OOTS #1223 - The Discussion Thread

[Kareeah_Indaga]

Nice.

I’d written off the floor color as a visual distortion from the magic barrier myself.

[drazen]

Looks like the Order now has a tunnel to explore.

Would Divination on the trap let a guardian monitor the crossings, in addition to showing the portal destination as if it were just a regular tunnel?

Unfortunately, the Order demonstrating such competence means that, at least by standard tropes, the villains will probably become that much more competent as well... :P

[pendell]

Bravo! This is the first time I've laughed -- really laughed -- at an OOTS strip in a long time. Blackwing's punchline cracked me up.

So now we know it's a teleportation trap much like the never-ending corridor in Wizardry I: Proving Grounds of the mad overlord (The corridor was actually 40' long, but there was a teleportation trap at 30' which sent you back to 10', so if you just walked down it you'd walk forever and never get anywhere).

This also tells us that the MITD's marking of additional doors did not help or hinder Team Evil, since they were always travelling to a decoy corridor anyway. Nonetheless, the attempt definitely counts towards a good alignment, since ze was attempting to hinder the evil villains in the most efficient way the MITD knew.

Respectfully,

Brian P.

[danielxcutter]

New crazy theory: the IFCC is sending a high-level mountebank in the general area as we speak.

...Mountebank is one of those Dragon Compendium base classes right? IIRC I think it did explicitly get its magical abilities from lower powers...

Also if we want to get pedantic, there are plenty of ways besides that. Factotum. The Chameleon PrC. Even a core-only Arcane Trickster might be able to pull that off.

But then, she probably isn't (khm, her life and times, khm).

There's being terminally stupid, and there's being stupid enough to have your location holding the cosmic underpants of the universe up defeated by a literal cantrip. I'm not sure if even early-OotS Elan was that stupid.

[Lightning Lance]

I think the scorch mark appearing by Blackwing from Roy's point of view is probably a mistake. Blackwing doesn't see it on that side from either of his points of view (entering the door, and after passing through the barrier to Xykon's side).

[Benedict]

Hm... the panel where Roy's looking through is a little confusing, since... isn't that dead end where the tunnel they're actually in terminates, just beyond the projection? Shouldn't the floor be the same yellower color in the dead-end? Or is the projection also a teleporter (hence the WONNNH), going to a third location with the same greener floor as the entrance? (And who builds a teleporter pointing to a dead end?)

On an unrelated note... how much do you want to bet Monster Hollow doesn't "regenerate" monsters like Redcloak is assuming? If these portals can switch around where they're pointing to, why not have them switch on a rotation of, say, a couple months, naturally? The MitD's trick here- surely Serini Toormuck would've thought of it when designing the place, and thought "well, okay, so what if I set it up to do that automatically?" Switching where the doors go every few months, so anyone trying to systematically work through them by marking the doors is wasting their time?

[Night Knight]

Does this mean there now exists the potential for the OOTS to trap Team Evil inside if they break the trap? It wouldn't be a win, but it would give the Order a lot of breathing room.

[KorvinStarmast]

... the pacing feels just a bit slow here ... nice to get some solid grounding and confirmation of what is going on here.

If you consider the strip as part of a graphic novel (which it is) and the readers as someone who never visits the forum, the exposition is needful.

I love how Belkar is essentially the audience.

As a part of the audience, this is the closest I'll ever get to being a Sexy Shoeless God of War, I guess.

I'm guessing the teleported dungeon is deep below Monster Hollow, possibly as some kind of pseudo-underdark ecology that handwaves the second law of thermodynamics (the door portals could act as vents, I guess, and there's a magical source of power to keep the entropy out).

V had a few strips commenting on how talent for making the laws of physics sit in the corner and cry was acknowledged as part of magic's benefit - the second law can go and hang insofar as magic is concerned in OoTSland.

Doom Tunnel and the Kill Skeleton is my favorite Hardy Boys mystery!

Oh my goodness, I didn't get the ref until you mentioned it.

Not really; none of the members of Team Evil have the Trapfinding ability.

I guess I am not smart enough on the 3.5 edition here; don't rangers have trap finding skills? (I was under the impression that Oona is some kind of ranger).

