OOTS #1270 - The Discussion Thread

[Riftwolf]

That's the part my question was about. What source do we have to support the idea that Serini didn't know Dorukon had died? Serini was an epic rogue moving around in a dungeon at least nominally under Xykon's control. Play the character yourself: how would you not know about Xykon? She already knew that Lirian's gate had been destroyed. Why would she not check in on her old buddy to talk about it?

At the time of the flashback panel she was talking to Sunny, a child-like being. If Sunny didn't know at that point that Dorukon was dead, what effect would that have had? Perhaps Sunny would have taken it well, or perhaps she would have had a full tantrum right there and went floating off to attack the lich who killed Pop. Why not get her away from the dangerous lich first?

I think Serini knew. That was why she was there: to see what was going on. Opportunism and kindness lead her to recruit the monsters she could before they became minions of Xykon, or dead. Even if that meant telling a lie to a child for her own good.

From memory, there was a big gap between the deaths of Lirian and Dorukan. She might have had chance to investigate Lirians demise and talk to Dorukan before Xykon showed up at the dungeon. And for all we know, the flashback panel might've been when Serini found out Dorukan was dead. After all, Dorukans gate hadn't fallen yet, and between the Oath (if Serini was serious about it) and the Cloister, the only way for Serini to Gather Information is investigating in person.

[Ruck]

From memory, there was a big gap between the deaths of Lirian and Dorukan.

Indeed. About 26 1/2 years according to Start of Darkness.

[brian 333]

I mean, if she knew Dorukan was dead and Xykon was near she’d probably be freaking out a bit? Also as mentioned earlier the man’s own employees didn’t know he was dead for a while.

This is true and it may be correct. However, she already knew that Lirian's gate was destroyed. Long enough before the depicted scene, in fact, to have discovered that, and how, she died. She would have known enough to check out Xykon fairly soon after her troll buddies put her back together. She is no idiot.

And that leads her to Dorukan's dungeon. By that time, Xykon has laid siege to it for how long? And she somehow missed the part where he ran out and got himself killed.

Her not knowing does not seem right to me. It requires an epic rogue to be oblivious.

Her lying to a creature she is recruiting rings true.

[Peelee]

This is true and it may be correct. However, she already knew that Lirian's gate was destroyed. Long enough before the depicted scene, in fact, to have discovered that, and how, she died. She would have known enough to check out Xykon fairly soon after her troll buddies put her back together. She is no idiot.

And that leads her to Dorukan's dungeon. By that time, Xykon has laid siege to it for how long? And she somehow missed the part where he ran out and got himself killed.

Her not knowing does not seem right to me. It requires an epic rogue to be oblivious.

Her lying to a creature she is recruiting rings true.

All the Scribblers and their allies are alerted when a Gate falls. They are not alerted when a Scribbler dies.

The Gate stood for at least 6 months after Dorukan died. Why would she assume, when there seems to be no problem with the Gate, that it was under control of a lich who slew Dorukan?

[hamishspence]

This is true and it may be correct. However, she already knew that Lirian's gate was destroyed. Long enough before the depicted scene, in fact, to have discovered that, and how, she died. She would have known enough to check out Xykon fairly soon after her troll buddies put her back together. She is no idiot.

And that leads her to Dorukan's dungeon.

The implication here:

https://www.giantitp.com/comics/oots1227.html

is that Xykon tracked her down after Lirian's death, not vice versa. She may not have known how and why Lirian died, until after Xykon's attack on her - and still may not have known where Xykon was heading next.
Allowing her visit to the castle, with Sunny, to be serendipitous, rather than "She traced Xykon to Dorukan's castle."


For that matter, given that the "alert system" is normally in the building itself (in the Girard case for example)

https://www.giantitp.com/comics/oots0844.html

and given that she left the dungeon behind and went travelling (strip 1227) - she may not have known about Lirian's death until she returned to the Kraagor dungeon, found that dungeon's "alert system" had one light dim, and guessed Lirian was dead.

[gbaji]

From memory, there was a big gap between the deaths of Lirian and Dorukan. She might have had chance to investigate Lirians demise and talk to Dorukan before Xykon showed up at the dungeon. And for all we know, the flashback panel might've been when Serini found out Dorukan was dead. After all, Dorukans gate hadn't fallen yet, and between the Oath (if Serini was serious about it) and the Cloister, the only way for Serini to Gather Information is investigating in person.

My assumption is that she was there checking out Dorukan's dungeon. At that point in time, two things have happened that she's aware of:

1. Lirian's gate has fallen
2. She's been attacked and nearly killed by Xykon and her diary stolen.

Pretty reasonable to "snoop" around Dorukan's place to see what's up. Whether the whole recruiting monsters bit was just the excuse she used with Sunny to explain what they were doing, or was something she also had going on on the side really doesn't matter that much.

Also, as a couple people have pointed out, the gate monitor thing only monitors the gates. As far as she knew, Dorukan's gate was still very much intact at the time of the flashback. It's entirely plausible that she had only just arrived and didn't know Dorukan was dead. And yeah, I'm also going with her having no clue Xykon was even there at that point in time. Remember. He pretty much kept to the lower levels and had minions dealing with the order to this point in the comic. If I were to guess, the moment she discovered that Dorukan was dead, and Xykon was running the show, she skedaddled.

Recall also, that the Order didn't actually know who Dorukan was at that point (other than the name of the dungeon itself). They thought it was built by Xykon. They knew Xykon was there because the oracle sent them. So could easily be two different groups, with different information at the same time. Serini assumes Dorukan is there because she knows this is his dungeon and knows nothing of Xykon's presense. The Order assumes Xykon is there because that's where the Oracle sent them, and knows nothing of Dorukan.

