The Open Door (megacrossover)

[Academia Nut]

Actually, the reasoning behind my temporal positioning have less to do with nerdrage and more to do with the fact that I have this nice shiny guide to the Underdark for 3.5E with maps and everything while for 4E WotC blew up large sections of said implausibly large system of underground caves. And set the rubble on fire. And extinguished the burning rubble by emptying several oceans into the hole (man, that had to have screwed with global environmental conditions).

Somewhat less pragmatically, while I have the 4E PHB and wouldn't mind playing a game sometime, a lot of the stuff is really, really gimped from a story-telling perspective, which I think is why Wizards set the whole damn world on fire and killed Mystra (again!), because the new rules disallow the spellcasters from throwing about large numbers of the same spell in a single turn. Quite frankly, I'm more comfortable working with the spellcasting system that has been in use by the literature for the past two decades than the new one.

Also, Lars already comes from a sufficiently grimdark universe that he doesn't need his problems compounded more than they already are.

Finally, a sudden... impulse has buried itself in my brain thanks to a certain aquatically coloured stylus (read: bluepencil). I want to see the trio of god!Shinji's from the internet all brought together. The would be my Tzintchi, Bpen's Emperor Shinji, and the Shinji from John Biles' Children of an Elder God, which for the uninitiated is an utterly awesome story where the Angels in EVA are replaced by the Great Old Ones from the Cthulhu Mythos. From the time where John Biles whapped me over the nose for bitching about the length of time it has taken for the final chapter to be released (penultimate chapter released in 2004), the story will hopefully conclude this year. Hooray! And for those of you who haven't stopped reading this to go wade through CoaEG yet, Shinji, and all of the other Children are playing by Necromonger rules and are slowly turning into Great Old Ones from all the enemies they have killed and eaten.

The basic set-up for this picture would be the trio sitting in a triangular pattern. On the left (or sinister) point, there would be Tzintchi, dressed in robes and wreathed in Warp Fire, his fingers bridged in front of him in a "Just as planned" sort of pose, grinning evilly. Opposite on the right hand side would be Emperor (but don't call him that, he hates that!) Shinji look contemplative or possibly annoyed at his Chaotic counterpart. In the middle, glancing between the two, would be Mythos Shinji, possibly with his wings folded and maybe manifesting some of the abilities he has picked up. Aside from just collecting the three god!Shinji's in one place, it would have the thematic addition of having CoaEG Shinji caught between two extremes: a Shinji who has embraced the power of becoming a cosmic horror, and a Shinji who has embraced humanity and the progress of technology completely.

Also, I think that making fan art for three different fanfiction pieces would be just awesome, and I hope Bpen and John Biles would share my enthusiasm for such a kick ass project. Other characters are fine too, but I really want to see the Shinjis. But if you want to compare say Daemon Princess Hikari, Mythos touched Pilot Hikari, and Inquisitor Hikari, go right ahead. Or just general fan-art, you now.

All of that said, since sacrifice pleases the dark gods, I will throw in some incentive. Any reasonable attempt at making some art (so no crayon drawings unless they're really good) will net you a passing mention of some sort of your choice in a chapter. A decent, well composed sketch with maybe some colour or such would net you a character of your design (within reason of course) getting some decent screentime in a chapter and the possibility of being picked up on a more regular basis if sufficiently awesome. Something with say this amount of work put into it will net you the ability to actually request the content of a chapter, even if that means me opening up a new universe. Even if that means me having to go research the new universe. Seriously, if you think you can bust out the paints and the watercolours and the full on Photoshop action and you can make my jaw drop, I'll go to that extra effort for you.

So, what do you guys think? Am I letting my ego get the better of me? Or will we see some kick-ass art? Or will John Biles, whose name I have said four times now in the hopes of summoning him forth from the eldritch abyss that is the Internet (I did it before by accident!), come in here and smack me? Or will he go "Sweeeet"? Only time will tell.

[Robo Jesus]

Actually, the reasoning behind my temporal positioning have less to do with nerdrage and more to do with the fact that I have this nice shiny guide to the Underdark for 3.5E with maps and everything while for 4E WotC blew up large sections of said implausibly large system of underground caves. And set the rubble on fire. And extinguished the burning rubble by emptying several oceans into the hole (man, that had to have screwed with global environmental conditions).

