OOTS #1229 - The Discussion Thread

[homersolo]

Personally I think that Xykon is too strong for the Order and there's no chance without ridiculous amounts of author fiat(granted, this is a comic and not an actual game), or my personal headcanon of "Roy bullrushes him through the Gate and the Snarl eats him".

Also I know that Serini probably won't try to kill them, but my point is that an epic level Rogue could probably KO Vaarsuvius with just one crossbow bolt if she got a Sneak Attack in, and quite possibly Elan and Haley as well. And that's before magic items and poison.

Dang it. Your random post about how you see Xykon dying has wriggled its way into my head and I am now of the belief that this is how Belkar dies.

[Ghosty]

well the order has to be better able to stop her than two paladins...

Wouldn't it be great if we could have the Order plus two Paladins? Oh, and an Epic Rogue and architect of the maze helping?

No, still not enough mojo? Bummer.

[TRH]

Besides, when did we learn that the gates can't possibly be used to control the Snarl and unleash it on the Material Plane? All we learned that I remember is that the existing ritual can't possibly be used that way.

[bunsen_h]

Nope. Her logic is pretty sound based on the following assumption: existing, with a complete {censored} ruling the world (before someone topples him, which she knows is possible given the existence of adventurers) beats not existing. There are a variety of RL parallels that I'll not introduce due to forum rules but suffice to say that the choices, as she sees it, are not binary: there is a third, fourth, or even fifth option. (We could toss in the old 'where there's life there's hope' cliche, but I'm not sure that she thinks along those lines).

Granted, the observation that she has incomplete information, being a character in the story rather than a reader of the story, is true but irrelevant as regards her sanity and motivations.

She's not insane. She's differently informed. There's a high likelihood that she has some information that we (and the Order) don't.

I suspect she doesn't know about Redcoak's Plan, or else she might have mentioned goblinoids in her list of people who aren't doing well under the current order.

Indeed, or destroying Xykon (which I believe is their plan A) as "the best defense". Doing that doesn't require finding the gate under these circumstances, unless they know Xykon has already found it. Which puts them one up on their old selves, or the party looking for the Lost Treasure of Sdigiji.

Not to be confused with the fabled artifact "The Arm of Sigdi". Which you become able to use by cutting off your own arm, then grafting the Arm to your shoulder, etc.

Those Trolls she loves so much might just be erased from existence because Xykie doesn't like their smell.

Point of order:

Spoiler: Start of Darkness

Show

I don't think that Xykon has a sense of smell any more. We know that he has no sense of taste.

WHY Do people keep saying the IFCC will save V everytime V comes into danger? They never HAVE saved V, they said they can't/won't save V, they don't even particularly want V to win.

They want to prolong any conflict. And they did say that they'd protect V's body while V's spirit was being held by them.

Also I love that her goggles look like old 3D glasses.

Yes. Although the "real" effect may be that we're seeing distorted, enlarged images of her real eyes: one blue, the other troll-red.

[Doug Lampert]

Any custom spells are going to come about through experimentation vis a vis charisma. His spellcasting has never come from research. It comes from his innate inborn magic and force of personality. Any new spell will be a result will be trial and error experimentation rather than what Durkon did to research Mass Death Ward. Which I still don't understand how he can research a spell and then ask Thor to be able to cast it.

We know X researched at least one custom spell, Xykon's Moderately Escapable Forcecage.

The DMG spell research rules work fine for sorcerers, they just need to take the researched spell as a spell known to actually cast it.

Similarly, a cleric can research a spell, but the gods grant a cleric their spells. The cleric asks the gods for ALL their spells, a custom researched spell is just asking for a special service. We ordered our house constructed with a standard floorplan (asked the builder for a house), but then we also asked for a bunch of handicapped accessibility features and told them to skip another feature. Strangely, the builder was able to accommodate us when we told him what we wanted and offered money.

Not so strangely, the gods can accommodate a cleric when he has researched a spell and has an appropriate spell slot.

[HalfTangible]

I like that Serini is... basically correct

When your choices are "be ruled by evil for a few years" or "utter oblivion" the former is obviously the better option. Stop Xykon if you can, but we're past the point where taking that risk is worth it.

There's one detail she doesn't know about that makes her plan here not an option (Redcloak's plan and/or the divine cycle) but she is otherwise entirely correct.

[TRH]

I guess it wouldn't suit the IFCC's interests to have V and the others' memories wiped - V's useless as a game piece if they no longer remember everything with the Gates and are effectively off the board. That said, calling in a soul debt wouldn't fix that, and it'd be easier for them to just send Sabine or Qarr to get everyone back up to speed so they can be steered properly again.