PS: thank you Giant. This is a fun strip.

I keep thinking "Roy Greenhat" these days. I really like his green wool watch cap head gear. One of those "small details I enjoy" about the strip.

[Mad Humanist]

Good to see the order testing out some of the ideas we were bouncing around. The fact that the other side is just a dead-end shoots down my theory that all they had to do was turn around to get to the gate.

Unless the dead end is an illusion.

[skim172]

Nice.

I’d written off the floor color as a visual distortion from the magic barrier myself.

I think the idea is that dust and light from the door is also teleported through the barrier, causing similar discoloration in the fake dungeon, while the real dungeon has not become discolored because it's protected from the outside elements.

As I understand this, there are two dungeons - Dungeon A, (the real one with the door, leading to the gate) and Dungeon B (the fake one with the dead end, leading to a random dungeon). If you enter the portal - from either direction - you are teleported to the other dungeon. Team Evil passes from Dungeon A into Dungeon B.

I wonder if there is a unique Dungeon B for every door (as in every door leads to a fake dungeon of its own) or if it's sort of a roulette system, randomly changing which dungeon the door is connected to after regular intervals.

[Shining Wrath]

Alas, poor Blackwing. I think your high-grade sarcasm may have been lost on Roy.
It is now confirmed that Team Evil has never actually explored the dungeon which hides the gate, aside from the first few feet of numerous tunnels. No rogue; no gate.
My objection is that you'd think that either Xykon or Redcloak would have cast Detect Magic sometime and noticed the trap. But ... if you get into a habit (open the door, walk down the tunnel) why vary the routine?

[RochtheCrusher]

Nice to see exactly were Roy’s sword actually went. Though is the fake dungeon connected to the dead end if the real dungeon is supposedly where the tunnel actually leads??

Presumably, the dead end is physically connected to Team Evil's tunnel, and magically connected to the area around Kragor's Tomb, while the Order's tunnel is physically connected to Kragor's Tomb and magically connected to the dead end. Otherwise, we have a third tunnel somewhere supplying the dead end for no reason.

[Metastachydium]

...Mountebank is one of those Dragon Compendium base classes right? IIRC I think it did explicitly get its magical abilities from lower powers...

Mhm. Precisely. It's an underwhelming rogue-analogue that pledges its soul to gentlemen in the ventral position in exchange for a couple of magic tricks.

Also if we want to get pedantic, there are plenty of ways besides that. Factotum. The Chameleon PrC. Even a core-only Arcane Trickster might be able to pull that off.

Factotums are fun stuff and yet I keep forgetting they exist.

There's being terminally stupid, and there's being stupid enough to have your location holding the cosmic underpants of the universe up defeated by a literal cantrip. I'm not sure if even early-OotS Elan was that stupid.

Well, committing to paper the location of every single object holding the underparts of the universe is not much better. Also, V's Detect Magic works just fine on the trap, so I'm not sure why Redcloak's wouldn't.

[RochtheCrusher]

My objection is that you'd think that either Xykon or Redcloak would have cast Detect Magic sometime and noticed the trap. But ... if you get into a habit (open the door, walk down the tunnel) why vary the routine?

https://www.dnd-spells.com/spell/nystuls-magic-aura

Magical auras can be spoofed and, for magical traps, they routinely are. The mage who sets them knows that another mage could easily find them, and therefore takes pains to hide the trap from their own skillset.

Rules as Written, and specifically, only a rogue has a chance to find a magical trap. Possibly because a mage is stepping into their turf, and is doing a fantastic MAGICAL job, but it's hard to outdo a scoundrel at their own game.

https://www.d20srd.org/srd/traps.htm

[KorvinStarmast]

My objection is that you'd think that either Xykon or Redcloak would have cast Detect Magic sometime and noticed the trap. But ... if you get into a habit (open the door, walk down the tunnel) why vary the routine?

Given that the bugbears, per Oona's exposition, go in and out with some frequency before Team Evil arrives, maybe they listened to Oona and friends and were pre-disposed to just accept the dungeon passageways at face value - hence no need to cast detect magic.

