137ben's page

Andostre wrote:

Does anybody have a link that directs to the most recent OotS comic? One that's not a static link to a specific comic? The old link that I used to use no longer works.

It looks like the comics section has been reorganized. You can still check the Order of the Stick archives, but it doesn't look like there is a page that auto-forwards to the most recent comic.

Thanks. Maybe they'll get around to it soon, but if not it's not a big deal.

They actually got around to it ten years ago.

The correct link to the latest page is
https (colon) //www (dot) giantitp (dot) com/comics/ootslatest.html

Sweet! And, I'll go with a Pathfinder product.

DAMN YOU SUPERJEDI224, YOU STOLE MY WIN!

May as well put me on the list.

Good luck!

Have readers forgotten about Xykon's fortress?

All I care about is the Giant pulled a Superior Spider-man.

You're more than four years late with that comparison:)

Why this doesn't happen to all vampires.

Sigdi's line about burying is a callback to strip 84, 14 real-life years ago.

I don't get it but then again it's pretty weird stuff anyway...

Durkon and his mother had dinner parties with the same five people for most of the time he lived in dwarven lands. We are just now being told that those five people are the people Sigdi had raised from the dead.

1126: Battle Cry

You're back! Yay!

1125: Throwing Shade

1124: Dominate Tricks

OH SNAP
ping bow string.

1121: Protection Racket

Unchained was merely my play test. I will remove the imperfections in your system. Improve it. Replace it. Progress is inevitable. And I am progress.

You're just an alpha test for me.

Also, you can now pre-order the next prequel book, Volume 1/2, in both softcover and DRM-free PDF.

1119: The Fighting’s So Bright

Noooooo not the poor giraffes :(

It looks like V isn’t chaotic, based on the gritted teeth in the chaos hammer.

V is True Neutral.

1118: Negatively Affected

Maneuvermoose wrote:

Which version of WotC psionics are we talking about? There's too many of them!

Edition bloat! Edition bloat! There are too many editions of WotC Psionics! The only way to solve it is for WotC to release a new edition to reduce the proliferation of...oh..wait a minute....

And now with Pathfinder 2 there will be even MORE edition bloat! That makes it more important than ever for Paizo to release a new edition to reduce the edition bloat!

Honestly I'm glad to see this thread bumped. I've seen a lot of "Pathfinder 2e" threads over the five years I've been on Paizo.com, but this thread was one of my favorite incarnations.

There will never be a Pathfinder 3.0. Remember, everyone who plays Pathfinder 2.0 is doing so because they hate switching editions. That's why all of them switched from 3.5 to Pathfinder 1, and then from Pathfinder 1 to Pathfinder 2. As we all know, past action is never an indicator of future action. That's why if someone switched from 3.5 to Pathfinder 1, you know they will never switch to Pathfinder 2, because they hate switching so much! Similarly, if anyone switches to Pathfinder 2, you know that those same people would be unwilling ever to switch systems again. Paizo knows this too, which is why they will never release a Pathfinder 3.

Though my opinion may change in subsequent rereadings, I think that last panel is my new favorite Elan quote of all time.

Spectacular.

Does this mean Kudzu is non-lawful?

It seems like he takes after his father in his passion for turn Undead.

We already know Kudzu's alignment: Kudzu's alignment is TBD.

We also know all of Kudzu's other stats:

Here are the stats you actually need for a hatchling dragon:

Movement: Gets away if you let it.
Saving Throws: Miraculously survives all accidents.
Armor Class: You hit.
Hit Points: Congratulations, Baby-Killer.
Special Qualities: I hope you can live with yourself.

Coincidentally, these are the same exact stats for every other species of baby.

The recent Nintendo Switch would be my recommendation, but that's due to my taste in games. It has the benefit of being somewhat portable, though, which none of the other major consoles (save the 3DS, which is really in a different category) have.

It really comes down to what sort of games you like. If you want Halo, then Xbox One is the only place to go. If you want Mario or Pokemon or Legend of Zelda or Metroid, Switch is the place for you. If you want any of Sony's exclusive games, go with PS4. I think Sony may be the best for multiplayer games, while Nintendo does better single-player games. But that's a very broad oversimplification.

I'd have a hard time recommending Xbox One to anyone, to do the dearth of exclusive titles and the fact that almost every XBO game is also on PS4. But if there's one in particular you really truly want, then go for it.

137ben wrote:

Looks like I got the only 2, and there were no 1s. Does that mean I win something?

Unfortunately, Ivory Songbird also got a 2.

Whoopsies, I didn't see that:P

Add me to the list too.

That dwarf appears to be the same one that Hurak is talking to on page 19 of OtOotPCs. I guess he's about to tell the Order about the prophecy that we found out about 12 years ago (finally!)

1089: Scents and Cents

Nice callback to the first page of book six.

Wultram wrote:

Sneak attack most certainly isn't something special.

That so?

Given that sneak attack immune targets are far less common in PF than they were in 3.5, I disagree.

