35 KiB
[MK] The Two Year Emperor, Ch62 - The Dead Hand of the Market
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Author: u/eaglejarl *
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URL: https://www.fanfiction.net/s/9669819/62/The-Two-Year-Emperor
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Score: 24
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Created: 2014-09-20T07:33:07
Post:
Comments:
u/Zephyr1011 [+17] Potentially Unfriendly Aspiring Divinity (42 minutes later)
Hammond's story was filled with so many remarks upon the lines of "that should have been impossible", that I am made extremely suspicious. The ability to command a goddess especially seems implausible for a non-deity. He could've been getting help from Neklos, I suppose, but this doesn't really sound like Neklos' style, and I am uncertain if he would have had the ability to so easily convince a goddess to give up such a valuable worshipper.
We know that Afi has access to spells which alter people's memories, with which he could easily achieve a memory like that with comparative ease. If it seems plausible that he could summon all the Lich Kings, it ought to be plausible that he could find a way to get them into a scenario where he can hit them with a mindscrape. A memory whose effect seems to have greatly benefited Afi. So, Afi has both the means and motive to Mindscrape such a memory, and seems unlikely to have the means to actually do the things detailed within
It seems far more likely to me that he Mindscraped the memory into Hammond rather than actually doing the things detailed therein
EDIT: I am also suspicious of how Hammond could possibly know that "There is nothing like the presence of a deity, no way to fake it", since he has no way of distinguishing there being a secret way to do so from there being no way to do so
EDIT2: Apparently mind affecting spells do not work on undead. However, my hypothesis could still work, albeit in a more complex manner. If Hammond was PAOed into a human, Mindscraped and then PAOed back, the Mindscrape could still work
u/blazinghand [+8] Chaos Undivided (an hour later)
It's easy for Hammond to have that thought, of course, if it was mindscraped into him.
u/Zephyr1011 [+7] Potentially Unfriendly Aspiring Divinity (an hour later)
I think it's plausible for Hammond to think that regardless, since statements like that seem easy to fall into the trap of believing in. I am just suspicious of whether or not it's true
u/Rouninscholar [+1] (5 days later)
Mind effecting spells do work I believe, the author house ruled it.
u/Zephyr1011 [+1] Potentially Unfriendly Aspiring Divinity (5 days later)
Nope, just unconsciousness. I asked the author
u/Bowbreaker [+1] Solitary Locust (5 days later)
With all that research going on, does Mass Greater Mind(sc)rape work on Liches? Also, Bluff.
u/Izeinwinter [+12] (2 hours later)
Options: 1: As powerful as he appears to be. 2: He is the lich queen. It is anything but trivial to sex a skeleton at a glance, and liches can and do make themselves new bodies, making it utterly impossible. The entire war was a gambit to establish a new persona with an even scarier reputation, and without her old entanglements. That provides a reason for the goddess to lie, and she wouldn't need to fake the destruction of the phylactery - no true way to identify who's phylactery it is in that situation, so she could just help an barely-qualifying mage through the process, then promptly betray said mage before the thing was hardened beyond the base level. This doesn't make her much less scary. 3: Illusionist breakthrough.
u/Zephyr1011 [+8] Potentially Unfriendly Aspiring Divinity (3 hours later)
4: Mindscrape. Mindscrape is always an option, given how utterly broken it is
u/GeeJo [+1] Custom Flair (9 hours later)
Except on other undead.
u/Zephyr1011 [+4] Potentially Unfriendly Aspiring Divinity (9 hours later)
Mindscrape works on undead. Remember, Melvin Mindscraped himself to remove memory of Icefi
u/GeeJo [+3] Custom Flair (9 hours later)
I took that as him [intentionally failing his saving throw](http://www.dandwiki.com/wiki/SRD:Saving_Throw_(Spell_Descriptor)).