I did notice something interesting in the flashback scene. Elan, Haley, and Durkon are standing in the same relative positions in the flashback as they are in strip 32, minus the rest of the order. So could be the same scene (sorta) just from a different angle. Either the other members moved, or we're getting an odd quarter angle shot and the others are more towards the foreground in the original shot (hard to tell). Just found that interesting, since it would place this literally immediately before Sunny appears in the final frame (or immediately between the last two in that strip).

[brian 333]

Timeline:
After Lirian's death Xylon went looking for Serini.
Unspecified time passes.
Xykon finds Serini and takes her diary.
Specified time passes and Dorukan deciphers Serini's code.
Coordinates in hand, he lays siege to Dorukan's dungeon.
Specified time passes before Xykon defeats Dorukan.
Specified time passes before Serini is found poaching critters in Dorukan's employ.

Whether or not Serini knew about Lirian's death before Xykon found her is unknown. However, as soon as she was ambulatory she had to be curious about her own attacker. That would have involved her discovering that her gate alarm had gone off. Knowing that her only missing possession was her diary, she had to add two and two.

This makes keeping track of Xykon imperative. She would be a fool to not do so because her own gate was on the list, and there is a 25% chance that her next visitor will be a skeleton with a goblin sidekick.

Xykon laid siege to the Dungeons of Dorukan for six months. If Serini didn't know about it, it was because she's not a very good rogue. Suddenly the siege ends and Xykon is inside the pyramid. If she doesn't know this she is a very bad rogue and stupid as well.

After Haley gives Sunny a 'will-call', Serini steps out of the shadows and recruits Sunny. With the timeline above, and my interpretation of it beneath it, how can Serini not know that Dorukan is dead? Even excluding the interpretation, how can one explain Serini not knowing?

She knew about Lirian. She had to have had time to learn about Xykon. In my opinion she would have had to be idiotically negligent to not have been aware of the siege and its outcome. She was inside Dorukan's stronghold after the seige succeeded.

Contrast that with a simple expedient lie.

[Peelee]

This makes keeping track of Xykon imperative.

Keeping track of Xykon is not as trivial as you seem to make it out to be.

[Tzardok]

After Haley gives Sunny a 'will-call', Serini steps out of the shadows and recruits Sunny.

I think you misunderstand this thing. Serini already knows Sunny in the flash back in 1270, which takes places (judging from the dialogue) before the "will-call" scene.

[brian 333]

Keeping track of Xykon is not as trivial as you seem to make it out to be.

Just follow the trail of zombies. And jokes aside, you are correct. However, even a poorly built rogue has impressive abilities which lend themselves well to gathering information. I'm not trivializing Xykon's ability to detect an epic rogue who is scouting him. I'm just not trivializing Serini's abilities to avoid detection.

[gbaji]

Whether or not Serini knew about Lirian's death before Xykon found her is unknown. However, as soon as she was ambulatory she had to be curious about her own attacker. That would have involved her discovering that her gate alarm had gone off. Knowing that her only missing possession was her diary, she had to add two and two.

Sure. There are two bits we don't know here:

1. How long it took her to recover, return to Kragor's tomb, and discover that the alarm had gone off. It's not clear to us where the Troll village was, but it didn't look like it was in the frozen north (or even near to it).

2. How long it took her to travel all the way from up north, to the Redmountain Hills. It's not like she has teleportation, so she has to sneak the whole way with Sunny to get there.

Xykon laid siege to the Dungeons of Dorukan for six months. If Serini didn't know about it, it was because she's not a very good rogue. Suddenly the siege ends and Xykon is inside the pyramid. If she doesn't know this she is a very bad rogue and stupid as well.

Or the entire siege occurred in the time period Serini was recovering, then travelling back to the tomb, then deciding what to do about this, maybe communicating with Girard's folks (she seemed to keep touch with them via sending maybe?), then maybe checking in on Lirian's gate location first, finding out information there, and then finally heading to Dorukan's dungeon. That could easily have taken her 6 months or a year, or more. There is no "suddenly the siege ends and Xykon is inside the pyramid" (I thought it was a dungeon, not a pyramid). There is only "she arrives many months after the fact, and begins sneaking into the dungeon". You're assuming she was what? Standing around outside the dungeon watching the siege and battle and result? And then, what? Hung around for more time until the Order arrived in time for the flashback scene? Why make that assumption when a simpler one works (and fits all the "facts" we have)? She just arrived, didn't know what happened, and is in the process if exploring the dungeon to figure out what's going on.

After Haley gives Sunny a 'will-call', Serini steps out of the shadows and recruits Sunny. With the timeline above, and my interpretation of it beneath it, how can Serini not know that Dorukan is dead? Even excluding the interpretation, how can one explain Serini not knowing?

As noted above, she didn't recruit Sunny from the dungeon. Sunny traveled with her to the dungeon to recruit other monsters. That's literally Sunny saying "I'm going to go talk to them", which presumably happened just prior to strip 32.

If Serini just arrived the day before or something, it's entirely possible she wouldn't know. How would she? She arrives and sneaks in. She notices goblins there, who weren't there before (we don't actually know what kinds of creatures were in the dungeon, but presumably there were some maintained there since she was "recruiting" them). She may have suspected something was up, or may not have. Xykon is deep in the dungeon. The Order is much farther up. She would run into them before she ran into anyone specifically that would make her think of Xykon being there.

I guess we can also go with "the dialogue in the strip strongly suggests she didn't know Dorukan was dead at that point". Maybe just go with what was written in the strip and take it as "fact" and fit other things around it, instead of trying really really hard to prove that it just couldn't be true.

She knew about Lirian. She had to have had time to learn about Xykon. In my opinion she would have had to be idiotically negligent to not have been aware of the siege and its outcome. She was inside Dorukan's stronghold after the seige succeeded.

Contrast that with a simple expedient lie.

Or... she just didn't arrive until after the siege was over. That's even simpler. And yes, she was inside Dorukan's dungeon after the siege succeeded. So what? The order was in there too, adventuring around. It's not like Xykon posted guards at the entrance with "Xykon's guards" written on their foreheads or anything.