Okay, back up a minute. Tell me, what does Sneak Attack actually do?

Dealing hit-point damage in Pathfinder is not something special. Every single class in the game can do hit-point damage. Even the commoner. Sneak Attack is a class feature that allows a rogue to do more damage than a commoner. You know who else has that feature? Every other class in the game except commoners. They aren't all called "Sneak Attack," but they all do the same thing: increase hit-point damage.

For the Fighter, it's called Weapon Training. It boosts damage, just like Sneak Attack. For the Paladin, it's called Smite Evil. For the Barbarian, it's called Rage. For the Wizard, it's called either Magic Missile or Bull's Strength. They all do the same thing, and that thing is hit-point damage. There is nothing special about Sneak Attack, no matter how frequently you can use it.

If you want to see what an actually special class feature in Pathfinder looks like, look at the Barbarian's ability to shrug off mind-affecting effects with the appropriate rage power. Or the Paladin's Mercy. Or the Wizard's ability to fly. Those are all special because not every class can do them. Unlike dealing damage, which literally everyone in Pathfinder does.

More specifically:

--All vampires that aren't currently thralls have free will.
--Malack's primary purpose in the story was to kill Durkon. If Malack weren't Evil, he probably wouldn't have killed Durkon and so wouldn't have been in the story. Hence, you only saw Malack because he was evil.

--HPoH's primary role in the story appears to be as the main antagonist of book six, so he also had to be evil for that role.

--The Giant hasn't decided how many death gods there are in the OOTS world. If there's a Good-aligned death god out there, they are probably more likely to be making Good-aligned vampire spirits, and if there is a Neutral-aligned death god out there, they are probably more likely to be making Neutral-aligned vampire spirits. But the only ones that matter are the ones shown in the comic.

Speaking from my personal perspective, I'd be very surprised if any of the vampires in HPoH's retinue were non-evil. Hel created all of them for the same purpose as HPoH, and they all very clearly want Hel's plan to succeed, which means they all want Hel to get more power. Then again, Eugene also didn't seem to mind the idea of Hel succeeding, since it would mean he personally could get into the afterlife and he's too self-centered to care about what happens on the ground.

Isn't the female vampire that did not immediately get onboard with the Great Leader narrative and shows more independent thought than the other spawns the same one who seemed to heed self-preservation more than bloodlust in the fight with Roy and the representatives ?

Is it possible for a spawn to actually be created free, and maybe even non-Evil ?

How Vampires Work in OOTS.

Thanks to Jaxzan Proditor (for the quotes, not just the votes.)

commoner

Commoners are only week if you view the game as a competition to see who can do the most damage like an MMO. In a REAL LIFE Pathfinder game, the GM can just arrange things so that the commoner can shine. If you are finding commoners are overshadowed then you're just a bad GM.

Besides, I was playing a commoner the other day and I rolled TWO critical hits in a row! Seriously, that's how awesome commoners are. No one else was that powerful.

So what?

Is the kind of sniping in this thread helping anyone have a more enjoyable or richer gaming experience?

If you don't want to take part in a discussion on alignment, you don't have to post on this thread. Evidently, some people do enjoy posting on these threads, since they keep doing it.

Lady-J wrote:

, real paladins aren't lawful good,

*tilts head*

The only real paladins were the Roman officials. They were not Good, they were legal officials whose loyalty was to the emperor of Rome.

You are probably thinking of fictional paladins, which are distinctly not real. The most famous fictional paladins are the Charlemagne peers--the paladins who regularly butcher and torture anyone they perceive as being a different religion. They are also not Lawful Good, and would be closest to Chaotic Evil if you insisted on using alignments for them.

The Lawful Good 'Paladin' is a very recent invention, introduced in the late 20th century. And it's basically spewing a big pile of vomit over everything the paladin has traditionally stood for for thousands of years.

But hey, if that's your preference, go ahead and use it! If you what to call your character a Lawful Good Paladin, you can do that. No real paladin will be offended by your insult to their profession, since all the real paladins are long dead. No fictional paladin will be offended either, since they are fictional. And while I personally will always prefer a traditional paladin over the modern Good 'Paladin' you seam enamored with, I'm not going to stop you from playing what you want. Unlike some people here, my enjoyment of a game isn't contingent on being able to tell other people what they are or aren't allowed to enjoy themselves. So go ahead and play your Lawful Good 'Paladin.' Just don't be surprised when other people prefer a different conception of a paladin.

Redcloak is an average leader. Zykon is the awesome leader. :)

Check again, [url="http://www.giantitp.com/comics/oots0917.html"]it's "Zyklon," with an 'l'. I always thought that T used divination to try and figure out who Xykon was, but couldn't due to Cloister. He then ended up finding out about an unrelated villain Zyklon, who was much weaker and hence concluded that the villain Elan is worried about isn't really a threat.

