Order of the Stick - Book 5 Discussion Thread

[Tom Scud]

Originally Posted by Gray Ghost

There's 'doing well', and then there's 'No matter what strategy you come up with, I've thought of it first, and happen to have the perfect counterstrategy or tool for it.' It's the latter that I think Tarquin is exemplifying and I think it's obnoxious. I get that a near-Epic character who's been playing for a long time is going to have a lot of skill and tricks, but between the mask, subduing/stunning Belkar with a thrown ax---in the nick of time!---knowing Drow sign language perfectly, et al; for me, it's getting ridiculous.

I have some faith that Burlew is setting him up for a fall; I remember feeling similarly about Xykon after he pulled the bouncy-ball trick (which no DM ever would have let a PC get away with), and he got his comeuppance pretty quickly there.

[Quartz]

My gut feeling is that Tarquin is well into the Epic levels, as is Xykon. Upper 20s, anyway.

[Gray Ghost]

Originally Posted by Quartz

My gut feeling is that Tarquin is well into the Epic levels, as is Xykon. Upper 20s, anyway.

The OOTS forums seem to think that he's demonstrated the Epic Skill Stand on Mount. I am hazy about the rules, but Stand on Mount seems like a picayune thing to take for one's first Epic Skill or Feat. Which implies, as your gut feels, that he's at a high enough level that he can bump up the skills he doesn't use that much (like Ride) to where he can do Epic stunts like that. I don't think he's demonstrated any other Epic Skills or Feats yet, though I'm certainly not steeped in the rules enough to recognize them if he has.

If any of you were 3.5 newly-Epic Fighters, which Epic Feats would be the first ones that you'd take? I guess we could then keep an eye out for those.

I agree with the OOTS Fora's Class&Level Geekery thread's logic that Xykon is at least Level 27. He's thrown an awful lot of arcane artillery down range, in the fight with Darth V, if nothing else. Are there other Feats we'd expect to see from a Level 27+ Sorcerer?

Edit: I agree with Tom in that T's going to get, what was the phrase? Lich-slapped? (LOL) Still, the most likely place for Z to Teleport them would be back to the main Castle, wouldn't it? Which would be far away from where Team Evil are going to show, but I guess T and the gang could re-equip, Heal, and Teleport back in time to meet TE.

[Quartz]

Originally Posted by Gray Ghost

Are there other Feats we'd expect to see from a Level 27+ Sorcerer?

As a Sorceror, he's quite likely to have gone for Spell Knowledge to increase the number of spells he can cast.

[Jophiel]

Originally Posted by Gray Ghost

Although I never noticed the issue with the book falling apart. Guess I was one of the lucky ones.

It may have been the first printing.

I remember taking one of those "How big of a gamer geek are you?" quizzes once with a question of "Have you ever used a manual so much it fell apart?" appended by "(First edition printings of Unearthed Arcanas and first edition Vampire: the Masquerade manuals don't count)". I owned both and, indeed, both suffered from extremely poor bindings and were soon held together with yellowing office tape.

[Malleus, Incus, Stapes!]

Originally Posted by Gray Ghost

.

Edit: Related to Miller's concerns about the ax: isn't there a spell or that can cause an object to transport from anywhere to your hand/person? I'd imagine his personal weapon would have that on it.

Originally Posted by Tom Scud

I have some faith that Burlew is setting him up for a fall; I remember feeling similarly about Xykon after he pulled the bouncy-ball trick (which no DM ever would have let a PC get away with), and he got his comeuppance pretty quickly there.

If someone else is holding your weapon when you magically call it back, does that person get taken along for the ride? Because if that's possible, than the reason for having T teleport out may be to bring someone unwanted to his safe place.

Or maybe the weapon just goes poof and the guy examining the cool axe his enemy dropped is left holding a whole lot of air. I don't know D&D stuff.

I do think that Tarquin's bad day is going to get even worse, however it happens.

__

Heads up for Kickstarterers- Rich says his next KS update will probably have the link for the Belkar story.

[hogarth]

Originally Posted by Jophiel

Also, those who owned the Unearthed Arcana probably remember that it was bound using pixie dreams and unicorn breath. All the pages would start falling out after about the third day.

That definitely happened to mine. On the other hand, the binding to the 1E DMG was remarkably sturdy.

[Inner Stickler]

Originally Posted by Malleus, Incus, Stapes!

