Re-reading, I guess “shriveled heartless snake” clears up any remaining question about Malack’s lower quarters.
Now, now, just because he’s over two hundred years old doesn’t mean he has erectile dysfunction.
Ereptile dysfunction, maybe…
It’s surprisingly hard to see Durkon so thoroughly on the other side. On the other hand, I’ll bet anyone 10 gold pieces that Q’arr is about to goad V into snapping out of the funk and jumping back in the game. I’ll further bet that Tarquin is planning on snatching victory out of Nale’s arrogant hands as soon as he trounces the OotS, and that his double-cross will involve Malack.
Question: If you were DMing the OoTS, would you let Durkon cast his spells while a vampire, and controlled by his master, to-boot?
I would not. His spells originate from powers granted by Thor. (Granted, Thor is drawn in this serious to appear to be hardly paying attention to the Prime Material Plane, but still…) I don’t think Thor would be too thrilled about having a vampire representing himself as Thor’s priest.
To the so-far-unasked question, Durkon is summoning a hamatula (formerly a barbed devil) and Zzwhatsisname is summoning a piscoloth. Which is interesting from an alignment standpoint…devils are lawful evil, as is (probably) Durkon at this point. Piscoloths are neutral evil, shading toward chaotic (the yugoloths have been converted to demons in 4th Ed), and the drow would be CE.
V’s familiar really knows how to comfort V, doesn’t he? (not)
Wow. This is as dark as it’s ever gotten, isn’t it? Even the fall of Azure City wasn’t as bad as this.
And the thing is, the book is almost over, and team really needs a win. They haven’t had one for a very long time.
As a GM, I would, absolutely, for the simple reason that a vampire who is also able to wield the mightiest of divine energies is a much more interesting and challenging opponent than a vampire who’s kind of like a fighter, except with fewer feats, a lower Base Attack, and a limited selection of weapons. As a GM, the first question I try to ask myself is, “Which would be cooler?” Then, I try to justify my decision.
Normally, I’d justify it by ruling that whichever God is most closely associated with undeath regularly steps in when a cleric of a good deity is turned into a vampire, and takes as their source of divine mojo. The fact that, in this specific case, the vampire who turned the cleric is, himself, a high priest of the God of death makes it an even easier sell.
The creator’s view.
http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showthread.php?p=15060436#post15060436
Right now I can’t help but wish we were still on the daily update schedule.
I find the telling quote to be “…and his dim-witted bird.”
Would an imp know for sure what sex V is?
Probably not.
It’s funny. I had a reply to mlees drafted, agreeing with him, and wondering whether we’d see it in a bonus strip or not. At first, I thought it’d be Hel, but now, there’s really no reason why Nergal wouldn’t take on the opportunity to imbue Durkferatu with divine energy. Plus, as Miller points out, it makes a better story.
The thing I was sure would happen though, and did, as Peter Morris noted, was that someone would ask the question about the new deity and either Burlew would reveal the answer in some snazzy way a few strips down the line, or get butthurt again about rules criticism. I see he picked Door #2.
Non-theistic clerics or for that matter, the idea that cleric spells don’t need a god at all, strike me as a load of cheesy horseshit, incidentally: a way for a Munchkin to get an arcane caster that can spam healing, without the whole church, followers, or pesky moral creed thing. When did they remove the idea that a cleric’s spells came directly from their deity, and the cleric merely channeled the energy? If your deity’s mad at you, there’s no energy for you to channel, hence no spells, no matter how many channeling instructions you still had memorized. At least in 2e, there was written rules commentary that spell-casters couldn’t store within their body the energy needed to cast spells: it’d be just too much for them to contain.
Clearly things have changed. But then I think daylight vampires are cheesy too. Entertaining story all the same, and I too long for a daily update. Which says it all, really.
So, is Tarq summoning his buddies, and that’s the ‘business’ he mentions to Malack? Or some other plot reason for why they’re out here in the first place? Still trying to figure out what T wants the Gate for; I can’t see how it helps his Plan. I also still think he’ll contrive a way to allow Nale to escape. I’m fiending for a battle between T’s party and Team Evil. Which means it probably won’t happen.
Barbed devils have 12 HD, which fits in nicely with the Planar Ally spellsD mentioned having a few strips ago. I think Z is Neutral Evil, instead of the traditional Drow Chaotic Evil, so the piscocritter seems an obscure, great choice. I just re-read FF a week ago, trying to find MiTD candidates, and I don’t even remember seeing the name. What can it do? Pretty much the same stuff as the barbed devil?
I had thought the Devil, traditionally, spoke the truth when he spoke at all, but that the truth would be incomplete or used to hurt the listener, or both? So I can see why people are piling onto Qarr’s pronoun choice. But isn’t it Word of God that Burlew isn’t going to reveal V’s gender until the very end of the story, if even then?
The usual array of minor outer-planar spell-like abilities, along with the ability to gate in other yugoloths. They also have paralytic tentacles and vorpal claws.
ETA: For the sake of completeness, hamatula.
Back when I DMed a long time ago, I treated cleric spells as gifts from his/her god, but stored within the cleric. So the cleric would at the very least be able to use up his/her memorized spells.
Eve the Three Fiends don’t.
A better question might be, “When did they add it?” My original red box D&D set from 1983 defines clerics as “serving a great and worthy cause.” The description doesn’t mention the word “god” once while describing what clerics are. It does have a single instance of the word “theological,” noting that all characters have “ethical and theological” beliefs, before emphatically stating that “this game is not about those beliefs,” (emphasis in original) and says that these beliefs “not affect the game. They can be assumed, just as eating, resting, and other activities are assumed.”
(You know, much love and respect to Gary Gygax for inventing one of my favorite hobbies, but I’ve always somewhat suspected that he must have been an absolutely horrible GM. But I digress.)
In my 3rd edition Player’s Handbook, from 2000, clerics are described as usually following a god, but it’s also explicitly said that there are clerics who derive their powers from belief in “a cause or source of divine power,” and not any specific deity or pantheon.
I don’t have easy access to my AD&D books, so maybe its in there somewhere? If so, it was a late and temporary addition to the game, at best.
And in that same strip, Qarr referred to Vaarsuvius as “her.” Apparently he just spouts pronouns at random.
Sabine, who’s probably Stickworld’s foremost expert on humanoid sexuality, isn’t sure about V, either. She’s referred to em as “sister” on one occasion, and as a “guy” on another.
An interesting detail I just noticed. Vampire Durkon’s magic has a new color theme; reddish, instead of white like it used to be.
I recall it being mentioned around the time of the Krynn/Dragonlance modules. That lower level clerical magic could come from dedication and will, but the higher level clerical magic was a gift of the gods. And that was why for centuries, there was no such high level clerical magic on Krynn.
Note, I played D&D back when it was called “Advanced Dungeons and Dragons”, no edition number.