Somewhat less pragmatically, while I have the 4E PHB and wouldn't mind playing a game sometime, a lot of the stuff is really, really gimped from a story-telling perspective, which I think is why Wizards set the whole damn world on fire and killed Mystra (again!), because the new rules disallow the spellcasters from throwing about large numbers of the same spell in a single turn. Quite frankly, I'm more comfortable working with the spellcasting system that has been in use by the literature for the past two decades than the new one.

Also, Lars already comes from a sufficiently grimdark universe that he doesn't need his problems compounded more than they already are.

Finally, a sudden... impulse has buried itself in my brain thanks to a certain aquatically coloured stylus (read: bluepencil). I want to see the trio of god!Shinji's from the internet all brought together. The would be my Tzintchi, Bpen's Emperor Shinji, and the Shinji from John Biles' Children of an Elder God, which for the uninitiated is an utterly awesome story where the Angels in EVA are replaced by the Great Old Ones from the Cthulhu Mythos. From the time where John Biles whapped me over the nose for bitching about the length of time it has taken for the final chapter to be released (penultimate chapter released in 2004), the story will hopefully conclude this year. Hooray! And for those of you who haven't stopped reading this to go wade through CoaEG yet, Shinji, and all of the other Children are playing by Necromonger rules and are slowly turning into Great Old Ones from all the enemies they have killed and eaten.

The basic set-up for this picture would be the trio sitting in a triangular pattern. On the left (or sinister) point, there would be Tzintchi, dressed in robes and wreathed in Warp Fire, his fingers bridged in front of him in a "Just as planned" sort of pose, grinning evilly. Opposite on the right hand side would be Emperor (but don't call him that, he hates that!) Shinji look contemplative or possibly annoyed at his Chaotic counterpart. In the middle, glancing between the two, would be Mythos Shinji, possibly with his wings folded and maybe manifesting some of the abilities he has picked up. Aside from just collecting the three god!Shinji's in one place, it would have the thematic addition of having CoaEG Shinji caught between two extremes: a Shinji who has embraced the power of becoming a cosmic horror, and a Shinji who has embraced humanity and the progress of technology completely.

Also, I think that making fan art for three different fanfiction pieces would be just awesome, and I hope Bpen and John Biles would share my enthusiasm for such a kick ass project. Other characters are fine too, but I really want to see the Shinjis. But if you want to compare say Daemon Princess Hikari, Mythos touched Pilot Hikari, and Inquisitor Hikari, go right ahead. Or just general fan-art, you now.

All of that said, since sacrifice pleases the dark gods, I will throw in some incentive. Any reasonable attempt at making some art (so no crayon drawings unless they're really good) will net you a passing mention of some sort of your choice in a chapter. A decent, well composed sketch with maybe some colour or such would net you a character of your design (within reason of course) getting some decent screentime in a chapter and the possibility of being picked up on a more regular basis if sufficiently awesome. Something with say this amount of work put into it will net you the ability to actually request the content of a chapter, even if that means me opening up a new universe. Even if that means me having to go research the new universe. Seriously, if you think you can bust out the paints and the watercolours and the full on Photoshop action and you can make my jaw drop, I'll go to that extra effort for you.

So, what do you guys think? Am I letting my ego get the better of me? Or will we see some kick-ass art? Or will John Biles, whose name I have said four times now in the hopes of summoning him forth from the eldritch abyss that is the Internet (I did it before by accident!), come in here and smack me? Or will he go "Sweeeet"? Only time will tell.

I think I'm going to post this quote of yours (edited of course to remove the info about the currently current chapter) on a few different forums I visit.

[Academia Nut]

If you subcontract be sure to give the contractors their credit and due. Also, theoretically SB should already know of some of the elements of this idea due that rather amusing thread. You know the one.

[Academia Nut]

Chapter Thirty-seven: Capture

Now surrounded on all sides by the black skinned creatures, Lars could do nothing as they isolated him from Skuld and kept her under close guard while two new sorcerers kept him and another female sorceress interviewed the one who had survived, obviously disgusted by both the fact that Lars had caused so much trouble and by the fact that the survivor had soiled herself.

Lars for his part was trying to hide how much that one spell had hurt. He had the feeling it had not interacted properly with his otherworldly nature and so he was still trying to pull his stretched being back into alignment. He just hoped that these creatures did not figure out that that particular attack was effective on him.

Finally the sorceress who had been grilling her subordinate approached Lars, flicking her wrist so that a tiny spell was launched at Lars. Clinging to him, it lit him up in pale, ethereal fire that provided only light. Obviously she wanted a better look at him. Of course, this also gave Lars a good look at her. She appeared much like the other sorceress, if a bit more ornately decorated and her features perhaps a touch older.