If someone else is holding your weapon when you magically call it back, does that person get taken along for the ride? Because if that's possible, than the reason for having T teleport out may be to bring someone unwanted to his safe place.

Or maybe the weapon just goes poof and the guy examining the cool axe his enemy dropped is left holding a whole lot of air. I don't know D&D stuff.

If the spell is instant summons, then someone holding the item negates the summons but informs the caster of who is holding their item and where they are. However, I doubt Tarquin couldn't already guess that a member of the OOTS is holding their axe in the pyramid.

[Grumman]

Originally Posted by Malleus, Incus, Stapes!

If someone else is holding your weapon when you magically call it back, does that person get taken along for the ride? Because if that's possible, than the reason for having T teleport out may be to bring someone unwanted to his safe place.

Or maybe the weapon just goes poof and the guy examining the cool axe his enemy dropped is left holding a whole lot of air. I don't know D&D stuff.

It would either fail or snatch it from their hands, almost certainly the former.

[Quartz]

I liked the foreshadowing: 'Nay lad, V normally has tha spell.'

[Max Torque]

Originally Posted by Miller

In this strip, he mentions "getting his axe out of storage for the occasion." So it appears to be an item he places a certain amount of personal value on - plus, it's almost certainly hugely enchanted.

There's also a pic of Classic Tarquin holding the same axe in #725, when he's remembering how he first conquered the kingdom. So, he's had it for quite a while.

[MHaye]

Originally Posted by Gray Ghost

The OOTS forums seem to think that he's demonstrated the Epic Skill Stand on Mount.

There's nothing particularly special about an epic use of a skill. Any creature can perform those tricks by making a skill check of the listed DC; 40 for Stand On Mount. That means at least a +20 modifier, or more if you want to be able to do it reliably (you require a +39 modifier to do it every time). But a high-level fighter should have some chance of pulling it off.

[Strassia]

Originally Posted by Max Torque

There's also a pic of Classic Tarquin holding the same axe in #725, when he's remembering how he first conquered the kingdom. So, he's had it for quite a while.

The ax in that comic does not have the glowing red runes that the current ax has. It could still be the same ax, it just know has added enchantment. Which probably means that enchantment is significant to the story line.

[Gray Ghost]

Originally Posted by MHaye

There's nothing particularly special about an epic use of a skill. Any creature can perform those tricks by making a skill check of the listed DC; 40 for Stand On Mount. That means at least a +20 modifier, or more if you want to be able to do it reliably (you require a +39 modifier to do it every time). But a high-level fighter should have some chance of pulling it off.

Originally Posted by Strassia

The ax in that comic does not have the glowing red runes that the current ax has. It could still be the same ax, it just know has added enchantment. Which probably means that enchantment is significant to the story line.

MHaye, I didn't realize that about the use of epic skills. However, considering T was many feet up in the air when he was standing on the pterosaur, I'd think he'd want to be really certain that he could make the DC... (Don't know why I would worry though; dude would have just used his Backscratcher of Feather Fall if he fell anyway...)

It just seems like such a random place to stick skill points, for someone we didn't even know could ride until the pterosaur scene. Maybe T's prestige class grants him gobs of skill points and he just had nowhere else to put them? But the more I think about it, the more I think he's quite a bit above the Order's level.

Strassia, has anyone blown up the runes on the ax and tried to decipher them? I've talked about it before, but I can't see the runes well enough on my monitor. Maybe the book version of the strips will reveal some Easter Egg? I thought they were Dark Rune for "Vorpal", in the same way the "Turbo" badge is so prominent on Porsches...

[Grumman]

I still think Tarquin might be a Factotum. It's a base class that focuses on using Int to do anything, it's in keeping with his son's choices of Bard and Rogue/Sorcerer/Fighter, and it's from a book Burlew helped write.

[E-Sabbath]

No way. He's a 1e Bard.

... which should terrify anyone who knows what that means.

[The Other Waldo Pepper]

Originally Posted by E-Sabbath

No way. He's a 1e Bard.

... which should terrify anyone who knows what that means.

He's a druidic spellcaster who may only use club, dagger, dart, javelin, sling, spear, staff, or sword -- never an axe? He's forbidden from wearing any armor heavier than leather, unless it's magical chainmail -- and the use of a shield is right out? That doesn't sound especially terrifying, or especially Tarquin-esque.

