon without much effort, I don't think that they would be that stupid.

Besides, if I recall correctly, the snarl destroys souls. I'd look this up (any excuse to read more OOTS), but I'm at work, so can barely catch time to monitor the thread...

[Closet_Skeleton]

I haven't seen it mentioned yet, and I was wondering: do the Isaac's Missile Storm spells still exist in 3.5? They seem like the kind of thing Xykon would go for, and being a area of effect diesel versions of magic missile they'd probably be mighty handy against these guys, especially after a few of the paladins got popped. Or poofed. Whichever.

That spell is in the second expansion pack for Neverwinter Nights so it may be in a Forgotten Realms book somewhere.

[slb]

Just because i´m totally in the "go evil"- league and pissed mostly because of this ghost-martyr thing, i´d like to suppress high hopes of oots saving the day.
[...]
Because of this gut-twistingly awful "good will prevail"- crybaby nonsense morals we have to share in this world, I presume something quite the opposite...
[...]
God, I hope not. But this is probable. And so wrong.

Well you know, it's because most readers still hope that "good will prevail" that this is a nice story. And this is also for this reason that the vilains are that powerfull: to be a challenge to the heroes.

Remember that the characters, esp- Xykon are created to entertain us and their whereabouts are guided by the story arc and not their uber-statistics.

If we were following your strange logic, Xykon would have wiped the OOTS in Dorukan Castle and the story would be already over .

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Speaking of the story (and not Xycon's remaining spells) I however agree with you that Soon and the Saphire Guard ghosts are doomed because he failed his will save against Xykon's taunt and is wrongly focusing his wrath on him instead of RedCloack

[MrQ]

Well you know, it's because most readers still hope that "good will prevail" that this is a nice story. And this is also for this reason that the vilains are that powerfull: to be a challenge to the heroes.

Yes. I´m only bringing back some fact to the world of imagination. Actually, it is nice story because of genius-level storytelling abilities of the author given the con- and pretext. As he has explicitly statet, he does not care one way or another ideas or suggestions of any reader whatsoever which also means that whether or not you´re buing everything he dishes out, it still doesn´t because you still read it. And some 200.000 also on a daily basis.

Remember that the characters, esp- Xykon are created to entertain us and their whereabouts are guided by the story arc and not their uber-statistics.

In situations like this, a possible powershift in the storytelling, that is just completely wrong.

I´d like to see them getting mopped. Big time. Just for even once, for god´s sake (probably yours. Not mine.).
No. Roy getting wasted in a world full of resurrections isn´t nearly enough. Imprisonment for elan... That would do it.

If we were following your strange logic, Xykon would have wiped the OOTS in Dorukan Castle and the story would be already over .

It is actually not that strange. I vision my self as "playing for the other team" and being completely fed up with predictable stories where good guys always win, no matter what the odds are.

[fractal]

I´d like to see them getting mopped. Big time. Just for even once, for god´s sake (probably yours. Not mine.).
No. Roy getting wasted in a world full of resurrections isn´t nearly enough. Imprisonment for elan... That would do it.

It is actually not that strange. I vision my self as "playing for the other team" and being completely fed up with predictable stories where good guys always win, no matter what the odds are.

Uhh, Samantha and her father handed them their heads repeatedly. So did Miko. Nale smoothly out-maneuvered the OotS. And Redcloak seems to have yanked the city out from under them, while Xykon killed Roy.

That's ignoring all sorts of minor incapacitations all along, like getting kidnapped, polymorphed, or cursed. Given that a TPK ends the story, what do you want to have happen?

[drKarling]

Being dead has essentially made Soon twice as resilient. Thus, Xykon would have worked him over immediately if not for the incorporeability.

But it works both ways, dunnit? Ghost pally will only hit around 50% of the times as long as it relies on physical attacks and so on... at least that's the impression I got.

