The Order of the Stick

An alternative option regarding which door hides the Gate: It's a Legend of Zelda situation where you have to clear everything to make the Gate appear.

Where's the gate? Buried under tons and tons of rocks, with no way to access it. The multi-entry dungeon is just a way to keep would-be gate meddlers occupied until you find a way to deal with them, that is if the dungeon itself doesn't do the work for you.

I mean, I could believe that Girard was that kind of arrogant. He was also still smart enough to know that it would be idiotic to rely on that when you could just have your real defences be insanely tough instead. I don't think that Serini was significantly more arrogant or stupider than Girard.

Unless you're trying to suggest that the 'nobody would be that stupid' reaction I'm having is part of why it would work. In case, well, no, that's not how it would work, because they're still be people like you insisting that there's a trick anyway, and if I was really in that situation, it'd be going 'well, I think that's dumb as hell, but who knows, maybe Serini was a idiot, I guess it's worth a shot'.

Excavating rock is a lot easier than fighting epic-level monsters. That's just a variation on the 'back door' hypothesis.

Edited by Gilphon on Dec 3rd 2019 at 2:22:06 PM

I agree that it's probably not in any of the tunnels.

A dumb Mark will bang his head against the brick wall of the puzzle until he gives up in frustration and goes home.

A clever Mark will start thinking of ways to outsmart the puzzle. Coming up with the best strategies they can think of for how to solve it.

Both of these people are fools. Everyone always wants a puzzle to have a solution, but no one ever considers that, from the moment you begin to try and solve it, you have already failed. It's a riddle with no answer, designed to waste your time in futility until you give up and go home.

The reason a shell game works is not because the dealer tricks you into following the wrong cup. No matter what methods you come up with to ensure that your cup is right, no matter how hard you try to outsmart the shells, you will fail every time. Because the ball was never on the table in the first place. You can't cleverly figure out the secret right answer when the secret is that there is no right answer. There never was.

No matter how smart you think you are, the only way to win is not to play.

I still maintain that the Gate is in Kraagor's Statue. It's easily accessible enough for the characters to find it when the plot needs them to, it's the last place anyone would possibly think to look, and yet it's also a thematically appropriate icon to stage a major plot point around.

Edited by TobiasDrake on Dec 3rd 2019 at 12:24:13 PM

Worth noting is that each Gate is in a fixed location by definition. They can't be moved because the rifts they are holding can't be moved. So whatever the defensive setup may be — illusion, misdirection, mazes full of monsters, an army of Paladins — it must be arranged so as to keep people from getting to the Gate even if they know exactly where it is.

This strongly indicates against Kraagor's Gate being anywhere other than inside the mountain, which is by far the safest place for it even without mazes full of monsters. More likely to my way of thinking is that none of the dungeons actually leads to the Gate, involving one or all of the following:

• It is sealed in an area that is not directly accessible from any of the tunnels.
• The dungeons themselves are not really "inside" the mountain but rather each door contains a disguised portal to an extradimensional space built to resemble a real dungeon.
• Some additional, hidden action must be performed to reveal the true entrance to the Gate that does not involve simply trekking through each dungeon to the end.
• There's only one dungeon that resets and randomizes its configuration whenever all parties inside leave. (This wouldn't be that hard to figure out just by having people go into different doors, so maybe there are a dozen or so that rotate instead of hundreds.)

The whole setup has felt suspicious to me from the start. Something must be keeping all these monsters fed, for example. I doubt there is a comprehensive subterranean ecology going on along with all the other things, and no matter how much money Serini had from their adventuring days, I don't see how she could have funded all of this.

If the puzzle can be brute-forced just by going through each dungeon, it's not really a puzzle, and why set something like this up that can be brute-forced in the first place?

Edited by Fighteer on Dec 3rd 2019 at 2:26:03 PM

Man. Tobias. Explain to me how the hell 'look in the statue' isn't a (pretty obvious) version of 'outsmarting the puzzle'. It's far from the last place anyone would look. I'm pretty sure it's the first place you personally would look. 'What's around that's clearly related to the Gate but isn't a door' is gonna be the first thing people trying to find a way around it are gonna think of.

Edited by Gilphon on Dec 3rd 2019 at 2:30:03 PM

I've said before that I'm not totally dismissive of their being some trick to this, but if the gate really is just what is seems, purely for their to be explanation for why Team Evil didn't just immediately take control of the gate/perform the ritual before the Order could even arrive, I won't be surprised.

