Order of the Stick - Book 5 Discussion Thread

Cafe Society
6442

Nale’s scorch marks on his face are weirding me out. I keep getting the optical illusion that I’m looking through him to the mountains behind. The shading is really similar.

Predictions: Durk kills Z, but not Nale. Why? The ‘evil opposite’ theme is played out, twice mentioned by Nale. Z’s powerful enough—somewhere in the Level 15-16 area—that he’s going to have to be accounted for by everyone, as a Transmuter that powerful can be game-breaking. Having Durkferatu eat his face, or just kill him and then war with whether to drain him or not, reminds us just how powerful and dangerous this new Durk really is. And it takes a powerful, plot-altering, piece off the board. Nale lives because we have the Sabine/loyalty to the Directors vs loyalty to Nale thing to hash out. Plus, escaping by the skin of his teeth is kind of what he does.

Completely off-topic: I wonder what role Malack’s holy symbol, that’s been so prominently drawn in the last few panels, is going to play for Durk? Is it a powerful goodie? Is it a hotline to Nergal? I imagine it’s been drawn prominently for a reason.

While Durk is screwing around with them, and maybe taking time out to feed, Haley dies. Why Haley? Because she’s the only one left in the Order who could possibly cast Resurrection via scroll. If Durk scribes a Rez scroll, the Order could stake him, buff Haley enough to cast Rez, and they get ol’ Durkon back. We went through a lot of rigamarole to set this vamping up, I can’t see it getting reversed quickly. Plus, there’s the whole death and destruction prophecy thing. Haley’s also getting pretty beat up by Sandy, last we saw her. This will: 1) force Durk to burn the last of the diamond dust on her, and not himself and 2) cause Durk to evaluate what costs slaking his urges might have on those around him. It might also cause Roy to feel guilty that she got killed instead of him. And Elan angry at that too.

I’d like to see them still go into the rift, on the magic carpet. The only way I can see that is if they’re chased. But by who? Team Evil is gone. The Linear Guild is busted up. That leaves Team Tarquin, which should be coming around the mountain right about…now. Not sure why they inevitably have to spar, but it sounds good, doesn’t it?

And then we end the book.

Edit: Jophiel, didnt’ Burlew say that clerics in 3.5 and Stickworld could draw on the primeval forces of Chaos or Law or Evil etc… to drive their divine magic? I’d personally like a tete-a-tete scene with Nergal or Hel, but it doesn’t look like we’ll get one.

6443

Yeah, someone way upthread linked to Burlew’s thoughts on divine magic in an RPG game setting. But Durkon’s “relationship” with Thor has been part of the strip so many times that it seems weird to just drop the entire pantheon and say “Yeah, he just summons Evil now”.

6444

Will Durkon’s knocking out Z’s teeth make it difficult for Z to cast spells requiring Z to speak?

6445

Who what now? Rogues can cast Rez scrolls? Huh. Well, I guess we saw Niu cast a Sending scroll a ways back, so that implies other scrolls can be cast by a rogue. But color me surprised they could Rez under any circumstances. Cool.

6446

Told you Nale would try to recruit him. Props, please.

6447

There’s a skill in D&D called “Use Magic Device” that allows a character to use a magic item they’d otherwise be unable to use because of class or race restrictions. Any character can take ranks in it, but for some classes, it’s a class skill, which means they can get more ranks in it, for cheaper, than other classes, but anyone could, in theory, learn how to do it - if they put the points into the skill. However, I don’t think we’ve ever seen any member of the Order use the skill. I don’t recall Haley ever mentioning the possibility of finding a scroll of Resurrection and casting it herself, when they were carting Roy’s body around in a hand cart, and if it didn’t come up then, I don’t see it coming up now.

It’s also a class skill for bards, FWIW.

6448

This is probably my ingrained 2.0 knee-jerking again, but if her Use Magical Device skill is high enough, she could use a spell scroll, even though Rogues can’t normally cast spells. She has to pass, IIRC, two UMD checks to activate the scroll, since she doesn’t cast Divine spells. UMD is a class skill of Rogues, and it’s tied to Charisma for some reason. Which reminds me…

Bards get UMD as a class skill too. And guess who’s got the highest Charisma in the Order… Hmmm, I never would have guessed Elan had a shot at activating the scroll. One massive sticking point is that Wisdom is the relevant ability score for Divine spells, and Elan’s Wisdom deficit probably mirrors his Charisma surfeit.

