The Order of the Stick

That is true. The recurring trend is that each member of the Scribble told their party to eat shit and built a defense around their singular class traits, mistakenly believing that whatever they're about is enough to defend against any invasion. And they are, each and every one of them, wrong.

Lirian put her faith in the idea that nature's raw ferocity was insurmountable. She was mistaken.

Dorukan put his faith in the idea that a wizard's immense power and intellect was unbeatable. He was mistaken.

Soon put his faith in the idea that an army of holy paladins united by honor was inconquerable. He was mistaken.

Girard put his faith in the idea that an illusionist's tricks and schemes are impassible. He was mistaken.

Following suit, it stands to reason that Serini put her faith in the idea that a rogue's _____________ is unsolvable. She will be mistaken.

The moral of the Scribble's story is that there's no such thing as a god-tier character class that can just do everything by themselves. Parties > loose cannons.

Edited by TobiasDrake on Dec 3rd 2019 at 1:09:15 PM

I mean, the balance that has to be walked here is that it can't (or at least shouldn't) be anything that makes Serini look like an idiot, but for narrative reasons we can't have something that so clever that the characters never manage to reach the gate. Like the story requires that the defences be overcome somehow, but none of the Scribblers so far have done anything obviously idiotic. And 'Xykon has an amount of force behind him that Serini wasn't able to plan around' is a pretty good way for that to happen. It's why most of the Gates have fallen, after all.

So perhaps she simply doesn't have a response to someone powerful enough to brute force their way through every dungeon.

Edited by Gilphon on Dec 3rd 2019 at 3:21:41 PM

Alternatively she expects someone to clear the dungeons, realize they haven't found the gate, and then start desperately looking for a puzzle or hidden door because she's a Rogue. Instead Xykon will just flip and start tearing apart the mountain until he stumbles on the gate by dumb luck.

Entirely unrelated to the new characters we saw in this last comic or to the discussion on the location of the gate, but I'm going to make a wild guess and say that the Order will get to meet Kraagor in some capacity (be it actually him or a representation of him) before this whole story comes to an end as part of the reveal about however the Snarl and the world inside the Rifts work.

Yeah, there is no way the gate is behind any of the doors. If a group can take on one of the doors, they can take on all of them and it's only a matter of time until they find it. That's a pretty lousy defence, considering the prize has basically infinite value, so time is no matter.

The means to get to the gate might be in there, like a series of levers that need to be pulled in the right order or whatever, but the gate itself is hidden a lot better than that.

I'm sure Kraagor would find it hilarious. He was a barbarian tank, his entire job description was "be a big, loud distraction".

Ooh, I like that idea. If it turns out the Snarl actually is intelligent in some way I think taking his form would be appropriate.

Yeah that idea is flawed too. I think the options for how it's hidden are most to least likely in this order;

1. It's just in a random section of the mountain with no door or connecting passages.
2. There's some kind of trick or puzzle involved with clearing or venturing into the dungeons.
3. The gate is just inside a random dungeon.
4. The gate is in the statue.

Anything but 1 and 2 is just an inadequate defense in my opinion.

Basically my belief.

Edited by Kostya on Dec 3rd 2019 at 3:27:52 PM

Any particular reason that the Gate can't simply be buried under tons of rock and earth?

If there were some reason for the Gate to still be accessible for those in the know, then the whole dungeon setup makes sense, even with the caveat that there might be some sort of trick going on with it.

If not, frankly I would have just buried the thing deep in the mountain and left this whole dungeon setup to waste the time of any who might want to get to it, make them think that there's some sort of trial to overcome.

I think the Gates are the kind of thing you want to keep taps on and have relative easy access to. Just in case something goes wrong, or the good guys figure out a way to manipulate the Gates into being completely harmless. If not, why did any of the Scribbles bother with their respective set-ups?

...Okay, Soon had a pretty good reason, what with his Gate being in the sky, but Girard's was practically buried under the sand anyway.

Maybe the idea is for the invisible folks who just carted off O'Chul and Lien to ambush anyone who safely comes out of one of the doors, but Team Evil has never had to burn enough resources for that to be likely to work.

