OOTS #1219 - The Discussion Thread

[Grey_Wolf_c]

Considering that Haley can disable it in "Less than a minute, even.", I don't think that's likely. If it was a stalling tactic, it would be a little more obvious (detectable by a ranger like Oona, for example), and take far longer to disarm.

All traps take the same time to disarm. And the point is not the amount of time it takes to disarm this one, but that then you might slow down to be on the lookout for others (which might even be there!), instead of rushing ahead like a proper barbarian. If it was an obvious trap, though, it might be too obvious. If this is an exercise of weeding out non-barbarians, there might be delaying tricks for every class - interesting smells that distract animal companions for rangers, for example.

GW

[Jaziggy]

How I read that is if Team Evil, or Kermit and Scooter, or Sabine or whoever ends up going into that place after them, they will trigger the trap unless they bypass/disable the trap.

And for the record, I’m not really sure what it will do, but my personal theory is that whatever the trap does, it means that Team Evil finding the gate through their original strategy is much harder than expected, if it’s possible at all, and that having a rogue disable the traps just means you’re facing what we thought you would be facing before the strip, just now you need a high level rogue to disable it and never fail at doing that.

This makes a lot of sense. I think what the trap is doing is causing the interdimensional stone to shift so that a different individual door connects to the gate (this saves Serini from having to figure out how to teleport the gate- an epic divine/arcane feat).

Say we have 1,000 doors, numbered 1-1000. The gate is behind door number 223. Assuming the questing party checks the gates in order to avoid a bunch of complex probability math, the party's rogue would have to successfully disarm the trap 223 consecutive times for the party to find the gate. If the rogue failed even once, the party would have to start over at the beginning. It's even possible the rogue could fail and not even be aware that they had failed.

This would be a truly devious and virtually impenetrable labyrinth for all but the most exceptional of rogues with an extraordinarily powerful and diligent party behind them, willing to systematically check hundreds of doors and potentially start over again at any time.

[Goblin_Priest]

FWIW, there's a level 64 wizard in the Epic Level Handbook, even if he isn't statted out. He makes a godawful spell that isn't worth the research, but hey, he exists.

I'll take your word for that, since I don't recall, but that sounds more like a "hey, here's an example of what you can do with the rules we just printed" build, rather than "someone could legitimately become this".

Level 64 would require 2 016 000 XP, compared to 190 000 XP for level 20. (Assuming the same formula because I can't find the numbers for epic).

I can't really find any of the charts relevant, but I have a really hard time believing it would be possible to legit arrive to such high levels. Even if you consider immortal characters like liches living really, really long times. And that they somehow never lose. It's just a question of the ridiculous number of ridiculously powerful opponents you'd need to find and defeat in order to get there, since when the CR gap is too wide you don't even earn any xp at all.

[Grey_Wolf_c]

This makes a lot of sense. I think what the trap is doing is causing the interdimensional stone to shift so that a different individual door connects to the gate (this saves Serini from having to figure out how to teleport the gate- an epic divine/arcane feat).

Say we have 1,000 doors, numbered 1-1000. The gate is behind door number 223. Assuming the questing party checks the gates in order to avoid a bunch of complex probability math, the party's rogue would have to successfully disarm the trap 223 consecutive times for the party to find the gate.

Unless you mis-described it, no, they'd only need to disarm it once, when they are in door 223.

This would be a truly devious and virtually impenetrable labyrinth for all but the most exceptional of rogues with an extraordinarily powerful and diligent party behind them, willing to systematically check hundreds of doors and potentially start over again at any time.

Even if it was, that was not Serini's design intention.

GW

[Doug Lampert]

I'll take your word for that, since I don't recall, but that sounds more like a "hey, here's an example of what you can do with the rules we just printed" build, rather than "someone could legitimately become this".

Level 64 would require 2 016 000 XP, compared to 190 000 XP for level 20. (Assuming the same formula because I can't find the numbers for epic).

