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ImpAtom posted:The Dragon used an Anti-Magic Field and V had to dispel it before she could attack directly. It was trivial to dispel but it was still a requirement. V didn't use epic magic on the dragon.
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Apr 4, 2013 16:41
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Colonel Cool posted:V didn't use epic magic on the dragon. Then I'll be honest: I think making an argument for OotS in terms of "D&D works this way, no arguments" is stupid because it's constantly proven untrue. v  v Considering Rich already made a post on his forums about how he was more interested in the drama than in the precise mechanical accuracy of the spell, I don't really think that's an argument either way.OotS follows the rules when it's funny or interesting and violates the rules when it's funny or interesting. Durkon's wandering around as a vampire now instead of in 1D4 days or whatever because it makes for a better story. If the theory ends up being true then it's trivial to explain away. Elan's dad was smart enough to plan for Epic Magic in his prison or whatever. If it isn't then it's a bunch of funny coincidences. ImpAtom fucked around with this message at 17:07 on Apr 4, 2013 |
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Apr 4, 2013 16:57
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If you're going to argue that way you might as well not present any argument at all because clear it doesn't mean anything anyway.
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Apr 4, 2013 17:06
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Spiderdrake posted:If you're going to argue that way you might as well not present any argument at all because clear it doesn't mean anything anyway. How so? Like, not to be a dick, but the response to "here is something in the story" being "Well, the rules of a game say it doesn't work that way" is a pretty meaningless argument. I'll point out that similar arguments were brought up for Malack not being a vampire right up until the point Rich revealed he was and he got around any rule problems by handwaving them as magic after the fact. The content of the story matters more than D&D's rules. This is something the author himself has said repeatedly. v v
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Apr 4, 2013 17:10
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Okay, so here's the Rules as Written on Anti-Magic vs Epic: "D&D 3.5 SRD posted:Antimagic field does not automatically suppress epic spells as it does standard spells. Instead, each time an epic spell is subject to an antimagic field, make a dispel check as a 20th-level caster (1d20 + 20). The epic spell has a DC of 11 + the epic spell’s spellcaster level. If the suppression check is successful, the epic spell is suppressed like any other spell. If the dispel check is unsuccessful, the epic spell functions normally. So the question is, what was V's Caster Level at the time? If it was the conglomeration of all three of her Epic ghosts, it was 70-80 (21 x3 + 14) and she couldn't be resisted by anything. However, I suspect that what was actually happening was that each of the ghosts was casting his or her own spell through V. After all when we see the epic spells go off, we also see the ghost in question actually cast it. Therefore it seems reasonable to me that even if "Haerta was the most powerful of the three by a fair bit", she wasn't 30th level, which would have made the DC of the Caster Level Check impossible at 41. Presuming she was, say, 25th level then the Anti-Magic check would have needed to roll a 16. Which isn't great odds, sure, but is certainly good enough to justify a character's Plot Protection. We here at Order of the Stick Mythbusters rate the "Ian is a rogue Draketooth Rogue" theory Plausible. jng2058 fucked around with this message at 17:28 on Apr 4, 2013 |
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Apr 4, 2013 17:20
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I dunno, I think the reason behind her not being related is fairly plausible; it's not that interesting. You already have her secret past with the guild, her father being held captive by Elan's, etc. And now she's also secretly the daughter of a rogue member of a rogue group of secret half-dragon illusionists? The same group that got genocided out of existence, but she got skipped because Tarquin might have put anti-magic fields on his slave pens? It sounds flimsy, and while OOTS likes to play 'gotcha' it sounds as convoluted as all the "Miko is going to become an undead death knight and join the Linear Guild, it's all spelled out man!" fan theories that Rich spent a lot of time lampooning.
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Apr 4, 2013 17:36
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I'd have thought that the Spellcraft ranks needed to create the familicide spell would put Haerta's level comfortably above 30, but I guess that's an even more pointless argument!
