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 Post subject: Re: The OotS Thread II

Posted: 2012-02-26 06:37am 

Penelope had a daughter with Orrin, so the familicide affects her as well

 Post subject: Re: The OotS Thread II

Posted: 2012-02-26 11:00am 

We do see a half-dragon half-centaur, though.



Girard may also have been dead already. There is a statue of him there, which would be rather unusual for a living person, even a living patriarch. Even if we assume that he is still alive and it was familicide, how would he know who cast the spell?

 Post subject: Re: The OotS Thread II

Posted: 2012-02-26 02:30pm 

According to the OotS-wiki page of Soon, the Order of the Scribble found the gates 66 years ago. Girard might have died permantly because of natural couses (which prevent resurrection) )in the meantime. Excluding of course the possibility he found magical ways to prolong his life. I can't say I find one way or the other more likely at the moment. Having them die due to familicide could have a big effect on V.

I doubt it's Xykon, there are no effects of Meteor Swarms visible.

 Post subject: Re: The OotS Thread II

Posted: 2012-02-26 02:45pm 

We never found out exactly what the spell affects. The dragon V targeted directly had no descendants, so presumably it first targeted her own parents (if they were still alive), her siblings, their descendants, then her first cousins and their descendants, and so on.

And as for Penelope... again, what does the spell target? Does it target husbands and wives of those it kills? Does it then target their relatives? Where would that ever stop?

There has to be a limit, or the spell would wipe out all life on Earth (not that its creator would have minded this, I suspect). And we haven't seen any evidence of anyone definitely killed by the Familicide except for black dragons and half-black-dragons.

Maybe the save DC is ridiculously high for immediate relatives, but gets lower as the degree of consanguinity drops off, so that it's actually pretty easy for a seventh cousin four times removed or whatever to resist the effect.

Then again, it also depends on how long ago the creation of the world was in this setting- if the world's only existed for a thousand years, and if the original population of black dragons included many specimens, there might be no genetic link whatsoever between this particular black dragon and another one on the other side of the planet. In which case the spell wouldn't kill everyone, just (roughly) "something" times 2^N or so beings, where N is the number of black dragon generations since the beginning of the world.

In any case, it would be a huge and weird coincidence if Girard just happened to have been the third cousin or whatever of the black dragon V hit with Familicide. So I'd rate that possibility as less likely than "it's all a trick" or "some third party killed them all." We know Xykon was able to pretty much wipe out the Sapphire Guard and break down Dorukan's defenses more or less single-handedly, and there's no obvious reason he wouldn't be equally able to take out Girard's clan of illusionists if he got there first.

All very true. He might find out who did it using Spellcraft and divination magic; an expert in hiding things by illusion might also be an expert in penetrating illusions and revealing secret information.

Hard to say. Dorukan was still alive until Xykon killed him, and Girard's magical powers were roughly equal in strength, just differently specialized. I wouldn't put it past him to artificially extend his lifespan; master wizards have a habit of doing that in fiction and Stickworld definitely runs on literary genre conventions.

There wasn't a lot of evidence of Meteor Swarms visible in the Azure City throne room either- "follow the bouncing ball." Xykon's quite capable of getting creative when it comes to wiping out swarms of mid-level opponents. But I don't think it's very likely to be him, either- I just think it would be a much bigger coincidence, a sort of diabolus ex machina, if it was the Familicide spell that did it.

 Post subject: Re: The OotS Thread II

Posted: 2012-02-26 03:23pm 

Familicide might not have been a coincidence after all. It's possible that the fiends deliberately set things up with the goal of having V cast Familicide for the purpose of killing Girard and his family. It would require them to have been planning things for a long time, but I wouldn't put that past them. Consider - the fiends find out about the Gates from Sabine as we've seen. Now assume they decide they want to control one of the gates, or possibly just kill the guardians of a gate so someone else can more easily claim it. They do some research, and discover that the guardian of one of the gates is descended from a black dragon. Not beyond their ability to discover, when Tiamat is apparently just a phone call away. They know from Sabine that the OOTS went on a side quest to a black dragon's lair, and with a bit more research they can learn that the young black dragon there shares a common ancestor with Girard's clan. From there, they just need to arrange to isolate and alienate a spellcaster, put that spellcaster in a position to need a soul splice, and then splice in a soul with access to the Familicide spell.

It may be that killing Girard's family was the actual goal of the Soul Splice after all. Or maybe I'm just grasping at straws here.