The smartest guy in Team Evil, Redcloak, looks at all of those doors and arrives at a method to use process of elimination and probability to narrow down the choices to the correct door. He's being taken in by the meta-shell game, isn't he? That shows us a bit of the rogue element folded into this gate's protection design. Redcloak falls for "if we just pick the right door we'll find it" ruse. Picking the right door will, I suspect, never lead you to the gate. You'll always go to a random dungeon, somewhere, and fight various beasties.

Oona mentions that the dungeons replenish, right? Or, maybe they (bugbears and later team evil) are depopulating the dungeons one by one, and end up in a random one each time so it seems like the dungeons are repopulating. When the have cleaned out the last dungeon that Serini stocked, they still won't have found the gate. Team Evil feels that they are under time pressure. Wasting time on fruitless search frustrates attaining their goals, and allows for others to arrive and disrupt their plan. That would seem to be an element of how to construct a gate's defense.

[Worldsong]

So the Order of the Stick now has a working theory for how the trap works. Nice.

[Sebastian]

"flap, flap, flap, flap."

Oh, my god. I've laughed so hard. Thankfully i was not at work. i doubt I could have stopped it.

[Shining Wrath]

I think the idea is that dust and light from the door is also teleported through the barrier, causing similar discoloration in the fake dungeon, while the real dungeon has not become discolored because it's protected from the outside elements.

As I understand this, there are two dungeons - Dungeon A, (the real one with the door, leading to the gate) and Dungeon B (the fake one with the dead end, leading to a random dungeon). If you enter the portal - from either direction - you are teleported to the other dungeon. Team Evil passes from Dungeon A into Dungeon B.

I wonder if there is a unique Dungeon B for every door (as in every door leads to a fake dungeon of its own) or if it's sort of a roulette system, randomly changing which dungeon the door is connected to after regular intervals.

Team Evil keeps finding monsters, so I think that means each teleport trap sends you to a different location.

Mhm. Precisely. It's an underwhelming rogue-analogue that pledges its soul to gentlemen in the ventral position in exchange for a couple of magic tricks.



Factotums are fun stuff and yet I keep forgetting they exist.



Well, committing to paper the location of every single object holding the underparts of the universe is not much better. Also, V's Detect Magic works just fine on the trap, so I'm not sure why Redcloak's wouldn't.

Factotums are indeed fun.
It may be that V's Detect Magic works because they cast it from the inside; part of the Divination magic might be giving a false result to Detect Magic, although I suspect that would be more than "minor" Divination.

[hamishspence]

Alas, poor Blackwing. I think your high-grade sarcasm may have been lost on Roy.

Blackwing's statement in the last panel isn't sarcasm, at least, it's Blackwing's version of what V says here, IMO:


https://www.giantitp.com/comics/oots0203.html

[Shining Wrath]

https://www.dnd-spells.com/spell/nystuls-magic-aura

Magical auras can be spoofed and, for magical traps, they routinely are. The mage who sets them knows that another mage could easily find them, and therefore takes pains to hide the trap from their own skillset.

Rules as Written, and specifically, only a rogue has a chance to find a magical trap. Possibly because a mage is stepping into their turf, and is doing a fantastic MAGICAL job, but it's hard to outdo a scoundrel at their own game.

https://www.d20srd.org/srd/traps.htm

I had forgotten Nystul's. A most spendiferous spell for the dungeon-building mage. And maybe Nystull's is in effect if you're outside the dungeon, but not if you're inside, past the trap.

[Ghosty]

Hm... the panel where Roy's looking through is a little confusing, since... isn't that dead end where the tunnel they're actually in terminates, just beyond the projection? Shouldn't the floor be the same yellower color in the dead-end? Or is the projection also a teleporter (hence the WONNNH), going to a third location with the same greener floor as the entrance? (And who builds a teleporter pointing to a dead end?)

On an unrelated note... how much do you want to bet Monster Hollow doesn't "regenerate" monsters like Redcloak is assuming? If these portals can switch around where they're pointing to, why not have them switch on a rotation of, say, a couple months, naturally? The MitD's trick here- surely Serini Toormuck would've thought of it when designing the place, and thought "well, okay, so what if I set it up to do that automatically?" Switching where the doors go every few months, so anyone trying to systematically work through them by marking the doors is wasting their time?