I'm going to paraphrase O'chul here. Which is more logical? That she's constructing a lie that serves no purpose at all, or that she just doesn't know the truth? It's not like she kept the truth of Dorukan's death from Sunny after the fact. He knows all about the gates and what's going on, right? So we'd have to speculate that she lied to him in the one flashback we see, for what purpose? So that some forum posters will think she really knew about Dorukan's death maybe an hour or so after the flashback sequence would suggest, so that we'd think... what? Sunny didn't know? He does. There's literally zero reason to do this. No value gained. No story impact. Zip. Zero. Nada. It has zero effect on any character action for us to think this, or travel down this path of reasoning.

Meanwhile, again, it makes absolute sense to just assume that she arrived right then, but didn't yet know that Dorukan was dead, or that Xykon had taken up residence. That fits all the facts and makes sense. The theory you are presenting not only doesn't, but actually opens up even more inconsistencies than it attempts to solve (like why on earth would she still be there if she knew Xykon was there?).

[RatElemental]

I already knew our mystery 1 page soon to be ally was going to be Sunny but I still find the obvious bit of retconning necessary to make that happen kind of awkward.

[brian 333]

Sure. There are two bits we don't know here:

1. How long it took her to recover, return to Kragor's tomb, and discover that the alarm had gone off. It's not clear to us where the Troll village was, but it didn't look like it was in the frozen north (or even near to it).

2. How long it took her to travel all the way from up north, to the Redmountain Hills. It's not like she has teleportation, so she has to sneak the whole way with Sunny to get there.

She literally has hundreds of teleportation devices in her stronghold. She would have to be criminally stupid to not have destinations all over the world for her personal convenience.

Or the entire siege occurred in the time period Serini was recovering, then travelling back to the tomb, then deciding what to do about this, maybe communicating with Girard's folks (she seemed to keep touch with them via sending maybe?), then maybe checking in on Lirian's gate location first, finding out information there, and then finally heading to Dorukan's dungeon. That could easily have taken her 6 months or a year, or more. There is no "suddenly the siege ends and Xykon is inside the pyramid" (I thought it was a dungeon, not a pyramid). There is only "she arrives many months after the fact, and begins sneaking into the dungeon". You're assuming she was what? Standing around outside the dungeon watching the siege and battle and result? And then, what? Hung around for more time until the Order arrived in time for the flashback scene.

How long did it take for Xykon to decrypt the code in Serini's diary? A full monsterous regeneration of a max HP/Level rogue would take 2 hours. At less than 1hp per round that's less than a day at 1hp per turn, 5 days at 1hp per hour, or 120 days at 1hp/day.
In short, Serini had a lot of time between the theft of her diary and the attack on Dorukan's dungeon.
The siege itself took six months.

Why make that assumption when a simpler one works (and fits all the "facts" we have)? She just arrived, didn't know what happened, and is in the process if exploring the dungeon to figure out what's going on.

Because I refuse to believe Serini is as incompetent as she would have to be for that scenario to make sense. We are talking about a person who knew intimate details about the goings on in Shojo's throne room while Xykon was there. I don't recall seeing any halflings, or halfling-shaped shadows. Why would someone that good at being a rogue be so bad at it between the attack on her and the attack on Azure City?

As noted above, she didn't recruit Sunny from the dungeon. Sunny traveled with her to the dungeon to recruit other monsters. That's literally Sunny saying "I'm going to go talk to them", which presumably happened just prior to strip 32.

Sunny was an upcoming encounter which was interrupted by the lawyers. What makes you think she came to the dungeon with Serini?

If Serini just arrived the day before or something, it's entirely possible she wouldn't know. How would she? She arrives and sneaks in. She notices goblins there, who weren't there before (we don't actually know what kinds of creatures were in the dungeon, but presumably there were some maintained there since she was "recruiting" them). She may have suspected something was up, or may not have. Xykon is deep in the dungeon. The Order is much farther up. She would run into them before she ran into anyone specifically that would make her think of Xykon being there.

I guess we can also go with "the dialogue in the strip strongly suggests she didn't know Dorukan was dead at that point". Maybe just go with what was written in the strip and take it as "fact" and fit other things around it, instead of trying really really hard to prove that it just couldn't be true.

The dialogue in the strip implies that. But if she doesn't know by that point that Dorukan is dead, well, that's the whole issue I have been wrestling with. It requires an epic rogue to be epically ignorant after being ambushed, left for dead, and learning that at least one of her adventuring buddies is now dead.

Can you at least see the problem I'm having with the 'facts'?

Or... she just didn't arrive until after the siege was over. That's even simpler. And yes, she was inside Dorukan's dungeon after the siege succeeded. So what? The order was in there too, adventuring around. It's not like Xykon posted guards at the entrance with "Xykon's guards" written on their foreheads or anything.

I'm going to paraphrase O'chul here. Which is more logical? That she's constructing a lie that serves no purpose at all, or that she just doesn't know the truth? It's not like she kept the truth of Dorukan's death from Sunny after the fact. He knows all about the gates and what's going on, right? So we'd have to speculate that she lied to him in the one flashback we see, for what purpose? So that some forum posters will think she really knew about Dorukan's death maybe an hour or so after the flashback sequence would suggest, so that we'd think... what? Sunny didn't know? He does. There's literally zero reason to do this. No value gained. No story impact. Zip. Zero. Nada. It has zero effect on any character action for us to think this, or travel down this path of reasoning.

But the lie (if it was one,) did serve a valid purpose. Two in fact. First, cynically, it verified that Sunny did not know Dorukan was dead. Second, it prevented Sunny from possibly doing a suicidal charge to the throne room to confront Xylon for murdering his Popi.

Zip, zero, nada? Who would have thought a throwaway gag from over 1200 strips ago would have story purpose? Because you don't see possibility does not negate its existence.