[Babale]

I very much doubt that Tarquin is epic. We haven't seen Malack cast spells above 6th level (Harm is 6th, as is Quickened Inflict Moderate Wounds). Malack was doing his best to one-shot Nale, had he had 7th level spells, he would have used Destruction (Nale must roll a save or be killed and his remains destroyed). I find it likely that Harm was the most powerful spell available to him. Malack probably didn't have any combat spells prepared, considering he was planning on hanging around the palace all day. That would explain why Malack cast Harm; he can spontaneously convert any spell to Harms or Inflicts. While the 5th level spell Slay Living would have been a better path to Nale's destruction, it's possible Malack didn't have it prepared (His domains are almost certainly Death and Destruction, so he would have had Slay Living or Inflict Light Wounds, Mass prepared in his domain slot. I guess he chose ILW,M). OTOH, if he had access to 7th level spells, he would have had Destruction (Death domain) or Disintegrate (Destruction domain) prepared. Either one of those would be a better choice than Harm, as it would kill Nale outright.

So Malack is likely level 11 or 12, just short of being able to cast 7th level spells. Durkon is level 13 or 14, likely 14, since he tried to cast Holy Word (a 7th level spell) as far back as the Orcish island. Roy is probably level 14 or so. Tarquin is able to defeat the Order, but that's not necessarily just because of his level. Owning a kingdom (or 3) allows him to pretty much piss on the Wealth by Level rules. He can have equipment worthy of a level 20 fighter, even if he's only level 5. It's likely that there is a gap between him and Malack, since he conquered a kingdom without the rest of his party. So I'd put Tarquin at level 16-17, Malack at 12, and the Order at around 14. In D&D, a 3 level difference can be huge. Especially with casters, but even among melee fighters. And even more so if Tarquin ignores Wealth by Level.

[Babale]

(Missed edit window)
EDIT: I also don't think Xykon is as high a level as some of you seem to think. His highest level spell cast on screen is Maximized Energy Drain, a 12th level spell slot. So he needs to have:
1) The Epic Spellcasting feat
2) Improved Spell Capacity (10th Level)
3) Improved Spell Capacity (11th Level)
4) Improved Spell Capacity (12th Level)

This would mean he got an Epic feat at 21, 24, 27, and 30. HOWEVER. There are other ways he can cast Maximized Energy Drain:
1) If he's level 21, he could have used a Greater Rod of Metamagic (Maximize) to Maximize 3 spells free every day. Might be unreasonable because we don't see a rod.
2) He could be level 27 and have taken Arcane Thesis (Energy Drain) to get metamagiced Energy Drains to take a slot 1 level lower. Considering how Energy Drain is his signature spell, this is certainly possible. However, we have evidence that Xykon isn't this high level, such as the silver dragon in the bonus strips.
3) Most likely of all, and this one doesn't even require him to be Epic: Sudden Maximize. Once per day, Xykon can maximize a spell free of charge. Until we see Xykon cast two Maximized 9th level spells in one day, this is my theory.

[ekedolphin]

Y'know, the Order still hasn't seen Malack, and hasn't identified who's behind the helmet (aside from the fact that it's not Thog), but Kilkil was one of those who teleported out just now, and if Roy and Durkon noticed that, it's not too far of a leap in logic for them to realize who the other two members are.

[Quartz]

Originally Posted by Babale

(Missed edit window)
EDIT: I also don't think Xykon is as high a level as some of you seem to think. His highest level spell cast on screen is Maximized Energy Drain, a 12th level spell slot. So he needs to have:
1) The Epic Spellcasting feat
2) Improved Spell Capacity (10th Level)
3) Improved Spell Capacity (11th Level)
4) Improved Spell Capacity (12th Level)

This would mean he got an Epic feat at 21, 24, 27, and 30.

Sorcerors get feats at levels 22 and 26, so he only needs to be level 26.

I really don't see why people have such a problem with epic levels.

[Chronos]

Quoth Jophiel:

Also, those who owned the Unearthed Arcana probably remember that it was bound using pixie dreams and unicorn breath.

Ah, so that's where you get those fancy components you needed for making magic items!

And Xykon's level has been the subject of much very contentious debate over on the GiantITP boards, so much so that the Class and Level Geekery thread was shut down by the mods for about a month to let everyone cool off. But to summarize: Everyone agrees that he's over 20, but disagree on just how much over 20. There's circumstantial evidence that suggests he's closer to 30 than to 20, but nobody can find anything that conclusively proves it, and nobody can agree on which assumptions are most Occamic. And there's also circumstantial evidence for the lower end of epic, too.

