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Old 11-29-2018, 07:36 AM   #11
martinl
 
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Default Re: Protection from Evil vs. Eye of Death

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Originally Posted by Tom H. View Post
Even the Holy Warrior's Resist Evil ability (Adventurers, p. 27) may not apply if you deem the Death Gaze's cosmic nature as eluding the requirement that said innate attack be supernatural.
Those should probably work against Things. I'd definitely label ALL elder things as "supernatural" - they are by definition not part of the natural world, and that eyepuppy is Evil.

Further clarification: the "Cosmic" is being used to override the requirement for an attack roll and ignore DR, not the resistance. So to force an attack roll you need a cosmic defense, and DR that is not cosmic is also ignored, and MR doesn't help because this is not a "magic" power. But anything that helps with HT, resistance in general, or resistance vs. Evil or supernatural things in general should work.

I'd also tend to call any unclear rules in the Holy Warrior's favor, since in my experience that template is not a favored one.
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Old 11-29-2018, 12:32 PM   #12
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Default Re: Protection from Evil vs. Eye of Death

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Originally Posted by martinl View Post
Those should probably work against Things. I'd definitely label ALL elder things as "supernatural" - they are by definition not part of the natural world, and that eyepuppy is Evil.
Thank you. I agree now that the cosmic source or origin can be classified as supernatural. I realized it after my previous post.

There can be a lot of subtlety in how abilities are classified and how they interact in DFRPG not to mention GURPS, and I became confused.

So to clarify, I would definitely allow the Holy Warrior's Resist Evil ability to apply against the Eye of Death, i.e. your Resist Evil level is a bonus to your HT roll to resist the terrible Death Gaze.
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Old 11-29-2018, 02:24 PM   #13
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Default Re: Protection from Evil vs. Eye of Death

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There can be a lot of subtlety in how abilities are classified and how they interact in DFRPG not to mention GURPS, and I became confused.
There is a grand tradition in RPGs for confusing terminology that contradicts English usage, and GURPS and DFRPG participate in that tradition.

"Magical," as a modifier, being explicitly limited to small subset of supernatural things is just one of those.

On the bright side, if you are careful it makes many things easier to handle. "Does resist magic help here?" can be clearly answered by checking if the power source of the thing being resisted is "magic."
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Old 11-29-2018, 09:57 PM   #14
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Default Re: Protection from Evil vs. Eye of Death

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On the bright side, if you are careful it makes many things easier to handle. "Does resist magic help here?" can be clearly answered by checking if the power source of the thing being resisted is "magic."
Meh. It's more lawyerly than my GMing style, especially with players who aren't GURPS grognards. "Yeah, her Resist Evil ability protects against this Truly Evil thing, but your Protection from Evil spell is useless because Elder Thing lawyers found a loophole in the spell description by making their magical power not magical." Seems like holy spells (from the gods) shouldn't be so easily outwitted.

This, however, is not to dispute the accuracy of the rules logic that has been applied in this thread. I find it edifying, even if I choose to houserule it. It might also depend on the background fluff I use to explain how elder things fit into the cosmos. But, this being DF, things aren't too fluffy yet. My player's cleric, however, speaks Elder and worships a god who has been in specific conflict with squids, so I think it all works.

Sadly, I have to wait at least another week to find out how my players handle the Eye. Our three-hour game on Tuesday was fun but featured an astonishingly bad "plan" that alerted all of the dungeon guards, who had been entirely unprepared for an attack and could have been ambushed or bypassed. (I laughed afterward because I actually playtested the entrance to the dungeon with a few nine-year-olds who did far better than my adult players!) So now they're bogged down fighting every mook in the place—mooks who have now had time to fortify their position. The cleric may not have enough FP to cast PoE when the time comes...

Last edited by Dalin; 12-01-2018 at 07:43 AM. Reason: typos
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Old 11-30-2018, 05:43 PM   #15
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Default Re: Protection from Evil vs. Eye of Death

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Originally Posted by Dalin View Post
Sadly, I have to wait at least another week to find out how my players handle the Eye.
Please let us know what happens. To me, Eyes of Death seem to be among several monsters that you pull out to humble (kill) over-confident, egotistical players. Then again, I haven't had a chance to experience the Eyes, so I'm curious how it goes.

I also appreciate how you seem to adjust your adventure to the players' plan. My teenage nephew ran some of us Uncles and Aunts through a D&D 5e adventure over Thanksgiving, and he needs more experience with measured responses.