A creature can voluntarily forego a saving throw and willingly accept a spell’s result. Even a character with a special resistance to magic can suppress this quality.
u/Zephyr1011 [+1] Potentially Unfriendly Aspiring Divinity (10 hours later)
I was unaware of that rule. It seems to explain what has been observed pretty well. Although, in chapter 10 they said that they are ruling that anything with a mind can be knocked out, and this may have just been a continuation of that
u/eaglejarl [+3] (14 hours later)
Although, in chapter 10 they said that they are ruling that anything with a mind can be knocked out, and this may have just been a continuation of that
Nope. Undead still immune to mind affecting.
u/Chronophilia [+9] sci-fi ≠ futurology (7 hours later)
I don't think it's Mindscrape - on a meta level, because HPMoR already used that trick several times and it's becoming overused in my mind. If the whole event was fake, then all the details we're given about it are literally meaningless, they don't even work as red herrings. Red herrings still have to be explained - the silhouette on the hill was Watson out for a walk, the butler's scar is an old war wound.
If the events Hammond saw were Mindscraped into him, Afi could have revealed that Manghild was actually two midgets in a robe, and that the entire D&D universe was magically created from the subconscious of Twilight Sparkle and will end when someone learns a lesson about friendship, and the scenario would have otherwise played out in exactly the same way.
If we start calling out "Memory hacking!" every time something impossible happens, we might as well dismiss the entire story up until Chapter 57 as Icefi's fabrication.
u/eaglejarl [+7] (7 hours later)
we might as well dismiss the entire story up until Chapter 57 as Icefi's fabrication.
I wish you wouldn't; I've put a crapton of work into this thing over the last year.
Speaking of, I realized that I missed the anniversary -- the first chapter of 2YE was posted on September 8, 2013.
u/MoralRelativity [+1] (a day later)
Congratulations! It's an engaging and fun romp.
u/TimTravel [+1] (7 hours later)
Agreed.
u/ulyssessword [+5] (18 minutes later)
Huh, either Afi is exactly as powerful as he seems, or else he found a way to Mindscrape at least one Lich at least once.
u/FeepingCreature [+5] GCV Literally The Entire Culture (59 minutes later)
Do the Gods protect the authenticity of divine presence? Or does Hammond only think the Gods protect the authenticity of divine presence? This sounds like it demands external confirmation. (Ask Fragment?)
u/TimTravel [+5] (7 hours later)
All caught up. Note thought dump.
Some kind of explosive in case people go zombie would be useful in high-level troops if you can make it trigger automatically and destroy the newly zombieified / vampified creature.
Why didn't the cannons just explode when the thing to be launched grew to normal size?
Commoner railgun: doesn't it only work if initiative rolls line up correctly?
Optimizing space: I don't get what they're doing with the reshuffling.
56: ~" //I don't remember what this means but I suspect it was a typo
57 hold you tongue -> hold your tongue
58 begs the question -> raises the question //unless it's intentionally wrong
I'm enjoying it but I regret that my knowledge of D&D isn't quite strong enough to solve the puzzles. I played a lot of Baldur's Gate and I played D&D itself once or twice with various people, but that's it. I know nothing of all this version 3+ nonsense, hehe. Is there a list of spells somewhere I can look at? I would help a lot.
I was toying with the idea that undead is relative: every so often a bunch of undead swarm and take over the world, then a group of beings that are undead relative to them take over. This is incompatible with alignment, but I never liked alignment in the first place. It's all well and good as a starting point for a character, but if you really look at the definitions, "evil" just means selfish. If there were some sort of "smite evil" effect, it would work just as well on selfish people as maliciously evil-in-the-classic-sense people which is counter-intuitive.
I assume the main reason for the gods being persnickety is because of the supergods, and the supergods are persnickety because of the supersupergods and so on forever because this assumption amuses me.
With this many high-level people around, would the resurrection engine be feasible again?
Just as a brief note, it is nearly impossible to describe how much of an understatement your description of Graham's number is. Merely 2^2^1000000 is more than can be expressed with a digit per elementary particle in the universe. Graham's number is, of course, much much bigger. A lot fewer people know about the Busy Beaver numbers. The short version is that BB(n) grows faster than any function computable in any finite amount of time whatsoever. Busy beaver numbers utterly stomp any other number sequence that isn't based on similar principles.
They didn't actually use this strategy, but what did you mean by "one level maze" for the wall following method? It only works in very simple mazes. There are one z-level planar mazes it won't work on.
u/Zephyr1011 [+3] Potentially Unfriendly Aspiring Divinity (8 hours later)
Optimizing space: I don't get what they're doing with the reshuffling.
