OOTS #1220 - The Discussion Thread

[ebarde]

Each gate was defended in a way that reflected the values of whoever made them. While this one at first seemed to be strength above all else, I still think there's still a bit of Serini's own values here, and I think what she valued the most from the little snippets that we had of her is teamwork and companionship. I feel she was the one in the party that most liked being an adventurer, considering she seemed to be the only one that didn't just retired. So I wouldn't be surprised if this gate wasn't themed around that in some way, maybe testing the skills of a balanced adventuring party like the one she was a part of.

[RatElemental]

Each gate was defended in a way that reflected the values of whoever made them. While this one at first seemed to be strength above all else, I still think there's still a bit of Serini's own values here, and I think what she valued the most from the little snippets that we had of her is teamwork and companionship. I feel she was the one in the party that most liked being an adventurer, considering she seemed to be the only one that didn't just retired. So I wouldn't be surprised if this gate wasn't themed around that in some way, maybe testing the skills of a balanced adventuring party like the one she was a part of.

It could also have been designed such that her old party reconciling their differences and working together would be the only way for any of them to access the gate. It just so happens that the Order matches their party composition enough to also make it work.

[ebarde]

Yep! That was what I posited in another thread, I think this dungeon is specifically made to be an adventure.

[Phhase]

"The con isn't in getting you to pick the wrong shell. The con is in getting you to accept that the basic premise of the game is still being followed. The con is in getting you to pick a shell at all."

"Why should they give us a 33% chance to pick the right one when they can give us a 0% chance? If they can create two decoys, why not three?"

Why not hundreds upon hundreds...

[Ghosty]

It could also have been designed such that her old party reconciling their differences and working together would be the only way for any of them to access the gate. It just so happens that the Order matches their party composition enough to also make it work.

FWIW, I like this theory a lot. Fits what we know of her character.

[Algeh]

I like that idea. "Not a lot of birds at the North Pole" makes Blackwing rather noticeable as a tiny black dot in a sky full of nothing but light colour, apart from the occasional yrthak flier. Elsewhere, there would be other small flying things around.

Not that it being a reasonable place to find a bird has always helped poor Blackwing...

On further thought: they've left a clear trail to the first door they entered, and a partially-obscured trail from there to this one. Which muddies the water considerably: what level of bluff are they playing? Did they really double back? Did they choose some other route altogether?

I don't suppose there's any magic along the lines of "scry the recent history of a location", AKA "video surveillance"?

I thought I remembered there being a spell for this, but I can't seem to find it it the online SRD. Might be a 2rd edition thing, might not be in the SRD, might be cross-pollination from GURPS, might be that it just has a non-intuitive name, but I'll look more later if no one else finds one.

[InvisibleBison]

Each gate was defended in a way that reflected the values of whoever made them. While this one at first seemed to be strength above all else, I still think there's still a bit of Serini's own values here, and I think what she valued the most from the little snippets that we had of her is teamwork and companionship. I feel she was the one in the party that most liked being an adventurer, considering she seemed to be the only one that didn't just retired. So I wouldn't be surprised if this gate wasn't themed around that in some way, maybe testing the skills of a balanced adventuring party like the one she was a part of.

What purpose would Serini have for testing the skills of people trying to get access to her gate? The purpose of the defenses isn't to find some sort of successor or next generation of gate guardian; the purpose of the defenses is kill everyone who tries to access the gate. Everyone seems to think that Monster Hollow is serving as some sort of secret test of character for some reason, and I find this attitude very confusing, as as far as I can tell it is completely unsupported by anything in the actual story.

[Hiro Quester]

I agree.
No. The Ioun Stone don't give additional spells. It only improves the effective caster level for the purpose of calculating the spells' effect and caster level checks.

That’s what I meant. One less ECL for their spells because Blackwing is far away.

[The Shadow]

Is this the first time someone other than Vaarsuvius has directly addressed Blackwing? Even if not, it's quite rare.

We never did get any explanation why there was a period after Azure City where the party forgot about Blackwing, did we?

[Grey_Wolf_c]

What purpose would Serini have for testing the skills of people trying to get access to her gate? The purpose of the defenses isn't to find some sort of successor or next generation of gate guardian; the purpose of the defenses is kill everyone who tries to access the gate. Everyone seems to think that Monster Hollow is serving as some sort of secret test of character for some reason, and I find this attitude very confusing, as as far as I can tell it is completely unsupported by anything in the actual story.

