OOTS #1222 - The Discussion Thread

[The Giant]

New comic is up.

[Psepha]

Ah ha, so it does work like that!

Also Belkar's line at the end, just perfection.

[ebarde]

Welp, comic over they best the bad guys. A bit sooner than I expected, but it works

[Yxylu]

Cross the Line

There’s something oddly endearing about Xykon just standing there and singing to himself.

[Schroeswald]

It is looking like yes, it’s a portal and OOTS has bypassed that

[Domino Quartz]

Well.
I suppose that answers the question about what the trap is.

[AstralFire]

Wasn't expecting to get direct confirmation on that so fast, heh.

[ByzantiumBhuka]

Just as expected... bwee hee hee..

It is interesting that the greatsword disappeared upon going back through the portal. Where did it go? Perhaps that’s where some key information is?

[hamishspence]

It is looking like yes, it’s a portal and OOTS has bypassed that

Makes sense. With Team Evil entering areas full of monsters but no gate, and the OOTS on the track to the gate.

[Wildstag]

Motherflipping called it. Now to just find proof of my conjecture, a tedious task on mobile...

But yeah, I’ve been sayin for weeks that I bet it teleports them to their own unique dungeon, and this kinda proves that. Also the transdimensionality is going to give the class&level crew a field day!

My personal hope is that the line trap is actually a reoccurring thing in the dungeons. Basically, if you walk over the runes without disarming them, they create a mystery dungeon that has a randomly generated set of rooms and monsters. If you disarm the trap and continue disarming each following trap, it is instead the pregenerated Gate dungeon with rooms and monsters and features specific to defending the gate. But to actually disarm the traps consistently, you'd need to be a high level PC.

It's not technically a shell game (since if it were, the gate would be in another castle), but an endless dungeon.

Not quite perfect as far as guesses go, but pretty close...

[ti'esar]

I haven't been following the discussion threads too closely, but I'd say this is definite confirmation that there's some kind of extraplanar weirdness going on with the tunnels.

[Laserlight]

I might need to frame that last panel and send it to a writer or two.

[Hackman]

So does WONNNH sound like waving a light saber around?

[Rinazina]

Can we state with sufficient certain that:

• if Redclock with True Seeing did not notice this magical trap, the trap should be epic?
• This made Haley having solved an epic-level trap, perhaps because she's super cool?
• if the sword has disappeared when moved backward, the hero might also walk in that direction and reach a hidden, dimensional place?
• redclock is going to figure out the deception and re-do calculations, this might increase frustration among team evil?

[danielxcutter]

I'm guessing that the Order's the one in a portal or demiplane or whatnot.

Going out to fight them would probably foolish at best, so I'm guessing that the Order are going to get to the end of this dungeon and see what's happening. My bet's on that there's another line of defense that figures out whether it's a legitimate band of heroes(or Serini going in for maintenance maybe) or just a band of evil adventurers who just had a Rogue as well.

Calling it now; V's going to have the general idea but not know much more than "it's a portal"; as a specialist wizard they have a bit of a penalty to making Spellcraft checks related to conjurations.

Edit

Can we state with sufficient certain that:

• if Redclock with True Seeing did not notice this magical trap, the trap should be epic?
• This made Haley having solved an epic-level trap, perhaps because she's super cool?
• if the sword has disappeared when moved backward, the hero might also walk in that direction and reach a hidden, dimensional place?
• redclock is going to figure out the deception and re-do calculations, this might increase frustration among team evil?

• No, True Seeing only works on illusions and transmutations. Portals would fall under conjuration effects, so it's probably not epic.
• See previous answer, though the DC probably is pretty high if Roy can't even see it.
• Nah, that's probably because of the portal effect or something.... Actually I dunno, but I doubt it.
• Oh, absolutely.

[2.5 cats]

Totally cracked up at the punchline!

[SlashDash]

Best punchline ever!


The question is, are the order going to keep going forward possibly towards the gate?
Seems like it's too soon for them to reach the gate.

I don't think we'll get to see Roy finding the gate and just do nothing with it for ages until they resolve all the loose ends.



The question is, does this thing exist behind all the doors, or just this one?
Redcloak's line about having Dark One's Luck (Reference to the Warlock power?) made me think that maybe he doesn't, but Durkon got the luck of the divine intervention in picking the right door.


If the door doesn't matter and it's just the trap, then narratively speaking, the monster's trick of painting the doors doesn't really matter at all.
I still think that should come to play somehow the fact that he kept them away from some door.