Meanwhile, again, it makes absolute sense to just assume that she arrived right then, but didn't yet know that Dorukan was dead, or that Xykon had taken up residence. That fits all

the facts and makes sense. The theory you are presenting not only doesn't, but actually opens up even more inconsistencies than it attempts to solve (like why on earth would she still be there if she knew Xykon was there?).

All of that is true. And for it to be true, Serini has to be the most incompetent rogue since Vinny Three-fingers tried to pick the pocket of Bagrem The Hanging Judge.

The reason she would be there? Many reasons. To get more monsters for her dungeon before Xykon recruits or kills them. To rescue them before adventurers kill them trying to get to Xykon. To learn what is going on with Xylon and assess his plan with the gates. To learn enough so she can recruit an epic level adventuring band to destroy Xykon.

The 'facts' do not make sense to me. I don't know what inconsistencies my guesswork opens up. I suppose the only inconsistency I see is that she told a lie to a child-like creature. And avoided causing a scene at a critical time.

[Edric O]

For some reason it always makes me anxious when a Main plot could have been solved easily in retrospect.

It couldn't have been. Sunny is just mistaken. While Xykon was in the Dungeon of Dorukan, there was absolutely no point in "jumping ahead" to Kraagor's Gate. Xykon had no intention of going anywhere else while Dorukan's Gate was still standing. And the chances of the Order successfully enlisting Serini's help back then were less than zero, considering how hard it was to enlist her even now, when the Order is far more competent.

[Edric O]

Also, I think it's telling that despite Serini, Shojo, the Draketooths and Dorukan being alerted to the fall of Lirian's Gate, Xykon could lay siege to Dorukan's Dungeon for months without Serini or the Draketooths meaning any known attempt to help. Dorukan did not ask for help and no one checked regularly enough to notice he might need any.

I suppose this shows that while Serini was okay with snooping around in the other party members' Gate defenses, she did not do it often.

[Dame_Mechanus]

Keeping track of Xykon is not as trivial as you seem to make it out to be.

Keeping track of Xykon is incredibly easy because he always travels with Redcloak, and Redcloak logs every location he visits on MaceBook. He's a lawful cleric, after all.

[hamishspence]

Keeping track of Xykon is incredibly easy because he always travels with Redcloak, and Redcloak logs every location he visits on MaceBook. He's a lawful cleric, after all.

Xykon was off on his own for three years in SoD (from 6 years before Dungeon Crawling Fools, to 3 years before Dungeon Crawling Fools). That's the period when he attacked Serini, got her diary, and decoded it.

The siege itself took six months.

Actually it was over a year. 6 months is the time between Xykon defeating Dorukan, and the Order arriving at the castle.

How long did it take Xykon to decode the diary? Unknown - but he disappeared for 3 years, so if his disappearance involved going straight for Serini very early on in the disappearance, it could have been almost 3 years of decoding - taking place in the backup fortress where he kept the diary - followed by him going straight for Redcloak and discovering him with Right-Eye.

Sunny was an upcoming encounter which was interrupted by the lawyers. What makes you think she came to the dungeon with Serini?

Sunny consistently calls Serini "Mom" and says Serini raised them. That doesn't gel with them having only met 2 years ago with Sunny being the same size as they are now.

[RickDaily12]

Liked the part of the comic where Elan and Sunny play baseball, and the jokes about the Bat and Banjo. But I'll be adding my name to those who found it strange that Serini didn't know Dorukan was dead. From what we've seen of her so far, and what kind of knowledge she's been flaunting, it doesn't really track.

Spoiler: Start of Darkness

Show

First of all, per SoD, we know that Xykon spent about a three year portion away from Redcloak (6 -> 3 years prior to DCF). Back then, they had no idea where the gates were (because they did not have Serini's Diary), as Redcloak was explaining to Right-Eye about why he'd gotten sick of just sitting around his castle before finally deciding to go looking for him. As Xykon arrives at the end of this arc, stating he knew where the gate at Redmountain Hills was, and having to trace it backwards from Lirian's Gate, he sends his army that way straight away.

6 months before DCF, Redcloak kindly announces to us that they had been sitting outside Dorukan's Dungeon for at least over a year.

So, we know that at this point, Serini's figured out that Xykon killed Lirian. Xykon also nearly killed her, and took her diary. So she knows both of a threat to the Gates, and to the Scribble members.

And while I can't exactly prove a negative, that there's no way Serini could have NOT known something, it seems a bit hard to swallow that Serini wasn't keeping a serious eye on the situation regarding the several Gates, and of Xykon, when she herself admits:

1. She knew that both Lirian and Dorukan were killed by Xykon, and
2. She also knew who destroyed Soon's Gate, and exactly whose sword it actually was that had done the deed.
3. She was also keeping tabs on Girard's Gate to know it was the OotS who destroyed it, (and Dorukan's Gate, as she also indicates "the party with the lich" [isn't] "running around destroying gates".)

Think about what she needed to have done to have even known about Point 2. Even Xykon couldn't scry into that room, but she still somehow knows enough about this to argue with the Paladins that she had known that they were the ones responsible for destroying it.

Also, for those pointing out "well, her Gate device only points out when the Gates are destroyed, but not when their defenders are dead", you're correct, but where you lose me, is where we go on to speculate that she wasn't keeping better tabs on Dorukan's Gate when it also had anti-detection magic surrounding that Gate, just like Soon's did; yet Serini had such high-precision knowledge of what was happening to Soon's Gate, as it was happening. It just doesn't seem as likely that she would have missed what was going on at Dorukan's Gate for the full 18 months prior to DCF Xykon had sieged there, and after Dorukan had been killed by Xykon, when she was perfectly aware of the circumstances surrounding Soon's Gate until its moment of destruction. Hell, if anything, her knowledge of Dorukan's Gate at that moment should have been better than Soon's, if say, she had informants in the area- because she was actively recruiting monsters at Dorukan's Castle, but Soon's only guards were Human Paladins!