You are correct that "setting neutral" is not quite accurate. In fact, I'd argue that it's not possible to make a truly setting neutral fantasy game system because there is no universal standard for how magic works.

Ah, I see you've never played Word Mill's Mythic Role playing. It is a truly universal setting, and it is designed so that the setting can be generated on the fly during play if you want to (although you can also play with a pre-determined setting).

It's amazing how many of the Paizo.com arguments go away once that book is available.

I have no doubt that, had barbarians originally been printed with a "Lawful only" restriction, and had monks originally been printed with a "chaotic only" restriction, then the same people who are now demanding Lawful Only Monks and Chaotic Only Barbarians would instead be demanding Chaotic Only Monks and Lawful Only Barbarians.

After all, Barbarians are all about living the traditional hunter-gatherer lifestyle of their ancestors. There's no way you can be a barbarian like that without being lawful.

Meanwhile, Monks outright reject the authority of the lawful secular government of their region, instead putting their faith in an extrajudicial quasi-religious order of martial artists. Hence, Monks cannot be lawful.

Heck, the same goes for pretty much any other class. If the Core Rulebook said that Fighters had to be a particular alignment, the same people defending the monk's alignment restriction would be making the same argument in defense of the fighter's alignment restriction, regardless of what it was. Fighters need a lot of discipline and patience to learn their martial art, so they have to be Lawful. Fighters resolve conflicts with violence instead of diplomacy, so they are inherently Chaotic. The only reason you don't see the same choir of people arguing in favor of either of those alignment restrictions is because they aren't already printed in the books.

The fact is, you can come up with a quick "justification" for any class to be restricted to any alignment. Not all such restrictions can actually be in the rules (for starters, you can't restrict a class to be both Chaotic-only and Lawful-only).

Really had me scared with the title, there!

I'd stopped buying anything from the Paizo.com store for a handful of reasons, but as long as PDG continues to put out products on OBS and/or the open gaming store, I'll keep buying them. I'd hazard a guess that customers like me contributed to whatever reasons PDG had for deciding to leave the Paizo.com store.

For people who forgot, the stone crumbling to dust was introduced a chapter or two ago in strip 1024.

Ascalaphus wrote:

It makes it much harder for enemies to "geek the mage first",

I always wonder how they knew who the mage was. It is true, that some wear a big pointy red hat with "WIZZARD" on it in sequins, but they are the minority. ;-)

Now you're just being silly. All Wizards are absolutely required to wear big pointy hats, and Jiggy explains why

As for the cone-shaped hat, that one's a bit more complicated. See, the most dangerous thing for a wizard is to have your magic taken away, which generally comes in the form of an anti-magic field. Wizards need a way to protect against this. So what do you do?

You get a teepee (a cone-shaped tent) and cast shrink item on it. Refresh it every couple of days. Now you have a teepee that you can wear as a hat. Should you find that you've run afoul of an AMF, the spell on the teepee-hat will end, returning it to its natural size. This means that suddenly there's a full-size, open-bottomed tent above your head. Gravity does its thing, and now you're standing in a tent.

As a result, there is no longer any line of effect from the point-of-origin of the AMF to your wizardy self, meaning you're no longer affected. You can now teleport to safety. And make a new hat.

That is why wizards wear flowing robes and pointy hats.

1083: You Bet

BALOR. Good god, Balor. The mythical Balor is one of my favorite figures in myth, so making it a discount Balrog frustrates me. It doesnt even have a gaze attack!

I'm in pretty much the same boat when it comes to drow, or paladins, or the tarrasque.

1082: And Your Souls For Free

Speeding up the disease just for this purpose might or might not violate the Domain Agreement.

Also, most people who get chicken pox don't encounter a chicken.

None of the people insisting that only Lawful characters can hold to a code have yet explained why Chaotic Evil gets to have Antipaladins. And according to the official Paizo PRD, Antipaladins do lose class abilities if they violate their Code of Conduct.

Edit: Ninja'd!

Being ninja'd is not allowed. Ninjas must follow a code of honor, and hence must be lawful.

1080: Clever Blasting God Stoppers

First time I can remember a Saturday update in quite awhile. I think the title is a reference to the film adaption of Charlie and the Chocolate Factory.

I love the Paladin, and have since 1988. I will not play a 5e Paladin as it's not a Paladin.

I love the Palatina. I have since circa 20 CE. I will not play the AD&D "Paladin" and it's not a paladin. The new-age anime producer who wrote the AD&D so-called "paladin" had no conception as to what a paladin really is. A real paladin is a government official, who swears allegiance to the Emperor of Rome, in connection with Palatine Hill. The AD&D "paladin" is none of those things, so it isn't a paladin. It's an insult to everything paladins have stood for for the previous 1900 years. Full Stop. End of discussion. And don't you dare tell me that the meanings of words change: all words are required to mean exactly the same thing that they meant in ancient times, and modern writers are not allowed to use ancient words like "Paladin" to describe fictional character archetypes that hadn't been invented when the word originated.

1079: Threat Level