[AutomatedTeller]

I guess an advantage of never looking at the forums is that you don't get the 100's of theories. I did not see that coming.

[danielxcutter]

Best punchline ever!


The question is, are the order going to keep going forward possibly towards the gate?
Seems like it's too soon for them to reach the gate.

I don't think we'll get to see Roy finding the gate and just do nothing with it for ages until they resolve all the loose ends.

Remember: finding the Gate and squatting on it does nothing until Team Evil finally get lucky or whatnot. There's still plenty to do even if they find the Gate, such as looking for the paladins if the Voices haven't stashed them here.

The question is, does this thing exist behind all the doors, or just this one?

Haley said all the doors are trapped.

Redcloak's line about having Dark One's Luck (Reference to the Warlock power?) made me think that maybe he doesn't, but Durkon got the luck of the divine intervention in picking the right door.

"Dark One's luck" is almost certainly a cleric term for "if we get lucky".

If the door doesn't matter and it's just the trap, then narratively speaking, the monster's trick of painting the doors doesn't really matter at all.
I still think that should come to play somehow the fact that he kept them away from some door.

I think that it's more the spirit that counts(as it's the start for the MitD of actually trying to hinder Team Evil), and the fact that he marked them at all means Team Evil just lost the one method they had of keeping track of everything they did so far. Maybe they can figure out which ones they already did since some don't have monsters yet(as they were killed by Team Evil), but that's going to put a strain on their teamwork. And maybe the MitD will have to start rebelling more openly.

I guess an advantage of never looking at the forums is that you don't get the 100's of theories. I did not see that coming.

Yyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyup, half the forum's been suggesting that for weeks.

[The Pilgrim]

Congratulations for everyone who guessed correctly that the trap would lead them into another dimension.

[DavidSh]

If Redcloak were destroyed here, that leaves resolution of the Snarl as an awful loose end. The Dark One doesn't have any other high level clerics, does he?

[masonwheeler]

Everyone's saying "dimensional portal." Am I the only one who looks at this and says "instanced dungeon"?

[Reboot]

It is interesting that the greatsword disappeared upon going back through the portal. Where did it go? Perhaps that’s where some key information is?

Yeah, that's the weirdest part of all of it. How do they see Xykon, Xykon doesn't see than, AND the sword disappears when going through it too? Where does the portal go this way round?

See previous answer, though the DC probably is pretty high if Roy can't even see it.

Even if they can't see the trap, shouldn't they notice the perfectly straight edge on half a scorch mark?

[RMS Oceanic]

Someone hired a Conjurer

[Cirin]

Redcloak's line about having Dark One's Luck (Reference to the Warlock power?) made me think that maybe he doesn't, but Durkon got the luck of the divine intervention in picking the right door.

It's almost certainly NOT a reference to the Warlock class.

Warlock was not a core class in D&D 3.5e (which OOTS generally runs on), it was a fairly obscure splatbook class in 3e that somehow, inexplicably became a core class in 4e.

While "Dark One's Own Luck" is a Least Invocation for 3e Warlocks, I really doubt it's a reference to a minor power from an obscure class by a character who for the last 17 years has consistently been depicted as a high-level Cleric, not a Warlock.

It's almost certainly a reference to the fact that Redcloak's deity is actually named "The Dark One".

[Corian]

Still very unsure about one thing: is the portal activated when you trigger the trap, or when you bypass it?
Everybody seems to prefer the former; I'm still not sold.
The fact that there were light effects when the order passed the line makes me prefer the latter. But the same sound effect repeating with team evil passing the line weakens my position. I mean, I could see the portal still existing on the order's side after they passed it, and they get a sound effect when they see someone bypassing it, but it's a huge stretch.
OTH, we have to explain the fact that there is no light and sound effect when you trigger the trap and enter the dungeon "normally" as TE has been doing all along.
Not sure whether time will tell, these hypothesis are hard to distinguish.
I'm mostly surprised that Roy's sword passed the line into a space that was not visible to Xykon.

[Fyraltari]

I relaly liked the way Roy went straight to "an avant-garde version of that thing where you don't remember who I am."

[hamishspence]

Warlock was not a core class in D&D 3.5e (which OOTS generally runs on), it was a fairly obscure splatbook class in 3e that somehow, inexplicably became a core class in 4e.

I don't think it making the jump from splatbook to Core, was all that inexplicable. I got the impression it was by far the most popular thing in that Complete Arcane book.

[Vrock Bait]

I really don’t know why I kept on telling myself that the theory probably wasn’t correct.

[locksmith of lo]

oh yeah! questions answered! speculations resolved!