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A Sword Without a Hilt: A Song of Ice and Fire/D&D 3.5 Crossover

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Goldfish said:
Eh, there are different degrees of "disturbed". I'm sitting here, drinking my morning coffee, scrolling through Werebear pics, then *BHAM* Scottish Werebear book, complete with ripped muscley guy on the cover. It's just strange for some reason. I know that Vampires got the trashy romance novel treatment (there's a lady at work who is really into that sub-genre...), and I think I recall hearing that Werewolves got a similar treatment, but Werebears? That's just weird.

The ways of the spiderfish abomination are strange and nonsensical, and not meant for the minds of mortals or even Devils to understand! :oops:
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~Link of Cover and Excerpt for the Canadian Governor General's Literary Award Winner of 1976 that will get me infractioned~
 
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Interlude CDXXXVI: Spinning Dark Webs
  • Threadmarks
    • Spinning Dark Webs​

    Twenty-Ninth Day of the Eighth Month 293 AC

    Tuin pondered long and hard whether or not to reveal the deeper secrets of his magic to the devil-kin enchantress. Few had there been even in long dead Venthar who had known he could weave spells as a spider spins its webs and for good reason. He had gained the lore from deciphering the grimoire of a priestess of Lolth who he had slain on the orders of Autarch Falseer some twenty years before the city's final revolt, a delicious blasphemy that only grew sweeter the more he savored it. Those still loyal to the Spider Bitch would have hunted him to the ends of the earth to punish the deed and Falseer's fellows among the Cabal of the Even Hand would have killed him for fear that the magic was somehow tainted by the will of Lolth, even though it had no more to do with the worship of Lolth than using daggers and whips did.

    In the end he could not dispute Morwyn's arguments, they would need every edge they could find to overcome the next challenge. The fire-priestess was mighty in lore, high in the favor of her god, and, Tuin suspected, much older than she appeared to be by the measure of the short-lived beast-folk. Though it was only a duel for sport there was a great deal to be said for winning here not only to prove to the jabbering fools that their god's champion could not stand against the might of the Drow, but to rise high in the eyes of the dragon who must resent their worship of anything besides him quite deeply beneath his smiling mask.

    It did not hurt that Siduri had been quite impressed with the eldritch tapestry he could work as well as the fact that he managed to hide it from her. She had placed her own grimoire in front of him and bid him study one of her own spells with no expectation of payment beyond the advantage it would gain them both...

    ***​

    So it was they stood upon the sands four against two, though it might as well have been one given the power one could almost see shimmer around the priestess, a flame waiting to burst into dreadful life, its shadow waiting to devour those foolish enough to stand against her. It was almost homelike. The mage felt a smile creep upon his face.

    "Thou would be mightier by far were thou to truly open yourself to the fire within," she said to Siduri, a spell of tongues upon her lips. None of those who stood before her were fooled. This was not a woman to do anything idly.

    "Given where it was lit, holy one, restraint seems wise to me," the devil-kin replied softly, though holding the other woman's gaze unflinchingly.

    "Many dark powers deceive themselves into believing that they can master the flame, but it can only truly have one master and it will betray them to Him in the end," came the reply.

    "You speak of your god as a weaver of treachery?" Tuin asked curiously.

    "He has many faces for many folk, and unless my eyes have grown blind and my ears deaf I do not think any of you here would have cared much were I to speak of compassion."

    Morwyn started laughing, the word translated so close to the Drow term for 'idiocy' that the distinction was one of inflection not distinct sound, but Tuin realized he was laughing with the priestess not at her. 'Careful little bother,' he signed with his left hand. 'Do not step into her webs.'

    The younger Drow's fingers twitched in annoyance, but before he could reply the horns called and battle was upon them.

    The Red Woman moved with the swiftness of leaping flame, faster than Tuin could ever hope to match, but for the spell he had just studied. Time turned to his will for the merest instant, more fleeting by far than the working he had studied, but enough just the same. Enough to draw the threads of his tapestry to him. Four threads burned at once into being, four enchantments entwined as one: the swiftness of the serpent, the thunder lizard's strength upon a giant's shoulders added, and over it all a twist in space so that the flame-blooded warrior and Morwyn were both but one step from her, while the two mages were thrown back away from danger.

    Gasping as he paid the price of stolen time Tuin watched with glee as the adamantine hammer fell in a dreadful bone crushing blow, as Morwyn's dagger reaped a spell from the sorceress' mind, and then the weapons rose to strike again.

    The shadows twisted and she was elsewhere, looking upon the pair of bewildered foes with knowing eyes of flame and it was flame she called down, from the halls of her god, bright and terrible as the heart of the hateful sun above. Though Morwyn managed to throw himself aside to avoid the worst of the blow he was still sorely wounded, burns covering armor and flesh alike, but pain was no barrier for one who had endured millennia of cursed agony. Even as Yrten struggled to put out the flames eating at even his gleaming skin the assassin charged, a blade of moonlight forming in his hands, the bane of many a mage.