I can't really find any of the charts relevant, but I have a really hard time believing it would be possible to legit arrive to such high levels. Even if you consider immortal characters like liches living really, really long times. And that they somehow never lose. It's just a question of the ridiculous number of ridiculously powerful opponents you'd need to find and defeat in order to get there, since when the CR gap is too wide you don't even earn any xp at all.

Level 64 is approximately 214 standard adventuring days. Less than one year of adventuring for a no-down-time party, and back when I followed the 3.5 discussions on this board, PLENTY of people swore backward and forward that they couldn't POSSIBLY take 8 whole hours of downtime to craft a wand of Cure Light Wounds because their GM would always throw something at them.

The SRD has monsters up to CR 57, and the organization line is Solitary or Pair, so there are multiple such creatures out there. There are other high level monsters that didn't make the SRD. CR 57 will give XP to a level 65 character, much less level 64.

So no problem, less than a year of game time for all those "no downtime" adventurers I kept getting told about. Play once a week, and you'd have made it in a bit over 4 years of play.

[Snails]

If I came across this setup in a game or D&D session, I would ASSUME that I needed a clue/code that I hadn't found yet, like Spelunky 2, the jar room where there are hundreds of very SIMILIAR, but distinct jars, where you obviously need to find the code for that run (although finding it can be tricky if you don't know), and I would keep an eye out for it as I continued my adventures - or look for rumors in the tavern.

Or maybe we DO know, it was encoded in Serini's journal, and Xykon hasn't bothered to look for it.

Which is exactly how the OOTS would find the correct path to the Gate - steal/acquire the journal, realize what the code is, and use it to access the Gate.

While mentioning the difference in doors is a point in your favor, the thrust of your argument leaves me thoroughly convinced I am correct.

It is true that what you describe would work well in a D&D adventure. However, it is a very crappy way of doing things in a work of literature, no less so for a work in the literary sub-genre of a comic book in a universe of D&D-like metaphysics.

After over a thousand pages, I have absolute confidence that The Giant is highly competent in building dramatic arcs and basic storytelling. He is not suddenly going to be overtly incompetent. He has been playing out key turning point for years. He is not suddenly going to have Xykon mention to Redcloak this weird puzzle he never figured out within Serini's diary. And he is most definitely not going to have The Order discover a puzzle in the diary that neither Xykon nor Redcloak have mentioned at all. Not going to happen. There is not even a one in a million chance you are right about that.

However, I would concede there is something potentially interesting about what Haley is doing now, as it is conceivable that this is the first time a highly skilled Rogue (level 15+) has ever manipulated one of these traps (at least the first time for someone not part of Team Serini). That Haley's actions might reveal a previously hidden puzzle or similar does make sense. So this is not the bluff people have been speculating about, but trickery that requires the right party composition to reveal.

[Peelee]

Say we have 1,000 doors, numbered 1-1000. The gate is behind door number 223. Assuming the questing party checks the gates in order to avoid a bunch of complex probability math

Actually, unless Serini enters the game and puts on her Monty Hall hat, there's really not any probability math, complex or otherwise (and the Monty Hall problem can be explained significantly better by using a billion doors instead of three, since then it's much more intuitive for anyone who got stuck on the traditional three-door explanation). It's a pretty straightforward 1 in a thousand shot per door.

[tanonev]

All traps take the same time to disarm. And the point is not the amount of time it takes to disarm this one, but that then you might slow down to be on the lookout for others (which might even be there!), instead of rushing ahead like a proper barbarian. If it was an obvious trap, though, it might be too obvious. If this is an exercise of weeding out non-barbarians, there might be delaying tricks for every class - interesting smells that distract animal companions for rangers, for example.

GW

The problem with this theory is that Xykon, being Xykon, almost certainly would have rushed at least one door by now.