The story supports it from the dungeon of Dorukan and his self-destruct mechanism based on the goodness of one's heart (as well as his similar process for obtaining a random amulet he seem to find precious enough to protect). There is also the fact that none of the gates where simply encased, buried and then unmarked - in all cases, there is a way of reaching the gate, however difficult. I honestly cannot remember at this point if it is canon or just my headcanon that repairs are occasionally needed, but even if it is the latter, I think it is a reasonable explanation to why the gates remain accessible, but protected.

In any case, for whatever reason, we know that all other gates are accessible in some way, and we know that "some way" is tailored by the "owner" of the gate - Dorukan trusted people of good heart, Soon trusted his Paladins, Whats-his-face trusted his family, etc. So it is reasonable to assume that Serini too left a way to the gate, and tailored the defences in such way that someone she trusted would be able to access her gate.

My problem with the idea that she trusted a balanced party, apart from the obvious "that's not a temple to Kraagor's physical might" however, is that the other thing every ex-Scribbler did was to retain their own access to their own gate while they were alive. Serini did not have a balanced party anymore (if she ever did at all), so any mechanism of accessing the gate that required her to have a competent party means that she locked herself out of her own gate. Instead, what I proposed last thread is rather the opposite: that there is a way for brute force to get to the gate, as Kraagor would have wanted, but that Serini also had to install a way for a rogue to get to it, because she needed it, what with her being a rogue and not a dwarven barbarian.

Is this the first time someone other than Vaarsuvius has directly addressed Blackwing? Even if not, it's quite rare.

We never did get any explanation why there was a period after Azure City where the party forgot about Blackwing, did we?

IIRC, Haley admitted she never forgot, and was just messing with V?

Grey Wolf

[Hiro Quester]

Is this the first time someone other than Vaarsuvius has directly addressed Blackwing? Even if not, it's quite rare.

To be fair, Hayley talked to Blackwing, in#154, BW’s second appearance, when she named the bird, too.

[Necris Omega]

You are right. if Xykon need to find traps he 'd send in some zombie. Or some minion. or some zombified minion.

No, wait, first he send minions, then make zombies of their corpses and send them forward. Much less wasteful.

I think that's probably why the entryway trap (or traps, assuming the other doors operate them same way) function repeatedly and more importantly subtly so as to counter that kind of brute-force methodology. You can't escape a trap if you can never realize you've been trapped in the first place - team evil is being fleeced without even realizing it.

"Evil overlord zergs the gate with fodder" would be one of the more obvious scenarios considered for defending said gates - that the epic Rogue would devise a way around that which is both entirely within the rogue wheelhouse and so effective it goes unnoticed is very cunning.

Kudos to Haley for both noticing and having a means around it. I'd like to think her specific methodology goes beyond "huck random thing in there and set it off" like a goober, and has actual rogue-trap specific connotations that couldn't be blundered into by any novice or trundling minion who happened to get lucky. That head isn't something she'd carry without good reason - that it plays into her professional craft makes more sense than not.

[bunsen_h]

"Evil overlord zergs the gate with fodder" would be one of the more obvious scenarios considered for defending said gates - that the epic Rogue would devise a way around that which is both entirely within the rogue wheelhouse and so effective it goes unnoticed is very cunning.

Whatever the mechanism is, it also has to "fail safe" in the case of someone neutralizing all magic in the entry area, e.g. with Dispel Magic or Anti-Magic Shell. That's part of why I suspect a two-part "trap": one to be neutralized by a rogue, another to detect that neutralization and trigger the shift to the alternate passageway, however that works.

[danielxcutter]

The story supports it from the dungeon of Dorukan and his self-destruct mechanism based on the goodness of one's heart (as well as his similar process for obtaining a random amulet he seem to find precious enough to protect). There is also the fact that none of the gates where simply encased, buried and then unmarked - in all cases, there is a way of reaching the gate, however difficult. I honestly cannot remember at this point if it is canon or just my headcanon that repairs are occasionally needed, but even if it is the latter, I think it is a reasonable explanation to why the gates remain accessible, but protected.

In any case, for whatever reason, we know that all other gates are accessible in some way, and we know that "some way" is tailored by the "owner" of the gate - Dorukan trusted people of good heart, Soon trusted his Paladins, Whats-his-face trusted his family, etc. So it is reasonable to assume that Serini too left a way to the gate, and tailored the defences in such way that someone she trusted would be able to access her gate.