“He looks like little more than a filthy top-worlder,” the new leader noted scornfully.

Licking an eyeball with a thin tentacle extruded from his mouth, Lars noted dryly, “Looks can be deceiving.”

One of the lesser sorcerers standing guard over Lars noted warily, “I do not like this one highest. My scrying has not let me know of what manner of demon he is, if he be demon at all.”

Growling in annoyance, the sorceress said to her minion, “I do not care. Can we control it?”

The two sorcerers deliberated for a few moments before they declared, “Probably. But it will take time and careful deliberation highest. We cannot bind it in the wild.”

The sorceress seemed ready to give a command when salt water began to drip profusely from under Lars’ coat and rime ice began to form on the cave walls. Lars then grinned over broadly and with far more teeth than he had shown a moment before and hissed telepathically If the next words out of your mouth are anything but ‘we take them both with us’ you will regret them.

Everyone in attendance boggled at this sudden change and while the leader refused to show her fear, she did say, “You think petty trickery will change my mind?”

Glancing at him and then at his leader, one of the sorcerers whispered, “Highest, it hasn’t cast a spell yet. That’s a wild magic backlash.”

The sorceress blinked and then a grin crept over her face. “I see. So you will do what we say so long as we keep your little pet alive?”

“And in good condition. But yes, I must protect her, and I will take whatever steps necessary to do so. Please remember that your deaths are quite high on my list of necessary steps,” Lars commented.

“Quite. Well then, your little pet here dies unless you eliminate this soiled piece of offal for failing me,” the leader said with a sneer while jerking her thumb at the one who had originally held Skuld hostage.

Lars was on the surprised sorceress before she could register the betrayal, his mouth opening up hugely large while his tongue became a grasping set of tentacles that ensnared the sorceress’ head and face, pulling her in. Her screams were only cut short by Lars’ tentacles filling her mouth, nose and throat. When it was done, the dead body slumped to the ground, the face drenched with frigid seawater and covered in thousands of tiny bites, none of them fatal. The true fatal blow had been Lars ripping her soul from her body for consumption. He was still feeling aggressive and impulsive from his stint in Hell

Tucking away his tentacles, he shifted his appearance to that of the dead sorceress for a moment. He said in a weird echoing version of both his voice and hers, “I enjoyed that.” He then reverted back to his usual form.

Everyone looked shocked at the sheer brutality of it, but the leader recovered first, laughing greedily. She said, “Now I see why you did so much damage! Ha! I should have promoted the bitch. Oh well, now I don’t have to share the credit for your discovery. You will call me either Mistress Aruvixa or highest.”

“Very well Mistress Aruvixa,” Lars growled out.


They had been marching in silence for hours, the only brief respite being when about half an hour after they left the cave where Lars and Skuld had arrived they had come across a camp where strange, bestial slaves had been waiting. They had quickly broken camp and the carriage of Skuld was turned over to two of the slaves with a pole that they tied her too, with a warrior standing by her at all times, sword drawn and ready to thrust.

Lars tirelessly followed along, an eye on Skuld and Aruvixa at all times, although mostly he delegated this to some of his other minds while he worked on a rather personal problem. Namely the little ball of unpleasant emotions he had sitting inside of him. It had, for lack of a better word, hardened. Lars had compressed it too much and delayed attempting consumption so long that the energy had taken on its own ontological inertia.

Right now it was little more than a psychic jaw breaker, and if Lars took a few days to consume it, the problem would be solved, which was what he was slowly doing. The problem was that he still had a lot of unprocessed hatred and anger in his system, especially after the fight, and consuming more would not do wonders for his disposition. Especially after eating that sorceress, although now that he had her apparently the title used for her particular brand of magic was ‘cleric’ as she had to have her spells prepared for her by her goddess and then begged for them each day with prayer.

With all of the toxic emotion still in his system, Lars found it quite amusing to slice apart her soul in a sadistic form of dissection, peeling her apart like an onion. While she released more poisons into his system, he just turned all of that hatred and avarice against her. She would have got the Hall of Torment back home anyway, so his crude ministrations did not seem out of line. Once the memory of sacrificing a child captured in a raid was discovered, things got really unpleasant for the cleric.

“What are you grinning about demon?” One of Lars’ guards asked in a whisper.

“Digesting,” Lars replied cheerfully, his face twisting into an agonized mask of the dead woman before subsiding again. Inside he immediately felt a twinge of regret, noting just how badly tainted he was at the moment, but he didn’t let it show.