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Apr 4, 2013 17:37
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ImpAtom posted:OotS follows the rules when it's funny or interesting and violates the rules when it's funny or interesting. I think he tends to follow the rules pretty closely, actually. House ruling in new spells isn't breaking the rules and the fact that he went to the effort to add in spells like Protection from Daylight and that insta-vampire thing shows, to me, that he is interested in working within the limits of the rules instead of doing whatever the hell he wants. He grumbles about the rules, sure, but the fact that he's grumbling about having to work inside them does show that he's fairly committed to them. I'd consider it far more likely that Rich simply wasn't aware of some obscure rule about how you can cast epic magic in an anti-magic field than it is that he was aware and just ignored it.
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Apr 4, 2013 18:12
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Wolfsheim posted:I dunno, I think the reason behind her not being related is fairly plausible; it's not that interesting. You already have her secret past with the guild, her father being held captive by Elan's, etc. And now she's also secretly the daughter of a rogue member of a rogue group of secret half-dragon illusionists? The same group that got genocided out of existence, but she got skipped because Tarquin might have put anti-magic fields on his slave pens? It sounds flimsy, and while OOTS likes to play 'gotcha' it sounds as convoluted as all the "Miko is going to become an undead death knight and join the Linear Guild, it's all spelled out man!" fan theories that Rich spent a lot of time lampooning. The thing is that you're dividing all of that up when even the comic isn't doing that. Again, Ian has a secret. I don't think we can argue against that because it's established pretty firmly in the comic. Even if he isn't a Draketooth, him running off like he did is a mystery presented in the text. We know everything about what happened to Ian except what prompted him to set off in the first place. It isn't a case of "you already have (x), why are you adding (y)" so much as everything in X has been leading up to Y. Y may or may not be "Draketooth" but it's clearly something. We're told Ian basically abandoned his job without telling his daughter because of a letter he recieved despite his primary trait being paranoia and selfishness, and it would be pretty poor storytelling if that wasn't something meaningful considering how much time has been devoted to it. I ain't saying "She's a Draketooth or bust" but if she isn't then there's another twist waiting in the wings. ImpAtom fucked around with this message at 18:31 on Apr 4, 2013 |
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Apr 4, 2013 18:24
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Colonel Cool posted:I think he tends to follow the rules pretty closely, actually. House ruling in new spells isn't breaking the rules and the fact that he went to the effort to add in spells like Protection from Daylight and that insta-vampire thing shows, to me, that he is interested in working within the limits of the rules instead of doing whatever the hell he wants. He grumbles about the rules, sure, but the fact that he's grumbling about having to work inside them does show that he's fairly committed to them. Or the scene was about overpowering and humiliating the Dragon just as she had done to V moments before. Breaking the Anti-Magic field is a powerful symbolic gesture of how much extra power V obtained from the IFF and instantly puts the Dragon on the defensive. Plus the vast majority of V's magic, even with Epic Casters, is non-epic. The only epic spell we see cast is Familicide, though some of the metamagic'd spells probably take up 10th or higher level spell slots.
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Apr 4, 2013 18:33
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Zore posted:Or the scene was about overpowering and humiliating the Dragon just as she had done to V moments before. Breaking the Anti-Magic field is a powerful symbolic gesture of how much extra power V obtained from the IFF and instantly puts the Dragon on the defensive. We also see Epic Teleport when V moves the Azure Fleet.
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Apr 4, 2013 18:36
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jng2058 posted:We also see Epic Teleport when V moves the Azure Fleet. Right, I meant in the battle with the Black Dragon when antimagic field would have come into play.
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Apr 4, 2013 18:37
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Plus the fact that we've seen on multiple occasions from both Ian and Haley that the only people they trust are family, a point of view you'ld expect if Ian was raised in a secret clan of illusionist part dragons.
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Apr 4, 2013 18:47
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Rumda posted:Plus the fact that we've seen on multiple occasions from both Ian and Haley that the only people they trust are family, a point of view you'ld expect if Ian was raised in a secret clan of illusionist part dragons. Actually, Ian's whole attitude screams Draketooth. He's paranoid, family-first, and afraid to the point of staying in jail when given a chance to escape with his daughter of being used by anything that resembles and authority figure. That matches Girard's attitudes almost exactly. I'm still not 100% convinced that this is actually the case, but I feel the rules support the possibility of the Anti-Magic block and the way Ian acts are enough to make me believe it could be correct.