Arrgh! Ninja’d.

6449

Rogues have a skill called ‘Use Magic Device’, which includes casting spells from scrolls. But it’s quite likely that Durkon will not be allowed a Resurrection spell by his new source of divine magic and so be unable to scribe the scroll in the first place. And even if he were, the Order lack the gem required: they used their one and only gem of such size to resurrect Roy. Of course, the best place to acquire another such gem is the Dwarven Nation…

Here’s a thought: Belkar, as a Ranger, can cast divine magic (if given a Wis boost) and therefore might be able to use a Resurrection scroll.

6450

It’ll be interesting to see what all Lizardboy had left in that staff. Durkon might be wielding some nasty stuff right now, if he can use it.

6451

Yeah, it falls under the use magic device skill.
She’d have to roll quite well though. A 29 on a d20 + cha mod + skill ranks roll with a 9-day time limit for the easiest (33 and 37 for res & true res, time wouldn’t be an issue though.)

6452

Resurrection isn’t tied to any particular alignment or deity. There’s nothing preventing Durkon from casting it as a vampire, assuming he’s got some deity or another supplying him the mojo.

Nope. To use a scroll (absent a UMD check), the scroll has to be on the spell list for your class. Rangers can’t cast resurrection, so Belkar can’t use a scroll of it. Plus, I don’t think its possible to buff Belkar’s wisdom up high enough to allow him to cast a seventh level spell.

6453

Durkon mentioned having enough dust for one more Resurrection spell in #845. So I guess diamond dust counts too.

As with Elan, I never thought of Belkar, until you mentioned it. Despite having evidence in the strip of him casting 3rd-level Cleric spells from a scroll. And that had to be several levels ago for him. Resurrection, at 7th-level, will be a wee bit tougher though, (as Miller again ninjas) Also, I don’t think that all of Belkar’s new levels from Strip #58 onwards, were in Ranger. We know he at least thought about taking one level in Barbarian, and they don’t get UMD as a class skill.

Oh well, thought I’d found a loophole.

6454

Casting a spell from a scroll via UMD requires at least one skill check, and possibly two. Ordinarily, scrolls require both that you be the right class, and that you have a high enough ability score, and you can make one check to fake it on each of those. Neither Haley nor Elan is likely to have a high enough Wisdom score for a scroll of Resurrection, so they’d both have to roll for it. Note that it’s only a question of “high enough or not”, so it wouldn’t actually make any difference that Elan’s Wis is probably lower than Haley’s.

Also, while Elan’s Cha is certainly higher than Haley’s, it’s not all that big a difference at this level. Assuming they’re about level 15, they could either of them have as many as 18 ranks in the skill. By comparison, Elan’s Cha modifier is probably only about 4 points or so higher than Haley’s, so if she’s been keeping the skill maxed out and he hasn’t, she could very easily be much better at it than him.

6455

Actually, it usually is. Death gods, for example, tend to not grant the spell.

That’s a big assumption.

6456

According to what source?

Not really. We’ve already seen that Durkon still has his spells, when he summoned the devil. It’s not clear where he’s getting his magic from, but someone is obviously still providing it.

6457

Showing Z losing some teeth is an interesting detail. I wonder if he’ll speak (succinctly) with a lisp.

6458

That could be part of his upcoming character development. He’ll likely want a new god - but who? Nergal - Malack’s holy symbol is right there. Hel? She has no priests apparently, and would possibly be very happy to have one. Loki, as part of getting together with Hilgya again?

As long as he keeps it in his hands he can re-protect himself from daylight if Z dispels it. And Z is strong against magic, not strong against a smash to the face. Plus yes; it was right there in his hands and he was clearly in the mood to WONK someone in the head.

6459

I’m seeing a potential Twilight spin-off here!
And then quitting the strip forever

6460

So did pre-vamp Durkon ever swear?

6461

Thanks, guys, for all the rules geekery re Haley (or Elan) casting a Rez.

So d20 isn’t being helpful here: would Durkpire need to feed on blood to survive? The the vampire entry just mentions a Blood Drain ability, but I assume from stuff we’ve seen in the comic (like Malack’s blood wart tea, and Durkon thirsting when he was turned) that he’d need the stuff as sustenance in some fashion. Does it have to be a sentient’s blood? If he went back to the OOTS, could he, say, harvest a goat every so often to drink?