The guard went very silent after that.

His attention temporarily distracted, Lars returned it to keeping an eye on Skuld and was immediately alarmed. He had been watching her so continuously up until that point while being otherwise distracted that he had not noticed what was happening to her.

Namely, she was very slowly running out of energy. It was why she had yet to wake up even after the poison had worn off. And if it continued it would become lethal.

Stopping, Lars announced, “Mistress Aruvixa, I have just noticed that my ward is quite ill. If you do not want her to die and for me to slaughter you all and eat your souls, I recommend you allow me to tend to her.”

Halting the march, Aruvixa turned to Lars with a lethal look in her eyes and asked, “Do you think your threats frighten me?”

His face straight, Lars replied, “Considering my ward still lives, yes. Now, will we have another discussion about our relationship, or will you take a recommendation with your best interests to heart, Mistress Aruvixa?”

Nodding to the guards about Skuld, Aruvixa ordered, “Set the surface dweller down and keep your swords on her throat.”

Nodding, Lars said, “Thank you Mistress Aruvixa.”

Sitting down next to Skuld, Lars probed with his psychic senses, and confirmed what he had suspected. Cut off from her native universe, Skuld was suffering from magic depletion, and as a goddess, this would be an ultimately fatal state unless she had some way of replenishing her energy.

There was magical energy all around, but Skuld’s body seemed unable to tap into it, which was unfortunate as her divine body could certainly handle being plugged into some of the main lines of power that Lars could detect. Probing about, Lars examined the relationship between the magic of this world and the creatures around him. The slaves had a very small connection, but it was there, while even the black skinned warriors had noticeable ones. The cleric’s direct link was about the same size as the warriors, but there was a secondary connection of much, much greater magnitude, presumably the link to her goddess. The wizards on the other hand had huge links directly to the lines of power, enough that he could tell that they knew he was examining them.

Skuld had no such link.

Running a psychic finger over a stray strand of free floating magical power, Lars was intrigued by the fact that there was a second set of strands that under laid the other, a subtle darkness to the bright light. That network seemed unconnected to the living creatures, so Lars left it alone, although he would have a look at it later.

Taking the filament of natural magic, Lars grasped it between two sharp psychic ‘fingers’ and gently snipped it. The two pieces of the filament immediately snapped apart, and it was all Lars could do to contain the backlash. It wouldn’t have been very big, but possibly enough to spook the guards into slicing Skuld’s throat open.

“Sorry! Sorry! I’m trying to do something delicate here and it got away from me,” Lars announced as a slight electric hum built up and hairs began to stand on end, but it died down before anything exploded.

“What are you doing?” Aruvixa demanded.

“My ward has suffered from a mishap and she is currently cut off from her normal supply of magical energy, so I am attempting to splice her into the local magical field,” Lars explained as he found another thin filament.

“She’s cut off from the Weave and you’re trying to tie her back in?” One of the wizards asked incredulously.

“Yes,” Lars replied.

“You can do that?” Aruvixa asked.

“I’m going to try. Umm… she might convulse a little, would you mind moving your swords just a bit for a few seconds?” Lars asked the guards.

Aruvixa nodded and said, “I want to see if this works.”

Once more Lars cut the line of magic, but this time he immediately grabbed one of the ends firmly. The other went sparking off for a second before tying back in to the rest of the network, creating a small burst of light and noise as it did so. Holding the live wire of magical energy was like sticking his finger in a wall socket, but Lars managed to hold on to it. He then reached out and as gently as he could he lifted up a tiny portion of Skuld’s soul so that he could connect the two.

Bringing the tiny but raw vein of magic together with Skuld, Lars managed to tie the two together and get them to stick. At first Skuld’s body recoiled and she began to go into convulsions, but very quickly she settled down. The peak output when first connected was quite large, but considering that Skuld could handle several orders of magnitude more energy easily, she survived the initial surge and once it settled down so did she.

“There, I’ve fixed the problem, we can continue now,” Lars replied.

The wizards looked at him incredulously before one of them pointed out, “You just took a raw piece of the Weave and plugged her into it!”

Shrugging, Lars replied, “I did what I needed to do. She needed the energy; your ‘Weave’ had it.”

Calculating this sort of thing, Aruvixa asked, “Could you do this to others?”