When they rearranged Grofhamr with a commoner railgun? I believe this was to reorganise Grofhamr to make it more efficient and so that people are closer to the exit for the Herrun ritual. Grofhamr is essentially a tree, with each node being a portable hole and each edge being the connection between a portable hole and the holes inside of it. Its start node was at the entrance, and each node led to up to 3 other nodes, but pre-reshuffling it was extremely disordered, with some nodes extremely far from the start. The reshuffling made it so that each node led to 3 others, which led to 9 more etc, so that if there are less than (3^(n+1)-1)/2 nodes, no node is more than n holes from the entrance
Here you can find a list of each class' spells, under class spell lists
With this many high-level people around, would the resurrection engine be feasible again?
I don't think resurrection is very feasible, as Drifa has said that 1 in 4 times they miss something, which can be extremely damaging. Even using Ice Assassin to avoid casualties on the part of the resurrectors, it isn't really worth it
u/TimTravel [+1] (8 hours later)
Yeah but...why wasn't Grofhamr like that from the start?
u/eaglejarl [+10] (8 hours later)
- It was assembled by people who didn't know computer science
- Having it optimized for short distances is good for getting in and out quickly, which is good for the ritual. It's horrible for defense; if something breaks into the city you want it to take them a while to get in deep. You also want choke points to defend.
u/Zephyr1011 [+6] Potentially Unfriendly Aspiring Divinity (8 hours later)
Well, Grofhamr is a refugee settlement. I doubt it was very well-planned, and more thrown together on short notice. Or it may have had portable Holes just added in wherever there was space as its population expanded. Alternately, the idea simply didn't occur to anyone
u/eaglejarl [+3] (9 hours later)
All true.
u/eaglejarl [+3] (8 hours later)
Why didn't the cannons just explode when the thing to be launched grew to normal size?
The only thing that changes size is the firing rod. At full size, the rod is designed to fit snugly in the barrel.
Commoner railgun: doesn't it only work if initiative rolls line up correctly?
No. You can always delay your action.
Optimizing space: I don't get what they're doing with the reshuffling.
Zephyr1011 is correct.
56: ~" //I don't remember what this means but I suspect it was a typo 57 hold you tongue -> hold your tongue
Thanks, will fix.
58 begs the question -> raises the question //unless it's intentionally wrong
It's correct as written.
I was toying with the idea that undead is relative
Nope, sorry.
"evil" just means selfish.
Not in D&D. From the SRD:
""Evil" implies hurting, oppressing, and killing others. Some evil creatures simply have no compassion for others and kill without qualms if doing so is convenient. Others actively pursue evil, killing for sport or out of duty to some evil deity or master."
If there were some sort of "smite evil" effect, it would work just as well on selfish people as maliciously evil-in-the-classic-sense people which is counter-intuitive.
There is and I'm afraid it doesn't.
I assume the main reason for the gods being persnickety is because of the supergods, and the supergods are persnickety because of the supersupergods
Nope. The Overgods are pretty hands off for the most part, and there's nothing above them.
Just as a brief note, it is nearly impossible to describe how much of an understatement your description of Graham's number is.
I'm well aware, and so is Jake. It was a simple way to get the general idea across without having to explain uparrow terminology and draw out repeated power towers.
A lot fewer people know about the Busy Beaver numbers.
I'm aware of them. They aren't necessary for the story; Graham's number is far larger than needed.
They didn't actually use this strategy, but what did you mean by "one level maze" for the wall following method? It only works in very simple mazes.
Yes, I'm aware. I wanted to demonstrate Jake being wrong about something, showing that he's not perfectly all-knowing.
u/FeepingCreature [+2] GCV Literally The Entire Culture (9 hours later)
""Evil" implies hurting, oppressing, and killing others. Some evil creatures simply have no compassion for others and kill without qualms if doing so is convenient. Others actively pursue evil, killing for sport or out of duty to some evil deity or master."
So, in D&D utilitarian calculations are explicitly evil? I don't see any provision in here for "... or through inaction allow people to come to harm". So ... is there an Evil God of Good? Maximizing the cause of Good through possibly-Evil means?
