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Regalingualius posted:"just what the hell do you worship, then?"
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# ? May 20, 2014 16:16 |
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# ? May 24, 2024 15:49 |
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I just figured that he would be bringing Death and Destruction to the Dwarf lands because those are possibly his domains of choice.
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# ? May 20, 2014 21:51 |
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Yukari posted:I just figured that he would be bringing Death and Destruction to the Dwarf lands because those are possibly his domains of choice. I hope this gets expositioned out clearly and the characters are like "yeah, that makes sense." And then in the next panel Durkon kills everyone and blows everything up.
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# ? May 21, 2014 04:22 |
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Eh, V should have no problem dispelling the weather. I hope they kill Durkula and bring his remains/ashes to his homeland. It'd still fulfill the prophecy.
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# ? May 21, 2014 09:35 |
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Someone on another forum posted a link to Rich discussing Durkon's vampirization, which I don't think has been discussed here.quote:There is absolutely zero difference between Malack and Durkon's vampirizations, with the sole exception that Hel made the spirit sitting in Durkon's head while Nergal made the one that was sitting in Malack's. Hel is able to put that spirit into Durkon's body because of the physical vampirization process that Malack enacts on Durkon's corpse, which opens a door to Negative Energy and traps Durkon's spirit inside it. Which would also be true of any other vampire created from a person who fell under the Northern Pantheon's domain, though she wouldn't take a personal interest in just any person because they wouldn't be a powerful cleric.
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# ? May 23, 2014 07:40 |
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All of that seems perfectly common sense and indicated by the comic itself. I can only wonder at the sort of poor comprehension skills that would make that post necessary.
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# ? May 23, 2014 07:54 |
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Welcome to the GitP forums.
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# ? May 23, 2014 08:00 |
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Colonel Cool posted:All of that seems perfectly common sense and indicated by the comic itself. I can only wonder at the sort of poor comprehension skills that would make that post necessary. To be fair, there ARE some panels that are pretty drat ambiguous, in a way that is hard to justify with "Malack doesn't want to admit he's actually an evil spirit of undeath": Durkon was already dead at this point. I mean, you might claim that he said that to keep up the charade with Belkar, but does it feel like Malack would bother with a fake-heartfelt-(actually-still-pretty-creepy)-confession for his benefit?
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# ? May 23, 2014 09:08 |
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Evil spirit or not if you lived with a trapped soul absorbing its memories for hundreds of years, you would start to identify as/with that creature.
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# ? May 23, 2014 09:32 |
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NihilCredo posted:To be fair, there ARE some panels that are pretty drat ambiguous, in a way that is hard to justify with "Malack doesn't want to admit he's actually an evil spirit of undeath": I don't think it's that unreasonable really. Vampires in fiction are usually considered to be dark mirrors of the original person, and I think that the process of absorbing all of someone's memories is probably going to change the negative energy spirit significantly to the point where they could probably justify thinking of themselves as the former person, in a certain sort of way. Remember that while Durkon and the spirit are distinct entities at this point, months or years down the line when the spirit fully absorbs Durkon's memories it seems like they're probably going to be a lot more integrated.
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# ? May 23, 2014 09:33 |
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All of those 'Durkon's alignment changed so he'll resist being resurrected' arguments seem extra silly now.
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# ? May 23, 2014 11:28 |
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Vampires in D&D are different than the ones in i.e. Masquerade. I don't think there's any other fantasy universe that allows you to get the old pre-vampirized person back by killing the vampire then using a resurrection.
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# ? May 23, 2014 12:16 |
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peak debt posted:Vampires in D&D are different than the ones in i.e. Masquerade. I don't think there's any other fantasy universe that allows you to get the old pre-vampirized person back by killing the vampire then using a resurrection. They did it in Angel.
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# ? May 23, 2014 12:33 |
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peak debt posted:Vampires in D&D are different than the ones in i.e. Masquerade. I don't think there's any other fantasy universe that allows you to get the old pre-vampirized person back by killing the vampire then using a resurrection. Yeah maybe. But raising the dead isn't that common a power even in fantasy. Because most fantasy isn't a game. Death is supposed to MEAN something. There was ONE stone to do it in the whole harry potter universe, for example.