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Apr 4, 2013 19:11
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Zore posted:Or the scene was about overpowering and humiliating the Dragon just as she had done to V moments before. Breaking the Anti-Magic field is a powerful symbolic gesture of how much extra power V obtained from the IFF and instantly puts the Dragon on the defensive. Oh certainly, that's absolutely the reason. I'm just saying in the cases of Rich actually breaking the rules I'd consider it to be far more likely that he's doing it unwittingly rather than it just being him shrugging and not caring about the rules at all.
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Apr 4, 2013 19:28
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I'd wager that chances are pretty good that Girard made it so that only a Draketooth can unlock the gate. So V is forced to admit/explain why there aren't any more Draketooths left... then Haley opens the gate.
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Apr 4, 2013 19:39
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jng2058 posted:Actually, Ian's whole attitude screams Draketooth. He's paranoid, family-first, and afraid to the point of staying in jail when given a chance to escape with his daughter of being used by anything that resembles and authority figure. That matches Girard's attitudes almost exactly. I have come up with a much bigger problem IMO, though: if Ian is aware of being a Draketooth (assuming that's where his escape is headed), why did he never tell Haley? She was already an adult before they got separated, it's a very important piece of information, so I see no reason for him to withhold it. Or for him not to mention in when they were reunited in prison (at least in the pages before he learnt of Elan). I guess it's possible that Ian doesn't know he's related to the Draketooths (he escaped somewhere else and we'll meet him later), and that we'll find out when Haley triggers some sort of lineage detector in the pyramid. That would definitely feel a bit lame to me, though.
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Apr 4, 2013 19:43
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NihilCredo posted:Haley states outright that "Girard is just like [her] dad", and pontificates on the parallel pretty much exactly as you have. This could be Rich doing a nudge-nudge wink-wink to the readers, or it could be a troll. All the Draketooths do the "go out, have kids, steal kids and bring them back to guard the gate" thing, right? If Haley was a Draketooth then she'd be kinda stuck guarding a lovely dungeon for the rest of her life. If you don't tell her then maybe she gets to not be that.
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Apr 4, 2013 19:46
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Besides, we've seen that Haley is bad about keeping secrets that she really shouldn't keep...including the secret about her dad in jail. After all, if she'd just told Roy in the beginning that's what she needs help with, odds are he'd just say "Cool, sidequest to the Western Continent. More gold and XP for us." And look how long it took her to come clean with Elan, the guy she's in love with! If that's how Haley was raised, then it makes sense that Ian would be equally reluctant to tell Haley the truth about the family.
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Apr 4, 2013 19:56
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Okay, lets say that Ian is a Draketooth, could the note he received been that the very first gate had been destroyed? Each gate keeper had that magic board that listed the status of each gate, so when the first one was destroyed, everyone would have known. Maybe Ian felt compelled by the utmost duty (world destroying monster) but wanted to leave Haley behind because it was almost assuredly going to be incredibly dangerous?
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Apr 4, 2013 19:56
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Noah posted:Okay, lets say that Ian is a Draketooth, could the note he received been that the very first gate had been destroyed? Each gate keeper had that magic board that listed the status of each gate, so when the first one was destroyed, everyone would have known. Maybe Ian felt compelled by the utmost duty (world destroying monster) but wanted to leave Haley behind because it was almost assuredly going to be incredibly dangerous? Nice thought, but the timing's wrong. In "The Origin of PCs" we see Haley get the letter saying her dad is in jail, and that's what prompts her to quit the Thieves' Guild and become an adventurer. She doesn't meet Roy and join the Order until months later, and the Red Mountain Gate doesn't go boom until even later.
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Apr 4, 2013 20:00
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jng2058 posted:Nice thought, but the timing's wrong. In "The Origin of PCs" we see Haley get the letter saying her dad is in jail, and that's what prompts her to quit the Thieves' Guild and become an adventurer. She doesn't meet Roy and join the Order until months later, and the Red Mountain Gate doesn't go boom until even later. Lirian's grove was the first gate destroyed and that happened years before the beginning of the comic. We see some Paladins investigating during the trial arc and Shojo comments it happened in roughly the right time frame. The whole adventure is in 'Start of Darkness'.