Again, this is all Serini just blurting out what she knows at the time, and it doesn't really track all that well given the timeline. Serini knows that Xykon killed Lirian and Dorukan. She knows exactly who destroyed each Gate. She knows who is doing it before the Gates actually get destroyed, which means she's either paying regular visits to the Oracle, or, more likely- she has some method of surveilance on each Gate that she has been checking really often. Yes, she doesn't have a device telling her when a Gate guardian is dead the exact moment they died, but her information has otherwise been extremely current. That she knew Dorukan was killed by Xykon, and that the Order blew up his Gate, but somehow didn't know the earlier fact during that gap in events, when her information has otherwise been pinpoint accurate to the exact date of the events is just not consistent of what we've seen of her so far.

Like I said, I can't absolutely prove that Serini did not know something, but given everything else she knew, when she indicates knowing of it- it just doesn't track well to me in a way that makes sense right now.

[Liquor Box]

1. She knew that both Lirian and Dorukan were killed by Xykon, and
2. She also knew who destroyed Soon's Gate, and exactly whose sword it actually was that had done the deed.
3. She was also keeping tabs on Girard's Gate to know it was the OotS who destroyed it, (and Dorukan's Gate, as she also indicates "the party with the lich" [isn't] "running around destroying gates".)

One of the more popular theories (even before this strip) about how much Serini knew was that the monitoring of the gates informed her on the event surrounding their destruction. That would explain how she knew your second and third points.

Even if Serini had the means to keep track of Xykon (which I doubt), I don't find it at all surprising that she didn't. She had been defeated by him, and he had taken her diary. She then had the choice of dedicating her time and resources to trying to track him, or to bolstering her gate's defences (something she'd neglected until then). Given that she seemed to think that she had no chance of hindering Xykon if she did keep track of him, bolstering her own gate's defence seems to me the more sensibly place to dedicate her energies.

That all assumes she had some way to keep track of Xykon. I can think of nothing obvious. We have seen no abilities, magic items or techniques from her that suggest the ability to track and epic lich (including in the no spell zone of Dorukon's dungeon). Indeed the only information gathering we have seen from her is from gate monitoring and lurking invisibly near her own lair.

[Ruck]

Something else I'd add is that Lirian was killed and her gate destroyed 27 years before the events of the main comic. Decades went by before another Gate was threatened. It's not hard to picture this scenario: With that long with no activity on any of the other Gates, Serini figured it was a one-time thing and stopped worrying about immediate threats to any of the Gates.

Then, perhaps, when Dorukan died and that Gate blew up, she decided to keep a closer eye on the activity among the remaining two beyond her own, which is how she knew the details from Soon's Gate.

Or another possibility-- when Xykon took her diary, she started keeping tabs on the other gates, but she's still only one person, and she may not have known Xykon was going for Dorukan's next (and while his beacon was still lit, didn't have any reason to think he was dead).

And further still-- there may yet be something we do not know that explains all this! That happens quite a bit in this comic.

[danielxcutter]

Also, Serini is still a non-caster. Skill ranks and UMD only goes so far.

[Riftwolf]

She literally has hundreds of teleportation devices in her stronghold. She would have to be criminally stupid to not have destinations all over the world for her personal convenience.



How long did it take for Xykon to decrypt the code in Serini's diary? A full monsterous regeneration of a max HP/Level rogue would take 2 hours. At less than 1hp per round that's less than a day at 1hp per turn, 5 days at 1hp per hour, or 120 days at 1hp/day.
In short, Serini had a lot of time between the theft of her diary and the attack on Dorukan's dungeon.
The siege itself took six months.



Because I refuse to believe Serini is as incompetent as she would have to be for that scenario to make sense. We are talking about a person who knew intimate details about the goings on in Shojo's throne room while Xykon was there. I don't recall seeing any halflings, or halfling-shaped shadows. Why would someone that good at being a rogue be so bad at it between the attack on her and the attack on Azure City?



Sunny was an upcoming encounter which was interrupted by the lawyers. What makes you think she came to the dungeon with Serini?



The dialogue in the strip implies that. But if she doesn't know by that point that Dorukan is dead, well, that's the whole issue I have been wrestling with. It requires an epic rogue to be epically ignorant after being ambushed, left for dead, and learning that at least one of her adventuring buddies is now dead.

Can you at least see the problem I'm having with the 'facts'?





But the lie (if it was one,) did serve a valid purpose. Two in fact. First, cynically, it verified that Sunny did not know Dorukan was dead. Second, it prevented Sunny from possibly doing a suicidal charge to the throne room to confront Xylon for murdering his Popi.

Zip, zero, nada? Who would have thought a throwaway gag from over 1200 strips ago would have story purpose? Because you don't see possibility does not negate its existence.



All of that is true. And for it to be true, Serini has to be the most incompetent rogue since Vinny Three-fingers tried to pick the pocket of Bagrem The Hanging Judge.

The reason she would be there? Many reasons. To get more monsters for her dungeon before Xykon recruits or kills them. To rescue them before adventurers kill them trying to get to Xykon. To learn what is going on with Xylon and assess his plan with the gates. To learn enough so she can recruit an epic level adventuring band to destroy Xykon.

The 'facts' do not make sense to me. I don't know what inconsistencies my guesswork opens up. I suppose the only inconsistency I see is that she told a lie to a child-like creature. And avoided causing a scene at a critical time.

1) A hotel janitor has literally hundreds of keys, it's criminally irresponsible that he doesn't have keys to military bases around the world.

2) Nice use of rules to explain a point. What are the 3.5 rules on psychological trauma?

3) We don't know how she got that information yet. Maybe it was the Oracle.

