OOTS #1166 - The Discussion Thread

[Kish]

How has no-one talked about Sigdi's axe yet? It very much reappeared in her hand after she very much lost it down the pit.

Is it a weapon of legacy?

Where do you see her axe in her hand after she dropped it?

[Jay R]

Durkon, you're trying to talk a vampire out of something because it's unfair to kill someone? That's ... not likely to work.

The argument he should use is, "Yer Master's na usin' it any more. Finders keepers!"

[Morquard]

Where do you see her axe in her hand after she dropped it?

Last two panels she's in.

[Fyraltari]

Looks like Durkon's hammer has some healing mojo.

RIP Kandro

I think he’s casting with his shield-hand.

[magwaaf]

this strip is fantastic and why i love dwarves lol

[deuterio12]

Hel and the vampire thought they needed something that could hold up a high-level adventuring party.
And considering the 'nobody but dwarves allowed' barrier, they thought the only one they really needed to worry about was Durkon.

Durkon just waltzed past the nightcrawler. It had one job and failed miserably at it.

Bringing in the biggest, nastiest thing you can get your hands on makes sense in that situation. Multiple weaker vampires (or just multiple lesser critters provided through the Gate) would be the play if you think you need to counter multiple weaker opponents - as mean as the nightcrawler is, outside of some limited spell-like abilities it can only be in one place at a time and attack one foe at a time (and note that it was ordered to 'defend this platform area thing', so it actually needed to be able to take some initiative to decide that actually meant 'don't let anybody through the orange barrier.') Basically Hel had no idea Durkon's extended clan would be showing up.

-It's dwarf country, dwarf reinforcements are expected.
-I'm not sure if "defend this platform" includes "use only your soft squishy tongue to grab invaders instead of clamping them between your sharp hard teeth". The Nightcrawler isn't even supposed to have a tongue attack, just a bite with poison included in, it's said poisonous bite that's used to grab victims before swallowing, so why the heck is the comic's nightcrawler showing off a prehensile tongue that can be easily axed?
-Comic's nightcrawler so puny the old dwarf at death's door doesn't even bother holding his axe with both hands for the extra damage and still heavily wounds it. Feels like he could've actually solo'd the comic nightcrawler, but then would've been left without a way for an honorable death, probably was feeling an heart attack coming.
-Nightcrawlers are supposed to be able to summon minions of their own, and since this one was called there's no reason it can't get a bunch of extra nasty ethereal undead with draining attacks to hold the line. Oh wait, clearly it traded the undead summoning for a fancy prehensile tongue that can be easily axed. Really good decision there, yessir.

The vampire spawn actually posed a threat to the veteran OoTS, they even had to barricade themselves inside a forcecage to buy time.

But the supposed strongest monster Hel has available struggles to score a single kill among a bunch of civilian dwarves.

And still lets Durkon calmly walk by.

The comic nightcrawler sucks against both mooks and high-level protagonist with his fancy useless prehensile tongue.

For extra irony, vampires can trap the souls of their victims increasing Hel's power, while the comic's failcrawler can only grant them honorable death if they're too old and close to a dishonorable end, meaning the failcrawler is actually helping souls escape from Hel's grasp!

[rbetieh]

Way to show the horrible implications of the Bet to everyone, Giant.

I can't imagine how much beer Thor must have had in his system to go along with this incredibly Evil plan...

Really feel sorry for the Dwarves now.

[GreatWyrmGold]

Durkon, you're trying to talk a vampire out of something because it's unfair to kill someone? That's ... not likely to work.

The argument he should use is, "Yer Master's na usin' it any more. Finders keepers!"

I mean, from a certain perspective, his masteris still using it, considering that Durkon*'s last moments of unlife were spent as a carbon copy of Durkon.

I can't imagine how much beer Thor must have had in his system to go along with this incredibly Evil plan...

Or how Loki got him to stick with it once he sobered up.

[Linneris]

Durkon's "literally" felt jarring to me. An ill-fitting case of modern Internet slang (and I find today's overuse of the word "literally" annoying).

[Rogar Demonblud]

That was at least as hard to understand as authentic frontier gibberish.

Maybe Kandro's last name is Johnson?

What about the black magic cloud when Kandro is devoured? Did the worm consume his soul too?

Kind of. Nightcrawlers can level drain someone they swallow.

I can't imagine how much beer Thor must have had in his system to go along with this incredibly Evil plan...

Well, one time when somebody tricked Thor into drinking from the ocean he drank so much new islands were exposed. Which means he can drink a lot of beer (or ale, or mead, or whisky, or...)

[Morquard]

Somehow I expect Kandro to not actually be dead and cut his way out of the Nightcrawler.

Who's with me on that?

[Kish]

Durkon's "literally" felt jarring to me. An ill-fitting case of modern Internet slang (and I find today's overuse of the word "literally" annoying).

"Literally" isn't slang, unless you're saying you think Durkon can actually think of things less fair than what he said.

[Jaxzan Proditor]

Aww, poor Kandro.

Also, this strip is the probably the one I’ve had to reread the most before understanding it.