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Apr 4, 2013 20:02
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The gate in the elven lands was destroyed first. e: beaten though I think the time gap between the destruction of the eleven gate and the start of the story is a little too long for the idea to be plausable. Rumda fucked around with this message at 20:06 on Apr 4, 2013 |
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Apr 4, 2013 20:02
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Edit: Nevermind, I'm wrong!
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Apr 4, 2013 20:03
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Zore posted:Lirian's grove was the first gate destroyed and that happened years before the beginning of the comic. We see some Paladins investigating during the trial arc and Shojo comments it happened in roughly the right time frame. Hmmm, good point. That was the first gate blown. But I think the timing's wrong the other way. There were years between Lirian's Gate going up and Team Evil making it out to Red Mountain, per Start of Darkness. And what we've heard about Ian's disappearance was that it had been a relatively short time before Origin of PCs that he vanishes.
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Apr 4, 2013 20:05
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jng2058 posted:Nice thought, but the timing's wrong. In "The Origin of PCs" we see Haley get the letter saying her dad is in jail, and that's what prompts her to quit the Thieves' Guild and become an adventurer. She doesn't meet Roy and join the Order until months later, and the Red Mountain Gate doesn't go boom until even later. Is it possible then that the event might have been Dorukon getting iced by Xykon? At that point even a paranoid fool should realize the Gates were in danger? All we know about that is that it happened "a few months" before our intrepid heroes made their way there.
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Apr 4, 2013 20:08
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It might be something that didn't actually happen. After all it was prompted by the new guild leader setting him up.
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Apr 4, 2013 20:12
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How long was Ian in prison? And was there a reason given why he was in prison? He looks like he's been there for a really long time.
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Apr 4, 2013 20:12
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jng2058 posted:Hmmm, good point. That was the first gate blown. But I think the timing's wrong the other way. There were years between Lirian's Gate going up and Team Evil making it out to Red Mountain, per Start of Darkness. And what we've heard about Ian's disappearance was that it had been a relatively short time before Origin of PCs that he vanishes. One gate going down might have been a fluke or a ruse, and the Draketooth clan is paranoid as hell. It may have taken them a long time to travel there, investigate and then actually reach out to Ian. They may not even have realized someone was deliberately gearing for the rest and written it off as a freak accident until Dorukun had the epic magical battle and went missing. Xykon coming on the radar, along with Redcloak, is an all-hands on deck moment.
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Apr 4, 2013 20:13
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Noah posted:How long was Ian in prison? And was there a reason given why he was in prison? He looks like he's been there for a really long time.
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Apr 4, 2013 20:14
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Noah posted:How long was Ian in prison? And was there a reason given why he was in prison? He looks like he's been there for a really long time. Three years. Zore posted:One gate going down might have been a fluke or a ruse, and the Draketooth clan is paranoid as hell. It may have taken them a long time to travel there, investigate and then actually reach out to Ian. They may not even have realized someone was deliberately gearing for the rest and written it off as a freak accident until Dorukun had the epic magical battle and went missing. Okay, maybe. I can see that as a possibility. Though I think it's more likely that the note was a setup from Geoff, since we already know he's a traitor.
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Apr 4, 2013 20:18
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Hey, look an upd  Oh, well, this looks fun too.Rich specified that he made the daughter of Orrin Draketooth and Penelopy 15 specifically to make sure that people don't think she's Halley (who is about 25). Why would he specifically want people not to mix her up with Halley? Because Rich doesn't want people realizing the "Halley is a Draketooth" thing too soon. Sure, it's a very  way of thinking with a bunch of holes, but it's a fun thing to toss into the plot speculation pile.
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Apr 4, 2013 20:22
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my dad posted:Hey, look an upd
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Apr 4, 2013 20:35
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Wasn't Haley still under the lingering effects of cloister when V cast familicide? I know cloister was more to prevent divinations, but it could have been a factor as to why she wasn't hit with it.