[edit] So I've been reading through the SRD and it looks like the creators simply didn't anticipate acting Evil/disrespecting lifes and dignity out of altruism. So .. does that mean utilitarians fall into Lawful Neutral? It seems like the catch-all alignment ("act according to some personal code [that we didn't anticipate in our Good/Evil spectrum]"). Sort of the alignment of Blue and Orange Morality?
So.. do the Gods strictly operate on SRD RAW re Good/Evil anyways?
u/eaglejarl [+6] (12 hours later)
From the SRD page on alignment that I quoted above:
"Good" implies altruism, respect for life, and a concern for the dignity of sentient beings. Good characters make personal sacrifices to help others.
It seems pretty clear to me that utilitarian calculations are based on a respect for life and a concern for the dignity of sentient beings. Good doesn't mean Stupid -- Good people are allowed to choose the lesser of two evils.
People who are neutral with respect to good and evil have compunctions against killing the innocent but lack the commitment to make sacrifices to protect or help others. Neutral people are committed to others by personal relationships.
Serious utilitarians have the commitment to make personal sacrifices for their beliefs, and their code operates on a high level (concern for all humans / all life), even if they don't have a personal relationship with the people involved. Therefore, utilitarians are not Neutral.
u/FeepingCreature [+7] GCV Literally The Entire Culture (12 hours later)
The SRD is interesting in that it's inconsistent - Good is based on outlook, but Evil is based on actions.
"Good" implies altruism, respect for life, and a concern for the dignity of sentient beings.
"Evil" implies hurting, oppressing, and killing others.
So I'm forced to agree with the other commenter in that utilitarian behavior can end up both simultaneously. Agreed about Neutral though.
u/Izeinwinter [+1] (2 days later)
Not.. in universe, not really. Dnd takes place in a world with literal demons of temptation. The hardline paladins take on "Do no evil, even for a greater good" is perfectly sensible - because there are forces out to manipulate you into making the world worse.
u/RMcD94 [+2] (14 hours later)
Utilitarian calculations are based on any basis or rather are based on whatever you want, if you don't want to include respect for life you don't have to
u/eaglejarl [+3] (14 hours later)
Fair enough. Every utilitarian that I'm aware of includes those things, however.
u/GeeJo [+3] Custom Flair (15 hours later)
Paperclippers are a rather infamous counterexample.
u/eaglejarl [+3] (16 hours later)
Ah, you're right. I should have thought of the relevance of theoretical AI constructs to a simplified moral system suitable for a tabletop role playing game such as Dungeons and Dragons. ;P
u/GeeJo [+3] Custom Flair (16 hours later)
Its not like artificial magical intelligences are unknown in D&D. They all seem to end up with approximately humanlike value systems, though.
u/eaglejarl [+3] (17 hours later)
True. All of the ones I can think of offhand--golems, intelligent magical weapons (or items in general, I guess), and...hm, actually, that's it. Everything else I'm coming up with is either a non-created magical being (e.g. elemental) or was once human (vampire), or doesn't really have a mind (zombie, skeleton).
Ah, and the SRD says that golems are animated by a spirit from the Elemental Plane of Earth, so they aren't actually AI. That just leaves intelligent magic items.
Anyway, magic items are created by humans using magic which clearly works off of intent as much as literal interpretation -- when you cast Move Earth, you don't have to understand the structure of the earth or the different amounts of force required to shift clay as opposed to loam, you just wave your hands and it DWYMs. Ditto for Wish. Under those assumptions, it's not unreasonable that AI in D&D would have a human basis.
Also, since the only way to modify a magic item is through Wish (can you do it via the car acting process? Not sure) then it's unlikely for an intelligent sword to be able to self-improve. Most magic items lack significant ability to influence their environment, providing anothe defense against paperclippers.
u/JackStargazer [+4] Primordial Apologist (17 hours later)
Outsiders.
Natural outsiders are the definition of alien intelligences. Allison is an example in system, as she likely has different values - although she approaches human norms - but for alignment based outsiders?