----

Throwing my hat into the ring with a hypothesis for what the runes do:

The runes are there for calibrating the dungeon, scanning HD/CR of whatever party enters. That information affects what monsters show up in the dungeon, and they're chosen so that the dungeon is always just barely too hard for the party, so that only a party that pushes past their limits and gives everything they've got can make it to the end. The scan allows a save, but if a save is made and information is not gathered, that run is "disqualified" and some approximation is used instead.

Rationale:
- The doors that Team Evil have been going into have been challenging enough for Xykon to get XP and for Team Evil to consistently burn through resources doing so, but the bugbears have been using the hollow for a while now (if a small village were to send in a scouting party that got rekt by a CR 20+ encounter, their most likely policy around it would be "never go there again").
- Between Xykon, Redcloak, and MitD, the chances of all 3 failing their saves is extremely low, so they would be disqualified unless they figured out they needed to voluntarily subject themselves to calibration.
- Thematically, it fits with the barbarian value of pushing past one's limits.
- Thematically, if the calibration also has a party size requirement, it would fit with Serini's value of teamwork (IIRC she was the member of the old party who was least in favor of it breaking up).

Problems:
- This cheapens MitD's rebellion because there are no consequences for that misdirection.
- It is unclear how the Order (or anyone) would figure out this mechanic; at the very least, that means this choice here causes this run to be a failure.

[Goblin_Priest]

Level 64 is approximately 214 standard adventuring days. Less than one year of adventuring for a no-down-time party, and back when I followed the 3.5 discussions on this board, PLENTY of people swore backward and forward that they couldn't POSSIBLY take 8 whole hours of downtime to craft a wand of Cure Light Wounds because their GM would always throw something at them.

The SRD has monsters up to CR 57, and the organization line is Solitary or Pair, so there are multiple such creatures out there. There are other high level monsters that didn't make the SRD. CR 57 will give XP to a level 65 character, much less level 64.

So no problem, less than a year of game time for all those "no downtime" adventurers I kept getting told about. Play once a week, and you'd have made it in a bit over 4 years of play.

Goes to show that I haven't read that book in ages, probably since about when it came out.

So I guess RAW allows it if your GM just throws are a super gamey world, where CR 40+ enemies are common enough that you can fight a bunch every day, and yet rare enough that they don't completely obliterate all life on the material plane. "Hey, boy, did you think to check under your bed before jumping in? Alright, let's look. Oh! Another great wyrm prismatic dragon! Gosh darn!"

[Riftwolf]

Yes, but if I’m right and it’s based on(if not a straight renaming of) the Mage Slayer feat, Xykon has a very good chance to make his Concentration check. Undead use their Charisma bonus for Concentration, and even Durkula made it once. Xykon has a Charisma bonus in the low stratosphere.

And like, the Order has trouble doing anything to him at all. The clerics are too underleveled to have a realistic chance of constantly hitting him, most of V’s spells won’t work and the IFCC can pull them out of the fight whenever they want, and the rest have trouble with so much as scratching him.

It probably isn't based off Mage Slayer. It's probably a technique outside the rules to prevent 'Spellsplinter doesn't work that way!' arguments.
And Durkula didn't make his concentration check against Spellsplinter, he made it against an attack of opportunity. Roy didn't have time to Spellsplinter the Harm as he'd not readied an action.
Huh, guess "Spellsplinter doesn't work that way!" started after all.

[b_jonas]

bunsen_h: Ah, you're correct. The honey ant trap is distinct from the barbecue sauce hydra trap. My mistake.

[Lex]

I'm a bit confused for why people think Serini built the dungeon in order to test the values and skills of adventurers trying to conquer it. Wasn't the whole point to not let ANYONE reach the gate?