And I'm really not sure why other people would be surprised by that either.

Yeah how is the big eye-catching landmark the last place anyone would look? The only hiding places that make sense are under the earth (in a cave still filled with as many and tough monsters as the corridors), or in a hidden entrance located inside one of the hundreds of doors.

Edited by Druplesnubb on Dec 3rd 2019 at 8:30:12 PM

It is the first place I, personally, would look. But I'm familiar enough with a low-class lifestyle to recognize a con when I see one, yet not so smart that I arrogantly think I can outsmart the dealer at his own game.

I'm not being clever when I say the Gate is in the statue. That's not a smart answer to the puzzle. That's why it works. The answer that a person immediately dismisses out of hand if it even ever crosses their mind in the first place is usually the best answer. Smart people always want everything to be so clever, and that's why they fall hook, line, and sinker into the trap of trying to solve the puzzle.

I have the utmost confidence that few people in this thread would actually bother smashing open the statue. Because it's too obvious and stupid to possibly be right.

That's why the statue works. It's an answer that Xykon is too stupid to think of, Redcloak is too smart to think of, and Haley can pick up on instantly.

Edited by TobiasDrake on Dec 3rd 2019 at 12:34:52 PM

The "shell game misdirection" approach only works if the Gate is able to withstand scrutiny from someone who sees through it. The reason Redcloak played the game with Xykon at Azure City wasn't because Xykon himself was in any real danger; it was to get him to the throne room with a minimum of effort, counting on the paladins' psychological blind spots.

The Gate is not in that same situation. You cannot build a defensive setup that relies on people being good marks unless there's a fallback position if it's found out.

Edited by Fighteer on Dec 3rd 2019 at 2:36:52 PM

I don't see why not. Remember that this defense was set up by a Rogue.

Coming at this from a Rogue's perspective, a big ol' con is the obvious approach.

Man, no. No. Just... No. That's why it doesn't work. The rationale reaction that suggestion- or at least, the one I'd have if both of us were in this situation and you brought the idea up- is 'well, let's check just to make absolutely sure the builders weren't that stupid. It feels like a better use of our time than hitting our head against this wall, in any case'. And then the game's up. Anyone willing to bet the fate of world on the idea that they're never have to deal with a intruder who understands how they think is an arrogant fool.

Like, 'this will be just fine unless somebody who's exactly the right amount of clever shows up' is not a winning strategy.

Edited by Gilphon on Dec 3rd 2019 at 2:41:40 PM

Yes, if you know that you need to excavate and where to do it.

It is the back door hypothesis, except that there is no door, and no way to know where the door should be if it existed.

Yes, but how can they know exactly where the gate is?

Xykon only got the coordinates. They aren't precise enough to pinpoint the gate, see how distant from the Pyramid they teleported the last time.

And Xykon's coordinates come from *Serini's* journal. She doesn't need to write down the precise location of her gate, do she?

If I was getting frustrated by not being able to find the trick and clearing the tunnels was taking too long I might break that big stupid statue out of nothing but frustration. You don't even need to see through the trick to get the answer! Let alone it being a big obvious landmark and therefore suspicious.

I remain unconvinced by this "Serini was a rogue, so obviously there's a con" defense.

But even with that, we've already seen from Girard's Gate how easy that is to crumble if a person with a similar mindset gets close. How quick did Haley figure out what was going on there? And Tarquin most likely would have too.

Other people like them exist, but unlike with Girard's Gate, if it's the statue there's not even a whole slew of defenses to keep people from getting to it whenever.

I say all of this, but I also just think from a narrative perspective "it's actually in the statue" is the least interesting/laziest route to go. Because literally everyone has thought of it.

Well, we'll see what happens. I really don't want to get into another argument about this. But I'm placing my chips on the statue.

Breaking the statue only takes a single spell slot. Compared to the slog of fighting through all the doors it's exceedingly easy.

It makes sense that none of the dungeons leads to the Gate. It does not make sense for the Gate to be anywhere other than in the mountain. Further, there's no way Serini would attempt a misdirection defense that can be foiled with a single Sense Motive check. This is what I'm going with for now.

That said, this encounter with O-Chul and Lien proves that the Gate is not just passively defended.

