Order of the Stick book 7 discussion thread

Cafe Society
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Most outsiders are also susceptible to critical hits and sneak attacks and the like, and a rogue doesn’t need any special training to be able to sneak attack them just as well as they do humans. So even if a demon’s heart isn’t in quite the same place as a human’s, and doesn’t have quite the same role, it’s reasonable to assume that a demon has some sort of important organ in more or less the same place as a human heart.

For comparison, undead and constructs are not alive, and oozes and elementals are alive, but have homogeneous bodies, and so still can’t be sneak attacked or critted.

There are still some key differences between outsiders and mortals. Outsiders don’t have a distinction between body and soul, for instance, and so spells that return dead mortals to life don’t work on outsiders (though there are some specialized spells which do work).

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I thought it was an interesting piece of character development that Sabine, in her own words the literal personification of lust, was the one saying “not right now honey”. Is this a) a healthy respect for the Directors’ attitude to employee productivity, b) an internal commitment to the mission or c) the results of some ulterior motive?

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A) and B), I’m guessing, in the sense that screwing around (literally or figuratively) in a way that jeopardizes the mission will piss off the Directors (with dire consequences), and also because she wants Nale to succeed in his new role. She hasn’t previously shied away from “mixing business with pleasure” when possible, but the stakes are a lot higher now.

That said, one can never rule out an ulterior motive as well.

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I mean, I think that the existence of ulterior motives is pretty much a given. The questions are just what they are, and whether they’re relevant to this particular decision.

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If she doesn’t betray him at some point, I’ll be disappointed. She’s a freaking demon, it’s what they do. Loyalty is for chumps.

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If we ported reality on to the D&D alignment map, I would think the majority would fall into the nearly West-South-West district of malign indifference. Thog would probably reside there, his chaotic enthusiasm notwithstanding. It’s not a demanding alignment.

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Pet peeve: When people refer to alignments by their position on some alignment map. Not all of those are laid out the same way.

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I love this discussion!

So many things on this. I never liked that early DND has all of these passive judeo-christian ideas in it. Ideas which wouldn’t exist in a fantasy world. One of the big one is that the good side wouldn’t make deals like the bad side. Of course they would! It’s the only way some deities or entities are allowed to make a difference in the mortal realm!

Along the same lines, I didn’t like that demon blood was seen as tough to swallow due to taste or something. Now I’m not remembering where I saw that, so might have to look for it. In any case, what I did in my world was that demon blood is like Hot Ones hot sauces. The more powerful the demon, the more powerful the scoviille rating. Like all things, then, some mortals can handle more than others. I also see that how they get that blood to determine other things. If they are fed from a demon/devil/fiend or the d/d/f gives it willingly, then the d/d/f has some control over that person. If a mortal manages to get it by force, then they get the power with no strings attached. This also gives d/d/f reasons to want to make deals and not to hand over anything because then they lose control of that power.

What I realize I haven’t done is ask what a celestial blood would taste like. I could see the same rules being followed, where the celestial gains some control over them if it’s willing. Lawful good celestials would probably want to, not have control per se, but be able to “show them the way to the greatest good.” Chaotic celestials might not care, assuming they have assessed the individual to gain the power.

I really like the idea of both bodies being representative of their position or role. They all have hearts but it could be more of a concept than a heart needed to pump fluids. The idea that to corrupt a celestial by removing their heart is awesome!

In Golarion, the PF world, they have lore that a celestial angel was sent to create a report on everything in the outer planes. Tens of millenia later, after doing so, it stumbles back to whoever ordered it, gives its report, but its obviously corrupted and no longer whatever it was. It leaves after that. I bring that up because it’s a common trope in media I watch and read that outer planar creatures are “pure” until they interact with mortals or are exposed to new ideas. It’s seeing something that has free will that starts to change them. In the case of this Golarion story, the celestial was pure until it saw all of the things in the lower planes, or opposing planes, that caused it to change.

Lots of good ideas! Thanks!

One of the things I didn’t like about PF1 was the restriction on sneak attack for rogues. I might still do it with regards to a select few types, mainly oozes and plants, but that was it. Sneak attack is a fundamental ability of rogues and to have creatures not susceptible to it seems like bad design to me.

Thanks for the discussion!

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I think where a lot of people stumble on portraying religion in most D&D settings isn’t so much the “Judeo-Christian” aspect specifically, so much as the monotheistic aspect. Most D&D settings are explicitly pan-theistic, and that changes a lot about how religion and society interact. Most people wouldn’t have just one god they pray to, they’d pray to whichever god is relative to whatever they’re praying about. Even if you’re the high priest of the Sky God, if you’re going on a ship voyage, you go and offer a prayer up to the Ocean God, because that’s whose domain you’re traveling through, and he’s the one who determines if you have a safe voyage or not. And the Sky God is cool with that, because why would you pray to him about ocean stuff?