Yeah, the fact that there are active, intelligent defenders changes the game here quite a bit. But Xykon is an epic lich sorcerer, which puts him out of reach of a lot of traditional responses. Note that as undead, he's flat-out immune to sneak attacks, so the traditional high-level rogue response of "go invisible and sneak attack it until it dies" isn't an option.

I like the idea that clearing the dungeons in the right order leads to the real Gate, but it's also possible that the Hollow has nothing to do with it, the statue has nothing to do with it, and the defenders can just open a portal to the real Gate and everything else is just a distraction.

If there's a way for a defender to shortcut past all the defenses and get to the Gate, than all an attacker needs to do is capture the defender and manipulate them into opening the door. A league of paladins might not be susceptible to torture or bribes, but we can't necessarily say the same about our friends with the green and orange speech bubbles.

It should be noted that we don't know that the invisible interlopers here are defending the Gate.

They're certainly aware of it. They have an enmity with the bugbears. But they haven't actually interacted with Xykon and Redcloak, the existing threat to the Gate. Instead, they attacked the paladins spying on Xykon and Redcloak, and their conversation at the end implies an intention to destroy the Gate.

While I'm leaning towards Serini being the green voice, it's worth noting that none of their actions here are actually indicative of some stalwart defender, protecting the Gate from wrongdoers. Yet another third party agenda to add to the agenda dogpile this next book's shaping up to be is entirely possible.

Edited by TobiasDrake on Dec 3rd 2019 at 3:29:40 AM

I'm putting money on these creatures being from the world within the rift.

How did the Scribble locate the rifts?

The first one, Soon found by accident when it killed his wife. The others I don't think we know how they found them, but we know it was the focus of their quest.

True, but there are multiple reasons why defenders wouldn't be interfering with Xykon. Top of the list being "he's just too freaking powerful," but if the Hollow really is nothing but a giant distraction then there's no need to get into a fight they don't know if they'll win. But if they just spotted some nearby paladins, grabbing them might be a step towards doing something about Xykon—paladins are much better equipped to fight undead than rogues.

But the colored text bubbles make things weird. I like the idea of them being dragons, and outsiders kinda make sense too, but both dragons and outsiders have better options for disabling people than poison darts.

D&D Dragons can go human form, right? Have we seen any human-dragons in OOTS?

Depends on the dragon. Metallic (Good-aligned dragons) have it as a natural ability, but chromatic (Evil-aligned dragons) do not. Though chromatic dragons still have natural spellcasting abilities that could do the same thing pretty easily.

It also uses the polymorph rules, and I can't remember if a dragon polymorphed into human form still has all its spellcasting abilities. Which, again, would mean it has better options than poison darts.

Another big flaw with this system is that it's essentially a source of EXP and loot for anyone sufficiently powerful enough to clear the dungeons. Xykon, an Epic Level character, is actually gaining Experience from all of this.

It seems unlikely to me that the invisible duo just now noticed Lien and O'Chul. What seems a lot more likely to me is that they were content to leave them be as long as all they were doing was watching Team Evil, but now that they apparently have incoming re-enforcements, they needed to be removed from the scene.

I further infer- from the way they concerned Lien into surrendering despite being in a position of power over her- that they're wary of alerting Xykon to their presence.

Additional, they're resigned to non-existence, not death. Which implies that they believe the gate's destruction is inevitable. Or perhaps that they believe releasing the Snarl is preferable to the alternative, but why would they think that? But in any case, I think we can safely assume that they don't think the Gate's defences are going to keep Xykon out forever.

To be precise, only the Lawful Good dragons (gold, silver, and bronze) have Alternate Form. The Chaotic Good dragons (brass and copper) do not.

And yes, shapeshifted dragons retain their spellcasting and spell-like abilities.

If I was a GM I'd house rule that they all can do it.

I probably would too, it opens up some great plot possibilities.

Why couldn't a non-LG dragon just polymorph into a Gold, Silver, or Bronze dragon and then use the Alternate Form

Yeah, that's a common house rule.

Alternate Form is a watered-down version of polymorph. If you can polymorph into a dragon, you can polymorph into a humanoid form. There's no need to overcomplicate it by polymorphing into a dragon that can turn into a human.