Infernal and Abyssal, the languages of devils and demons, literally do not have words for concepts like 'mercy'. These beings are literally made of evil and law/chaos. What they think is part of their being. Demons are, in general, Omnicidal Maniacs because they are trying to return things to the primal chaos that spawned them. That they take pleasure in suffering is almost incidental.
Devils are basically tyranny personified. Angels are the opposite - Celestial doesn't have words for torture or anything like schaudenfreude, but it has dozens of words for mercy and joy.
Imagine a group which literally cannot conceptualize (in most cases) the thought patterns of the other side. Who feels their morality in their very being, because their utility functions are representative of their makeup in the same way our genetics defines ours, only moreso.
That's alien in my book.
This isn't even getting into Far Realm outsiders. That stuff gets really weird.
u/eaglejarl [+2] (19 hours later)
Those aren't AI, though. They are absolutely alien intelligences, no argument. But not artificial ones.
(Also, your comments about the languages -- are those from canon?)
u/JackStargazer [+1] Primordial Apologist (a day later)
I may have confused it with the Dark Speech, which is the precursor language to Abyssal and Infernal in the same way Latin would be to our English - BoVD page 32:
There are no words in the Dark Speech for good concepts such as kindness, mercy and purity. However evil characters can speak of misery, anguish, hate and betrayal with an accuracy impossible in any other tongue.
And on it's flip side, the Words of Creation, the precursor language to Celestial, BoED pg 32:
It [The Words of Creation] has no words for evil concepts such as misery, despair, hate and betrayal, while the subtlety of it's terminology for beauty, kindness and mercy is astonishing.
So, while it is possible that Abyssal/Infernal and Celestial adopted those concepts out of necessity as those languages evolved, older demons and Angels likely learned with the basic forms of the Dark Speech and Words of Creation, as their precursor tongues, so their minds would have been formed with those understandings of the world.
As an aside, in a world where Angels and Demons are canonically birthed from the minds or powers of Gods, created wholecloth from nothing, can we really say they are not artificial intelligences? The Modrons and Inevitables of Mechanus would certainly qualify as AI, likely in form as well as origin.
They were created to enforce universal law on the planes, existing only to do so. There are ones who serve Justice, Death, Time/Space, Divinity(as you have the gods do directly here), and Oaths. They hunt down transgressors like the Furies of Greek mythology hunt down kinslayers.
u/eaglejarl [+1] (a day later)
[languages] Interesting, thanks for the reference.
[Inevitables etc] Heh. So, basically, they are the deputies for the gods and do the exact kind of "don't do that" message deliveries that I've had gods doing themselves?
Ah well, I still prefer having the relatively human deities do the work instead of sending minions.
u/JackStargazer [+1] Primordial Apologist (a day later)
Notable also is that both languages (Dark Speech and Words of Creation) have actual magical effects on the world when spoken aloud in specific combinations, regardless of who is doing the speaking.
They are sometimes mentioned in the fluff of other spells or abilities as well. the Warlock's Shatter invocation is performed by speaking a word of the Dark Speech - 'unmaking' or similar.
The Words of Creation ability for Bardic music is especially valuable, as it flat doubles the bonus provided from Inspire Courage (an ability that is already eminently exploitable in the 3.5 ruleset) can be used even by nonmagical characters to get a +4 sacred bonus to Craft checks or to automatically Extend a Conjuration (Creation) effect.
The Dark Speech can be used to weaken physical objects, permanently reducing their hardness by half, or to create (and this gets overpowered fast) a hivemind of insects which gets mental stat increases and Sorcerer caster levels for free as it gets larger. The hivemind can also ignore spell components. Including expensive or rare ones. So, they could for example Ice Assassin a God without having the requisite piece of the God to do so.
They have Int/Charisma based on size. 500 centipedes have a Charisma 14. 1000 have Charisma 24. 5000 have Charisma 104. They get 1 Sorcerer caster level per Charisma over 17, so my last example is a level 87 sorcerer with spell slots per day of....
0/1/2/3/4/5/6/7/8/9
6/26/25/25/25/25/24/24/24/24
And it just gets crazier from there.
u/GeeJo [+3] Custom Flair (17 hours later)
The idea of an intelligent sword wanting to be the best sword there ever was and desperately seeking to power Wish spells for self-improvement is a pretty amusing premise, though. Maybe it gets the Extraordinary "Charm Person" ability and sets about trying to convince anyone who comes across (who's still low enough level to fail the DC check) it to enroll in Wizard School, urging them along the path towards getting Wish.