You should also have at least a shrine to every major god in a significant settlement, including a lot of the evil ones. Refusing to allow a temple to the Disease God in your town is a real good way to get a plague dropped on your head.

I can’t say I’ve really spent much time thinking about what demon blood tastes like. Does drinking demon blood come up a lot in your campaigns? What are the benefits?

Going back to your first paragraph about the inappropriateness of “Judeo-Christian” themes in parts of D&D, one thing that bugs me in a lot of fantasy settings is that fallen angels are relatively common, but redeemed demons are almost unheard of. I feel like this is a very Christian-flavored take on morality: that “being good” is a very difficult and precarious place to be, and I feel that undersells goodness as a concept. However rare “outsiders changing alignment” is in a given setting, it ought to be equally rare in every direction.

I got to stand up for my boy Pathfinder on this one. Pathfinder had the most generous approach to rogues’ sneak attack of any generation of D&D up to that point. The PF sneak attack rules were identical to the 3rd edition sneak attack rules, except that it worked on more creature types - off the top of my head, only elementals, oozes, and ethereal creatures are immune to sneak attack in PF, while 3rd also included undead, plants, and constructs. And 3rd edition was a massive upgrade on sneak attack from either version of AD&D, where it only worked on “humanoid” monsters, could only be done as a surprise attack, and could only be done once per attack. And, I think, never with a ranged weapon.

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In a 3.5 supplement, or maybe on the WOTC website, they had a redeemed succubus who became a paladin. Which was a scary good combo, since Paladins use Charisma and Succubi has a big bonus to that.

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Which is another thing: when there is a redeemed demon, it’s almost always a succubus. It’s always the sexy demon waifu who sees the error of her ways and wants to be better, and never this guy.

Pathfinder has an entire deity built around this trope.

Also, “redeemed by love” is way too common. There’s six other classical virtues that could lead a fiend to redemption! How about a devil who switches sides because he sees how the good guys don’t have to spend half their time defending themselves from their supposed allies, and redeems himself because he admires the concept of loyalty?

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Yeah, you’re definitely not wrong - it’s just the only example I could think of that’s explicitly DND.

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Arguably, this is what happened to Durkula - presented with an example of unalloyed selflessness, he went through spiritual crisis and found a new way of being via a Damascene conversion.

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I think I do pretty well with this. I use Forgotten Realms (my Thursday group knew FR and wanted to play in FR but otherwise, I had been using Golarion) in my group. The problem with FR is that it’s not a fantasy world. Most game worlds I know of, aren’t. Exalted’s is the one exception but would love to know if there are more. I say that because FR has deities for different domains (battle, darkness, agriculture, rivers, death) but what you said isn’t followed. Maybe a few novels did this but most didn’t, IIRC. Further, it was created with strong themes of good and evil, so gods are good and evil, which I don’t like. That’s not to say that I don’t have some gods seem evil but I’m trying not to make it Evil. In other words, they can pray to Besheba to ward off bad luck as well as pray to Tymora for good luck.

I think I have created the idea of mystery religions, albeit inadvertently. They may see a follower of Auril do something that in the moment seems bad but could turn good later. Shar is a better example. Darkness and loss are scary and so Shar is seen as scary. I’m fine with that but don’t want her to be evil. Maybe you want to feel someone’s presence in that darkness, so you pray to Shar. Or maybe you are so overcome with grief due to loss, you want to forget. Those can have many different outcomes.

The other thing missing is that gods were used to explain how things worked. The river spirit or deity moved the river the way they did because they wanted to. Or maybe the ocean god had all river gods under them and told them all to join back to them. I have not seen a DND adventure based on a god not following their domains. I have not seen Eldath stop rivers from flowing because they are bored, flooded them because they are sad, or dried them up because they are angry. I think we have lost a lot of opportunities in stories due to this missing.

Very early in my gaming, the group wanted to eat a dragon they killed to gain benefits of the dragon. I was too young to use it to better advantage but that idea has been with me almost my entire gaming career. That’s how I thought about gaining powers by consuming something.

As for demons, given the vastness of the material plane, my recent idea is that demons are only interested in worlds that called them. I haven’t set it in stone that Netheril in this timeline ended due to the phaerimm. I’m toying with the idea that there is a group, or groups, that were envious of what the high netherese had and turned to demon/devil/fiend to gain power. That eventually led to netheril’s downfall. It also explains sorcerer bloodlines, tiefling heritage, and other things that are part of FR. It also got the demons/devils/fiends attention.

