The monster is definitely sabotaging them. The combination of “That’s what we all want, right”, (which you would never say around Elan or Tarquin as it would immediately give you away), his clearly hiding his intelligence re the bugbears, and now xing doors that haven’t been used is clear evidence he’s deliberately working against X&R. For what ends, who knows, but it’s not casual carelessness.
I would think that he knew which one was the right one and so xed it to stop it being used, but if he actually knew, why would he paint more than one fake x?
Freedom of Movement doesn’t just prevent grappling, and the magic items that perma grant it are the second best magic items one can possibly have (after a ring of regen - but Xykon can’t use one of those. I wonder if Bad Guys make rings of perma-harming ? :)).
It nixes all paralysis and hold spells, Bigby’s Hands, stun, slow, difficult or slippery terrain, getting tied down, hell it even allows one to move underwater as if they were on dry land. Definitely a big deal.
MitD knows that O-Chul is heading for their location and for the same goal as Xykon (securing the Gate). He’s pretty obviously trying to tip the scales in favor of his paladin buddy who treated him well versus his current companions.
Sure he does. They’re evil, and he’s good. Now that he’s overcoming his crippling lack of self-worth and discovering his own sence of agency, I expect to see him do much more to thwart them.
Yes, MitD is clearly sabotaging them on purpose. He slyly asked permission, even.
In addition to all the reasons previously mentioned, it makes no plot-sense for MitD to randomly interfere. MitD is a major character, and i predict his role will get more and more interesting.
Why do we think it is the monster marking the doors? Might it not be magic? Are not some of the doors newly marked high off the ground, beyond his reach?
MitD is carrying a bucket of paint. The comic depicted a blaze of painting action. As puzzlegal points out, MitD acts a bit coy or furtive about the subject.
What’s the Monster’s reach?
And Monster-San says he’s going to paint the red X.
Kobal2, a Ring of Regeneration was indeed a honkin’ big deal back in 2nd edition, but in 3rd (which the comic is set in), it’s an overpriced piece of crap. It literally only lets you heal 24 times as fast as normal healing (as in, no medical attention, resting only at night, and no magic), and that’s never even remotely near enough to be relevant. Besides which, it also only works on damage taken while you’re wearing the ring, so you can’t even trade the thing off with partymates. Over the course of an entire adventuring career, you’d get more healing by spending a tenth that amount on wands of Cure Light Wounds.
Where would he have learned that piece of information?
My new headcanon: The MitD is the son of Reed Richards. His reach is very, very long…
Variable.
From Xykon and Redcloak. They pretty much ignore the MITD and talk freely in his presence.
It’s already been shown. There was the recent strip where the MITD argued with Oona about his status. But there was also this older strip that shows he’s begun forming his own agenda. This is just more foreshadowing.
“Knows” is probably too strong a word but at least “strongly suspects”. Despite using it as an excuse to NOT kill the Order, MitD likely does believe that O-Chul, or at least his friends, are heading to the Gate. Even if not O-Chul, then MitD knows he saved O-Chul’s friends and they are heading to the Gate (which would make O-Chul happy). Either way, MitD has good reason to delay or mess with Xykon’s plans until the Good Guys show up.
Xykon and Redcloak don’t know it either. No one on Team Evil even knows where O-Chul was teleported, not even the MitD who did it. They can’t find him because he’s still under the Cloister effects.
OK, but this is all just wishful thinking. At least for the MitD. If it were Tarquin, he’d know because he’s genre savvy.
They believe it to be true though, since MitD convinced them of it and thus they’ve been acting as though it’s true. Plus, they’ve encountered resistance at every Gate so far so, genre savvy or not, it doesn’t take a bard to predict that they’ll encounter it here as well.
The one wishfully thinking it is the one painting "X"s on the doors. Which is all that matters. Even if, in reality, no one was coming to the Gate, MitD believes that they are and is acting accordingly.
Huh. Just checked and yup, you’re right, 1HP healed per hour is pretty darn naff, certainly not worth the 90k price of admission :o.
In my defence I never played much actual, non-video-game 3rd Ed. ; and in *Pathfinder *RoRs heal 1HP per round. Also regrow lost limbs, make you immune to bleeding, and implicitly never let you die when reduced below 0 HP. Which is kind of a bigger deal :D.
What if the bajillion doors is just a trick in itself to make you waste time checking every one?
Each door magically opens to a dungeon. What if it’s a random dungeon each time? As in, the dungeon gets generated as you open the door and if you were to step out and come back in through the exact same door, you’d find yourself in a new dungeon? Then there’s no use marking doors you’ve already gone through.
Alternatively (or perhaps in conjunction with the last point) what if NONE of the doors directly leads to the gate? What if it’s a code where you have to open the right doors in the correct order to unlock the path to the gate?