[Fyraltari]

Yeah, but that's all on the way to the next objective. Bullying your subordinates for lulz while you're doing other, big-picture evil is one thing...willingly going along with a fake plan for years, just because you really like torturing this one goblin and think the payoff will be funny, does not really make sense given what we know about Xykon. That feels more like a pre-character-growth Belkar.

This snippet of a quote, which got The Giant's seal of approval (not canon, I know, but illustrates Xykon's mentality) feels relevant:

Xykon is very much like an early Belkar. Low-attention span sadists who think the world exist for their amusement. Xykon isn't a long-term planner, as you quoted he has no real stakes in the Plan (at least not since he became undying). He does whatever he wants whenever he feels like doing it. If he feels like spending two decades torturing this one guy, he will do it. It's not like he's getting any older anymore. Even if he did conquer the world, it wouldn't change much in his life. He's not Sauron, he's not trying to take over the world so he can rule it, he's doing it because it feels like fun and once he's king of the universe he can just blast a city or two to smithereens whenever he wants. He's certainly not going to create a unified tax system or anything. With the sole exception of protecting his phylactery, it's all just a conseqenceless game to him. Like a bored Skyrim player who's made a save before rampaging through Whiterun.

Isn't someone trying to topple Xykon when he had control of a gate how this whole thing(OotS not the prequels) started in the first place? That doesn't seem like a good premise on which to base the security of the WHOLE FRICKING WORLD! :)

This whole mess started with someone trying to topple Xykon while he was failing to get access to a Gate, actually.

Serini is one of the people who created the gates. She, if anyone, has to understand that there is not "ultimate world domination" to gain from the gate.

Isn't there? The Dark One isn't planning to control the Snarl but that doesn't mean it's impossible. I doubt that even Epic spellcasters could honestly say with full confidence "It's impossible for a god to devise a spell that would tame this creature." Dorukan put a self-destruct rune on his Gate so he clearly feared that someone could use it for nefarious purposes. The Sapphire Guard wasn't aware of Redcloak's goals so it seems that the Scribblers weren't either. Tsukiko figured out that Redcloak's Ritual doesn't do but she had access to one half of the Ritual, how is Serini who hasn't access to it and isn't a mage supposed to guess that?

[Windscion]

... Also, I wonder if Oona might actually be on Serini's side somehow? A bit of a wild guess, but the way her village is set-up in relation to the dungeon makes me wonder if Serini didn't strike some sort of agreement with them.

I really like this idea. After all, Serini might have guided them to Monster Hollow in the first place.

[BloodSquirrel]

Sure, Xykon killed the entire Sapphire Guard easily, but he didn't BEAT them easily. That's like saying you easily won a final boss fight because you destroyed the first of their 2 (or 3, or more) health bars. The boss then explodes, and turns into a fiery angel or whatever, and you begin the second round of the boss fight. Xykon did not win the FIGHT. He killed them, but he was not prepared for everything a bunch of mortals had put in place to stop him. That the mortals had to become positive energy spirits to stop him does not change the fact that they still almost stopped him through their own actions and preparations.

Just because the Sapphire Guard Ghost-Martyrs had to stay in the Azure City throne room doesn't mean Xykon is invulnerable to every possible scenario as long as he stays in his Evil Fortress. If he completed the Ritual and it did what he thinks it'll do, eventually someone would still grow powerful enough and kill him.

Sorry, but you've said absolutely nothing to address the difference between Xykon facing defenses that were built up for decades versus someone trying to fight him after he's had decades to build up his defenses.

You tried to bring up an example of something that could defeat Xykon, and I've explained why it isn't relevant. Do you have an example that is relevant, or are you just going to keep blindly asserting that, someone, somehow, will be able to defeat Xykon?

This entire conversation is moot because Xykon is never going to get "control" over the Snarl, and nobody wants that to happen.

No, it's not, because we're discussing Serini's sanity, and she is acting on asumptions that make Xykon controlling the Snarl plausible.

[locksmith of lo]

what no one seems to have commented on is that we have more and more of the principles and heavies all coming together on the scene. the only one that we are missing, that we know of, is the MitD. once the MitD is there, all we would be missing are the IFCC, et al, and the gods. this really is the beginning of the end it seems.

[Theshipening]

Sorry, but you've said absolutely nothing to address the difference between Xykon facing defenses that were built up for decades versus someone trying to fight him after he's had decades to build up his defenses.

You tried to bring up an example of something that could defeat Xykon, and I've explained why it isn't relevant. Do you have an example that is relevant, or are you just going to keep blindly asserting that, someone, somehow, will be able to defeat Xykon?