Edited by Fighteer on Dec 3rd 2019 at 2:47:47 PM

I feel like such logic is flawed in that it rests in the assumption that there will never be a bad guy looking for the Gate that is familiar with that sort of logic and won’t at least take a look. Why would anyone charged with the fate of the world take such a risk.

Personally I think this needs to be looked at from a second angle: Serini was a rogue who set up her dungeon in honor of a muscle head barbarian.

Also, in light of the shell game comparison, a random thought occured to me: The Gate isn't anywhere near the mountain. The big fancy dungeon full of monsters is the shell, and the ball is someplace else entirely.

Another option that could well go with the above: Serini's con is her diary. It's been noted that it's what led to all the Gates being wrecked because she detailed their locations. But what if she was honest about the other Gates but then lied about her own?

The other four are softer targets than Kraagor's dungeon so directing them to other targets keeps her Gate safe even if the others' defenses fail. Because the other info is actually, it's natural to assume the info about get Gate is, too. But it isn't.

You want a Roguish con, how about misdirecting your enemies to various meat shields?

Like Fighteer said, you want a defense that works even when the enemy knows exactly where to go (or thinks they do)

Edited by sgamer82 on Dec 3rd 2019 at 12:58:12 PM

In fairness, Serini DID already take at least one very stupid risk we know of, and that was leaving written evidence of the gates and their locations lying around for Team Evil to find. Not to mention that one of the defining traits of the Order of the Scribble is their rigidity causing them to hug the Idiot Ball regarding protecting the gates.

Edited by SilentPartner on Dec 3rd 2019 at 11:58:12 AM

I mean. If it does turn out to be in the statue, I really hope Tobias won't miss the opportunity to sling a good round of 'I told you so's at all of us, because he will have earned them.

But I honestly don't feel like I've earned the right of sling any at him if it's not. That feels like it would be punching down.

So I guess I'm gonna to out on a limb and put my chips on 'there's no trick whatsoever, you just have to choose the right door and fight your way through the monsters' of the purposes of earning the right to be smug if that turn out to be right.

But the point was made that this isn't her gate - not really. She was designing this the way she best figured Kragoor would.

Now, it might turn out that rationale wasn't entirely true and she did do some spin on it, or it might not. We know very little about her, so for now all we can go off of is what we've been told.

It's possible that the ststue is jsut one part of the puzzle. Doing osmething with the statue changes something inside the dungeon, though it doesn't tell you what or where. Have fun going through all those doors a second time. Of course for top security it shouldn't even tell you at all that anything has even changed, so you wouldn't even know to look a second time.

Edited by Druplesnubb on Dec 3rd 2019 at 9:04:00 PM

I also think the gate being the statue is stupid because it leaves too much to chance. Like, let's run down the list of defenses we've seen.

• Lirian: Protected by an epic level Elf Druid and an entire forest of assorted beasts, Fey, and other creatures.
• Dorukan: Protected by an epic level Wizard and an entire dungeon of monsters.
• Soon: Protected by an entire city's worth or soldiers and numerous high level Paladins.
• Girard: Hidden in a random spot in a vast desert with dozens(?) of high level Illusionists and a pyramid full of traps. Then at the very end there's a bluff trying to trick people into looking somewhere else.
• Serini: Hidden in a random statue out in the open that any idiot can just come up and smash. They don't even need to know about the gate or be trying to find it. Shit one of the Bugbears could have gotten drunk and destroyed the damn thing years ago and jumpstarted the end of the world.

Frankly if Serini did this she is unbelievably fucking stupid. So many things could go wrong and this is meant to protect the world for, presumably, eternity. I just can't accept any version of the story that has this as the solution unless it paints her as a dumbass.

In my mind there are only two options depending on what philosophy she decided to follow for protecting the gate.

Option 1: She followed Kraagor's martial philosophy and designed a test of strength. The gate is either inside one of the chambers or appears once all of them have been cleared in a certain period of time.

Option 2: She followed her more Rogueish nature and implemented some kind of trick. Either there's a puzzle to the dungeons(like beating them in a certain order) or, more logically, the dungeons themselves are a con. The gate is indeed inside the mountain. It's just inside a tiny room in a completely random patch of rock. The dungeons are designed to waste time and hopefully kill the potential intruders.

Frankly if I were tasked with protecting a potentially world ending item I'd go with option 2. It makes the gate virtually impossible to find even if you're looking for it and doesn't rely on dumb luck.

Edited by Kostya on Dec 3rd 2019 at 3:10:15 PM