“I could, but I wouldn’t recommend it, Mistress Aruvixa. I used the smallest strand of magic I could find and it nearly overwhelmed me, and if my ward had not been already used to handling large amounts of magic, the initial shock might have killed her,” Lars explained.

“Curious. We will discuss this more later. For now though, we continue. You may prove even more valuable than I had anticipated,” Aruvixa noted.

“That I may,” Lars replied. He idly wondered what Aruvixa would smell like if he plugged her into the Weave on her orders. He guessed burnt bacon. That was the smell of a greedy animal set on fire after all.

[von Neufeld]

Interesting chapter. Looking forward to seeing what the consequence of connecting Skuld to the weave has.
A big question about the situation is when it's taking place.

[Xon]

Skuld as the Goddess of the future will hopefully smack Mystra around with a 2x4 for being such a suicidal asshole. Obviously dealling with a God with a Death Wish is problematic

Hopefully Lord Ao also gets some shit to stick over what he is ultimately responsible for.

[Academia Nut]

Pfff. Skuld isn't just the Goddess of the Future, she's the Norn of the Future, as in she is one of the deities tasked with making sure that Yggdrasil is working properly AKA reality maintenance. Admittedly, this came up far less than it probably should have in OMG, but hey, its still a plot point. I'm sure the set-up in the Forgotten Realms would be more than enough to annoy any OMG deity, but for the ones tasked with actually making sure that the laws of physics work as they're supposed to, it would be extra annoying.

[Firethorn]

Digesting! Beautiful!

I'd have kept quiet about Skuld normally handling large amounts of magic.

Could be dangerous for her, might allow the Drow to put up effective restraints on her for when she wakes up.

Then again, throwing them a tibit increases her potential value, and possibly gives the Drow a 'reason' for Skuld being valuable to the superiors of a soul eating demon monster. And restraints intended for a cleric or wizard might not work on a goddess.

I'm betting they have until Skuld's been conscious for a few minutes until Skuld herself removes the danger long enough for Lars to effect an escape.

[Singular Quartet]

not so sure about that, Firethorn. I mean, given Lars' description of Belldandy, I don't think Skull is working on her usual power level. Unless she can ramp up her power draw to her natural levels on her own?

[Firethorn]

Unless she can ramp up her power draw to her natural levels on her own?

I was thinking more along the lines of deploying a dozen or so of her bombs.

As for waking up - increasing the power draw would be more to restore Skuld's goddess body; it is rather tougher than a human's.

[Xon]

Pfff. Skuld isn't just the Goddess of the Future, she's the Norn of the Future, as in she is one of the deities tasked with making sure that Yggdrasil is working properly AKA reality maintenance.

I know the Xeelee arent likely to be included (they canon backstory has them in 2 seperate un-connected universes/multi-verses) but they exist as a closed time-like loop and have the ability to selectively edit physics in a local area

How would Lars or Skuld react to one of those suckers?

Admittedly, this came up far less than it probably should have in OMG, but hey, its still a plot point. I'm sure the set-up in the Forgotten Realms would be more than enough to annoy any OMG deity, but for the ones tasked with actually making sure that the laws of physics work as they're supposed to, it would be extra annoying.

I realise that the OMG deities are consistantly more powerful than anything deity running around the D&D setting. And a fuckload nicer to share the same universe with.

Seriously, WH40K is only just more horrible for basic humans than your standard Forgotten Realms setting. Especially if you run into anything vaguely non-standard.

[Aranfan]

Pfff. Skuld isn't just the Goddess of the Future, she's the Norn of the Future, as in she is one of the deities tasked with making sure that Yggdrasil is working properly AKA reality maintenance.

I know the Xeelee arent likely to be included (they canon backstory has them in 2 seperate un-connected universes/multi-verses) but they exist as a closed time-like loop and have the ability to selectively edit physics in a local area

How would Lars or Skuld react to one of those suckers?

Um, when did the Xeelee show the ability to selectively edit physics in a local area? One shot stars, yes. 100% efficient energy to matter conversion, yes. Ability to alter physics, not shown by the Xeelee. That was the Silver Ghosts. The Xeelee almost certainly can, they just haven't shown the ability so we can't assume that they can or will.

[Academia Nut]

You know what? In consideration, blowing up the Realms to remove a bunch of the high level characters makes it make less sense. Why? Because you need a bunch of motherfucking epic guys running around acting as population control for all the monsters out there because without GM fiat everyone is getting fucking eaten. Let's look at a list of monsters in the MM, the basic MM, for 3.5 that can depopulate a hamlet of 200 people in a single night, single handedly (at least at first, see below).