[Cifer]

I believe the proper word is "WITNESSED!"?

[xroads]

Hmmm... I just noticed something. Why aren't the mesmerized guards responding? Wouldn't they normally be defending the vampires that charmed them?

[Resileaf]

Hmmm... I just noticed something. Why aren't the mesmerized guards responding? Wouldn't they normally be defending the vampires that charmed them?

Not unless they are ordered to. As long as Gonthor doesn't tell them to start fighting, they'll stay where they are and won't do anything unless their own lives are in danger.

[gatemansgc]

honestly wish there was a direct link to the discussion thread at the bottom of each comic. though i guess that might encourage necroing the threads of older comics, sigh.

Somehow I expect Kandro to not actually be dead and cut his way out of the Nightcrawler.

Who's with me on that?

i feel like this is possible. cut his way out for MAXIMUM DAMAGE! but he's also constantly being level drained, so i don't know how long he'd last. or if the axe was swallowed too.

[137beth]

So let's recheck...

Freshly created vampires spawn:
-Tear their way through a dwarf fortress like a hot knife through butter.

Strongest non-unique monster that Hel can gate to her followers:
-Has the defensive advantage and earth elemental summon support yet takes several comics to kill a single old dwarf that was already at death's door and so wanted to get killed in battle for an honorable end before a "dishonorable" demise in the bed.

Clearly they shouldn't have bothered with the deathcrawler and just gated a bunch of extra vampires.

Since this council isn't the normal dwarven government, the guards that were already there were probably mostly low level.

[knag]

"Okay, I didn't understand any of what you were saying, but I feel pretty insulted by"?

Oh, and for reference, "knobby", "roaster", "tadger", "bawbags", "haf-pished", "skelp", "geggie" and "dobber" all mean precisely what you think they do.

"Bairn" means child.

Not all of them violate the forum rules when translated. "Geggie" means mouth. "Roaster" is someone who is making a fool of themselves. "Haf-pished" is partially intoxicated. Skelp is to hit. I'll leave the rest alone.

[Elfey]

Does Kandro's death at the hand of a summon spawned by a Priest of Hel count for the free drink upgrade in Valhalla?

[Kish]

Also, Hel doesn't have a bunch of extra vampires; every vampire she has was created by another vampire draining someone fifth level or above.

[tyckspoon]

"Literally" isn't slang, unless you're saying you think Durkon can actually think of things less fair than what he said.

Yeah, Durkon isn't the type to use a word like literally anything less than.. well, literally.

[gatemansgc]

I love this half-confused, half-terrified face Haley made at the end

i just noticed that. i've always loved the ( o_o ) face in this comic as it was!

[jwhouk]

Dwarves are weird.

Repeating this because it is incredibly true.

Durkon's fight with the Ex-Exarch is gonna be epic. And I bet he'll have the same opinion of Uncle Kandro's death as well.

[Snails]

Frankly I think that speaks more to the vigor and fight the old dwarf still had in him then it does to the deathworm's failures. At the very least the deathworm has been keeping the rest of the OotS busy, which is more than a dozen vampire spawn could do.

Exactly. A dozen vampire spawn can sneak up and overwhelm a honor guard that has fallen to such a level of unimportance as to not warrant individual names, but they will fall like wheat before the Order. The worm is at least a large enough bag of hit points to survive four rounds. That this old dwarf is tough enough to take two full rounds to annihilate does not mean the worm is weak, it means it is not too much of a "glass cannon" for this tactical role.

[Snails]

Does Kandro's death at the hand of a summon spawned by a Priest of Hel count for the free drink upgrade in Valhalla?

Recently killed by vampire dwarves will probably buy him a couple rounds, to hear how things are panning out.

[Jasdoif]

Nightcrawlers are supposed to be able to summon minions of their own, and since this one was called there's no reason it can't get a bunch of extra nasty ethereal undead with draining attacks to hold the line.

Since they take up to 10 rounds to arrive after being summoned, I think it's a little bit early to rule out that it hasn't done so.

Though frankly, the nightcrawler's abilities are a mess; like the creature was naively ported from an earlier edition of D&D rather than actually converted. How many combats actually last more than five rounds, especially at the nightcrawler's CR 18? Come to think of it...who decided the most challenging undead creature in the original monster manual should be a giant worm?

[Rogar Demonblud]

Somebody who likes to make 'wormfood' jokes?

[JeenLeen]

So this is the cultural result of having weird rules for the afterlife combined with absolute certainty about the afterlife (and the accuracy of those rules).

I wonder if this implies that challenging someone to a fight and killing them is perfectly legal in most dwarven states. I could see honor duels being allowed, even to the death, with a loose need for a good justification.

[NihhusHuotAliro]

So, is the female bard wearing blue dead, or did she fall onto the other (unbroken) half of the bridge.

Also, given that she and the other bard are both wearing blue, both have brown hair, and both seem to have wooly/curly hair, I'm going to assume that they are siblings, especially as Sigdi refers to them as "you kids".

Additionally, does falling to your death in battle count as honorable?