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Old 12-02-2018, 04:24 PM   #21
Neveron
 
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Default Re: Protection from Evil vs. Eye of Death

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Originally Posted by Tom H. View Post
Oh cool, I was looking for just such a "cosmic" reference, but didn't think to go back to the DF line source.

It started to dawn on me that the truly evil label on the Eye of Death may be a bit irrelevant with its special features.

Would that label even be able to come into play at all? I haven't researched all the ways.

Turning seems to require undeath in addition to evil.

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.
A list of Stuff That Cares about True Evil:

Adventurers
The Cleric's Detect Evil lets them find evil even if it's hidden, and know roughly how strong it is and (if you're lucky) specific details.
The Cleric's Turning works on truly evil undead and keeps them away from you.
The Holy Warrior's Resist Evil gives bonuses to resist rolls against the innate supernatural abilities of truly evil critters. This probably works against Eyes of Death.
Code of Honor (Chivalry) requires you to defend civilization against evil.

Exploits
Monster reaction rolls get an extra -5 if the monster is truly evil and the delver is good (example given is demon vs. holy warrior).
Taunting evil monsters uses Religious Ritual.

Spells
Sense Evil detects beings and items imbued with true evil.
Protection from Evil gives DR and MR against creatures of pure evil.

There's also Intolerance (Evil religions) and Code of Honor (Gentleman's), but the groups those cover generally aren't the Truly Evil ones. Generally. I could see a Lich Evil High Priest, admittedly.
Note also that Honesty does not apply to the "'laws' of Evil".

There's not a lot of mechanical interactions, but there's a few.

I think the only ones here that apply to the Eyes of Death would be reaction rolls, taunting with Religious Ritual, and Resist Evil.
If they're hiding Sense Evil and Detect Evil can find them, and if they're a danger to civilization Code of Honor (Chivalry) somewhat forces you to engage.
Turning does not apply (they aren't undead), and neither does Protection from Evil (it's an innate monster ability). Intolerance and Code of Honor (Gentleman's) seem exceedingly unlikely to matter.
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Old 12-02-2018, 09:28 PM   #22
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Default Re: Protection from Evil vs. Eye of Death

Nice index Neveron.
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Old 01-11-2019, 04:04 PM   #23
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Default Re: Protection from Evil vs. Eye of Death

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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...
Six weeks and three sessions later, my group finally (after literally slogging through every intended-to-be-avoided encounter) made it to the grand finale of the adventure, duking it out with a Floating Eye. I did allow the cleric's PoE spell to provide some benefit vs. the Death Gaze, but plenty of HP were sucked away, regardless. The room with the Eye was a nightmare for the PCs, being massive and high-ceilinged. The Eye could stay high up in the darkness and the PCs didn't have enough magical resources left to get enough people airborn to corner it. They realized that luring it back into the dungeon passages would provide a tactically superior situation.

The cleric (who speaks Elder for complicated reasons) rolled a brilliant success on a taunt roll, so I ruled that the eye would, indeed, follow them. It wasn't foolish enough to close into melee range, and tried to keep 20 yards back. The PC thief and Bard concocted a mad idea to attach a rope to a door, cast Glue on the surface of the door, and then pull the door shut as the Eye passed through. They knew it was unlikely to succeed, but it seemed worth a shot. I thought it was pretty clever, and allowed the rule of cool to guide my thinking.

The Bard cast the spell; the thief took wait maneuvers until the Eye popped through and yanked the door shut. Maybe I should have treated this as an attack, giving the Eye an opportunity for an acrobatic dodge, but instead I rolled IQ on the Eye to see if it understood the trick (it failed... which seemed plausible), so I made it a straight contest of DX at a penalty for the Thief due to the distance. The Gods were smiling upon the Thief, who won by a wide margin, and the Eye failed its ST check to resist the Glue. Great cheers of delight erupted around the table as the formerly terrifying Eye was immobilized. The Scout began firing arrows. Two shots (and two Death Gazes) later, and the Eye missed its first death check, imploding in a frighteningly spooky fashion.