The average hamlet has, from the PC classes, NPCs that are there are 3rd level at the highest, topping out at level 6. So let us say that any monster with a CR of 10 or greater is "unstoppable" and thus can kill members of the community until it grows bored. This is probably being overgenerous to the defenders as there are a lot of CR 8 creatures that would screw them over, especially since theoretically as you go down in CR the occurence goes up. Removing good creatures and ones with class levels we get:

Colossal animated object
Beblith (demon)
Formian, myrmarch **
Giant, fire **
Golem, clay
Hydra > eleven heads
Hydra, cryo or pyro > nine heads
Monstrous scorpion, guargantuan and up
Rakshasha
Salamander, noble
Slaad, grey
Barbed devil
Cauchemar nightmare
Devourer
Any elemental elder
Giant, cloud **
Golem, stone
Hezrou (demon)
Monstrous spider, colossal
Retriever (demon)
Displacer beat pack lord
Frost worm
Kolyarut (inevitable)
Kraken
Purple worm
Beholder
Glabrezu (demon)
Golem, iron
Ice devil
Lich (any)
Slaad, death
Nalfeshnee (demon)
Nightwing
Marut (inevitable)
Horned devil
Nightwalker
Formian, queen
Marilith (demon)
Nightcrawler
Balor (demon)
Pit fiend
Tarrasque

Any adult dragon

** Creatures marked like this are of particular threat to commoners as they tend to perform raids instead of sitting in their lairs and only occasionally venturing out

Also, special consideration must be given to any incorporeal spawning undead like shadows or wraiths. If just one of these fuckers gets into a group of commoners it is game fucking over for the whole town. Seriously, with your average hamlet having only level threes, that means its going to take pretty much its entire magical arsenal to stop a single wraith, and all it has to do is slaughter a family of farmers before going on the main assault and let exponential growth take care of the rest. I mean, as a GM, you want to make a bunch of high level characters cry? Tell them that a shadow went nuts and started killing small communities, only know there are dozens of depopulated thorps, hamlets, and villages, with thousands of incorporeal undead slaughtering hundreds of innocents each night in a great side of evil and the defences tens of thousands of people, all of them additions to the growing army of darkness, are physically incapable of doing enough damage to even hinder the waves of destruction. Suddenly the prospect of fighting some CR 3 monsters seems much more daunting.

In fact, thinking about it, I think WH40k is less sadistic to the common human being than D&D. At least with 40k the Imperium has the sound policy of exterminating xenos threats to their populations, and a puny human with a melta gun is an actual, credible threat to some of the fuckers that would make a balor shit itself in fear and awe (although fuckers worse than that do exist and require a little more firepower, which is available if not to your average infantryman). I mean, pretty much every monster manual is like "The NPC's Encyclopedia of Shit that can Kill You and Your Entire Extended Family in Six Seconds"

ADDENDUM: On doing some math, the NPC classes are so fucked its not even funny. The average soldier in D&D is a warrior, and looking up the stats for some of them, I get this:

Your typical level 1 warrior has 8 HP, an AC of say 13, an attack bonus of +3, and the ability to do say 1d8+1 damage

Your typical fire giant has 142 HP, an AC of 23, and an attack bonus of +20/+15/+5 (three attacks per round in full attack), and the ability to do 3d6+10 damage

So the warrior hits the giant 5% of the time (dumb luck really) and typically does 5.5 points of damage. So each warrior will do 0.275 points of damage a round. That's 517 "warrior rounds" to bring down the giant.

Conversely, the giant is going to miss only 5% of the time, and any hit it lands will drop the warrior below 0HP instantly, no need to roll dice. The giant also has Great Cleave so in melee it will get another attack against any ajacent warriors. When you factor in reach, assuming it has enough targets, it will kill 8 warriors a round in front of it. If surrounded, it will reap a gory path of destruction and only a roll of 1 will stop it. Unless of course it still has attacks left, in which case the carnage will continue until the giant is out of targets in reach.

The description for a tribe, AKA the basic family unit for fire giants is: 21-30 fire giants (NPCs can weep now) plus 1 adept, cleric, or sorcerer of 6th or 7th level (what lucky hits you do get in can be healed!) plus 12-30 hellhounds, 12-22 trolls (like life wasn't bad enough, these guys can regenerate so lucky shots that don't involve fire don't even help!), 5-12 ettins, and 1-2 young red dragons (fuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuck!). Seriously, a single tribe of fire giants has no physical comparison to any real world army that doesn't involve tanks as real armies don't have living seige engines capable of wading through essentially unlimited numbers of footsoldiers with air support capable of incinerating entire blocks of soldiers on a pass-by.