[ekedolphin]

Myself, I've always found it amusing that people argue about who's at what level when it can never really be conclusively proven, and it's a work of fiction rather than an actual in-progress roleplaying game.

[Gagundathar]

Apparently, Rich Burlew is a gamer and works hard on trying to make the strip match 'real-world' gaming convention based upon AD&D 3.5.
So it becomes something of a challenge for the fans to determine levels, stats and skills of the various characters.
Personally, I think it is fascinating to watch people figure things out, even when they end up being wrong.

[Peter Morris]

No, he has never tried to follow the rules. A few quotes:

http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showp...82&postcount=6
I promise you I have never EVER spent one moment trying to write down the Order's stats. Everything is up in the air, all of the time, until I need to give them a specific ability.

And then I promptly forget that I gave it to them a week later.

http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showp...2&postcount=59
As was pointed out, I don't always follow the rules...including the rules on what things are named.

http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showp...0&postcount=11
If you are looking for moment-to-moment rules accuracy from this comic, you probably should stop reading. You are guaranteed to be continually frustrated and disappointed, because I don't care about that at all.

http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showp...5&postcount=35
The only things I feel less bound by than the rules are common player trends.

[Gagundathar]

Golly, I guess I was wrong.

Ignorance fought successfully.
Thanks.

[E-Sabbath]

Originally Posted by The Other Waldo Pepper

He's a druidic spellcaster who may only use club, dagger, dart, javelin, sling, spear, staff, or sword -- never an axe? He's forbidden from wearing any armor heavier than leather, unless it's magical chainmail -- and the use of a shield is right out? That doesn't sound especially terrifying, or especially Tarquin-esque.

No, no.
Bards in 1e, because of the nature of dual classing, have the abilities of a fighter, a thief, and a druid. Remember? It'd fit with Nale and Elan's varying concepts of doing the same thing.

And once he passes his fighter and thief levels as a druid, he has full access to his fighter and thief abilities.

[Chronos]

Burlew says that he doesn't pay attention to his characters' exact stats, but if that's true, then he's done a remarkably lucky job of avoiding accidental contradictions, under the watchful eye of dozens of Internet nerd gaming rules lawyers. Sure, there have been a few, but only a few. I think it far more likely that he does have character sheets for them, and that he just made that statement in case he needs to retcon something: He follows the rules, he's just not shackled to them.

[Little Nemo]

Originally Posted by Quartz

Sorcerors get feats at levels 22 and 26, so he only needs to be level 26.

I really don't see why people have such a problem with epic levels.

"Gods, doesn't anyone know the epic rules around here?"

[Little Nemo]

I'll admit I only recently realized the real meaning of Dorukan's Cloister spell. Dorukan was as suspicious as Girard. The Cloister spell was aimed at Soon and Girard.

[Gagundathar]

Oh, my goodness, Little Nemo, you are almost certainly correct.
I didn't get it until now.

Hmmmmm....

[ultrafilter]

That makes a lot of sense. It also reraises the question of why exactly the Order of the Scribble hated each other so much. I hope we get that story someday.

[Little Nemo]

I'm glad I'm not the only one who took a while to figure it out.

And we've seen that Soon also had his paranoia.

[Malleus, Incus, Stapes!]

O.O



Nemo, I think you're on to something.

[Little Nemo]

Ironically, it appears that while all three of them assumed the other two would cheat, everybody actually lived up to their agreement.

[Babale]

Welll,Girard kept in touch with Serini, and Durokan kept in touch (Heh) with Lirian.

[ekedolphin]

Long-standing resentments boiled over as a result of Kraagor's death.

And yeah, that comic makes it clear that Dorukan didn't like Soon any more than Girard did. Serini was able to stop the men from killing each other, and it's not clear if Serini and Soon, Lirian and Girard, or Lirian and Soon ever saw each other again. It's pretty clear that none of the men ever kept in contact with each other. (And I don't think we saw any two members of the Order of the Scribble together in Start of Darkness; just two of them individually.)

[Der Trihs]

Link doesn't work; try this. You left out a " at the end of the link; it screwed it up bad enough that it ruined the formatting of my post when I tried to quote yours.