I have setup the possibility of the Blood Wars coming to (my) FR. (Do I need to say that this is my version of FR? I don’t run standard FR because I got rid of cyric and the ToT and usually start campaigns at either 1357 (grey box) or 1372 (3E campaign setting) when I restart it.) They have met demons and devils in previous campaigns, who have offered deals, sometimes sealed with their blood. What can it give them? Well, depends what they bargain for. Darkvision, night vision, strength, agility, a spell, or whatever we decide fits the moment with the character. One of the things I like is the idea that powerful entities can do huge things, even good things, as part of a bargain or agreement. I have done this with good as well, having an aasimar in a campaign. In those cases, it’s not that they ask for a bargain but for a promise.

I decided to give players really good deals when dealing with demons or devils. Demons and devils play the long game, at least those willing to make a deal. Maybe their grandchild is the one that gets the backlash from their deal, which comes up in later campaigns. It also makes it more tempting to take the deal. What I’m still working on is how a deal with the fey v outer planar will differ.

I also expanded what could be affected by rogues with sneak attack. I allowed all but oozes, plants, and specific elementals, mainly air. Given that rogues can disarm magical traps, regardless of their magical ability (class, sub class, prestige class, dual class, multi class), I have rogues understand magic instinctually, such that they could sneak attack all but creatures with no organs.

PF1 has Aeons, Elemental, incorporeal, oozes, Swarms, and Proteans immune to sneak attack. DND 3.5 had undead, constructs, oozes, plants, and incorporeal creatures immune to sneak attack. I don’t think anything in PF2 has immunity to sneak attack or precision damage but they might have resistances to a type of damage.

I have had all sorts of evil and Evil things redeemed by the players and make it last so they know their actions have lasting effects.

I also think that Golarion has gone all in on the sins and their good side and how to redeem some things. I liked that remastered PF2 Core doesn’t have alignments. There are some traits, like Unholy, defined by giving into sin. There are things that have “bad” traits or are called irredeemable. There is no alignment, though.

Thanks for the discussion!

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Can you expand on what you mean by this?

I’m with you 100% on alignment. In my PF1 games, mortals don’t have alignments, because being mortal means you have a little bit of every alignment in you. Paladins and mid-level priests are an exception, because their deity’s aura influences it. Other than that, it’s something specific to outsiders and undead and other fundamentally supernatural creatures.

I really like your point about gods encompassing both the good and bad aspects of their portfolios. That’s something I hadn’t really thought about before, but now I want to start adapting it. One house rule I use that sort of ties into it is the idea that gods can’t really gatekeep who accesses their power. So long as the worshipper genuinely believes they’re acting in the service of their god, they can access their gods power. That way, there can be zealots of Iomedae who go around burning innocent people at the stake, even though Iomedae herself would abhor that. And there’s a feedback loop where if enough worshippers of Iomedae come to believe that she’s okay with burning heretics, it can change the nature of the goddess herself so that she is okay with burning heretics. This allows for things like schisms and doctrinal drift in a setting where gods are objectively, demonstrably real and reward people who follow them.

I haven’t really played PF2 yet, outside of a one-shot and a campaign that fizzled after two sessions. I’m thinking of running my next campaign using it, though - I really like everything I’ve seen about it.

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One setting that does really interesting stuff with their deities is The Elder Scrolls (Morrowind, Oblivion, Skyrim) - although a lot of the interesting stuff is buried under a more traditional generic fantasy veneer (especially in Oblivion).

Each of the setting’s cultures has their own pantheon. A lot of the characters are similar, and clearly variants of one another; and many of the stories rhyme. But the details - which character takes which role in the story, exactly how things play out - is different in the different cultures.

So the Elves believe that the world was created when a trickster deity tricked the divine spirits and trapped them within creation, so they kill him; humans view him as the leader of the deities and having sacrificed himself to create the world. But both myths agree that this god dies and his heart is anchored to the world.

Another example, the chief good deity in Oblivion is Akatosh, the Imperial Dragon God of Time who made a covenant with the founder of the original Empire. But to the Nords in Skyrim, Akatosh is Alduin, the Dragon God of the END of Time, who has returned to devour the world.

And to the elves, Akatosh and Alduin are both misinterpretations of Auri-El.

Or sometimes a being considered Daedric by some cultures (Mostly evil spirits who didn’t participate in creation, like Mehrunes Dagon who invaded in Oblivion) will be worshipped as a full on deity by others (the Khajiit worship Namira, the Reachmen worship a bunch of Daedric princes, etc).

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This got to be long and off topic, so I started a thread here for any interested.

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1328 - Facing Rules

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Squishy noises, LOL…

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Is Nale having some sort of character growth, a moral reckoning? Will this be consequential?