[Grasilich]

I think Redcloak and Xykon deserve to win. They've thoroughly demolished every defense Azure City has put in front of it. Within one day's worth of fighting, the city is being occupied. All that's left to challenge them are these Ghosts, who Redcloak has already figured out how to beat down. From start to finish, things have gone flawlessly for Team Evil.

The Stick, on the other hand, have only really managed to take out some throwaway Hobgoblins and the Xykon decoys. They did not hold the wall and they did not protect the throne room. Mission: Failed

Honestly, if Xykon and Redcloak somehow lose after hacking their way through Azure City the way that they have then something is just wrong.

[MrQ]

Uhh, Samantha and her father handed them their heads repeatedly. So did Miko. Nale smoothly out-maneuvered the OotS. And Redcloak seems to have yanked the city out from under them, while Xykon killed Roy.

That's ignoring all sorts of minor incapacitations all along, like getting kidnapped, polymorphed, or cursed. Given that a TPK ends the story, what do you want to have happen?

Hey. Them getting clobbered all the time and constantly is what makes me tick besides the rhetorics and belkars antics. TPK would certainly spoil my fun completely, so no. I´m not into that.

Beaten into submission, taken to "lair evil", beaten some more just in case and consequently, let them run for it so they can at least prepare themselves for the final tussle, hollywood style.

Crap. God, please, make belkar switch sides. Then waiting for team evil- strips would be like birthdayparty all over again without hangover.

[Blaznak]

Wow this series has really been going well. I enjoy Redcloak's intelligence and desire to do a 'good' job. I'm not sure about the logic in the undead turning... it smacks a bit of Star Trek Babble... but still it was fun.

Nice job!

[DrivinAllNight]

I don't see any scratches on Xykon during or immediately after the Harm =/

sorry, when I went back and looked again I had looked a couple of panels past the harm spell and noticed something on his sleeve, I guess I must have been tired last night to not notice it was a panel in the second row after Harm. I'm awake now, and feel silly for not looking harder last night before questioning.

[Mawhrin Skel]

I'm sure that while they were dying heroically to defend their city, the paladins were making sure to pack a +1 greatclub just in case their immortal spirits needed to beat up a skeleton.

Those living paladins left in the throne room with O-chul knew a lich was coming for the Gate. They should also have been high enough level to cast Bless Weapon, so even mundane improvised clubs would have allowed them to overcome Xykon's DR. I can only imagine many failed Knowledge checks - being NPCs they don't get to metagame.

Durkon: probably nearly out of spells, nonmagical hammer no reason to believe that he has even access let alone prepared such spells as to buff his or anyones hammer to a magical epic-crushing maul of devastative horror and gut-shaking doom to epic-level liches.

There was an early strip in which Durkon's hammer was shown glowing white. Possibly a result of the spell Magic Weapon. Also, he would have been able to foresee the need to whack a lich upside the head, although he may not know how to overcome its DR.

[Jarrad]

I agree mostly with Jarrad's second theory as to who's under the cloak... but with a slight modification.

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Putting two and two together:
"Only the honor of a paladin is unbreakable - even by death itself."
I think the cloaked figure is Miko's honor, which died in the throne room alongside the other paladins.
I could be wrong, but unless it's just a random nameless character who'll shortly vanish anyhow, that seems the most plausible explanation for such a figure to be brought into the spotlight - and also would explain such a one's survival (the Martyrs seem to retain some sense of their prior power, and as a mid-teens Martyr with a good reflex save, Miko's honor could easily have survived this long).

Yeah, that's pretty much exactly what I was trying to say. It just feel "right", somehow, from a story perspective.

[Jarrad]

Geez, I'd think I'd have paid enough attention to notice that before I posted, but clearly I didn't.

7) Soon can smite evil, at least once.

Which is to say, we don't have a monster entry for these things, which means means we don't know for certain what all they can do.