[Chronos]

I wouldn't say that warding the throne room against scrying constitutes paranoia-- That's just a simple, basic precaution that he'd be negligent to omit. Likewise for, say, consecrating it. And even if Soon hadn't put such a ward on the throne room, Shojo surely would have.

[ekedolphin]

Originally Posted by Der Trihs

Link doesn't work; try this. You left out a " at the end of the link; it screwed it up bad enough that it ruined the formatting of my post when I tried to quote yours.

Eeep! Sorry about that. What were you going to say?

[Der Trihs]

Originally Posted by ekedolphin

Eeep! Sorry about that. What were you going to say?

My first sentence, except the glitch ate everything but "this"; here's what my original reply looked like:

[quote=ekedolphin;15452898]Long-standing resentments this.

[Peter Morris]

Just a reminder, folks, there's a past strips thread for this sort of discussion.

Please restrict this thread to discussing the most recent strips.

[The Other Waldo Pepper]

Originally Posted by E-Sabbath

No, no.
Bards in 1e, because of the nature of dual classing, have the abilities of a fighter, a thief, and a druid. Remember?

Characters can dual-class from fighter to thief with the ordinary 1e rules, but the whole point is that they in fact become "bards under druidic tutelage" upon switching class a second time: they aren't really druids (since they're neither required to be True Neutral, nor allowed to use shields), and can immediately start using their old fighter THACO and thief saving throws while gaining a whole bunch of non-druidic (and non-thief and non-fighter) abilities.

There's no indication they lose their new armor-and-weapon restrictions -- which ain't those of a druid, even leaving aside that bit about shields -- upon reaching a given level, because it's not really 1e dual-classing; it uses those rules as the jumping-on point, but then apparently becomes the lone exception to 'em.

Originally Posted by Peter Morris

Just a reminder, folks, there's a past strips thread for this sort of discussion.

Please restrict this thread to discussing the most recent strips.

I figure Tarquin's latest-strip comment, seemingly referencing 1e, sorta kinda suffices.

[Gray Ghost]

Originally Posted by Chronos

Burlew says that he doesn't pay attention to his characters' exact stats, but if that's true, then he's done a remarkably lucky job of avoiding accidental contradictions, under the watchful eye of dozens of Internet nerd gaming rules lawyers. Sure, there have been a few, but only a few. I think it far more likely that he does have character sheets for them, and that he just made that statement in case he needs to retcon something: He follows the rules, he's just not shackled to them.

Piling onto Chronos's observation, is this post from Burlew, explaining how he plotted out the "Miko vs the Order, Round 2" fight in Strip 251. That's a lot of plausible detail for a guy who doesn't feel bound by the rules. I want to say that he made a similar post explaining their Round 1 fight, but I can't find it.

My take is that Burlew is very cognizant of the 3.5 rules, and tries to nonetheless surprise the audience while staying within them as much as possible. Like Durkon using Meld into Stone to get the drop on the LG. Or the Smokestick/Holy Word combo. Of course, the rules will take a back seat if drama requires it. (See, Familicide.) But on the whole, I think he tries to follow the rules as much as possible, which, for me at least, makes it a lot more fun to read. The whole trying to figure out the 'locked room mystery' kind of thing.

I do agree with Babale that it is hard to square a Level 25+ (assuming Xykon leveled once or twice from the Azure City battle) Sorcerer having that much difficulty with even an Ancient Silver Dragon. Especially having RedCloak there to help too. I'm still going with Epic though, and if he's lower than 27, it isn't by much. He needs some epic levels to cast Superb Dispelling and Cloister. Or can any level ~15+ arcane caster cast Cloister if they have the headband?

Unlike many of the posters in the OOTS forum, I didn't find the Drow sign language that obnoxious. Tarquin had mentioned dealing with them in the past, and he's old enough to remember when everybody just had to have a Drow character. It's annoying that he's instantly proficient in a language he probably hasn't had to play with in 15 years, but hand-wavable, I guess. (Quoting one OOTS Forum poster, "Who knew the Drow had a sign for "accountant"?) What I found ridiculous was the two handed throw of his ax, that just happened to swat Belkar out of the air before the coup de grace on Nale. And the mask, and the Dwarf tossing, and the....: combined, it's all a bit much for me. Which'll make his eventual ass-kicking by Xykon that much sweeter, I guess.