My problem with the idea that she trusted a balanced party, apart from the obvious "that's not a temple to Kraagor's physical might" however, is that the other thing every ex-Scribbler did was to retain their own access to their own gate while they were alive. Serini did not have a balanced party anymore (if she ever did at all), so any mechanism of accessing the gate that required her to have a competent party means that she locked herself out of her own gate. Instead, what I proposed last thread is rather the opposite: that there is a way for brute force to get to the gate, as Kraagor would have wanted, but that Serini also had to install a way for a rogue to get to it, because she needed it, what with her being a rogue and not a dwarven barbarian.

Lirian isn't mentioned here, I see, but the general method is similar to Soon's Gate, just with different creatures. In both cases, you could literally waltz up to the Gate unopposed if they let you through for some reason, which isn't the same as leaving it unprotected. I mean, the paladins let the Order into the throne room.

In short, "a way to access it" is not the same as "defeating the purpose of the defenses", in the sense that putting a lock on a vault is not pointless because it can be opened with a key. By that logic you should put valuables in seamless blocks of concrete and forget about them.

[Grey_Wolf_c]

Lirian isn't mentioned here, I see, but the general method is similar to Soon's Gate, just with different creatures. In both cases, you could literally waltz up to the Gate unopposed if they let you through for some reason, which isn't the same as leaving it unprotected. I mean, the paladins let the Order into the throne room.

Yeah, I tend to forget about her gate. Sorry. I suspect she was the one least interested in a successor selection on the basis that, being an elf, it's the kind of thing they can push off, unlike the others that, by the end of their adventures together, where within a few decades of their max age, but if push came to shove, I'd imagine she'd trust druids above all others.

GW

[danielxcutter]

Whatever the mechanism is, it also has to "fail safe" in the case of someone neutralizing all magic in the entry area, e.g. with Dispel Magic or Anti-Magic Shell. That's part of why I suspect a two-part "trap": one to be neutralized by a rogue, another to detect that neutralization and trigger the shift to the alternate passageway, however that works.

Does Detect Magic and the like help detect magic traps, incidentally?

Also Anti-Magic Shell isn't a 3.5e spell, but Anti-Magic Field has the slight drawback of negating the caster's own magic and that of their allies which may make them vulnerable to the monsters inside. Of course if you cast it when going in, then dismiss it once everyone's through it could work.

Edit:

Yeah, I tend to forget about her gate. Sorry. I suspect she was the one least interested in a successor selection on the basis that, being an elf, it's the kind of thing they can push off, unlike the others that, by the end of their adventures together, where within a few decades of their age max, but if push came to shoe, I'd imagine she'd trust druids above all others.

GW

Or other creatures of the forest in general. I think a lot of the intelligent creatures she'd call her allies are also extremely long-lived if not flat-out immortal.

Also yeah Lirian seemed to not be nearly old enough to worry about succession. Maybe in a couple centuries, but considering her power then squatting on top of her Gate may indeed be the best strategy for quite a long time before that.

[Throknor]

The rat head was left on the trap line, half over. If the trap line is in fact an invisible portal, that means when it activates again the rat head may be cut in half, or at least appear to exist only on one side of the portal. That would certainly let team evil figure out what is happening.

If they leave it, sure. But it's also on their side of the line and they still have time to grab it.

[Mic_128]

I wonder if Oona might know about the trap, but feel no obligation to mention it. She has no particular interest in finding the Gate, after all -- she's just along for the EP and treasure from clearing out all the tunnels.

Assuming she, or one of the other bugbears had even noticed, they might simply have assumed if it was a trap, that it didn't work. "We've been going in and out of there for years. It doesn't do anything, so why bother telling the new people about it?"

Or hell, they could have spotted the runes and just assumed it was decoration.

[tigerusthegreat]

Rogues (and only rogues) can disable magic traps. Magic traps beaten by a high enough disable device check can be temporarily bypassed instead. What if our tricky dungeon creator rigged a spell/trap that would only work if bypassed by a skilled enough rogue?

Someone barreling through wouldnt get to the right area.

Someone disabling traps wouldnt get to the right area.

Someone bypassing a resetable trap would.

Combine that with the shell game of 100 doors and you have the 'rock isn't hidden under any of the cups" scenario. It would take a very long time for anyone to figure out that they arent eliminating wrong options.

[danielxcutter]

Actually, there's not much reason for the bugbears to take levels in Rogue even if that is their favored class. Aside from Sneak Attack, UMD, and sometimes the social skills there really isn't much that it contributes to in this environment. If they needed stealthy combatants, there's always Ranger.

[hamishspence]

Scout class from Complete Adventurer fills the "rogue/ranger" niche fairly well.