They are definitely the Deathless subtype. If I had my sourcebooks here I'm pretty certain that I could work out more-or-less exactly what they are. I think Redcloak's "homebrew or third-party sourcebook" reference was a dig at the Eberron campaign setting. Rich has never yet made something plot-critical up out of whole cloth, and the deathless are good-aligned positive-energy spirits, revered by their descendants, that can be turned or destroyed by evil clerics... it looks pretty clear-cut to me. There's even a deathless creature called a Risen Martyr, although if memory serves, they're corporeal and thus wouldn't fit the profile. Can anyone remember off-hand whether a Sacred Guardian would be appropriate?

Many deathless creatures retain the abilities, by and large, that they had in life except where they wouldn't be logically compatible with deathless traits. Good clerics and paladins can rebuke, command, or bolster deathless creatures as evil clerics rebuke, command, or bolster undead; thus, I could see...

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...Durkon getting a really great battle against Redcloak, with the two of them opposing each other with turn vs. rebuke attempts as the fight rages on...

...being a viable (and totally cool) scenario. And yes, it would be possible for a deathless Cleric or Paladin to bolster themselves in the same way that an evil undead Cleric can, but they'd have to spend an action (each round?) to do it.

[DreadArchon]

That spell is in the second expansion pack for Neverwinter Nights so it may be in a Forgotten Realms book somewhere.

I think they just made it up. There's something fishy about "Level 6 spell that does 40d6 unresistable damage with no save," if you ask me.

(It sure did make the Epic modules for Neverwinter Nights easy, though.)

[happyturtle]

Unless "Become a Ribbon" is an option, they´re still subject to blade barrier.

Surely a building that size has more than one entrance--can you imagine the bottleneck when food and supplies are brought in for all the paladins, prisoners, servants, and other occupants of the building otherwise?--and Hinjo will know all of them.

Rich has never yet made something plot-critical up out of whole cloth,

I could be wrong, as I haven't read all the source material, but isn't the Snarl an original creation?

[Chronos]

And amusingly, in 3.0 a holy weapon won't help you out at all in bypassing devils' and demons' DR, as theirs is based solely on enhancement bonuses; only Bane provides that boost. Holy's just a couple of piddly d6s to add on to your wholly ineffective weapon.

In 3.0, the first-level paladin spell Bless Weapon would bypass the damage reduction of any evil creature, so that would still be completely effective against any demon or devil. But I think that was changed in 3.5

As to why the paladins (apparently) can't Lay On Hands or bolster each other, despite still being able to Smite, (spoilered to protect the Giant)

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Turning and Laying of Hands are both channeling of positive energy, but the paladins are now nothing but positive energy. All of their positive-energy-channeling abilities are now devoted to keeping themselves in existance. But Smite Evil is a Good thing, not a Positive thing, so it still works as advertised.

[Jarrad]

I could be wrong, as I haven't read all the source material, but isn't
the Snarl an original creation?

Nope, not really. Calling it the Snarl is original, but the "sentient flaw in the weaving of the world" is a very common mythological theme. The Giant did, I suppose, make it up in its current form but only in the same way that he made up the whole OOTS world.

You're quite right though; I should have put it another way. Both the Snarl and the planet the characters are standing on, are "original creations", but they're unstatted elements of the OOTS universe.

I can't see a way the Snarl could have normal game statistics: it wiped out a pantheon!

It's a Macguffin, and as such is unlikely to directly confront the characters. All of the plot-critical creatures, items and devices the characters have encountered (with the odd exception solely for a gag) have been D&D-legal creations; arguments about rules abuses aside.

"Rich has never made any *statted* plot-critical element up out of whole cloth," would have been a better way of putting it.

I could yet be wrong about that element; it has been stated that the Snarl could more easily be opposed by mortals than by the gods so perhaps the OOTS team will encounter it after all. For all I know, it's really a creature out of the Epic Level Handbook! I doubt it though... For my money, the Sapphire Guard follow - at the least - a standard creature template (deathless) and may even be pre-existing examples of a specific type of deathless from core material.