Seriously, if you don't have PC classes in D&D, life must suck.

[Robo Jesus]

Ok, first off, Bpen threw up a picture in that one thread over at Sb. Secondly, what happened to the damn rabbit?

[Xon]

Aranfan, the Hyperdrive works by manipulating the lengths of the higher order dimensions, the wings are literially living space-time flaws which require manipulation of the event horizens of supermassive blackholes to create and the Xeelee Starbreaker apparently utalizes some wacky shit to generate gravity beams which can actually do shit without envolving supermassive objects.

In fact, thinking about it, I think WH40k is less sadistic to the common human being than D&D. At least with 40k the Imperium has the sound policy of exterminating xenos threats to their populations, and a puny human with a melta gun is an actual, credible threat to some of the fuckers that would make a balor shit itself in fear and awe (although fuckers worse than that do exist and require a little more firepower, which is available if not to your average infantryman). I mean, pretty much every monster manual is like "The NPC's Encyclopedia of Shit that can Kill You and Your Entire Extended Family in Six Seconds"

Seriously, if you don't have PC classes in D&D, life must suck.

I knew it was bad, but not that it was that bad

[Setesh]

Seriously, if you don't have PC classes in D&D, life must suck.

I knew it was bad, but not that it was that bad

Well yes and no, most of these high CR critters are extremely rare and take a long time to reach adulthood. A lot of them also hate each other and fight constantly.

For instance Pyro-Hydras are considered a delicacy by red dragons, so their population mill never be high. Dragons are mostly solitary so evil ones kill each other off (this of coarse means only the smart and powerful survive), combined with low infant survival and taking a century to reach adulthood keeps their numbers low.

Others, like the various demons, or golems have to be brought to the area by someone else and set to the task.

Undead while a threat can be warded off with things like consecrated ground and priests (priests can turn undead but only in temples or other 'holy' places). Liches and other undead who wouldn't be, are exceptionally rare as well as draw characters like clerics and paladins like a magnet.

Add in the 'heroes' PC and otherwise killing them off, humans higher breeding/adulthood survival rate and while it sucks to be human they do persevere.

[Aranfan]

Aranfan, the Hyperdrive works by manipulating the lengths of the higher order dimensions, the wings are literially living space-time flaws which require manipulation of the event horizens of supermassive blackholes to create and the Xeelee Starbreaker apparently utalizes some wacky shit to generate gravity beams which can actually do shit without envolving supermassive objects.

All of which is manipulation of physics, not changing it, or does the computer violate natural law too? Now, if you were to bring up when the Space-Time Flaw proto-Xeelee creatures caused Cosmic Inflation, or when the Matter Quagma proto-Xeelee creatures broke CP symmetry on a universal scale (causing the preponderance of matter over anti-matter that we see today), I still wouldn't concede that we have never seen the Xeelee themselves change physics. They almost certainly can, we just haven't ever seen the Xeelee themselves actually do it.

[Academia Nut]

Yeah, hence why I said that in a "realistic" D&D setting you need an abnormally large population of high level characters to help counter balance the ridiculous number of threats that the average human being has absolutely no hope of stopping. While a lot of the higher level monsters are fairly solitary, that's why I marked down the fire giants as a particular threat to the common man in D&D. If you live near a tribe of those bastards, you're going to need some major firepower to keep them from simply sweeping in and enslaving entire villages in one go.

The problem is of course if some of the nastier critters native to a plane get a bug up their ass and just decide to start killing people. A young red dragon can kill hundreds of regular people in under ten minutes if it wants to. If a spawning undead horde gets rolling, then yes, you're going to need consecrate to slow them down by making it impossible for them to replenish their numbers within the area of the consecration, but the majority of such casters are going to be low level and vulnerable to mass attacks. Kill the cleric, and then sit and wait patiently for the spell's duration to expire then begin turning whatever civilians are sheltering in the area into spawn.

I...

Actually, now that I think about it, that sounds like an incredibly cool horror campaign. The undead horde is being led by a particularly intelligent example of the species and has the objective of killing and converting everyone, such that they will wait patiently for such warding effects to end, like predators waiting at the edges of the circle of light around a dying campfire. The objective of the PCs is not merely to kill monsters, but to save the innocent people caught in the path of the onslaught.