    Yet before he could reach the red-clad sorceress, this Melisandre of Asshai, the other priest, the warrior charged into his side, his burning sword help high and the words of his god upon his tongue. Alas for him that Drow were daunted by neither prayer nor dragonsteel, and so the assassin slipped aside and the blow cleaved naught but air and sand. As he charged above him shone Siduri's spell, a bolt of emerald light to shackle their true foe in place. The light caught, held steady for a moment... and then the shadows swallowed it.

    From shadow to shadow flickered their foe and shadows did she raise to bind Siduri in turn, empowering her own protections. Morwyn's luminous blade struck true, though doing less harm than one might have hoped. Free at last from the tangle of time Tuin tried to use his own magic to steal the priestess' wits knowing she would not have the time to counter it with shadows, yet just as Siduri's spell had done it too found no purchase.

    The warrior priest must have taken heart in seeing her undaunted for his next flurry of blows felled Yrten in a furious duel that left him hobbling with one broken knee.

    Just us now... it's always just us, Tuin thought. Then almost as quickly: Thank fate and fortune this is only sport.

    As he had feared would happen her next spell sent Morwyn reeling, his life sapped at her touch, leaving Tuin standing alone against a priestess to match the very Handmaidens of Lolth.

    All who had ever had the misfortune to encounter the breed could say that Drow were merciless as they were proud, but the Venthareen were one other thing besides, practical when all the cards had been played. "I yield," Tuin said, nodding in grudging admiration.

    OOC: Tuin's tapestry gave Melisandre quite a fright, she thought he had some ability that let him cast four spells every turn. For anyone wondering why Morwyn switched out his poisoned dagger, it's because he realized she is immune to poison.
     
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    • Darn, I thought Team Siduri might have had a chance. Oh well, still a great fight. Drow POV is fun.

    Would Freedom of Movement have prevented Prison of Night from trapping Siduri, @DragonParadox?
     
    Goldfish said:
    Darn, I thought Team Siduri might have had a chance. Oh well, still a great fight. Drow POV is fun.

    Would Freedom of Movement have prevented Prison of Night from trapping Siduri, @DragonParadox?
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    *Checks source book*

    There does not seem to be any standard ruling on that, so I guess it's up to me.

    What do you guys think would freedom of movement stop something like Amber Sarcophagus? It's a roughly equivalent effect.
     
    You really manage to sell Melisandre's presence, magic and charisma alike, each time she appears.

    And each time it hurts to see one who could be a god in time merely serve one.
     
    DragonParadox said:
    *Checks source book*

    There does not seem to be any standard ruling on that, so I guess it's up to me.

    What do you guys think would freedom of movement stop something like Amber Sarcophagus? It's a roughly equivalent effect.
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    Your treading on unstable ground here.

    Raw says yes, but then does freedoms of movement let you walk out of resilient sphere?

    Edit: I remeber a particularly interesting discussion concerning freedom of movement and wall of force.
     
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    DragonParadox said:
    *Checks source book*

    There does not seem to be any standard ruling on that, so I guess it's up to me.

    What do you guys think would freedom of movement stop something like Amber Sarcophagus? It's a roughly equivalent effect.
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    I wouldn't let FoM block Amber Sarcophagus, because it's a physical effect which doesn't even allow a saving throw if it hits and overcomes SR, but Prison of Night seems roughly equivalent in effect to Chains of Light, which FoM would block.
     
    Goldfish said:
    I wouldn't let FoM block Amber Sarcophagus, because it's a physical effect which doesn't even allow a saving throw if it hits and overcomes SR, but Prison of Night seems roughly equivalent in effect to Chains of Light, which FoM would block.
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    Also a fair point but then would we rule the force sphere that has held so many high level casters as as 'physical'? that does not seem to work too well.
     
    He can cast as a Move action? That's all lesser celebrity grants.

    @edit: War Weaver is more bullshit than I thought.
     
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    DragonParadox said:
    A very good point. I'm going to go with no on that, I was inclined that way in any case just because Freedom of Movement is relatively low level and would be countering so many high level save-or-lose abilities.
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    Chiming in with the people who say it shouldn't block Amber Sarcophagus. This isn't an exact comparison, but it's along the lines of saying PfE should no-sell Dominate Monster. There's just too big a difference in power.
     
    DragonParadox said:
    Autarch Falseer
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    That title and name sounds extremly Eldar.
    I want to learn more about that Drow society now, if there's more in common between the anti-Loth Drow and the 40k Eldar.
    DragonParadox said:
    but to rise high in the eyes of the dragon who must resent their worship of anything besides him quite deeply beneath his smiling mask.
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    Good man, give him a raise.
    DragonParadox said:
    Morwyn started laughing, the word translated so close to the drow term for 'idiocy' that the distinction was one of inflection not distinct sound, but Tuin realized he was laughing with the priestess not at her. 'Careful little bother,' he signed with his left hand. 'Do not step into her webs.'
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    Manipulating Drow on their first meeting, Mel continues to be unsettling.
    DragonParadox said:
    The warrior priest must have taken heart in seeing her undaunted for his next flurry of blows felled Yren in a furious duel that left him hobbling with one broken knee.
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    And a success for Thoros, nice after his bad showing in the last fight.
     
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