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Apr 5, 2013 02:11
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Mylan posted:Wasn't Haley still under the lingering effects of cloister when V cast familicide? I know cloister was more to prevent divinations, but it could have been a factor as to why she wasn't hit with it. That doesn't explain Ian not getting hit though, unless she's only related to the Draketooths on her mother's side of the family.
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Apr 5, 2013 02:24
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I don't think you have to answer the Familicide issue to tie the Starshines to the Draketooths. Give the woman of the original pairing in #842 a brother or sister and have the Starshines run from that family line. Now you have a blood connection but not one subject to the Familicide spell. It might be a bit distant by the current generation, but we don't know enough about the family history to assume they didn't maintain any connection. It also points out the other flaw of the Familicide spell. Committing more murders based only to specific bloodlines would seem to be more likely to result in someone coming after you, since you are just affecting that many more people...
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Apr 5, 2013 07:35
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If they're that removed why bother having that be a plot thing? Also, where is his face tattoo if he were a draketooth?
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Apr 5, 2013 07:37
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Grogquock posted:I don't think you have to answer the Familicide issue to tie the Starshines to the Draketooths. Give the woman of the original pairing in #842 a brother or sister and have the Starshines run from that family line. Now you have a blood connection but not one subject to the Familicide spell. It might be a bit distant by the current generation, but we don't know enough about the family history to assume they didn't maintain any connection. It also points out the other flaw of the Familicide spell. Committing more murders based only to specific bloodlines would seem to be more likely to result in someone coming after you, since you are just affecting that many more people... Er, according to how Rich clarified the spell working they would still be dead. The only reason it didn't wipe out every Black Dragon and Human, at least, in the world is because the world was created a few hundred years ago and a bunch of creatures were just placed there by the gods. Only that particular fourth of the Black Dragon population was actually related at all on a family tree. I mean, if the person in your example wouldn't have died, Penelope wouldn't have died. Zore fucked around with this message at 07:44 on Apr 5, 2013 |
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Apr 5, 2013 07:40
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Zore posted:Er, according to how Rich clarified the spell working they would still be dead. The only reason it didn't wipe out every Black Dragon and Human, at least, in the world is because the world was created a few hundred years ago and a bunch of creatures were just placed there by the gods. Only that particular fourth of the Black Dragon population was actually related at all on a family tree. I think you are referring to #843 and I definitely can see your read of it, but it's not clear how far back through already deceased generations it goes. Even if the world is only a few hundred years old (is this right? Were ancient black dragons just created out of whole cloth at old age by the gods with no history?) it would be much, much worse than V described it since it would keep going up the chain until the beginning and then working its way back down every line. If you look at it statistically you only have to go back a surprisingly short time to start connecting virtually eveyone from a particular geographic region with some common ancestor. http://www.theatlantic.com/magazine/archive/2002/05/the-royal-we/302497/
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Apr 5, 2013 08:04
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Zore posted:Er, according to how Rich clarified the spell working they would still be dead. The only reason it didn't wipe out every Black Dragon and Human, at least, in the world is because the world was created a few hundred years ago and a bunch of creatures were just placed there by the gods. Only that particular fourth of the Black Dragon population was actually related at all on a family tree. Why? Because Tarquin's wife died. She was in no way part of the family tree to which the dragon belonged: all she did was have a child with someone who was. And it's said in the comic that if she and Tarquin had had a child, that child - even less related - would have died too! (And no, that was a blatant exposition speech, Rich didn't mean V to be mistaken.) By that same logic, Tarquin would have also died, and Elan, and Elan's mother, and Elan's mother's siblings, and Elan's cousins. And repeat all of that for Tarquin's family tree, and all the trees of the spouse of anyone in that tree, repeat forever. Even if the world was created with bunch of "primogen" dragons/humans/etc., their bloodlines are all but guaranteed to have mingled with each other. So if "X had a child with Y" was supposed to be a valid link for the Familicide, then yes, the only way any species capable of mating could have survived it would be if there were a bunch of Eskimo bloodlines on a remote continent that had never had any contact with outsiders. So yeah, the Familicide mechanics are a big plot hole that responsible people should not spend any time analysing, and certainly not write several paragraphs on the subject.
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Apr 5, 2013 08:06
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