4) Sunny calls Serini Mum, suggesting a longer relationship than what you're suggesting. If I started calling my new boss mum I can see it causing problems.

5) Serini knew Dorukan was an Epic Wizard and it's well known they're far better equipped to fight Epic Sorcerers than a surprised Epic Rogue. Maybe that trip to the dungeon was when she found out Dorukan was dead.

6) Source on Sunny even knowing Dorukan and referred to him as "Popi" when you're willfully ignoring them referring to Serini as Mom?

[Fyraltari]

Let's not forget that Dorukan invented the Cloister spell.

There's no way short of knowing a completely unrelated Epic mage that Serini could have knowledge of what was going on in his dungeon before going there herself.

[urbanwolf]

There are ways for her to know how Soons gate was destroyed, without scrying.

She could of been spying on Ochul and Lien the whole time they were in the vally. Maybe with a wand of detect thoughts to gleam more info.
She could of woke them up questioned them wiped their memory then woke them up questioned them again then wiped the memory. Repeat over and over until she knows all she wants.

She could have a monster ally that can read minds or special DM power.

[KorvinStarmast]

I'm pretty annoyed that even the woman who proposed the "go our separate ways" plan violated it.

She is chaotic (3.5e wise)so why would she keep an oath?

and the only one who took that separation seriously is the one who takes the most scorn and criticism from the rest of the party.

The paladin hate is strong in the 3.x community. It is its own trope.

Having read some of my own writing from 10 years ago, I know how embarrassing reviewing your own past work can be!

I recently reviewed a monograph I wrote back in the 90's. It has not aged well.

Her lying to a creature she is recruiting rings true.

Yes. She is chaotic and a thief. (Given that Haley's dad was AD&D 1e thief, and Serini is a bit older than him, she began as a Thief. OK, she transitioned to 'rogue' with one of the edition changes before strip 0001.

All the Scribblers and their allies are alerted when a Gate falls. They are not alerted when a Scribbler dies.
The Gate stood for at least 6 months after Dorukan died. Why would she assume, when there seems to be no problem with the Gate, that it was under control of a lich who slew Dorukan?

Saved me the trouble. Thanks.

is that Xykon tracked her down after Lirian's death, not vice versa. She may not have known how and why Lirian died, until after Xykon's attack on her - and still may not have known where Xykon was heading next. Allowing her visit to the castle, with Sunny, to be serendipitous, rather than "She traced Xykon to Dorukan's castle." For that matter, given that the "alert system" is normally in the building itself (in the Girard case for example)

https://www.giantitp.com/comics/oots0844.html

and given that she left the dungeon behind and went travelling (strip 1227) - she may not have known about Lirian's death until she returned to the Kraagor dungeon, found that dungeon's "alert system" had one light dim, and guessed Lirian was dead.

Well reasoned.

My assumption is that she was there checking out Dorukan's dungeon.

Durokan's Dungeon also had the collection of all of the 'pre 3.x edition monsters' which might have been what she was trying to recruit monsters from. (Nale's amulet, yadda yadda)

I already knew our mystery 1-page-soon-to-be-ally was going to be Sunny but I still find the obvious bit of retconning necessary to make that happen kind of awkward.

It could have been done a bit more gracefully, yes. In my own head, Serini talling Sunny "we need to work on getting those AD&D monsters out of their confinement" would have been a better line, but I'm not writing this book.

I suppose this shows that while Serini was okay with snooping around in the other party members' Gate defenses, she did not do it often.

Yeah, and she only robs banks every other Thursday.

Keeping track of Xykon is incredibly easy because he always travels with Redcloak, and Redcloak logs every location he visits on MaceBook. He's a lawful cleric, after all.

OK, I giggled.

[expectocat]

Is it possible that Serini became aware when she saw that his get had been destroyed?

[Quizatzhaderac]

Think about what she needed to have done to have even known about Point 2. Even Xykon couldn't scry into that room, but she still somehow knows enough about this to argue with the Paladins that she had known that they were the ones responsible for destroying it.

How, specifically, you think she got that knowledge? I ask because the ways I imagine she got the information about Soon's gate wouldn't work for Durkon's death.

As I see it, the three main possibilities. 1) She got the information from O-Chul without him knowing, or wiping his memory later. 2) She learned about #663, panel 4, rather than the direct event, from the nameless scribe Hinjo and O-Chull spoke to afterwards. 3) She spoke with one of the many dead witnesses.

Two possibilities I'm especially willing to dismiss 1) She scryed the scene 2) She made a non-descript "gather information" check. Rich does like to sometimes do such things as jokes, but there was no joke made here.

All of the witnesses to Durkon's death were either members of Team evil, or trapped inside a soul gem.

[Peelee]

How, specifically, you think she got that knowledge? I ask because the ways I imagine she got the information about Soon's gate wouldn't work for Durkon's death.

As I see it, the three main possibilities. 1) She got the information from O-Chul without him knowing, or wiping his memory later. 2) She learned about #663, panel 4, rather than the direct event, from the nameless scribe Hinjo and O-Chull spoke to afterwards. 3) She spoke with one of the many dead witnesses.

Two possibilities I'm especially willing to dismiss 1) She scryed the scene 2) She made a non-descript "gather information" check. Rich does like to sometimes do such things as jokes, but there was no joke made here.

All of the witnesses to Durkon's death were either members of Team evil, or trapped inside a soul gem.

I can think of at least one major and not-unlikely method you haven't listed, so I'm hesitant to assume any given list is exhaustive.

[gbaji]

She literally has hundreds of teleportation devices in her stronghold. She would have to be criminally stupid to not have destinations all over the world for her personal convenience.

We only know that she has a wand of dimension door.

How long did it take for Xykon to decrypt the code in Serini's diary? A full monsterous regeneration of a max HP/Level rogue would take 2 hours. At less than 1hp per round that's less than a day at 1hp per turn, 5 days at 1hp per hour, or 120 days at 1hp/day.
In short, Serini had a lot of time between the theft of her diary and the attack on Dorukan's dungeon.
The siege itself took six months.