[danielxcutter]

Scout class from Complete Adventurer fills the "rogue/ranger" niche fairly well.

Hmm, I suppose. I can't find the "complex classes" part where it's unlikely to, say, find a wizard in a smaller or less civilized settlement so I don't know where Scout falls on that, but it's probably either the same as Rogue or Ranger and those are "simple" enough for some of the bugbears to possibly have levels in I think.

[Saint-Just]

Hmm, I suppose. I can't find the "complex classes" part where it's unlikely to, say, find a wizard in a smaller or less civilized settlement so I don't know where Scout falls on that, but it's probably either the same as Rogue or Ranger and those are "simple" enough for some of the bugbears to possibly have levels in I think.

"NPCs in the community" is in DMG, so it only contains the core classes. I do not think that it was ever updated to include non-Core classes. It's also too generic, so the highest-level Rogue gets 1d8 + community modifier, and the highest-level Ranger is 1d3 + community modifier, which makes sense for cities, but not for hamlets/villages. Also thorp's (less than 80 people) community modifier is -3 so there is never a Ranger in a normal small community.

[Peelee]

That’s what I meant. One less ECL for their spells because Blackwing is far away.

I don't believe the distance rule is in effect here.

[Roland Itiative]

The rat head definitely got damaged in that flashy display, so I guess that trap is actually two traps. There's a damage component, which Haley identified and counteracted, and then the "floors changed colour" teleportation component, which is the real trap. The first one distracts any rogue, and the limited time to act makes them not think through the second one. Well played.

[Petrocorus]

I don't believe the distance rule is in effect here.

It does, the Ioun Stone effect works only as long as Blackwing remains close to V.

Which incidently is another example of BW talking to people.

Unless i misunderstand you and you're saying it wouldn't work anyway because of the dimensional shift/displacement/interference/thing?

[Peelee]

It does, the Ioun Stone effect works only as long as Blackwing remains close to V.

Which incidently is another example of BW talking to people.

Unless i misunderstand you and you're saying it wouldn't work anyway because of the dimensional shift/displacement/interference/thing?

No, you understood perfectly and rebutted my claim quite inarguably.

[B. Pseudonym]

I honestly cannot remember at this point if it is canon or just my headcanon that repairs are occasionally needed, but even if it is the latter, I think it is a reasonable explanation to why the gates remain accessible, but protected.

I'm pretty sure that's not canon, but then again, I have very recently proven unreliable on this topic.

My problem with the idea that she trusted a balanced party, apart from the obvious "that's not a temple to Kraagor's physical might" however, is that the other thing every ex-Scribbler did was to retain their own access to their own gate while they were alive. Serini did not have a balanced party anymore (if she ever did at all), so any mechanism of accessing the gate that required her to have a competent party means that she locked herself out of her own gate. Instead, what I proposed last thread is rather the opposite: that there is a way for brute force to get to the gate, as Kraagor would have wanted, but that Serini also had to install a way for a rogue to get to it, because she needed it, what with her being a rogue and not a dwarven barbarian.

As for her lack of a balanced party, maybe she made some new friends. After all, she's shown shouting at someone offscreen for a brief gag in the crayon segments. If I remember correctly, it's showing the construction of the Tomb, and she's saying something like "yeah, just set the purple worms down over there." I'll admit that that was pretty clearly a gag panel, but still- one halfling rogue couldn't have built the whole tomb. Maybe she knows a couple spellcasters now?

[Hiro Quester]

So this seems clearly a rogue’s deception/misdirection.

Serini tells everyone (the other guardians, and perhaps even her own diary, which Xykon acquired, right?) that the game is about strength, in defeating monsters.

But the real path to the gate requires (hopefully among other things) a rogue’s skill in bypassing traps.

[skim172]

What purpose would Serini have for testing the skills of people trying to get access to her gate? The purpose of the defenses isn't to find some sort of successor or next generation of gate guardian; the purpose of the defenses is kill everyone who tries to access the gate. Everyone seems to think that Monster Hollow is serving as some sort of secret test of character for some reason, and I find this attitude very confusing, as as far as I can tell it is completely unsupported by anything in the actual story.

I wouldn't say the gates were some sort of test. But I could see this idea work in the premise of "This is what they believed would form the strongest defense". Dorukan believed in magic, Lirian believed in nature, Soon believed in honor, Girard believed in deception - and they built their defenses based on what they believed. Not because they were testing anyone, but simply because they believed this was what made the most sense.

So I could see the argument that Serini believed teamwork and diversity of approaches was the strongest of all, and constructed a dungeon defended upon that basis.