It was an immensely satisfying finish.
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Old 01-11-2019, 05:16 PM   #24
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Default Re: Protection from Evil vs. Eye of Death

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The PC thief and Bard concocted a mad idea to attach a rope to a door, cast Glue on the surface of the door, and then pull the door shut as the Eye passed through.
That was a brilliant plan, even if it just trapped the Eye in the room with them. But it's even better that it succeeded spectacularly!
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Old 01-11-2019, 07:17 PM   #25
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Default Re: Protection from Evil vs. Eye of Death

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That was a brilliant plan, even if it just trapped the Eye in the room with them.
My exact words when they caught it were, “You’ve successfully affixed the orb of horrible death to the door you need to pass through.”
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Old 01-11-2019, 08:43 PM   #26
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Default Re: Protection from Evil vs. Eye of Death

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My exact words when they caught it were, “You’ve successfully affixed the orb of horrible death to the door you need to pass through.”
Colonel John 'Hannibal' Smith - "I love it when a plan comes together."
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Old 01-12-2019, 02:06 PM   #27
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Default Re: Protection from Evil vs. Eye of Death

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. . . duking it out with a Floating Eye.
Thanks for sharing the outcome.

The creative, inspired moments are really what make RPG gaming. Even better when they succeed. (It's even better that you adjudicated the tactic rather than just letting the rule of cool force automatic success.)

How terrible was the Eye, i.e., did any PCs get close to death?

I wonder if such an Eye of Death stuck with glue would have its gaze attacks restricted or impaired?
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Old 01-12-2019, 02:46 PM   #28
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Default Re: Protection from Evil vs. Eye of Death

The description of the Eye of Death and the Sphere of Madness always remind me of a fun old Apple II game from the early '80s named Conan: Hall of Volta.

YouTube play of Conan: Hall of Volta.
The most compelling depiction of the Eye starts at 13:56.

It doesn't seem so threatening because the player of this example has figured out the pattern to stay safe.

The graphics, primitive by today's standards, I think the movement of the Eye captures these descriptions from Dungeon Fantasy.

Eye of Death:
Quote:
They fly by some sort of levitation, steady and whisper-silent.
Sphere of Madness:
Quote:
The sphere moves via creepy, gliding levitation, dropping from above to engulf its victim's head . . .
I assume that the Eyes and the Spheres were created by Peter Dell'Orto or Sean Punch credited with Dungeon Fantasy: Monsters 1. I often wonder if they played and were inspired by this Conan video game.
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Old 01-13-2019, 05:35 AM   #29
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Default Re: Protection from Evil vs. Eye of Death

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How terrible was the Eye, i.e., did any PCs get close to death?
In this case, it wasn't all that close for the PCs. Once they understood that it would do basically automatic damage every turn, they kept out of sight and alternated characters running into its range. They were definitely freaked out though, so tension was high. The prior three sessions were 100% combat slogs, so I was happy to let this be more of a puzzle than a straight-up fight.

Quote:
I wonder if such an Eye of Death stuck with glue would have its gaze attacks restricted or impaired?
Yeah, I thought about this. In this case its was a door at the end of a two-yard wide passage, so I figured it could easily focus on anybody in its 20 yard range. If it had been glued to the wall of a large room, then I'm not sure what I would have done. I may have reduced the HT penalty for people on the periphery, under the logic that the Eye couldn't focus its gaze properly on them (kinds like a splash hit). And it clearly couldn't target anyone directly to the sides or behind it (like, say, if it were glued to a pillar in an otherwise open room).

Now I want to create a lair of an even viler monstrosity who keeps Eyes of Death mounted on its walls and pillars. Or have Eyes of Death behind the giant mural in a haunted house ("I swear those eyes are following me... and I'm dying!").
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Old 01-13-2019, 09:03 AM   #30
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Default Re: Protection from Evil vs. Eye of Death

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Originally Posted by Tom H. View Post
The description of the Eye of Death and the Sphere of Madness always remind me of a fun old Apple II game from the early '80s named Conan: Hall of Volta.

YouTube play of Conan: Hall of Volta.
The most compelling depiction of the Eye starts at 13:56.
I'm shocked that I've never seen this game before. It looks like exactly the sort of game we loved playing back in the day. I may try to find an emulator version to play through it.

I have always assumed that the two Eyes in DF were attempts to recreate D&D's Beholder without making them an obvious photocopy.
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