[MReav]

In 3.0, the first-level paladin spell Bless Weapon would bypass the damage reduction of any evil creature, so that would still be completely effective against any demon or devil. But I think that was changed in 3.5

As to why the paladins (apparently) can't Lay On Hands or bolster each other, despite still being able to Smite, (spoilered to protect the Giant)

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Turning and Laying of Hands are both channeling of positive energy, but the paladins are now nothing but positive energy. All of their positive-energy-channeling abilities are now devoted to keeping themselves in existance. But Smite Evil is a Good thing, not a Positive thing, so it still works as advertised.

They probably do Lay On Hands each other, but Xykon deals a s***ton of damage, so anyone that is hurt is often subjected to more damage than is necessary to kill them (or they have been, but Xykon has been similarly pounding away at their HP)

They don't bolster each other, because their turn checks are as clerics that are 3 levels lower, so it's probably just less effective than just beating on the person.

[Chronos]

They probably do Lay On Hands each other, but Xykon deals a s***ton of damage, so anyone that is hurt is often subjected to more damage than is necessary to kill them (or they have been, but Xykon has been similarly pounding away at their HP)

I wasn't referring to them healing each other. It's already been pointed out by others that Lay On Hands can be used offensively, too. Soon probably has over 100 points of Lay On Hands, all of which can be unleashed on undead (like, say, Xykon) in a single touch attack. Plus however much the other, lower-level paladins have. If they had that option, they probably could have destroyed Xykon in a round or two.

[EvilJames]

Because of this gut-twistingly awful "good will prevail"- crybaby nonsense morals we have to share in this world, I presume something quite the opposite...

I'm not quite sure how hoping good will prevail is "nonsense morals" Most people read a story for that exact reason. If I wanted to see good completly decimated and humilated I would read some world news. So yes your logic is strange as what you propose would make the story largly unreadable for the majority of readers.

I bet that under the cloak is...

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Lord Shojo, of course!!! Who else could be Soon's second in command than his own descendant???

Except that Shojo was neither a paladin nor Soon's descendant.

[JT]

But still. Consider this. Even in the extremely unlikely situation of Durkon actually having prepared dispel magic...

http://www.giantitp.com/comics/oots0429.html -- Durkon casts "Greater Dispel Magic" in order to reveal Xykon on the dragon.

...get this: Unless "Become a Ribbon" is an option, they´re still subject to blade barrier.

As noted by someone above, there are probably more entrances.

Durkon: probably nearly out of spells...

We haven't seen anything to indicate that Durkon is running short of spells. He has not been in major combat (that we've seen), other than one Titanium elemental (offscreen) and the Huecava. All the panoramas have shown minor hobgoblin attacks where D has been, at most.
He could be running low, but there's nothing that indicates it in the previous strips.

But knowing that they´re gonna storm another gate, we know for sure that this isn´t the end of them.

I agree. X and R will not die this day.

So. With this in mind, I truly hope that Xykon is gonna mop the floor with anything and anybody stupid enough to mess with them.

"But, knowing that they're gonna storm another gate, we know for sure that this isn't" where they succeed either. ;)

[Suri]

Next one! Next one! Next one! Now Now Now Now!

[Alfryd]

New comic is up.

Not bad. Slight obviousness in gaggery.

Because of this gut-twistingly awful "good will prevail"- crybaby nonsense morals we have to share in this world, I presume something quite the opposite...

Look, I'm not particularly happy with Xykon's Symbol of Insanity rules abuse or the sudden introduction of Paladin Avengers from Beyond the Grave(tm), but *granted* these additions, there's nothing mechanically impossible about the OOTS taking out Xykon & Co.

Of course, in the event that the protagonists manage to save the day, Redcloak still has to make an escape in order for Xykon to regenerate. And even if Redcloak and Xykon are forced to beat a hasty retreat, there's still a good 20,000 hobgoblins to mop up within the city walls.