 Post subject: Re: The OotS Thread II

Posted: 2012-02-26 03:46pm 

If Girard was deliberately targeted by Familicide, why isn't the place crawling with Fiends? Why isolate someone unrelated for a splice, instead of handing the splice to Sabine or Nale and telling them to do it? How they knew Familicide will even be used, instead of earlier Disintegrate/Gust of Wind combo?

 Post subject: Re: The OotS Thread II

Posted: 2012-02-26 04:03pm 

They'd have to accurately predict that V would cast Familicide, though, which would also require that they be intimately familiar with how V thinks and behaves.

There's also no evidence that the fiend-trio actually did anything to "isolate and alienate" V, rather than V just doing that by himself.

We can't rule out the possibility, mind you- I'm not rejecting it. I just don't expect it to be the answer, even though it's the only thing we already know happened recently that could kill a huge number of people all at once like that.

I think the most likely possibility is that it's an illusion. V's Familicide and some strange sort of attack by Xykon are probably bying for second place.

 Post subject: Re: The OotS Thread II

Posted: 2012-02-26 06:54pm 

I think it's all a big rouse. Think about it, three of the gates have been destroyed. Two of them fairly close together in time.
And the last one, if you scryed on it,
immediately thereafter - Oh look, Azure City is overrun by Hobgoblins
Short time thereafter - Hhas a epic level clositer effect guarding it

Also, around the same time, Penelope is scrying to find them.

I'm willing to bet Girald increased defenses and monitoring, and when the Order of the Stick showed up in the canyon, either 'hatched' a bunch of prepared family clone bodies (if they were not hatched when the 3rd gate blew up), and the clan is all in hiding, waiting to slowly bushwach the invaders if they don't show themselves to be good people/not associated with anyone trying to seize or take the gates.

 Post subject: Re: The OotS Thread II

Posted: 2012-02-26 08:05pm 

Yes, but would he be able to do it with without any of the Draketooths even standing up and trying to mount a defense? Rather than being able, would he have been willing to kill them without having any fun? As the page title makes clear, the whole gang was interrupted while having lunch. From the presentation, it seems clear that all of them simply dropped dead. How many possible reasons could there be for that?

For the record, I don't think the Draketooths being related to that black dragon would be especially implausible or contrived. It would actually be quite clever if the name turned out to be significant. And from a narrative perspective, I think it would be the most interesting thing that could possibly happen in regards to V.

 Post subject: Re: The OotS Thread II

Posted: 2012-02-26 11:46pm 

Perhaps I've been playing the game too long. When I saw a statue of Girard Draketooth I immediatly assumed that it was Girard disguised as a statue of himself.

As far as Familicide goes, I think it unlikely, though hardly impossible. According to V, the spell killed every blood relation of the Dragon used as a spell component. So really, there should be a sizeable number of vengeful dragon spouses and friends looking for V.

 Post subject: Re: The OotS Thread II

Posted: 2012-02-27 04:26am 

That depends on Dragon culture, if they mate for life or even a an extended period and if they generally have friends. The moma dragon seemed to care for her mate, noting that her son was the only thing she had left from him after he was killed by adventurers but I dont know how normal that is.

 Post subject: Re: The OotS Thread II

Posted: 2012-02-27 12:07pm 

Kill 1/4 of a species and it's really pretty likely that a lot of the rest will be out for your blood.

I suspect the main things keeping V alive so far are that he's been moving around a lot, and that a lot of dragons have to be worrying about whether or not he'll be able to do it again. This is (or should become) a really serious problem for him in the aftermath of the main story, if nothing else.

 Post subject: Re: The OotS Thread II

Posted: 2012-02-27 01:44pm 

Assuming the remaining dragons have a clue what happened or who did it. From a spellcraft perspective, V didn't even cast the spell; he couldn't have. It's Haera Bloodsoak's epic spell, implied to be created by her and known by her alone. If any of them use Spellcraft or such rolls and successfully find out what spell killed their friend(?), they'll find it was an epic necromancy spell, known to be created by one particular epic necromancer who is now dead, but "cast" (assuming the soul-splice spells count as being cast by V to begin with) by a non-necromancer with no epic spell slots. Something tells me that given the situation, they'd have no clue what to do with the information they received.

Also, V says that not only are dragons who share the target's bloodline killed, but so are any who are directly related to any of those dragons. Mating/marriage might count for that second part.

 Post subject: Re: The OotS Thread II

Posted: 2012-02-27 03:54pm 

There's perfectly omniscient Oracle who happens to be a prophet of evil Dragon god. As mummy dragon seeked his help, we know he isn't secret to them and is willing to help.