Regeneration takes that long. We don't know how long the procedure to transform her into a half troll/hobbit thing took. Again though, it's somewhat irrelevant. The strip clearly shows her there in the dungeon at that time, apparently there with Sunny to recruit monsters, and apparently not knowing that Dorukan is dead. We can speculate ways this can be true, or we can assume it's false and speculate ways to show that side instead. I tend towards finding things that support the written stuff instead, unless there's something else written that directly and unambiguously contradicts it. I'm not seeing that here.

Because I refuse to believe Serini is as incompetent as she would have to be for that scenario to make sense. We are talking about a person who knew intimate details about the goings on in Shojo's throne room while Xykon was there. I don't recall seeing any halflings, or halfling-shaped shadows. Why would someone that good at being a rogue be so bad at it between the attack on her and the attack on Azure City?

For the love of Pete! I've seen this silly assumption that Serini must have epic scrying, or a massive spy network, or was physically there in the shadows, or some other absolute silliness to explain how she knew the details of O'Chul's actions in the throne room. There is a vastly simpler explanation that does not require adding all that extra stuff into the story:

She dosed them repeatedly with the amnesia and sleep potions. Get it? She had them captured for three days. Do you honestly think the only time she questioned them was the one time we saw (and the one in which their interrogation was interrupted and she had to run off to deal with the Order, and so haven't been dosed again)? Really?

She knows the details of those events because the paladins told her. They just don't remember doing so. Think about how you would use short term amnesia potion to interrogate someone. Then assume that Serini is at least intelligent enough to use it that way. Recall also that the paladins actually want to recruit Serini to their side, and so are more likely to try to share details like this instead of keep them secret.

Note that every single thing she knows is specifically (and exclusively) information she would have known from her own gate monitor, her investigation (she knows Lirian and Dorukan are dead), and things that the paladins themselves know. What she doesn't know? Anything about Vamp Durkon. Anything about the Godsmoot. Details about Girard's gate beyond it being destroyed (by the order, which they presumably reported to the paladins). Why assume a (completely theoretical) massive intelligence network here, when one old lady with some amnesia potion (which we literally see in panel) can explain the same thing?

Sunny was an upcoming encounter which was interrupted by the lawyers. What makes you think she came to the dungeon with Serini?

Because Sunny is with Serini *before* the encounter with the lawyers. And because Sunny is with Serini to recruit monsters, which would be strange if he was just recruited himself. And because literally every single thing we know about Sunny in the strip says that Serini raised him from a child. Why on earth leap to some other explanation?

The dialogue in the strip implies that. But if she doesn't know by that point that Dorukan is dead, well, that's the whole issue I have been wrestling with. It requires an epic rogue to be epically ignorant after being ambushed, left for dead, and learning that at least one of her adventuring buddies is now dead.

No. It requires an epic rogue to not have the frankly absurd world spanning knowledge and abilities you have previously head cannoned her into having. Once you eliminate that assumption, and accept that she's just a semi-retired adventurer and is actually quite out of the loop, and only has the resources she can physically carry with her, then that expectation that she must have been able to know about Dorukan's death prior to actually going there and finding out herself disappears in a puff of smoke.

Can you at least see the problem I'm having with the 'facts'?

Yes. I can. I suspect it's not the same one you see though.

But the lie (if it was one,) did serve a valid purpose. Two in fact. First, cynically, it verified that Sunny did not know Dorukan was dead. Second, it prevented Sunny from possibly doing a suicidal charge to the throne room to confront Xylon for murdering his Popi.

Now I'm just confused by your logic (or lack thereof). If you believe that Sunny didn't travel there with Serini, but was recruited in the dungeon, then that makes zero sense. Sunny would be more likely to know Dorukan was dead, since he would have lived there (again, totally false belief, but just exploring the fact that even then this doesn't make sense). If you also assumed (as you appear to have) that Serini did know Dorukan was dead, what possible reason would she have to lie about it... to Sunny? In your alternative reality, she just met Sunny. Sunny lives in the dungeon. Why on earth lie? "Hello. I just recruited you to join me in my dungeon up north. Oh btw. That guy that runs this dungeon. Ignore what you know. He's really still alive and well. Ok. Let's go!". Er... that makes zero sense.

Um. In either scenario, the whole "Sunny does suicidal charge" makes no sense. If he lived in the dungeon, he would have known already, and probably not cared that much about Dorukan other than as "the guy who runs this place" (not to mention, if they just met, how would Serini know to lie in the first place, or care to do so?). And (back in the real world where Sunny traveled with Serini to the dungeon), Sunny would have known of Dorukan only via Serini's stories of him. Would you go off on a suicidal attack to avenge the death of someone your parents knew 30+ years before you were born? Probably not. It would be "gee. That sucks mom. Sorry to hear about your friend"

Doesn't it make vastly more sense for Serini and Sunny to have both traveled to the dungeon, together, neither of them knowing that Dorukan is dead? There are no absurd inconsistencies if we just assume that what we read is exactly what happened. Why invent new things just to create contradictions in the story? That seems strange.

Zip, zero, nada? Who would have thought a throwaway gag from over 1200 strips ago would have story purpose? Because you don't see possibility does not negate its existence.

Huh? There's no "story purpose" to what you are proposing. There is a lot of story purpose to having it be just what we saw. It's the story of how Serini found out about Dorkuan's death, and perhaps a bit about how she knew the Order may have been involved in the destruction of the first gate (cause now we know she was there, or at least in proximity at the time). And yes, it creates and further explains the callback as to why Sunny was in the dungeon in the first place (was with Serini traveling there).

The reason she would be there? Many reasons. To get more monsters for her dungeon before Xykon recruits or kills them. To rescue them before adventurers kill them trying to get to Xykon. To learn what is going on with Xylon and assess his plan with the gates. To learn enough so she can recruit an epic level adventuring band to destroy Xykon.