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# ? May 23, 2014 13:26 |
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Not even that. The Resurrection Stone in Harry Potter just made temporary ghost-like echoes.
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# ? May 23, 2014 13:32 |
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MikeJF posted:Not even that. The Resurrection Stone in Harry Potter just made temporary ghost-like echoes. Yeah the resurrection stone was really underpowered.
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# ? May 23, 2014 14:58 |
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Shwqa posted:Yeah the resurrection stone was really underpowered. I don't know, if there is no time limit on it (meaning that you don't have to use it on a fresh cadaver), I can see it being pretty useful at least for academic purposes. You can use it on Louis XIV's dessicated corpse and ask him about the French Revolution from his point of view. Historians would go crazy over that. Or you can use it on a murder's victim to find out more about the crime. A lot of killing wouldn't happen if criminals knew that the victim can testify against them.
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# ? May 23, 2014 15:38 |
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paradoxGentleman posted:Or you can use it on a murder's victim to find out more about the crime. A lot of killing wouldn't happen if criminals knew that the victim can testify against them. Nah, the Phoenix Wright series showed how that was the worst idea to do because the victim is just as unreliable as some witnesses.
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# ? May 23, 2014 17:14 |
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Cavatica posted:Nah, the Phoenix Wright series showed how that was the worst idea to do because the victim is just as unreliable as some witnesses. Pretty much there's no reason why a spirit can't lie for any number of reasons.
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# ? May 23, 2014 17:16 |
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Cavatica posted:Nah, the Phoenix Wright series showed how that was the worst idea to do because the victim is just as unreliable as some witnesses. And Rashomon did it well before that. And to stay on topic, the testimony might be unreliable for reasons besides the ghost's desire to lie. People's memories are often unreliable in the wake of sudden trauma. Death's not much different. (Not that it still wouldn't be a valuable resource - summoning up a ghost)
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# ? May 23, 2014 18:14 |
Hell, in the PW case alluded to, it was unreliable for both of those reasons: The victim didn't want to implicate his supposed killer for very good reasons, and he had no way of seeing his actual killer.
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# ? May 23, 2014 19:23 |
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There's actually a murder-mystery quest in Arcanum that it appears you can bypass if you have the 'Speak with Dead' spell. In fact, the dead guy intentionally gives you the wrong information, and you get the bad ending for the quest if you listen to him. In fact, I think part of the joke of that particular spell is that the dead are all either useless of give bad information; the game specifically points out that the spell is torturous to them.
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# ? May 23, 2014 19:30 |
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NihilCredo posted:To be fair, there ARE some panels that are pretty drat ambiguous, in a way that is hard to justify with "Malack doesn't want to admit he's actually an evil spirit of undeath": Fake it 'til you make it. Nergal (and probably any 'evil' god) would be pretty PO'd if it came to light that vampires aren't the people they used to be; it's in the inhabiting spirit's best interest to keep the facade up and never let it slip (to anyone) that what they're saying isn't the whole truth. Live a lie for a couple years, let alone a couple hundred, and even you might have difficulties remembering the lie you're telling everyone isn't actually real.
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# ? May 23, 2014 20:22 |
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fallingdownjoe posted:But what could they do about it, realistically? How much worse for Durkon to see his friends go "welp, guess trying to stop world-ending poo poo is worth allying with the horrifying spirit inhabiting the body of our friend"? Well it seems like if the whole "It's still Durkon, just a vampire" charade breaks down, Nokrud isn't really going to have a whole lot of reason to actually work with the Order anymore. For the moment they think he's still functionally Durkon, and, in Roy's own words, it's more convenient to have him carrying his own carcass around by walking and also casting healing spells for everyone. If it turns out he's not really Durkon, and is likely to resist the whole stake-'em-and-raise-'em routine, then all the reasons they haven't just staked him and stored his ashy vampire corpse away until they have access to a cleric and enough diamonds have been thrown overboard. Literally he's only pretending to be Durkon because it serves his interests at the moment. Probably he's the "death and destruction" that was prophesied. Dr. Buttass fucked around with this message at 05:54 on May 25, 2014 |
# ? May 25, 2014 05:48 |
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When did this stupid Nokrud thing start, Durkula was a much better name
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# ? May 25, 2014 15:53 |
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peak debt posted:When did this stupid Nokrud thing start, Durkula was a much better name No it's not. Nokrud is way better.