[locksmith of lo]

I'm a bit confused for why people think Serini built the dungeon in order to test the values and skills of adventurers trying to conquer it. Wasn't the whole point to not let ANYONE reach the gate?

yes! thank you! i thought the same thing.

but i think they are arguing narratively too, but this is an important point. even if it narratively makes sense that TE have the means to find the gate, does not mean they should. OOTS just happens to have a high enough level team that effectively mirrors the order of the scribble, coming close to the competence level of original creator. they just have the right skill sets to be able to figure this out. brains, skills, levels vs brute force raw power. a balanced, high level team vs a high level cleric, epic lich sorcerer, a local guide, and unspecified monster. i vote for the former figuring it out.

[tanonev]

I'm a bit confused for why people think Serini built the dungeon in order to test the values and skills of adventurers trying to conquer it. Wasn't the whole point to not let ANYONE reach the gate?

That wasn't true of the other gates. Dorukan was fond of setting up things in his dungeon (including the gate itself) that would respond to Good-aligned creatures. Soon built an entire city around his gate. For some combination of practical and personal reasons, each Member of the Scribble had conditions under which people would be allowed to approach the gate.

Just as it is plausible that the Order of the Scribble thought there could be scenarios where it would be worth blowing up the gate rather than defending it (see Dorukan's self-destruct rune), it is plausible that they thought there could be scenarios where it would be worth letting capable people with good intentions and new information get close to a gate (such as, say, a new group of adventurers figuring out how to make a stronger, more permanent gate).

[danielxcutter]

I don’t think it was really about “letting” anyone to reach it, though of course when they were still alive they could have done that. For Dorukan, it was like “I might need somebody to access the Gate eventually for some reason, but obviously I can’t trust anyone so I should limit it to Good people only. I mean I’ll probably still be around, so what could go wrong?”

[hroþila]

Soon built an entire city around his gate.

Soon did build a keep around the gate, but Azure City predated it. I'm afraid the pagoda that totally looks like a tree fooled many of us.

[BarakDeathBlade]

Soon did build a keep around the gate, but Azure City predated it. I'm afraid the pagoda that totally looks like a tree fooled many of us.

I'm pretty sure that's a Blue Spruce tree.

[Grey_Wolf_c]

I'm a bit confused for why people think Serini built the dungeon in order to test the values and skills of adventurers trying to conquer it. Wasn't the whole point to not let ANYONE reach the gate?

Because.

The gates need maintenance. They can't be unreachable. The question then is "who should be allowed to reach them?". Each Scribbler had a different answer ("Pure hearted" for Dorukan; "Family" for whats-his-face; "Paladins under oath to protect it" for Soon). Serini, it seems, decided on "those Kraagor would approve of" for her gate.

Grey Wolf

[Doug Lampert]

Level 64 is approximately 214 standard adventuring days. Less than one year of adventuring for a no-down-time party, and back when I followed the 3.5 discussions on this board, PLENTY of people swore backward and forward that they couldn't POSSIBLY take 8 whole hours of downtime to craft a wand of Cure Light Wounds because their GM would always throw something at them.

The SRD has monsters up to CR 57, and the organization line is Solitary or Pair, so there are multiple such creatures out there. There are other high level monsters that didn't make the SRD. CR 57 will give XP to a level 65 character, much less level 64.

So no problem, less than a year of game time for all those "no downtime" adventurers I kept getting told about. Play once a week, and you'd have made it in a bit over 4 years of play.

Goes to show that I haven't read that book in ages, probably since about when it came out.

So I guess RAW allows it if your GM just throws are a super gamey world, where CR 40+ enemies are common enough that you can fight a bunch every day, and yet rare enough that they don't completely obliterate all life on the material plane. "Hey, boy, did you think to check under your bed before jumping in? Alright, let's look. Oh! Another great wyrm prismatic dragon! Gosh darn!"

Oh, the no down-time campaign where all encounters are level appropriate is deserving of nothing but ridicule, but it appears to be fairly common, to the point that slower rest mechanics are often decried on game discussions as making daily/long rest abilities "completely unusable", because in many campaigns, "we spend a week in town recovering and visiting the local bars, temples, and whore houses" is an UNTHINKABLE thing to do. How could you ever get a whole week off without the monsters destroying the multiverse?