There's a lot of GM advice out there regarding "railroading." I used to think it mainly applied to adventure design, but I've experienced it even more as "tactical railroading" where battles devolve to the same contrived, intentional slugfest (granted this experience is most reflective of D&D).
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Old 11-30-2018, 07:33 PM   #16
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Default Re: Protection from Evil vs. Eye of Death

For game purposes, is a toxic attack a metabolic hazard, and can players buy limited immunity to it as they might against poison?
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Old 11-30-2018, 08:25 PM   #17
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Default Re: Protection from Evil vs. Eye of Death

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For game purposes, is a toxic attack a metabolic hazard, and can players buy limited immunity to it as they might against poison?
Good question. That's probably something that is going to fall through the cracks at the DFRPG level.

In any event, it's appearing that the Eye of Death is intentionally supposed to be irresistibly oppressive. ;-)
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Old 11-30-2018, 08:37 PM   #18
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Default Re: Protection from Evil vs. Eye of Death

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For game purposes, is a toxic attack a metabolic hazard, and can players buy limited immunity to it as they might against poison?
As far as I can tell, yes maybe.

In GURPS and DF, I'd say yes, with the caveat of "With GM Permission".

With DFRPG... again yes. In a game I ran, I'd allow it only after being affected by (and surviving) an Eye* and it would be Resistant to Elder Thing.

My reasoning, it's not really what we'd call a "metabolic hazard" so much as "weird stuff happens and your body starts dying". More that whatever the Elder Thing is doing merely resembles a Metabolic Hazard (and thus is modeled like one) rather than being one.

So monsters (or PCs) that are Immune to Metabolic Hazards† are still fully susceptible to Eyes of Death, while immune to a Wizard's Smoke cloud.



* Or another Elder Thing that did some sort of Resistible damage. In the Monster book that would only be a Demon from Between the Stars.
† Of which I've just discovered there are none (in RAW). Huh.
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Old 12-01-2018, 04:29 PM   #19
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Default Re: Protection from Evil vs. Eye of Death

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Originally Posted by Tom H. View Post
Please let us know what happens. To me, Eyes of Death seem to be among several monsters that you pull out to humble (kill) over-confident, egotistical players. Then again, I haven't had a chance to experience the Eyes, so I'm curious how it goes.
I'll definitely report back. I have no idea how it will play out. I think the 1d damage per turn thing will scare the players big time (as it should). A lucky group could ignore the encounter if they find the secret door to the next chamber and just slam it behind them. They would take a few dice of damage and get away. But investing resources into searching the room rather than fighting the killer eyeball would be quite a gamble, and it would leave a deadly foe behind them.

For those that know Mirror of the Fire Demon, this is a reskinned ending to that adventure. The mirror is actually being controlled by some sort of elder thing god that has absorbed Shardak (the titular demon). The Eye will be in room 13 (the "outer chamber") of the hidden fortress. It will rise out of the pit. The ceiling is much higher now, rising into darkness and giving it plenty of dodging and maneuvering room.

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I also appreciate how you seem to adjust your adventure to the players' plan.
Thank you. The adventure is always amorphous. It started out completely as published. At this point, it barely resembles Riggsby's brilliant original, due to many unexpected moves by the PCs. Each time I react and adjust things, the adventure moves further into new territory. I love this aspect of gaming. With each change, it also becomes more authentic to this particular group of players (including me).

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My teenage nephew ran some of us Uncles and Aunts through a D&D 5e adventure over Thanksgiving, and he needs more experience with measured responses.
Yup. I see that sort of thing in my weekly DFRPG activity at school. GM skill needs boosting with earned CPs.

Quote:
There's a lot of GM advice out there regarding "railroading." I used to think it mainly applied to adventure design, but I've experienced it even more as "tactical railroading" where battles devolve to the same contrived, intentional slugfest (granted this experience is most reflective of D&D).
I'd be interested to hear more about your thoughts on this. Material for a new thread?
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Old 12-01-2018, 05:11 PM   #20
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Default Re: Protection from Evil vs. Eye of Death

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For game purposes, is a toxic attack a metabolic hazard, and can players buy limited immunity to it as they might against poison?
Toxic attacks cannot normally affect machines, implying immunity to metabolic hazards will help, and presumably some lesser type will as well. The exact type of immunity required, however, depends on the attack.

I would probably change Protection from Evil from 'magic resistance' to 'resistance rolls'. That's in some ways less effective (magic resistance affects some spells that cannot be resisted, and affects resisted spells twice), but eliminates source issues, so on balance it's probably even.
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