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# ? May 25, 2014 16:02 |
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Nokrud sounds like a cleaning agent orcs came up with.
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# ? May 25, 2014 16:30 |
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EndOfTheWorld posted:And Rashomon did it well before that. In my own webcomic this is exactly the reason why testimony of the dead isn't court-admissible. The other reasons involve the fact that it requires mind-altering states to be able to see the spirit world and it's all subjective anyway so nothing you see can be completely trusted and may not be reproducible to others.
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# ? May 25, 2014 19:33 |
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fool_of_sound posted:There's actually a murder-mystery quest in Arcanum that it appears you can bypass if you have the 'Speak with Dead' spell. In fact, the dead guy intentionally gives you the wrong information, and you get the bad ending for the quest if you listen to him. In fact, I think part of the joke of that particular spell is that the dead are all either useless of give bad information; the game specifically points out that the spell is torturous to them. I'm not sure about the sidequests, but you could kill/Speak with Dead your way through the entire main plot line.
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# ? May 26, 2014 08:47 |
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http://www.giantitp.com/comics/oots0953.html A new one
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# ? May 26, 2014 08:58 |
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Well, I think we'll be seeing a lot more of this kind of interaction
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# ? May 26, 2014 09:17 |
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I was torn between Nokrud and Durkula too, but I think I like Lurky better. Fits with his role.
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# ? May 26, 2014 09:22 |
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I love how Durkon states that non of his friends can see through the vampire, while Belkar is actively pointing out the falseness of the vampire. They'll never be friends! Also, I'm not quite sure how cleric spells work in here now. I know Durkon was casting spells in the non Northern lands, right? So if
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# ? May 26, 2014 09:41 |
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World Famous Whore posted:Also, I'm not quite sure how cleric spells work in here now. I know Durkon was casting spells in the non Northern lands, right? So if If I remember right, it's a relatively high-level spell, like level 7 or so. The other guy is probably too low-level. And I don't usually complain about OOTS... but this strip is really a bit limp.
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# ? May 26, 2014 09:48 |
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World Famous Whore posted:Also, I'm not quite sure how cleric spells work in here now. I know Durkon was casting spells in the non Northern lands, right? So if Spoiler in reference to the above spoiler: Control Weather is a level 7 spell, meaning the cleric has to be at least level 13. That seems the most likely explanation to me, he also just might not have it prepared. Though it seems like that would be odd for an airship crewman. Mind over Matter fucked around with this message at 09:53 on May 26, 2014 |
# ? May 26, 2014 09:48 |
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I'm partial to "Yurkon," myself
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# ? May 26, 2014 10:58 |
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Really you just gotta wonder why nobody asked him to cast that half an hour ago when the storm hit.
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# ? May 26, 2014 11:09 |
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blizzardvizard posted:And I don't usually complain about OOTS... but this strip is really a bit limp. Eh, "how will the vampire deal with losing his god's protection?" "LOL common list" would have been perfectly fine as a one-strip joke, it was just a misstep on Rich's part to stretch it to two, because after a week and two pages of buildup we were expecting more than a rules-based punchline. Not a big deal but yeah, def a bit of a wihmper.
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# ? May 26, 2014 11:15 |
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When I first read it, I thought that this could deal a blow to Durkon's faith, but then I realized it doesn't really make sense.
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# ? May 26, 2014 12:46 |
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# ? May 24, 2024 15:49 |
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Control Weather. A 10-minute casting time and then you gain control of the weather for some hours. It's the kind of spell that only seems useful in very specific circumstances (as opposed to Summon Monster VII which is pretty much always useful to have). That's probably why Rich has made a big deal of it twice now. However, while the Cliffport use is the kind of fun rule-breaking that a good DM would want to encourage, I'd be pretty skeptical of using Control Weather to shut down a sky-god.
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# ? May 26, 2014 13:38 |