But yeah, the point is that the environment in your typical D&D world is ridiculously dangerous to your average human being, and by simple evolutionary pressures you should get a large number of high level characters running around just to keep the ecosystem in balance. In fact, fuck the elves and druids, a scorched earth policy is the only sensible policy!

[Firethorn]

If a spawning undead horde gets rolling, then yes, you're going to need consecrate to slow them down by making it impossible for them to replenish their numbers within the area of the consecration, but the majority of such casters are going to be low level and vulnerable to mass attacks.

When I've DM'd I've generally solved that issue by a couple tricks 'not mentioned in the MM'.

First, for vampires and such, only 'master' vampires can create more vampires. And the spawn of a vampire can't become a master until the master is dead, at least most of the time. Even the master dying isn't 100%, and sometimes the master doesn't need to die. Part of the storytelling process.

Second, for successful transformation, your average peasant actually isn't strong enough to 'survive' the transformation. It basically takes a leveled character to turn.

[Academia Nut]

Well, vampires are probably one of the least worrisome undead capable of spawning as they have incentive to control their population, but the trouble is of course that what you are doing is technically house ruling as the relevant part of the exact rule is "Any humanoid slain by X rises etc", so unless you as the DM make a specific ruling, guys with NPC classes should be fair game. Admittedly, you would only launch an undead apocalypse at your players if they were asking for it, either by being idiots or by the campaign being structured that way.

[holyknight]

Hmm.........now, on the other areas....what has been happening on the Original-WH40K-Verse, and why i feel that a certain Primarch it's going to arrive to sunnyhell soon?

[Satori]

Life in Faerun does suck unbelievably. Part of why I hate that setting and pretty much only play Eberron and Greyhawk (and even then, with heavy houseruling).

Eberron has a notion of technological progress. Even with WWI just over, a nation nuked, and WWII looming, life for the common man is relatively good for a D&D setting. Magic is harnessed to benefit people on a large scale, and a large percentage of people have access to magic-based technology. Nations boast centralized government and solid standing armies that keep the barbarians at bay.

Grayhawk is less well defined, but the fluff makes it clear that there are a decent number of large cities, and flourishing sea and caravan trade. Large areas are well patrolled by civilized races and are safe enough to travel and live in, and even the common folk can expect to celebrate cultural festivals with a decent degree of prosperity. (The races books are a really good source for fluff.)

Faerun seems to be made up of rare fortress cities with peasants squatting in muck outside, being ravaged by Zombies, Xvarts, and the occasional angry Ankleg. Trade is sporadic and frequently hindered by bandits, and Ogliarchies or loose Artistocracies based on merchantile wealth, military might, or arcane lore run most outposts of civilization. The High level casters that run arcane colleges and *magic railways* in Eberron exist in Faerun, but almost all are busy killing eachother or plotting to. The few good-aligned casters who might be able to promote reforms or quality of life increases are busy fighting off extraplanar incursions, often by in-efficient means thanks to the general lack of government and organization.

Well, heck, looking at this, WH40k doesn't seem so bad. At least they have people trying to make things better. The People who could in FR are all busy, and few of them would, even if they weren't busy.

[Firethorn]

Darn, thought it was a new chapter....

Satori, I think I agree with you. There are worse D&D realms, even ignoring demon/devil realms where humans don't normally tread. For example, there's Ravenloft - but it's pretty much designed to be bad, and there are artificial controls to keep it stocked with humans.

[Setesh]

Darn, thought it was a new chapter....

Satori, I think I agree with you. There are worse D&D realms, even ignoring demon/devil realms where humans don't normally tread. For example, there's Ravenloft - but it's pretty much designed to be bad, and there are artificial controls to keep it stocked with humans.

I don't know some of the lands of ravenloft are better than some D&D worlds. Strahd for example keeps such tight control over his land that very few new visitors ever appear, the population of humans sustains him and his few vampires spawn easily. The people are actually very little changed from their pre-ravanloft lives. Strahd, Azalin, and a few others kill of so many of the other supernatural horrors that arrive in their lands, the people are generally unmolested.

[Academia Nut]

Okay, general status update: my grandparents are in town and guess whose room is also the guest room? And guess where I keep my computer? So right now I'm kind of isolated from my materials even if I have, through school and the machines of the rest of my family, fairly even access to the Internet. Thing is, I can't really write deeply unless I'm in my little warren where I feel the most comfortable, so until Monday I'm not going to be doing any writing at all, which sucks.