All of this, but mainly the first paragraph. Roy stuck his head into a different tunnel than where the Order is. It might even be a different tunnel than what TE is currently in. I'm interested in discovering what would happen if Roy went completely through the portal, then reversed and went back through it. I don't think he'd end up with the Order, but I don't know where he'd end up.

(This is making me want to use Feynman diagrams to try and figure out what's going on.)

I think if Haley were to disable the portal from the door side, TE would still be able to come back to the door side, as her actions wouldn't affect the portal where TE currently is. My guess is all doors lead to the same thing, if you bypass the portal. Ties in with Roy's observation about the close spaced doors and where do you fit the corridors. No idea if that same thing is the Gate.

I wonder if there's a second set of portals, more difficult to find than this first one?

Glad the Giant is well and posting again.

[KorvinStarmast]

It may be that V's Detect Magic works because they cast it from the inside; part of the Divination magic might be giving a false result to Detect Magic, although I suspect that would be more than "minor" Divination.

IIRC, Nystul's Magic aura does that, doesn't it?

[Zhorn]

This gave me a good late night chuckle.
Thanks Giant, loving the work as always.

[Windscion]

Flap, flap, flap, flap.

I wish this site had shmuckers so I could tip this.

[Alaris]

I saw the comic go up before i got the email about it. I don’t know true seeing well enough but it’s surprising it doesn’t tell this is happening. Good for the order though :)

So, it's because the way it is set up that Tree Seeing doesn't tell that it's happening.

It's not actually an illusion. It's a trap that teleports them, with a Divination spell that shows them their destination.

It's actually quite clever. The only reason the OoTS got through it is because they had a high level rogue who actually saw the trap. Team Evil... well, a High Level Cleric and Sorcerer can get through a lot... but traps will still be a problem.

[Metastachydium]

My guess is all doors lead to the same thing, if you bypass the portal. Ties in with Roy's observation about the close spaced doors and where do you fit the corridors. No idea if that same thing is the Gate.

„Yes, this theory keeps coming up, and I happen to be one of the folks who keep pointing out that »all the doors lead to the Gate if one has a rogue« would be a horrible defense. (…) [I]f there are two corridors behind each door, the second of which can only be accessed if the trap is disarmed, and only one of the secondary corridors (which are guarded) leads to the Gate, it's clever. (…)
If, rather, disarming the trap behind any door leads to the one secondary corridor which leads to the Gate, now that's DUMB, period, even if the secondary corridor is guarded.”

[Dragonus45]

IIRC, Nystul's Magic aura does that, doesn't it?

It does exactly that, and depending on the designers resources you can do a lot of great stuff with the spell. Like the dungeon I'm running right now where every five foot square of the dungeon's floor, walls, and roof, have had the spell cast on them to register as a different school of magic to baffle attempts to detect within the dungeon. I'm a complete and total moron and even I worked this idea out so I'm sure a high level rogue with the kind of resources like Serini can do much better.

[Ivrytwr]

I am loving Blackwing!
"Flap, flap, flap, flap" made me laugh out loud.
Thanks Giant!

[Jaxzan Proditor]

Hmm, interesting that trying to go back through teleports you again. I wonder if going all the way through and then through again would bring you to a yet another spot...

I cackled at that last punchline.

[Ghosty]

„Yes, this theory keeps coming up, and I happen to be one of the folks who keep pointing out that »all the doors lead to the Gate if one has a rogue« would be a horrible defense. (…) [I]f there are two corridors behind each door, the second of which can only be accessed if the trap is disarmed, and only one of the secondary corridors (which are guarded) leads to the Gate, it's clever. (…)
If, rather, disarming the trap behind any door leads to the one secondary corridor which leads to the Gate, now that's DUMB, period, even if the secondary corridor is guarded.”

I just noticed Blackwing is visible flying in the panel where Roy's head went through. So, I'm guessing Roy would be transported to TE's tunnel if he were to do what I suggested. If TE, returning to the door, saw the portal, disabled it, and walked past it, they'd see Roy's head's alcove dead end.

So no 3rd set of tunnels. (Funny what you miss: I'd have sworn Blackwing wasn't there in that panel, the first time I read the strip.)