Basically a ridiculous take on the AI-box thought experiment.
u/eaglejarl [+1] (19 hours later)
Hm. Interesting premise for a short story, but I'm not sure it's practical to actually happen. Charm Person wears off pretty quickly, so it would need to be renewed frequently. By the time the person is high enough level to use Wish, they also aren't vulnerable to the CP.
u/Empiricist_or_not [+2] Aspiring polite Hegemonizing swarm (20 hours later)
I know magic Items usually only have int, but if the sword were a diplomancer. . .
u/TimTravel [+3] (11 hours later)
Interpreting that description literally someone who hurts people for the greater good is simultaneously Good and Evil.
u/Chronophilia [+2] sci-fi ≠ futurology (8 hours later)
Hey, here's a thought I had: Is there a maximum level you can reach in D&D? Within the 2YE ruleset, I mean, where you can keep going up levels past 20 but there's no epic rules.
I can't find the "player level \ monster level -> XP gained" chart online, but I recall from Order of the Stick that if you're so many levels stronger than the enemy that they literally provide no challenge to you, you gain 0 XP for defeating them. If that is true, then it suggests this: once you've gotten to the point where the strongest monster in the entire game can't challenge you (or at least, the strongest monster that you can find in large enough quantities to train against), then you'll hit a level cap. You'll only gain XP at all when you fight other people who've had the same idea as you, which is not exactly ideal level-grinding material.
Any idea what the hard limit on levels might be? Less than 50? More than 1000? Or are there creatures in the outer darkness of arbitrarily high power that could provide decent XP even to a level googoolplex character?
(I wouldn't try actually hitting this level cap unless I were a god, or an Afi, but it's still useful information.)
u/eaglejarl [+3] (9 hours later)
The XP charts aren't part of the SRD; they are only in the books. (I believe PH, but not sure.) You can find PDFs of the books online if you look.
Power levels cap out on classes - a level 20 wizard gets the exact same number of spells as a level 1,000,000,000,000 wizard, all else being equal. (Which it wouldn't be due to increasing ability scores, but you take the point.) Beyond this capstone, the character only gains minor benefits such as a few more HP.
You're absolutely right about an effective limit due to inability to find a challenge, but that wouldn't happen until quite late. I'm not sure how late though.
It's an interesting question; if anyone more familiar with the monster lists wanted to poke at it, I'd be curious to know the answer.
u/Zephyr1011 [+1] Potentially Unfriendly Aspiring Divinity (7 days later)
While you might run out of monsters to fight, could you not get other characters to your level and fight them? They should still pose a challenge
u/Bowbreaker [+2] Solitary Locust (5 days later)
About the Grappling Run (wrong chapter but meh), Shouldn't they still be unable to run through enemies? Or at least those that take up all the corridor space? Bull Rushes don't become stronger through speed (i.e range of the Bull Rush) and in any case Initiative still applies as normal (although the raids Dex should be far beyond average so that might often not be an issue). If 2 Iron Golems stand next to each other in a tunnel you cannot run through them according to RAW. And if you cop-out is that they get knocked aside by Mach 7, well that would be real life physics in which case Mach 7 also squishes soft humans all bunched up in a 5 ft square.
Also, isn't it possible to fire conjuration spells into an Anti-Magic Field as long as the casting of the spell happens outside of the field? Damage dealing conjurations actually summon a non-magical projectiles as far as I know. Or in RAW words:
"The effects of instantaneous Conjurations are not affected by an antimagic field because the conjuration itself is no longer in effect, only its result."
u/eaglejarl [+1] (5 days later)
[dealing with creatures]
They didn't Bull Rush anything. As per canon, they killed it.
My take on it is that they get a surprise round because they're traveling hypersonic. During the surprise round they run up to the enemy, stab it with five or six dozen daggers, then continue running past its bleeding corpse. (Assuming that it bleeds. In any case, corpses do not block movement AFAIK.)