Without bringing up “It’s a story, someone, somehow, will always be able to defeat Xykon because he’s the BBEG”, Durkon once spoke to two dudes who occasionally storm the gates of Hell for funsies, and we know this world spawned, in addition to the whole Order of the Scribbles, at least three epic-level spellcasters (from V’s soul splice). Xykon may, or may not, be the biggest fish in the pond at any given time, but it’s not by a wide margin, and a group of epic-level adventurers assembling to take him down is always a possibility, especially with the giant target on his back that comes with ruling the world.

[Fyraltari]

what no one seems to have commented on is that we have more and more of the principles and heavies all coming together on the scene. the only one that we are missing, that we know of, is the MitD. once the MitD is there, all we would be missing are the IFCC, et al, and the gods. this really is the beginning of the end it seems.

The party doesn't start 'til Trigak gets there.

[Dion]

And Serini votes for Safety over Freedom.

*shrug* I’m not sure a world shattered into raw elemental threads by the gods is the kind of “freedom” that people have in mind when they say that.

[Nymrod]

True. But then again, so is everyone else, up to and including the Gods themselves.

Having said that... yeah, Serini is definitely nuts.

Conservation of Detail tells us that either someone knows the full picture and may spill it at a crucial moment (my bet is that the IFCC KNOWS what is on the other side of the gate and actually is interested in getting their hands on that) OR that the Order ends up on the other side of the Gate at some point in the future.

[Grey Watcher]

... (my bet is that the IFCC KNOWS what is on the other side of the gate and actually is interested in getting their hands on that) ...

Not that I have a better theory about what their goal is, but how could they know anything about it?

[BloodSquirrel]

Without bringing up “It’s a story, someone, somehow, will always be able to defeat Xykon because he’s the BBEG”,

Without passively-aggressively countering with "If it's a story, then we don't have to worry about the world blowing up in the first place because it would be a thematically inappropriate ending"...

Durkon once spoke to two dudes who occasionally storm the gates of Hell for funsies, and we know this world spawned, in addition to the whole Order of the Scribbles, at least three epic-level spellcasters (from V’s soul splice). Xykon may, or may not, be the biggest fish in the pond at any given time, but it’s not by a wide margin, and a group of epic-level adventurers assembling to take him down is always a possibility, especially with the giant target on his back that comes with ruling the world.

Aside from the fact that Xkyon is 3-3 against the Scribbles, and V even with her soul-splices couldn't take him down- Xykon will now have a superweapon that can be used to take out anyone before they become that dangerous. As I said: this isn't a JRPG. High level adventurers don't just pop out of nowhere. They have to earn their levels, and that means fighting powerful enemies and achieving great deeds, and that's going to make them visible enough for Xykon to say "Eh, those guys look like trouble. Snarl 'em".

[HalfTangible]

(my bet is that the IFCC KNOWS what is on the other side of the gate and actually is interested in getting their hands on that)

They didn't know here, and by that point their plan was already in motion.

[HalfTangible]

Aside from the fact that Xkyon is 3-3 against the Scribbles, and V even with her soul-splices couldn't take him down- Xykon will now have a superweapon that can be used to take out anyone before they become that dangerous. As I said: this isn't a JRPG. High level adventurers don't just pop out of nowhere. They have to earn their levels, and that means fighting powerful enemies and achieving great deeds, and that's going to make them visible enough for Xykon to say "Eh, those guys look like trouble. Snarl 'em".

Yeah, if Xykon were the ruthless, methodical, efficient villain Redcloak likes to act like he is. But he's not.

Xykon's the Big Ham. He's evil because it's fun, and part of that fun is, occasionally, having a great hero rise to oppose you. He offers to let Roy go free at Azure City precisely because he's not interested in taking the most efficient route to power. The big climactic showdown at the end would, in Xykon's eyes, be entirely worth letting him go.

[dancrilis]

Not that I have a better theory about what their goal is, but how could they know anything about it?

They could provide Sabine or a different servant with a few dozen souls and tell her to throw them into a rift and depending on how that plays out have a few Imps or Quasits (or similiar) fly into the rift and see about returning with an info gathered ... what they know and don't know depends on what studies they conducted and what the result of those studies was.

We do have an open question in the comic about if there is any problem that sacrificing minions can't solve.

[BloodSquirrel]

Yeah, if Xykon were the ruthless, methodical, efficient villain Redcloak likes to act like he is. But he's not.

Xykon's the Big Ham. He's evil because it's fun, and part of that fun is, occasionally, having a great hero rise to oppose you. He offers to let Roy go free at Azure City precisely because he's not interested in taking the most efficient route to power. The big climactic showdown at the end would, in Xykon's eyes, be entirely worth letting him go.