Eh, that logically should only multiply number of dragons looking for blood. Instead of just spouses, now it will be whole families of these spouses.

 Post subject: Re: The OotS Thread II

Posted: 2012-02-27 04:40pm 

You're assuming a very tight-knit society for dragons, which doesn't fit with most of what's been depicted in AD&D lore. Dragons are mostly solitary creatures, coming together to mate, caring for young until they're old enough to fend for themselves, but then territorial instincts kick in and they separate. It would take a lot of communication between dragons to even figure out that so many had died at the same time.

 Post subject: Re: The OotS Thread II

Posted: 2012-02-27 04:46pm 

Well it looks like Teamat has been placicated by the demon/devil/deamon group so the answer from the Oracle might be 'dont get involved'

 Post subject: Re: The OotS Thread II

Posted: 2012-02-27 05:54pm 

And we know they didn't expect it, from the shocked looks on their faces when V actually did it.

 Post subject: Re: The OotS Thread II

Posted: 2012-02-27 10:42pm 

AHEM!!
The Comic after the splash page of killing


So the spell affected all creatures who:
1. Directly shares bloodline.
2. Is related to someone who shares the bloodline.

To me, that covers both (1) Draketooth and (2) Tarq's wife, as she gave birth to a Draketooth.

 Post subject: Re: The OotS Thread II

Posted: 2012-02-27 11:41pm 

Yes, speaking of the super-V incident. I seem to recall the Three Fiends saying that a Soul Splice is an uber-rare once-in-a-century deal ("don't bother looking it up.") yet Redcloak immediatly recognizes the Soul Splices when he sees them, and Xykon immediatly understands what Redcloak is talking about, unlike, say with Soon. Does anyone know what's up with that?

 Post subject: Re: The OotS Thread II

Posted: 2012-02-28 12:20am 

Um, Xykon and Redcloak are both extremely powerful and knowledgeable evil spellcasters, Xykon in particular being old as well as powerful. They are probably experts in manipulating souls, dealing with infernal creatures, and knowing what kind of soul-magic is possible.

Whereas Soon and the ghost-martyrs were some kind of weird positive energy spirit, possibly genuinely unique in the world.

How many generations out does "directly related" go? Also, do we know anything about how Penelope actually died?

 Post subject: Re: The OotS Thread II

Posted: 2012-02-28 12:39am 

Assuming Draketooth is somehow related to a black dragon. Is there any evidence of this?

Also, even assuming that fairly astronomical coincidence...what further are the odds that everyone in his entire band is related to him, too?

 Post subject: Re: The OotS Thread II

Posted: 2012-02-28 12:48am 

Why do you assume it's Drakentooth who's the half dragon? Why can't it be Drakentooth's great grandfather? If so it's easy to see how the Familicide would axe him and his brothers, sisters, aunts and uncles, the big guy himself and then, grand children and various great grand children.

Your starting to far forward and need to think in Draconian terms. The Dragon that was the focus for the Familicide was over seven hundred years old had sisters and brothers of similar ages and who were much more prolific breeders than she was. She had one kid, they had more and those kids had kids and so on. The direct line ancestor can be pretty far back up the Drakentooth lineage.

The more I think about it the more Drakentooth massacre being a result of the Familicide makes more sense from a "Your writing a story" prospective. What better way than to have that fundamentally evil act come back and bite you in the ass than finding out one of the dragons you offed was a big fan of the humanoids and you killed dozens, perhaps hundreds or thousands of humans who had only a touch of draconian lineage.

 Post subject: Re: The OotS Thread II

Posted: 2012-02-28 01:06am 

I'm assuming no such thing. You helpfully deleted the part of my post where I said "somehow related to a black dragon" and substituted "half-dragon", then kindly argued with that strawman by saying that he could just be "somehow related."

Brilliant! Assuming your goal was to look like a fucking idiot, anyway.

At any rate, that doesn't address my other question, which was the odds that everyone else in his band of guards for the gate were all related to him? He hired his own grandson or second cousin's grandnephew as a waiter at his isolated castle? Really?

 Post subject: Re: The OotS Thread II

Posted: 2012-02-28 01:29am 

Possibly, if he's paranoid enough.

 Post subject: Re: The OotS Thread II

Posted: 2012-02-28 01:45am 

truely parinoid are ones that make sure your guards are not only family, but dependant on you to keep alive. kinda like something out of Vetrinari and the evil overlord list...