[conjuration spells into AMF]
That's how I read it, yes: conjurations that manifest outside an AMF can still go into it. Fireballs, Lightning Bolts, and Manyjaws (the things that Hammond was asserted to be using) are all Evocation spells, so the AMF nullifies them. If he had had spell traps that:
- Used Conjuration spells...
- Which did not require targeting or manifesting inside the AMF...
- Could reasonably affect the Meatball by RAW...
...then yes, Hammond's traps could have affected them.
u/Bowbreaker [+1] Solitary Locust (6 days later)
Forgot about surprise rounds. Although of course attacking would end one persons contribution to movement right there while cutting in half the contribution of each one who chose to attack. I assume that the raid had enough people for that to be a non-issue?
u/eaglejarl [+1] (6 days later)
The trick is to have the people who have already finished their movement do the attacking. Then no resources are wasted.
And yes, with 3500 people there was plenty of extra movement to cover everything.
u/Bowbreaker [+1] Solitary Locust (6 days later)
Assuming double move/run those who have already used both move actions should be unable to attack and vice versa. Or I am misunderstanding something regarding the grapple rules (which wouldn't be that surprising).
u/eaglejarl [+1] (6 days later)
Hm, looks like I'm wrong. Attacking is still a standard action, but moving is now also a standard action, so you can't do both. Meh, whatevs. There's still plenty of people available; if you have to sacrifice the movement ability of a couple hundred it doesn't significantly decrease the speed.
u/Zephyr1011 [+1] Potentially Unfriendly Aspiring Divinity (10 hours later)
Can Mind Affecting spells affect sentient undead in 2YE? The SRD say that they can't, but Icefi says in Chapter 57 that
Then he Mindscraped the memories out of himself so that the next time His Bossiness decided to manifest through him, the memories wouldn't be there to be noticed.
Mindscrape seems pretty clearly mind affecting, and none of the people there seem to think anything is amiss by that statement. Besides, it seems a logical continuation of your rule in chapter 10 that undead can be knocked out if they have a mind
u/eaglejarl [+4] (12 hours later)
No, mind affecting spells cannot affect undead. Keep in mind, however, that characters are allowed to lie, and allowed to be wrong. Also, I'm allowed to be sneaky. Even if something happens onscreen, that doesn't mean there isn't a tricky explanation for it.
u/Zephyr1011 [+3] Potentially Unfriendly Aspiring Divinity (12 hours later)
Is it common knowledge that mind-altering spells cannot affect the undead? Because Thomas suggests that some Ice Assassins may have used Mindscrape to get the knowledge of Jake from Icefi.
And would something along the lines of PAOing someone into a human, Mindscraping them, and PAOing someone back work?
u/eaglejarl [+3] (13 hours later)
Reasonably so and yes, respectively.
u/JackStargazer [+1] Primordial Apologist (11 hours later)
Yeah, the only thing I'm not getting is if there is an easy way to effect undead with mind-affecting spells. Mindscrape (which I'm assuming is just a renamed BoVD Mindrape as it does the exact same thing) is explicitly mind-affecting and so does not normally work on undead.
u/eaglejarl [+5] (12 hours later)
It is Mindrape, yes. I dislike the name and wanted something more family friendly.
u/JackStargazer [+6] Primordial Apologist (17 hours later)
Well, as family friendly as "I can now rearrange your consciousness as I see fit and you won't even remember me doing it." and "I hope you like never trusting your perceptions again." can be.
u/eaglejarl [+1] (17 hours later)
Heh. Yes, true.
u/None [-5] (3 days later)
[deleted]
u/eaglejarl [+2] (3 days later)
Sorry you don't like it. Maybe you should stop reading?
u/mns2 [+0] (3 days later)
Huh. For some reason I went in expecting something better. I guess seeing it on here multiple times caused me to expect some kind of serious story. It turns out most of the postings for it here are by you. Your words have allowed me to take a step back and adjust. I'm sure your writing gets better, but I'll be stopping here. Thanks! :)
u/Bowbreaker [+2] Solitary Locust (5 days later)
Well, it does seem to get more upvotes than downvotes...
u/eaglejarl [+1] (3 days later)
You're welcome! :)