And I wasn't kidding about having been told MANY times that someone couldn't craft a wand of CLW because it takes so much time. It takes 8 hours and there's no requirement for special conditions or for anything but time and components, so it can be done in the field. Apparently, in many campaigns, the monsters will wait politely while you get a good night's sleep, but if you try to take 8 hours off during the day they attack in massive hordes. (I'm not sure how this works with the fact that 4 encounters is about 2 minutes fighting, what exactly ARE these characters doing the other 15.97 hours of each day?)

On the other hand, a level 63 campaign is almost certainly capable of dimension hopping and divination, so you need not find that prismatic dragon under your bed, it could be 50,000 crystal spheres over that-a-way menacing some completely different dimension and you hunt it down and take it's lunch money (which defeats it and gets full XP, while leaving the valuable adventuring resource for the next level 63 party trying to advance to 64; except I don't think people in no-downtime all level-appropriate campaigns actually do anything but kill monsters for XP).

Still hopelessly silly, but it appears to be the way many people play the game.

[Goblin_Priest]

Oh, the no down-time campaign where all encounters are level appropriate is deserving of nothing but ridicule, but it appears to be fairly common, to the point that slower rest mechanics are often decried on game discussions as making daily/long rest abilities "completely unusable", because in many campaigns, "we spend a week in town recovering and visiting the local bars, temples, and whore houses" is an UNTHINKABLE thing to do. How could you ever get a whole week off without the monsters destroying the multiverse?

And I wasn't kidding about having been told MANY times that someone couldn't craft a wand of CLW because it takes so much time. It takes 8 hours and there's no requirement for special conditions or for anything but time and components, so it can be done in the field. Apparently, in many campaigns, the monsters will wait politely while you get a good night's sleep, but if you try to take 8 hours off during the day they attack in massive hordes. (I'm not sure how this works with the fact that 4 encounters is about 2 minutes fighting, what exactly ARE these characters doing the other 15.97 hours of each day?)

On the other hand, a level 63 campaign is almost certainly capable of dimension hopping and divination, so you need not find that prismatic dragon under your bed, it could be 50,000 crystal spheres over that-a-way menacing some completely different dimension and you hunt it down and take it's lunch money (which defeats it and gets full XP, while leaving the valuable adventuring resource for the next level 63 party trying to advance to 64; except I don't think people in no-downtime all level-appropriate campaigns actually do anything but kill monsters for XP).

Still hopelessly silly, but it appears to be the way many people play the game.

Well, in a way, we tend to have campaigns without downtime either, as far as crafting is involved. But still a lot of time sinks, mostly with travel. It's a bit odd, now that I think of it, that we never seem to teleport around. I honestly don't think it'd matter, though, because a "race against the clock" paced adventure will not grant downtime if shortcuts are found. That's just some GM's style. For the most part, I think they dislike crafting specifically and feel like it cheats the wealth system. Another issue is that crafting takes so long that even if you had your weekends off to craft, every week, by the time you finish crafting an item, you'd probably be high enough level and bathing in enough wealth to already be needing an upgrade. The only things that become worth crafting are scrolls, potions, and rods, at which point, "these are so cheap they aren't worth the feat".

But yes, I'll concede that you are correct and that I was wrong in that the game does provide the means, in terms of statted monsters, in order to reach level 63, I didn't remember they went so high.

I'm not sure if we were initially talking about the OotS-verse specifically, though. I think that epic monsters are clearly established as being super rare here.

And I don't really remember epic magic well enough to figure out how hard it would be to track down epic monsters. Epic martials, as any high level martial, would mostly be left to suck up to their spellcasting counterparts. I guess a divination and/or conjuration specialist would probably be able to develop the means to track down worthy opponents, assuming a cheesy enough meta setting?