Xykon also gets very serious, very fast, when he's genuinely threatened- just look at how he lost his **** when Redcloak lost his phylactery.

Also, remember, this is not "Oh, it might happen", this is "I'm willing to let Xykon have a gate and count on it happening". Serini is counting on Xykon being incompetent and chaotic enough to eventually lose, but competent and careful enough to be trusted not to blow up the gate.

[Nymrod]

They didn't know here, and by that point their plan was already in motion.

Didn't know what would happen if the phylactery dropped in the rift, not what was on the other side. There could be a different quote I am missing of course, but that's not it (I mean it could be that moving the phylactery to the other side of that gate breaks its connection with Xykon.

[Theshipening]

Aside from the fact that Xkyon is 3-3 against the Scribbles, and V even with her soul-splices couldn't take him down- Xykon will now have a superweapon that can be used to take out anyone before they become that dangerous. As I said: this isn't a JRPG. High level adventurers don't just pop out of nowhere. They have to earn their levels, and that means fighting powerful enemies and achieving great deeds, and that's going to make them visible enough for Xykon to say "Eh, those guys look like trouble. Snarl 'em".

3-3 on 1v1, given his fight against Dorukan was kinda close, if Lirian had been there for some support magic, or Soon for a good ol’ SMITE, etc..., they’d have taken him down, and V not only already used some spells and lost the most powerful of the splices, they were still shackled to their mid-level ass, and would’ve fared much better against Xykon if still in their own high-level bodies (and with some sweet action economy).

You mean, the same Xykon who told Roy to go level up some more before fighting him because otherwise the fight isn’t fun ? Plus, not all great deeds bring great fame (I doubt the Scribblers were well-known, even in life), and even pretty potent forces like Azure City and Dorukan couldn’t track down a god-forsaken lich after he destroyed a Gate, and we all know how Xykon feels about Divination. Also, other planes exist (likely Durkon’s friends were extraplanar, and Ganonron’s whole deal was conquering ‘a thousand planes’, so clearly OotS’s planet isn’t the only inhabited place), and Xykon can’t monitor them all.

[Ionathus]

I'm not sure if "dumb" is the right word. "Uneducated", maybe. I doubt Dorukan would be as good at playing the paladins like a cheap kazoo, would he?

Agreed. This comic is exceptionally good at demonstrating different forms of intelligence/understanding (Hayley's street-smarts in War & XPs, Elan's bardic knowledge in BRitF, even Durkon's understanding of personal growth in Utterly Dwarfed) in different situations. That's what we're seeing here: Serini didn't spend time learning arcane/divine magic, she spent that time learning about troll communities and developing epic-level misdirection & sneakery. I imagine her competence will be even more thoroughly displayed in the upcoming pages.

Also I love that her goggles look like old 3D glasses.

Makes me think of the 10th Doctor occasionally doing the same!

Again, deciding to destroy the Gate when you have a spare, doesn't mean you're going to want to destroy the last one. She obviously doesn't believe the Paladins, and I gave two reasons why she might not upthread---oblivion beats Xykon running things, and the 'Good Guys' might bluff that they'd destroy it or blow it up inadvertently. But "You did it three times before," shouldn't be one of those reasons.

Look, The Order are the protagonists and I am on their side. I support their actions at Girard's Gate, and I hope they take out Big X instead of letting him reach the gate. But that doesn't mean that their viewpoint is unimpeachable, or that Serini is not entitled to her worldview.

And her worldview is pretty clearly that ZERO of the gates should have ever been destroyed. We're thinking about this in storytelling terms: Elan himself says "it WOULD be more dramatically appropriate to have the final showdown at the final gate".

But if our real world had 5 pillars that kept it from undoing itself, don't you think there would be at least some people who would see the destruction of even one of those pillars as a horrifying step towards oblivion? We're thinking in game terms and saying "well there's still X pillars left" and people like Serini would be saying "NO! You idiots, don't destroy that! There are only X pillars left!"

Sorry, but you've said absolutely nothing to address the difference between Xykon facing defenses that were built up for decades versus someone trying to fight him after he's had decades to build up his defenses.

You tried to bring up an example of something that could defeat Xykon, and I've explained why it isn't relevant. Do you have an example that is relevant, or are you just going to keep blindly asserting that, someone, somehow, will be able to defeat Xykon?

No, it's not, because we're discussing Serini's sanity, and she is acting on asumptions that make Xykon controlling the Snarl plausible.

This is pretty much a parallel debate to the one we had on this thread. You asserted that X is impossible, and then I put forward an example where X happens, and then you said "that's not relevant." Except it is. You're fixating on details and minutiae but the big picture is what's important.