Then why not just tell Sunny "we need to recruit as many monsters as possible to free them from Xykon". There's no reason to lie here.

Oddly, I agree with everything else you pointed out. I'm just assuming that it was after this flashback that she learned what happened to Dorukan, and she did do some poking around, and learned some stuff. This could very well be exactly when and where she realized that Lirian's death and gate destruction was not just a one off fluke, but that the same guy who attacked her out of the blue and stole her diary is actively seeking the gates.

The 'facts' do not make sense to me. I don't know what inconsistencies my guesswork opens up. I suppose the only inconsistency I see is that she told a lie to a child-like creature. And avoided causing a scene at a critical time.

Again. Circular logic. There's only a scene to be avoided because you have also speculated that one would have existed. I don't agree. Sunny is childish, but he does seem to understand what they are doing, why they are doing it, and why it's so important. I'm just not clear on why you think that she would feel the need to lie to him about this, since she's told him pretty much everything else (and the "everything else" is a lot worse than some guy having died).

The biggest inconsistency is that your entire chain of assumptions lies on Serini being much more aggressive and actively involved in investigating the gates than is actually shown in the comic. Everything we know about her in the comic is that she's completely content and prepared to just hold up and defend her gate. She's let the others go as they went. But now that hers is the last one, she will act. But even then, just to prevent it from being destroyed. If anything, what we've learned of her is just how much she didn't know about what was really going on, which led her to make perhaps poor decisions.

If we went by your assumption of easy teleportation to every major location of interest in the world, and communication, and ability to find out anything via stealth, then why didn't she warn the Azurites about Xykon's army? I mean, any decent epic rogue could not have missed the massive army heading their way, right? Wouldn't she have tracked Redcloak leaving the dungeon (trivial for an epic rogue), have spied on them recruiting the hobgoblins, and known what they were doing all along? Why not act? Why not skulk around (since you seem to think she had the run of the city, including the Throne room), and learn about Kubuto and stop him before he left with most of the nobles? Heck. She could have singlehandedly solved pretty much the entire thing on her own there, since she's such a powerful epic rogue and is really really determined to ensure the gates aren't destroyed, right? Even if she'd already adopted her "better Xykon than destroyed" position, why not kill Miko as she was headed to the gate to destroy it? Would be easy for her to do, right?

I mean. If you're going to ascribe to her super epic rogue powers, knowledge of everything, and assumed she would always use them in the most intelligent ways possible, and was strongly motivated to directly involve herself like you are assuming, why stop where you have? We could take that much farther, and resolve a lot of other things. Other things that just didn't happen. The irony is that it is your position that creates such a broad inconsistency, with her having to be amazing "super rogue" in some cases, and complete incompetent rogue in others.

Or we can assume that she just doesn't have those resources. She didn't really spy on Azure city. She really only knows what she can get from the monitors and her own poking around. And she really hasn't been that actively involved until it became obvious that hers was the last gate and everyone was coming right to her. Maybe she (shocking thought) actually followed the rules they put in place and just took care of defending her own gate, just like she promised to.

To me. That makes sense.

EDIT. one more bit:

And while I can't exactly prove a negative, that there's no way Serini could have NOT known something, it seems a bit hard to swallow that Serini wasn't keeping a serious eye on the situation regarding the several Gates, and of Xykon, when she herself admits:

1. She knew that both Lirian and Dorukan were killed by Xykon, and
2. She also knew who destroyed Soon's Gate, and exactly whose sword it actually was that had done the deed.
3. She was also keeping tabs on Girard's Gate to know it was the OotS who destroyed it, (and Dorukan's Gate, as she also indicates "the party with the lich" [isn't] "running around destroying gates".)

Think about what she needed to have done to have even known about Point 2. Even Xykon couldn't scry into that room, but she still somehow knows enough about this to argue with the Paladins that she had known that they were the ones responsible for destroying it.

I'll point out that every single one of those point is information the paladins she had already held captive for 3 days had knowledge of. Also, we have zero information (from her, or otherwise) to indicate she knew any of that (except that Lirian and Dorukan were killed by Xykon perhaps) prior to the scene where we see her talking to those same paladins after she'd already held them captive for 3 days.

Every single piece of that information was there in front of her. And she had 3 days, amnesia potion, and presumably some pretty decent interrogation skills to obtain it. Yes. I've thought about what "she needed to have done" to know about that (especially including point 2). Amnesia potion and time with the paladins. Oh. She had both! Mystery solved...

[brian 333]

Sunny was literally the next encounter the Order was supposed to face in Dorukan's Dungeon after the intellectual property issue with the squiddy-faced brain-eater guy. Sunny worked for Dorukan.

All of the assumptions made based on what you call fact are similarly flawed. They are your speculation based on what you want to believe. Is that not the heinous crime of which I am guilty? But, no, I admit I am speculating.

If I was playing Serini, I would have been curious enough to learn a bit more than is shown. I am glad that you support my previous speculation about repeated interrogations of the paladins. Are you certain that is how she did it? It's not shown in comic, so it's just speculation. So far as we know for a fact, the only time she spoke to the paladins after the dart episode was when they woke up in shackles.

And literally every door in Monster Hollow has a teleportation device. Why would she set up literally hundreds of them, yet forget to set up a few that went to important places she might want to visit? Is she stupid? Or just lazy after having already built so many?

And that is my issue. That's what is bugging me. Any halfway decent rogue has informers, contact info for experts for hire, and even a few handy magic items. But, from what is shown, Serini has chilled at the North Pole while 80% of the defences holding her reality together fall.

She's not that stupid. And, as this comic shows, she has not simply waited on the sidelines. We don't know what she has or has not done, but I utterly reject the notion that she has done nothing. It is out of character for Serini.