[Doug Lampert]

Well, in a way, we tend to have campaigns without downtime either, as far as crafting is involved. But still a lot of time sinks, mostly with travel. It's a bit odd, now that I think of it, that we never seem to teleport around. I honestly don't think it'd matter, though, because a "race against the clock" paced adventure will not grant downtime if shortcuts are found. That's just some GM's style. For the most part, I think they dislike crafting specifically and feel like it cheats the wealth system. Another issue is that crafting takes so long that even if you had your weekends off to craft, every week, by the time you finish crafting an item, you'd probably be high enough level and bathing in enough wealth to already be needing an upgrade. The only things that become worth crafting are scrolls, potions, and rods, at which point, "these are so cheap they aren't worth the feat".

Crafting arms and armor (or wands) becomes available at level 5 or 6 (5 for the wizard). Wonderous items at level 3.

Wands of lesser restoration or cure light wounds take 1 day starting at level 5. As pointed out, claiming that you don't have that much time is utterly nonsensical and it saves vast numbers of slots and means you enter every fight at full HP.

An item of +2 to a stat takes 4 days starting at level 3.

+2 armor takes 4 days at level 6. +2 swords take 8 days. Wands of magic missile at caster level 5 take 4 days.

And the days NEED NOT be consecutive or while in a town. IIRC you can even break it down into 4 hour half days, in which case you can do it at half rate just working nights when not resting.

You have the time unless you ARE playing in the nonsensical world of no-down time, in which case ANY long lasting campaign you get into should in fact hit very high epic levels.

[mjasghar]

*Nat 1, I'd imagine, since we are talking about missing a saving throw.

Third thought (closely related to my first): maybe this is a counter, but of a very simple type: it counts how many people are crossing the threshold at the same time. And if it is more than 1, you are out of luck to get to the gate. This is a Temple of Personal Might. No teams allowed.

Grey Wolf

Then the warg would have bypassed it
And i get the impression Oona May have gone in solo as well hunting meat

[Grey_Wolf_c]

Then the warg would have bypassed it
And i get the impression Oona May have gone in solo as well hunting meat

First, no he didn't. The others went in, and a simple counting process turnstile-like knows they are still inside. If you somehow meant in other instances, neither of those are at all interested in reaching the end of one of the doors. Greyview wouldn't go in on his own at all, and Oona, even in the weird scenario where she doesn't take pets, would hunt something, then leave.

GW

[drebb]

Yeah, geez, Roy. Use your head.

Hahaha. I love Belkar.

[Goblin_Priest]

Crafting arms and armor (or wands) becomes available at level 5 or 6 (5 for the wizard). Wonderous items at level 3.

Wands of lesser restoration or cure light wounds take 1 day starting at level 5. As pointed out, claiming that you don't have that much time is utterly nonsensical and it saves vast numbers of slots and means you enter every fight at full HP.

An item of +2 to a stat takes 4 days starting at level 3.

+2 armor takes 4 days at level 6. +2 swords take 8 days. Wands of magic missile at caster level 5 take 4 days.

And the days NEED NOT be consecutive or while in a town. IIRC you can even break it down into 4 hour half days, in which case you can do it at half rate just working nights when not resting.

You have the time unless you ARE playing in the nonsensical world of no-down time, in which case ANY long lasting campaign you get into should in fact hit very high epic levels.

Depends on the game being run. When I GM, the parties /tend/ to have a lot more downtime than with the other GMs at my table, but there are also large stretches of time with little downtime. I.e. "Spend a month with 17 days of downtime back at the barracks, then we head out trekking into hostile territory, spend 4 weeks traveling without any downtime". I run lower powered campaigns though.