The existence of ANY example of X happening means that X is possible. I'm not arguing that a Lich Xykon in control of the Snarl would be easy to defeat, or simple to defeat, or quick to defeat. I'm arguing that he would be not impossible to defeat. It doesn't matter if that defeat takes a long time, or comes after a reshaping of the world, or requires him to be lured into some new chamber a la the Sapphire Guard Throne Room. I'm saying we have proof, in-comic, that Xykon The Lich Sorcerer is not an unkillable god. He has, in fact, many flaws that could (and probably will) be exploited in his downfall.

If Serini was watching the battles for the assorted gates, that means she saw Xykon The Lich Sorcerer get his ass handed to him twice(Roy throwing him at the rune, and the Ghost Martyrs dunking on him). It is nowhere near outside the realm of believability that she would say "yeah, this dude is Evil and will cause a lot of pain, but someone's gonna eventually take him down."

ETA: The threat of Xykon, even from the beginning of the main plot (when the Order learned the Secret Lore of the Sapphire Guard), has never really been "we have to stop Xykon because if he gets control of The Snarl, that's it, he will be invincible literally forever." The threat has been "we have to stop Xykon because if he gets control of The Snarl, loads of people will get hurt and civilization as we know it will be dramatically reshaped."

Even in Roy's dragon-zombie battle with Xykon, he acknowledges that the world will keep on turning, and Xykon offers for Roy to leave and come back once Xykon's got The Snarl, and they can have a big dramatic fight with Roy at higher levels. Sure, maybe that's a ploy on Xykon's part, but maybe not.

It's like a rampaging bull has broken into the china shop, and The Order and The Paladins are saying "we have to get it out, RIGHT NOW! It'll break some of the china!" because they're do-gooders and they can't stand even small things going wrong if they have the power to try and stop them. Meanwhile Serini, with a much more pragmatic outlook, is saying "you idiot, it might kill you, and then there will never be a china shop ever again!"

Except, you know, on a cosmic scale.

[Cazero]

I'm not sure what Serini is hoping to accomplish with her amnesia potion. Eventualy, the paladins and the Order are going to notice that Xykon isn't dead (deader, dead-ish, you got the point) and come back for more.
Except this time they'll be in an even bigger rush prone to mishaps. Like breaking a gate.

[Theshipening]

I'm not sure what Serini is hoping to accomplish with her amnesia potion. Eventualy, the paladins and the Order are going to notice that Xykon isn't dead (deader, dead-ish, you got the point) and come back for more.
Except this time they'll be in an even bigger rush prone to mishaps. Like breaking a gate.

The plan is to make them think Kraagor’s Tomb isn’t where Serini said it was to Soon (kinda like Girard.) So they can rush all they like, they ain’t finding nothing, because they’ll be looking elsewhere.

[Ionathus]

The plan is to make them think Kraagor’s Tomb isn’t where Serini said it was to Soon (kinda like Girard.) So they can rush all they like, they ain’t finding nothing, because they’ll be looking elsewhere.

Agreed; it doesn't feel like a terribly long-term solution, but I think Serini probably knows that.

[HalfTangible]

Didn't know what would happen if the phylactery dropped in the rift, not what was on the other side. There could be a different quote I am missing of course, but that's not it (I mean it could be that moving the phylactery to the other side of that gate breaks its connection with Xykon.

"I don't know why the raven is just staring at the rift"

[Dion]

Serini believes the existential threat to the gates comes from someone destroying them to prevent them from falling into Xykons hands.

And she’s 100% absolutely and totally correct. Everyone saying “the last gate won’t be destroyed because it’s the last one” is wrong.

Because that really is what is going to happen. She’s figured it out correctly. The gates (and the rest of the world) really will be destroyed to prevent Xykon and Redcloak from taking control and performing their ritual.

What she doesn’t know - the missing piece of information - is she doesn’t know WHO is going to destroy the gates. She thinks it’s paladins or adventurers or whatever. She’s wrong about who.

All of the gods, working together, are planning to destroy the gate (and the rest of the world along with it) to prevent Xykon from taking control.

And she’s not going to prevent that with her amnesia potions.

[dancrilis]

Agreed; it doesn't feel like a terribly long-term solution, but I think Serini probably knows that.

It might not have to be - if her current approach can hold off Xykon and Redcloak until Redcloak hits level 21 and if she has a copy of the Gate construction ritual on hand then she could (secretly) hand it to them so that they decide to go away and repair one of the other rifts and leave the north alone.

That way she gets to a) protect her gate and b) help reinforce reality.