On the benefits and drawbacks of the 1e Bard, this thread at a UK D&D forum goes through a lot of them. One thing, thinking about Tarquin as a Bard, (Not that I think that he is, but playing with the idea.) if you ported a 1e Bard to 3.5, would he be able to count all of his Fighter and Thief, ahem, Rogue levels towards skill points? So if he was a Fighter 7/ Thief 7/ Bard what-ever, would he get to count all 14+ level's worth of skill points? That might explain why he has such a stellar Ride score, while not demonstrating any epic feats yet.

Not to mention that 1e Bards had a ridiculous amount of hit points, due to all of the multi-class hit dice they picked up. This post explains it better than I could. (Scroll down to May 19th, 2010, Man in the Funny Hat.) FTP:

A 7th level fighter (maximum for bard prerequisite) requires 70,000xp and then another 55,000xp to make 8th. Making 9th would be another 125,000xp on top of that.
Becoming an 8th level thief requires only 70,000xp for a total earning of 140,000xp thus far for the bard-in-training. 140,000 xp for a single-classed fighter is hardly over halfway to 9th (250,000). In the time it takes that fighter to BE 9th level (110,000xp) your bard (who is F/T 7/8) has become F/T/B 7/8/10! A 9th level fighter has 9d10 hit dice - average 49.5 htk without Con bonuses. Your Bard has 7d10+9d6 - average 63 without Con considerations. Along with all his other abilities the Bard is making that Fighter Lord look like a wannabe and it's only gonna get worse.

Not sure if I agree with all that, but I thought it was an interesting point. Tarquin being a Factotum is probably a lot more elegant solution though.

One last question for you all. Durkon went on about only having enough diamond dust to cast one more Resurrection. I think this is only a big deal if you have two dead characters and need to figure out which one to raise. Or Durkon could be the dead character---he is returning to the Dwarven homelands "posthumously"---and then they could have a mountain of diamond dust for all the good it would do. You could get Malack to do it, assuming Nergal is down with the whole Resurrection thing, but wouldn't he have his own stocks of diamond dust to draw on?

So, assuming we're limited to Durkon and his stock of dust, who will be the two dead characters out of: the LG, the Order, the Draketeeth, or Ian and Uncle Geoff, where this Sophie's choice will come up? Belkar and Haley? Belkar and V? Girard and V? Alternately, I guess Durkon could use the powdered diamond as the component in a Symbol Spell, like Death. I thought that was going to be his "just 'da spell, lad." Shows what I know.

[mlees]

"Bring my accountant"?

I assume he was trying to sign "Bring my Axe".

*I am sooo slow.*

[squeegee]

Originally Posted by mlees

"Bring my accountant"?

I assume he was trying to sign "Bring my Axe".

*I am sooo slow.*

The kobold is his accountant.

[mlees]

Originally Posted by squeegee

The kobold is his accountant.

Ack. I must have missed that. Ok, thanks.

[Malacandra]

(Further to the discussion about 1st Ed Bards, having talked about hit points without CON bonuses we should note that if CON bonuses are available then the lucky bard is potentially applying them to 7 fighter hit dice, one thief hit die, and ten bard hit dice - that's 18 doses of CON bonus to the fighter's 9. I once played a bard who had over 140 hit points...)

[Chronos]

On the other hand, only fighters got full benefit of the con bonus to HP: For everyone else, it capped out at +1 per level.

And it's not at all implausible that a pure fighter would max out the Ride skill, especially for a human fighter who happens to have a high Int score. If we guesstimate that Tarquin is about an Int of 16, then he's got 6 skill points per level, and fighters don't really have all that many useful skills on their class skill list. What else is he going to spend those points on?

[ekedolphin]

At this point I'm guessing Tarquin is a deliberate parody of characters that just miraculously happen to know a wealth of information on seemingly every topic under the sun, and can defend themselves against seemingly every conceivable method of attack. Just as Miko was a deliberate example of the wrong way to play a paladin.

(Though I think this point was brought up earlier by someone else, re: Tarquin.)

Prior to the parody really showing up to the extent it has recently, Tarquin was just so Affably Evil that even though he's a bad guy, everyone liked him. Perhaps the over-the-top parody is partially to re-assert Tarquin as being hated, and make a greater percentage of the readership happy when he snuffs it.

In any event, it's clear that Nale, Tarquin and other secondary villains I may not be thinking of have to be disposed of before Xykon and Redcloak. As to which of those two will last longer, six to five and pick 'em.