You are right that lower leveled items are more reasonable to make. What's "reasonable downtime", though? If we go with "weekends", in two weeks you can make your +2 bracers. Not too bad. If the rest of that time was spent killing stuff and earning loot, though, also not incredible. The bigger issue is at higher levels, when a +1 bonus takes dozens of days, which crammed into weekends, can stretch into years sometimes. The more you advance, the more the returns on crafting reduce, especially if counted in terms of "+1s per week" or "per gained wealth", or some equivalent.

And that also all assumes always succeeding your check. You do need to make a check every day, right? Iirc?

[danielxcutter]

Honestly scribing a few scrolls shouldn’t take too long. It does depend on the campaign though; if the archdevil summoning ritual starts next Tuesday it’s probably not the best of ideas to start crafting that Belt of Magnificence +6.

[mjasghar]

First, no he didn't. The others went in, and a simple counting process turnstile-like knows they are still inside. If you somehow meant in other instances, neither of those are at all interested in reaching the end of one of the doors. Greyview wouldn't go in on his own at all, and Oona, even in the weird scenario where she doesn't take pets, would hunt something, then leave.

GW

That’s reaching a bit isn’t it? Your argument is that Oona is okay to go in solo because she goes in for a shorter time? Not much of a defense if you leave such a lag time for it to take effect
Or is it reading her mind to know she doesn’t care about the Gate?
Symbol traps aren’t usually artificial intelligences that keep count of people entering and leaving either. It’s simply a triggered spell

[Metastachydium]

The gates need maintenance.

Now, do they? Did I miss something? (Because if they do, splitting up the party definitively was fairly counterintuitive, since a rogue or a paladin cannot be expected to patch up a Gate should it begin to shake.)

[Peelee]

Now, do they?

Well, they definitely do now.

[Schroeswald]

So I'm not really trying to figure out what exactly the trap does, I do like thinking about the effect it will have and sharing what that effect is and why I think that.

One important thing to think about, is the relationship of the Order of the Scribble and the Order of the Stick. The Scribblers, they failed, they didn't save the world, they broke up and because of this crucial failure, each of the gates so far has fallen. Lirian alone guarded her gate with nature, but didn't let the forest ever burn, and so her gate fell first to an undead abomination, and then second to an accidental blaze catching on all the excess fuel. Dorukan designed his gate based on the power of arcane magic and wizardry, and then with a secondary defense of good, and his gate fell first to a sorcerer (ew) just as powerful as him, and then a good person being really dumb. Soon thought only the honor of a paladin was unbreakable and could defend the gate, and yet Miko, a delusional fallen paladin convinced in her Good, destroyed it. Girard thought he could only trust his family, and so when something took out his family the gate was near defenseless, and a surrogate family made it their and destroyed it to keep it out of the hands of one of their family members (most of the rest of the analysis is stuff I've heard before but that last bit is a Schroeswald original). And the there's Serini, who built a testament to strength, and came up with the idea to split the Scribblers.

So what's going to happen to the final gate? Well, I'm not completely sure, but I have some ideas. What I'm feeling right now, is at least briefly, Team Evil will take it. They will take it with the magical strength of Xykon, the intelligence of Redcloak and the vast physical might of the Monster in the Darkness. The Order is going to win though, they will save the world. They're going to do this, by succeeding where the Scribblers failed. The Scribblers failed because they couldn't work together, they had resentment bubble up for years, and so when they "won", they fell apart, they couldn't Stick together, and so the scribbles went their separate ways. The Order will win by working together. Thoughout the past 17 years and six books we've seen them grow more competent, trusting, and a more cohesive team. The six members of the Order will work together, each of them balancing out the others, and together the Snarl will be contained and together the world will be saved.

What this has to do with the trap? Honestly idk if it has anything to do and thinking about the trap didn't just make me think about this thing I wanted to share. But if it has anything to do with it, its that the traps being overcome is possible by both Team Evil and their strengths and the Order and their strengths, and it will show that a monument to singular physical strength isn't enough and can be overcome, just like the power of nature, arcane wizardry, paladin honor and mistrust of everyone but family could.